 why I would make the case that I think this is the best exercise for your shoulders is not because I think it necessarily will build the most muscle on your shoulders. But if you get really good at the Z press, the transfer from that over to a standing overheld, it unlocks new gains from traditional exercises. Yes. What's up everybody? Here's the giveaway for today's episode maps power lift. Okay. You can get it for free. Here's what you got to do though. You got to leave a comment in the first 24 hours that we drop this episode, subscribe to this channel and then click on notifications, do all those things. And then if we like your comment and we pick your comment is the best comment of all the comments, we will give you free access to maps power lift. Also, we got a sale going on this month. We have two things on sale to programs on sale or to be more specific, a bundle and a program on sale. The bundle is Matt is the starter bundle. It includes maps, anabolic maps prime and the intuitive nutrition guy. Okay. So that entire bundle is 50% off. And then the program that's 50% off is maps split. This is a high volume bodybuilder style workout program. It's a body part split routine. That program is 50% off. So both half off, if you're interested, go to maps, fitnessproducts.com and then use the code may special for that 50% off discount. All right. Here comes the show. One of the best exercises for full round delts is the Z press. And most of you never do that exercise. It's one of the best exercises. I like you sharing that one. Yeah, I know you would. Yeah. No, it is. I mean, I would, I would go even further to say it's one of the best shoulder exercises period. I agree. Yeah. I actually agree. Just, and in, you know, it's crazy is that I, I didn't know that until not that long ago. Same. I'd never done it until we were introduced. Yeah. I wish that I had that in my, my toolbox as a trainer in my early years, it would have been a staple go to because you know what happened was as a young trainer, I, I would teach shoulder press and many times I would abandon it because my clients lacked the shoulder mobility and they would arch their back and I would always go, man, the risk, risk versus reward, uh, with this movement. Uh, so I actually, as it is an early trainer, I abandoned the overhead press. It wasn't till later did I recognize how important it was for me to make that a stable movement. And at the bare minimum work towards my client getting there. And this was all before I saw a Z press. Yeah. See, my store is similar, but different. I always did overhead presses. I always saw the value in them. But the reason why I didn't do Z, because I didn't know of a Z press. It was a very obscure exercise. Like, you know, when do you see anyone doing a Z press in the gym? Never. Um, it was obscure. I'd seen it before, heard about it. Uh, but I didn't do it because I thought, what's the difference between that and overhead press? You sit on the floor, you sit on a bench or you're standing. It's the same movement. It is not the same movement because you're sitting on the floor. The biggest difference, you notice, well, first off, you have to control the rep more than if you're standing and if you're sitting on a bench. But really what I noticed was the extension at the top. You have to get this really good full extension at the very top. And that last like quarter inch squeeze at the top of the movement pumped up my shoulders like nothing else. It takes everything for you to get that last little bit and to stay in control and so much demand on stabilizing your core and everything else, just to keep everything intact. It was like, I wish I would have known like to your point Adam earlier, like using that more as an assessment in order as like a prerequisite to then get to the standing overhead position. Uh, cause it wasn't like we've got rid of overhead pressing. We use dumbbells, we use whatever else we could, uh, you know, to make sure we still, uh, you know, provided that movement, but to get somebody on a barbell, uh, and pressing overhead, it just exposes so many imbalances. And you pointed out what I think was one of the most common, um, problems with people, you know, one, of course, the inability to get full extension and tight lats, lack of shoulder mobility, but probably one of the most common things I saw was the instability in the core and the core strength to stabilize the trunk in the overhead press, which is like the most important piece to protecting your low back. Right. And so, uh, the, and the Z press, it forces that you cannot, you'll fall over. Yeah. You cannot press the barbell over your head in a Z press without being completely stabilized there. And so why, why I would make the case that I think this is the best exercise for your shoulders is not because I think it necessarily will build the most muscle on your shoulders. But if you get really good at the Z press, the, the transfer from that over to a standing overheld, it unlocks new gains from traditional exercises. Yes. So whatever gains you're getting from the traditional shoulder exercise, you're actually missing a little bit because of your inability to stabilize a particular way. And here's the two biggest things that I noticed. I talked about the extension. Almost nobody gets that real full tall extension where the head comes through what they say the window, where your arms are right next to your ears, everything's real straight up at the top. The other part that people don't do is, is bringing the bar all the way down. People almost always stop just short is the press. You can't, if you stop here, you're going to fall back. And if you don't do a full extension, you feel like you're going to fall. So it encourages this crazy full range of motion that a traditional overhead press doesn't encourage. Yeah. It's