 Hey guys, welcome to the dream lounge podcast Today I'm gonna be answering a question from a reader. I was actually sent in a while ago And it just kind of got lost in the bottom of my inbox, but it's good. It's good email. It's well-written respectful nothing like the recent Barbell squat post comments you've seen on the blog which are just raging fucking pissed irrational emotional messes So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna go through the email the message this guy sent me I'm gonna quote it or read through it and then just kind of respond line by line And hopefully you guys get some value out of it Begin quote. Hey, Anthony. This is from a guy named Mark. Hey, Anthony. Hope you're doing well I'm having an amazing time with the videos and following your blog Thanks for all your hard work and providing such awesome content. The value on your sites really is second to none. Thanks, man I just wanted to ask a quick question or two regarding your exercise philosophy I've watched the videos with Doug McGuff and Drew Baye and Understand how the high-intensity approach works and the results you will get with that type of training. I'm just curious as to your quote values unquote in regards to exercise I Have a background in athletics and more recently CrossFit and was wondering if with you following the hit type of training You have no interesting competitive sport and therefore doing something with more of a focus on conditioning It's part of your reasoning that you rank overall health longevity more than far more than athletic performance Have you been badly injured in the past or do you still have an interest in sport and I'm understanding the effects Under estimating excuse me the effects of this style of training There's more to the message, but I'm gonna pause here and just kind of kind of ad lib. I do rank personally My you know global or comprehensive health and you know lifelong longevity longevity and lifelong quality of life so to speak More than yeah athletic performance and competition and things like that. I Do that on a personal level? Definitely so even it and I think this will make sense more sense as each moment comes by So they do that on a personal level You know very explicitly. I think it's from my life and the scope of my life in the context of my life Yeah, my health is always gonna be more important than athletic performance and sports And that would be true even if I had a greater that would remain true. I guess Even if I had a greater interesting competitive sports Even if I was into something that was a team sport or personal individual sport like boxing or something Yeah, my health is super super important It is a huge foundation. I think I accurately recognize it in my life as a huge foundation for anything and everything I'm ever gonna do for the entire You know capacity of my happiness. It's dependent on my physical health and it you know staying high now and For the remainder of my life how long that is and yeah, of course you mentioned longevity I want to live you know as long as I can and great health Kind of like Doug McGuff and maybe Drew Bay have spoke about I want to have a very high-level physiological head room throughout my life And then when I die just drops off a cliff because I die doing something awesome or you know Who knows what maybe an accident even I don't want to die just in a long drawn out Non-exciting way so yeah, I want to be a hundred skydiving and just something goes wrong or some shit That'd be great. I think that's the way to go Or some variation of that Now what I should also mention though is that I I think it's accurate To say that your health and your longevity At least it's very hard to get to get to get out of this Argument is that they are more important on an objective level so independent of your what your personal values are Then athletic performance So I don't think it's At least I think you're on the thin ice anyway to say that you know competing in a sport is more valuable than your life Or than your physical health. I don't know if that's ever gonna be true. That's almost like I Think I think not even almost like I think it is If you put competing in a sport above your physical health Truly it like on purpose Or even subconsciously It's it's a variation of self-sacrifice your sacrificing yourself or something that It's just it's not rational like why would what's the point of competing in a sport to to the Meaningful and significant detriment of your health I Mean meaningful might not even be the right word there, but you know significant It's like say a boxer who knows he's gonna fucking he's ready to go blind His doctors like you need to stop boxing ready to what Rocky five or something or you're on the brink of like, you know Permanent brain trauma. Yeah, you should stop you should you should not continue. It's not You're placing something that's in the scope of your life It's under the umbrella of your life above your life So sports are a part of your life your life is not a part of sports I don't think that's a healthy way to live life no matter how much you care about sports That's I think what I'm trying to say and that that's what I meant You know, I said a minute ago between like a personal valuation of sports and athletics Versus like a really objective look on on human life So I hope that makes sense You know, it's not just like saying the comments and I'll try to expand on that You also asked in your in your questionnaire. Have you ever been badly injured in the past? Yeah, I have In fact, I really see a surgery about seven and a half almost eight months ago now. Yeah, almost eight months It wasn't from a recent injury. It was from I dislocated my kneecap five times in high school Never had any problems before that. I love playing sports as a kid. I love football as I'm giving this podcast I'm actually wearing my high school football shirt. It's like in fucking rags and it's falling apart, but I love it So, yeah, I used to love sports. I did get injured eventually, you know before that I was always stunned when people get hurt. I'd be like, man, the fuck I never get hurt And I you know, I get bruises and I would get all banged up and I would never get Any sort of meaningful injury or you know, chronic injury or long-term injury At least that I knew of But yeah, I got hurt and then that just repeated itself Until I couldn't even play anymore the doctor just forbid it after my and my coaches weren't gonna go against that Then my kneecap just kept dislocating when I played even when there wouldn't even be necessary a lot of force to do it And that was actually due to the MPFL your medial patello for more ligament mine Every time you just look at your kneecap it gets injured a little bit and it gets looser and looser And that's what the surgery. I just recently had fixed it tightened it down really really tight Among other things that that caused problems in the knee But you know a good taking step back that Yeah, that obviously affects my personal Judgment in the scope of my own life as far as athletics goes go Because yeah, I'm at risk of both my knees aren't very healthy, especially one that says surgery on it It's it's not it's not a good idea for me to play sports To do things that are gonna put, you know, my knees at risk of acute injury and of any kind of chronic wear and tear So I'm young I'm 24, but I definitely have I'm not in a personal position to play sports. Unfortunately, I think I would I would consider it if that wasn't the case You know doing things for fun it would not but yeah, I've been injured and I'm not in a position to To go play sports. Oh Yeah, I also wanted to mention though that I try not to let that affect though my outward view or my existential view I guess you'd say of You know the the the appropriate role of potential role of sports and man's life As a recreational activity as a competitive activity as a career even for the short term maybe So yeah, I'm aware of that I don't want to let that affect, you know the kind of information I put out in the world. I want to make sure that that remains personal if That answers what you're getting at You also asked do you still have an interest in sports and Am I underestimating the effects of the style of training? I think you are just by the nature of your question You're underestimating the value of high intensity training or as James Steel would say high effort training Which is a little bit less less catchy the way to the really thing about this is that hit or You know very intense Very brief infrequent strength training properly performed congruent. It's a lot of Descriptors there we have to add on to it Yeah, I think I'm estimating the effects of it and what it can do and how it can How it how it can in such a huge way support, you know, your entire athletic all of your end up athletic endeavors Muscle is Muscular hypertrophy muscle, you know new muscle added muscle Or larger muscles actually Yeah, they're gonna benefit everything you do forever that has any meaningful degree of physical Effort in it and yes, I mean obviously sports is huge here or any kind of athletic endeavor So yeah, you're underestimating it. I'm gonna continue on Reading what you have to say here and then answer what else is in here Begin quote. I know you're not a big CF fans. I mean it's CrossFit a lot of stuff Wylist I agree that a lot of the programming is way too much free average Joe I think if programmed correctly ie less volume There are incredible benefits to be had especially when geared towards playing sports There's more to be to read here, but I'm gonna stop You know scott hanniers today a video came out from paleo effects where he was one of the guest speakers at and at the end of it, you know, he said something that I guess was a little bit abrasive, but You know, it was worth saying and it's worth repeating and it's that hurting yourself in the pursuit of health is stupid This is something I've said. I think verbatim my on my own And I was glad to see scholars say it because it's so fucking true, man It's it's a total. It's a plea of insanity. I almost want to say it's it's a total contradiction of terms of Efforts and of goals Yeah, there's benefits to CrossFit, but they're always you're always in the net negative doing CrossFit or peon yaks or anything like that Because you're gonna get hurt the the injury rate and with CrossFit just just cross by itself is enormous They have an entire section on just the main form and they have like 6,000 or 7,000 affiliated CrossFit gyms I'm sure many of them hundreds of them at least but their own forms so yeah, there's this like Huge sections of their forms and that's only what's getting reported of injuries so the injury rate for CrossFit is enormous and acute physical injuries Independent of the cumulative of cumulative or accumulating damage and injuries. I Mean that that completely outweighs instantly The health benefits or any benefits you're gonna get from it if you're treating CrossFit as exercise Which I think a hundred percent of CrossFit enthusiasts do no one does CrossFit Exclusively with nothing else in the picture. They don't do CrossFit for fun or for recreation or leisure That'll be pretty pretty struck far stretch of the imagination. It's pretty intense stuff So yeah, the the benefits it doesn't matter because there's injury there's always looming injury in the CrossFit Enthusiasts future. I said that right So yeah, the benefits it just doesn't matter man. You're always gonna get hurt in any any looming injury physical