funny you went this direction. I honestly, I saw the notes. I thought you were going to the direction of rear delt exercise. It's just because of the full round, you know, like people using neglect rear delts. But I mean, I love the Z press for so many different reasons, like functionally and also just like building a definition for your deltoids. Well, where are most people weakest at in a movement? It's at the end range, right? And so end range is both of them, right? Yeah. So here on the Z press, not only do you get like to your point where you get that full extension, you kind of have to stabilize for a minute before you let the bar come back down. It's like an isometric contraction at the top. Yes. So you get this isometric contraction and stability component at the top of the movement before you come down. Just not a lot of people are training an overhead movement like that. And because the exercises forces you to, it's this is why it's like great trainer trick because you don't have to queue it. I used to love movements that I found where it forced a client to do a queue that you wanted because you could do a dumbbell press and tell someone to get an isometric contraction at the top. But very few people do that. They'll just come right back down. It requires a lot of coaching. Yes. With the Z press, it's like the coaching in that from that point is minimal. Yes. You have to do full range of motion. You have to get that full extension and balance at the top. You have to have a controlled rep or you're not doing the Z press. So it really does encourage us. And I know all the biomechanics, you know, nerds are going to be like, it's the same motion as whatever. That's not the point. The point is that certain exercises when they're done differently. What I mean by that is it's an overhead press, just like a standing overhead press is just like a seated overhead press. They're all overhead presses. But when you sit on the floor with your legs out in front of you, well, that's why it's called a Z press. Your legs are out in front of you like that. When you're sitting that way, it encourages a type of form that really brings out the best in the overhead press. So when you do, so that's the magic of it. It's not that you're doing an overhead press necessarily. It's that because you're sitting on the floor, because you have to balance, because you have to brace your core, you have to go all the way down. You have to get that full extension and get that isometric contraction at the top. You are now doing a beautiful overhead press. You're maximizing the overhead press. Well, and what the critics will say about the the muscle building potential of it is that you can't load it as much as you could, like a standing or a seated barbell press. The tension is high as hell, though. Well, yes. But and also the case that I would make is that, you know, one of the things that helped me increase my standing overhead barbell press the most was learning how to engage my core before I initiated the movement, right? Like you just, a lot of people don't think about that. They have to be intentional. Right. They're they're in a they're in a press motion and they're thinking of getting that bar up and they're not thinking locking in. Yeah. And they're then tightening and bracing their foundation, their core first and then initiating the movement. When you learn to get really good at that, you'll watch your your overhead press increase significant. By the way, people think the obvious, which is, oh, you want to brace your core to protect your back? Yes. Also, here's the part that let people don't know. Contributes more force production. Yes. A braced core will allow you to produce more force in your upper body as you're pressing the weight. So Bruce Lee used to talk about this with martial arts where you talk about throwing a punch and you would talk about having a very strong stiff wrist and he trained his forearms like crazy. And what he said is like, imagine if I hit you with a stiff broomstick versus a broomstick where in the middle of it was like a section that was made out of sponge, like which one would cause more damage and more pain? Why? Because the force transfers through a stiff object more than something that's kind of soft and squishy in the middle. Well, when you brace your core properly with an overhead press, you lift more, you generate more force, your delts get better results in your shoulders because your core is more stable. Well, you lose so much energy from pressing from the because your feet, right? You drive from this performance. Right. You leak and the most common place that you leak in an overhead press is in that core place. It's like a noodle, right? So if you have like this weak core and like noodle like core and you have these legs that are driving the force and they work their way up and then also 50% gone. Yeah, they lose all this force production and then it transfers up. So a lot of what's just getting that press up is just the raw strength of that person's shoulders. If you can learn to really make that core rigid, you really get the max benefits of that driving force from the ground all the way up. And so yeah, the Z-Press, you may not be able to load as much as you can with a standing overhead or a seated bar bar, but if you learn to Z-Press really well, watch what happens when you go back to those other movements. I love that tip. It's a favorite movement. Totally. Stop noodling, bro. Don't do it anymore. Totally noodling on that. I'm going to I'm going to take a left term. You know, when we spend time like this, obviously we're in a different studio. If you're watching this, we're up at the where the mine pump East, I think Doug calls it. Yeah, we have a we have a place that we go to when we're doing lots and lots of work where we're going to work all