injury in An exercise program is completely inappropriate. It makes it It's not even appropriate any further to call it an exercise program at that point which they claim they claim I want to say it's verbatim That CrossFit is a comprehensive fitness program or something to that effect and it's not it never is because it Always hurts you they have the evidence is sitting on their own website It's like tens of thousands of people getting injured and that's just what's getting reported Just on one website the main website be it But yeah, it's just nuts man the benefits. No, they don't matter. They're always that way as far as we're talking about exercise It's completely inappropriate Continuing on begin quote With that said, what do you think of the idea of following a more sport-based bias? You said bias, but I think you might have meant based training program EG a modified CrossFit program that doesn't have the volume of their main site workouts much like the training Rob Wolfen dorses For an individual in his early 20s follow To follow until his 30s at which point he will temporary training and adopt the body by science type of program Prioritizing things like joint health injury prevention and longevity There's more to be rode here, but let's just stop. What do you think of the defaulting more sport? Yeah, I don't It you know, you said for an individual in his early 20s, I'm in my early 20s still almost I guess my mid-20s now shit getting old 24 fuck Yeah, you have to think You know my girlfriend Many months ago like a year ago and I've got time flies She made a comment to me when I was talking about long-term thinking and she was like Anthony You do not think long-term you think in nothing but in terms of like lifelong thinking it's just everything for me is like lifetime and I realized in part that might be a personal approach to life, but There probably is a lot of merit to it for everyone to Appreciate and to incorporate into how they approach things in life That yeah, you have to think long-term your life expectancy right now is like 70 something years Assuming economic collapse isn't fucking shipball Society that we live in and the life expectancy rate isn't dropped at 50 You're gonna live for a long time, especially if you're in your early 20s. You have 50 60 70 years in front of you and To not appreciate the damage you can do at a young age You know my brother yesterday He went to the orthopedic doctor surgeon To discuss problems with his feet because he was born with club feet and he had surgery on his baby And now he's having problems and he has like really bad arthritis in his left foot And I realized that's a specific case He has a birth defect that was fixed, but it wasn't fixed maybe correctly Or there were just problems looming anyway and no matter what happened when he was a baby But those kind of problems can happen anyone conjugal Asia for example of the kneecap something I suffer from in both knees and That might be partly hereditary, but it might also be in large part the activities that they're growing up Probably not so much sports, but like I did jump rope for example for a number of years And that might have been the way I was doing it Very very damaging very stressful on my knees and it might have contributed Significantly or enormously to conjure Malaysia. I had advanced grade 3 in my left knee that has surgery. There's only four grades I believe so it was pretty high So yeah, I mean dude in your 20s and this is something a lot of people in the 20s suffer from conjure Malaysia And that's just one single problem that young people can suffer from That dude it doesn't go away unless you really focus on it And maybe you get lucky in a genetic sense that you actually have the capacity to get out from under that from that problem So yeah, there are tons of things you can do even just a few years like I did a jump rope can be You know, especially if you're on a genetic track to have knee problems can really accelerate things really fast And yeah, you have to think lifelong man like if I run for five years just five years Dude That's gonna that could add up very very much To joint problems down the road whether it's your ankle knee hip so on Yeah, you have to think long term. You can't I really don't think it's appropriate to say that We're not appropriate, but It's not accurate to say that yeah, I'll just do this in my 20s and then when I hit 30 You know, I'll you know temper it back and I'll you know, shift over to a body by science program You should really be doing that the whole time. You don't know and I mean think about even just acute injuries What have you suffered an acute injury that then creates problems for the rest of your life? I mean if you're not If you're not thinking lifelong to at least some degree all the time You can be very easily sitting yourself up the problems down the road So the better approach would be to adopt a body by science program now and really take I know it might seem excessive, but like an over overzealous view of caution and of Isis caution be the way to say it for the things you're gonna do in athletics and competition and recreation You know mark system of somebody who caught what was it about two years ago? Maybe two and a half He was playing frisbee on the beach ultimate frisbee or something and he came down in his leg one of his legs Just completely wrong and really screwed up his knee It was some bad shit like he had a lot of damage from what I from what I recall and I bring that up because I mean that's a freak accident But dude, how often has that happened guys playing frisbee frisbee alone thing about the cumulative thing about You know every day of the week there are 300 something million Americans is running around this country And a lot of them are