day, all night type of deal and just get a lot of things done. And it's the we have an opportunity to see each other morning till night. And one thing that I noticed is we're very different in the morning, in particular with breakfast, everything really, everything very different, but breakfast and like particular everybody's breakfast is really different. So Doug has Doug has is stable. Did you do I don't know he actually didn't see today. Yes, it's two eggs, two eggs, two eggs, two eggs cup of coffee, not some toast today. Okay, that's that's different because for a second there, you were doing oatmeal with eggs inside and yeah, that's sometimes so 2020. No, Doug, haven't you watched his day in the life is two eggs is even like every single coffee is why he's healthy. It's a routine. I love it. Yeah. What about you, Adam, today? I know I did. Shut up. I can't tell you the last time I had a donut sounds all good. No, I stole somebody's oats today. I don't know who has the gluten free oats here. Well, who do you think has gluten free oats? Is it you or oh, I actually thought they were Doug's. So I stole those and then I did a scoop of protein powder. I actually haven't done that in a while. So that is not something. It's a very convenient breakfast, but it was a staple for me back when I was competing and tracking my protein and so that and I'm trying to get back into I know that I'm I'm I'm lacking my protein intake. And so, you know, being and being around you guys and us all eating together, there is a part of me that it's a good reminder of oh, I need to do this. I need to do that. So that was mine. You're just looking how jacked we are. What were you? You're normally like, you know, 12 eggs or some crazy. No, not 12 eggs. I had 10. So I'll fry. I'll do a over easy 10 eggs. And then I'll do today. I did four slices of toast with that. But other times I'll do that and I'll have a bowl of oatmeal or something like that. Yeah. So what would you do, Justin? Well, usually, I mean, these days I'm doing more whey protein, like shakes. And I didn't bring any with me. And so I had I looked in there and I was like looking through my stuff and like, I didn't see anything. I was really stoked on. Actually, there was like bacon in there. But I was like, I'm lazy, dude. I don't want to cook myself some bacon right now because you should all do like bacon coffee or like, you know, that's kind of like a thing with the super American breakfast. Very much of that picture. Bacon coffee and like a handgun. Yes, yes. God, guns and glory. Something like that. Yeah. But anyway, I I saw that there was a magic spoon, a blueberry magic spoon. I was like, OK, I can I can do it. This is the kid in us. I'm like, yes, dude, I can do some cereal and just, you know, have a good day. Well, magic spoon is not bad. I mean, you get it's got your whey protein in it. Exactly. It doesn't have sugar for the whey protein. It's grain free. Now, how much do you eat? I don't have a measurement guy. A big bowl. So you did one of the big bowl. Yeah, I did. I did almost the punch bowl size today. Do you know what's funny is that I I eat magic spoon a lot, but I could probably count on one hand how many times I've had it for breakfast. It's a. Oh, you could use it more as like a treat. Yes, I eat it at night. I do. It's like a treat. I like it for breakfast, dude. It's such a it's a it's a when I have an ice cream craving type of like I rarely have a breakfast. It's not a breakfast go to for me at all. It is almost always a nighttime post dinner, watching TV. I have the munchies. You know, jealous I get. I swear to God. So we obviously will work with magic spoon and I've tasted a few of them. They're really good. I can't have it because it's got whey protein and I can't do dairy. I'm always so jealous when I hear you guys talk about it. It's a high protein. It's like I've always wanted that in front of you ever since I was a kid. I you know, they've had products, not magic spoon, but like in general cereal products that have they claimed to be high protein right four grams. Yeah, not only are they have and for decades now, right? Like even as an early trainer, I remember buying these different the cereals that would claim to be high protein and then you flip the box around and it's still a massive carb, carb breakfast. And it's like six grams or something like that and they tasted like whack. They weren't even that good. So I mean, magic spoon to be able to give you a bowl of cereal with like 30 grams, 40 grams of protein. I mean, I remember getting a high pro I remember that I was at the grocery store a long time ago and I saw this box of cereal and said high protein contains as much protein as an egg. I'm like, oh, these sneaky, you know, advertisers because everyone's like eggs are so high. Yeah, one egg is six grams of protein. Yeah, it's one. It's only six grams of protein. So it's not a lot of protein. It's more than, you know, Cheerios. Yeah, this is kind of funny because I didn't tell you guys I have a confession, actually. Oh, so I had magic spoon send us the birthday cake and I took all of them home. Wow. You got some. Yeah, I have all of them. Have you had it yet? Yes, is it good? It's good. I like it a lot. You used our name to get such a dog. Bro, I have like I am Justin Andrews. I represent mine pump. We'd like 15 boxes. Yeah, we'd like just keep sending them. Go ahead. I wasn't going to tell you guys, but I just thought of that. I was like, oh, man, they're a dog. I'm going to try that flavor, too. I have it. You know what? I have it. It's like a limited run. I'm still I'm almost through. Oh, still remember all those boxes like 70 boxes. No way. Yes. I'm not all the way through yet. I still probably. I have like 12 forever. Yeah, I was just going to say, what a great what a great emergency years. No, no, no, what