playing sports on daily basis are doing some significant level of physical activity You know, I realized that the percent chance of you getting injured on a daily basis is small But you have to realize at the same time someone somewhere is getting injured Pretty significantly pretty severely Whether it's a guy like Marxistin who's a little bit older But highly aware of how he moves. He's a former triathlete like champion and shit And yeah, just because you're young and you're what is it? Right at bushy tailed or whatever Yeah, you can get injured man. It can be bad. It can be some bad shit With me just dislocating my kneecap. That's not even that bad But it set me up because I continued playing football. I wanted to continue playing the sport I kept dislocating it making the problem worse and worse and worse And what did that what did that mean that meant, you know, eight years down the road I need to get surgery that cost like five thousand dollars So, yeah think long-term really long-term and don't say Be very cautious and saying all just do this now and then in ten years. I'll be like, I'll do something better Do what's better now and then adjust to You know what you want to do with sports and athletics things like that And you also mentioned I realized kind of rambling here, but before moving on you mentioned volume So Rob Wolf, I guess uses less volume than standard orthodox big C CrossFit. We'll call it I don't think volume is a problem. If an exercise program you're doing is fundamentally flawed Doing less of it doesn't make it not fundamentally flawed So yeah, it's not the volume. I guess if you do crossfit less frequently You're reducing your risk of injury and you're reducing the cumulative damage. You're incurring on your body But that doesn't make it, you know, correct to do especially as a fitness program But maybe even also it was like a recreational program. Maybe there are more fun things to do that are less risky less damaging Moving on you said as they say everything's a trade-off. I Don't know if I grew that statement. I realized how you know popular that is everything's a trade-off, but You know, that doesn't mean there are contradictions in reality. That doesn't mean that you can't have You know a really high level of fitness and excel in your sport and In the context of your fitness program and your exercise program you know have a Flatline level of risk of injury and that that's what it is essentially when you make a congruent when you listen to what? Build a Simone as to say and other people as well And you you really taken to you appreciate How risky strength training can any any physical activity can be but especially something with a lot of weight a lot of resistance You know you can strength rank hit high intensity training or higher for training Is a way to achieve a high level of fitness? It's the best way. I obviously I think I'm highly endorse it It's a way to achieve that to achieve muscle hypertrophy without with a risk of injury That's so low as I like to say that your risk of you know The risk of injury walking into the gym is greater than actually doing the exercises That's how low it needs to be and no, it's not a trade-off. You're not trading Believe me if you've ever done a workout with someone like Drew Bay or build a Simone or anyone like that the workouts are like They definitely have the capacity to be you know, they'll put you on the floor You'll leave and you just like I've passed out on the floor one time with a trainer in Austin Keith Norris, even though he's not orthodox hit Very closely with Drew Bay once to him So yeah, they're very intense. They have all the benefits and the the cons the negatives are As close to zeroes are ever going to get that's what you have to find that is the best of both and It is possible. You don't have to say that you know CrossFit people love saying like oh getting injuries is part of the game It's not part of the fucking game. I mean, this is a problem. It means you need to fix what you're doing It means there's something really wrong so when people say everything's a trade-off I Appreciate a proper this statement is but generally I don't agree with that statement At least not in something like exercise that has very immediate physical consequences and then invisible consequences long term That can accumulate without you knowing it and then one day as Bill Desmond says you bend down to tie your shoes and ah Through my back out. Oh, no, what the hell the fuck freak accident. It wasn't a freak accident It's because even a barbell is squatting for 20 years. Oh through my back out. Who would have fucking knew man? So moving on Begin quote and just wanting to get your thoughts as to whether this type of training for 10 years could do a Lot of damage that I'll get later in life. I think I've answered that I think it definitely has a capacity to do that. Maybe you'll be lucky But I wouldn't depend on luck. I would depend on you and your thoughts and your efforts and your actions and your decisions Continuing on I'm sorry if you've mentioned this elsewhere, and I've missed it. Nope, probably not But hope you get an answer on it as you're certainly someone whose opinion I highly value and I consider rule You a role model and all things self-improvement. Thanks, man Thanks for everything. Keep up the awesome work mark Cool, so I think I've answered everything in pretty good detail. Maybe even too much detail But yeah, that's today's podcast mark or anyone else if you have questions You can post them on the dream lounge net on the blog or you can post them on YouTube video Probably respond to the ones on my blog more consistently the ones on YouTube But I'll keep an eye for both for at least a few weeks after this goes up. Thanks guys. Catch you later