a great emergency food. Seriously. Yeah. If there's an emergency, my bomb shelter for sure lasts a long time and you got high protein. Yeah, so that's pretty actually in fact, I have protein powder in my little earthquake. You know, oh, your little kit. Yeah, because protein powder. Have you done that? Like created a little emergency kit thing. I know that's why I said that he's coming over to one of our houses. So about that guy. You got a ring at the door. We're like the paranoid, like tinfoil guys over here. You know, it's like, oh, shit. I have friends in that way. I'll be knocking on your doors if that makes you put enough away. We'll save some room for it. I got to tell you, Adam, dude, I because, you know, you went off caffeine and you were trying to, you know, you know, quote unquote detox or whatever. No, it's not what it means, but you're trying to get your body resensitize the caffeine. And I'm like, man, free of all the drugs. I'm like, I need to get I need to lower my caffeine. I was getting up to like 350 to envy you at all 350 to 400 milligrams a day, which for me is a lot. I know for some people, that's not a big deal. For me, that's a ton. And it started to lose its effect. I would have 300 grams of caffeine and I would just feel like I'm kind of normal now. So man, I got to go off, dude. And so we came up here and I'm like, this is a good time for me to do it. We're going to be here all day. Couldn't. I couldn't. I couldn't go cold turkey. I tried and I felt like a zombie. That's like any headaches or was it just fatigue? I don't get headaches. I get like sad. I do. So I keep trying to get me. I give you a hug. Yeah, I'm trying to be crying. I was like, Justin, give me a hug, please. Yeah, I get sad and tired. Like I could sleep all day long and then I had to get on other shows. I was I got interviewed and then we did the Pog. I'm like, I can't show up like this. This is so it's so weird. Like I didn't. I got the headache. Bro, caffeine is a gnarly drug. Nobody people don't respect. It's weird because it wasn't that long ago. We had a similar conversation around this and I think I actually said to you like, oh, I'm easy. I can cut it cold turkey and be fine talking mad shit like that. So fucking I swear to God, like anytime something like that have I always like karma's a bitch. Well, I told my wife, I said, I said, I'm going to that's I'm going to cut caffeine. I have a it's a good opportunity because we're going to be up at the at the place and she's like, are you sure? Why don't you kind of wean it down? I said, no, I'm going to cut it and I said it's a good opportunity because I might have the opportunity that the chance to do it, but I can't because I need it and I know people watching understand this. I'm at the point now where I needed to function and I don't have downtime right now. None. I have none will work and then I go home and Jessica still, you know, believe or not terrible, you know, first trimester symptoms, even though she's past the first trimester. So I come home and she's sick and I'm having to do everything that she can't do. So it's like, man, I can't I can't cut caffeine. If I cut caffeine, everything's going to go haywire like what do I so I'm almost thinking like I'm going to book a trip where I'd go somewhere and just your trip sucks. So I was having the same thing, right? Where it had been, I had told Katrina probably months ago that I needed to pull back on both the Kratom and the creed and the caffeine. But I just kept going, man, there's never a good time because the exact point you said, man, I need this stuff because I've now got a point where my tolerance is sick like you did. Well, well, that's what. So the reason why I did was because the flu hit me so bad. Obviously, I'm not taking anything. I already feel miserable and I'm going through the ringer and I already got like a five day head start. So I kind of was like, you know what, I've already got some of this out of my system already because I've been so fucked up for the last five days. Like now let's just see if I can finish tapering at all. Well, I was so what happened to me was that this morning I woke up and I always wake up early, right? So I'm up at like seven, which is actually late for me. But you know, we went to bed late last night, you know, working on some cool stuff. By the way, I got some cool stuff coming. So I know I'm not going to say anything else. So we're doing that I wake up at seven and I'm like so groggy, you know, I go downstairs and like I eat my, you know, my 10 eggs or whatever, do my, you know, my breakfast thing. Then I go upstairs and I'm like just trying to like muster the energy for the day or whatever. And then I make I made a mistake. I looked at the stock market. I'm already I was already stopped looking at that. I was already sad from the no caffeine. I was already feeling physically sad. Then I look at that and I'm like, wow, this is it's gone. I mean, where is it adding compares? So it's funny, you were looking at that coin base. No, I'm not watching. I'm watching the house because because because Bitcoin's getting hammered already accepted. I've lost all my money. Oh, bro. So Coinbase just came out with their earnings and they came way below expected because nobody's buying Bitcoin right now because Bitcoin's going down and Coinbase is I'll tell you guys what it's well, this is as of the recording of the show right today. This is just today now. By the way, Coinbase is down 20% today. Now at its peak. Okay. And I'm going to tell you what I bought it at. But it would peak up in the 350 range. Like that was when it was getting like crazy or whatever. Right now it's at 53 bucks. 53. What did you say? Remember Peloton peaked at 170. What was Peloton? That's another one I totally screwed up. They didn't hit like on all kinds of they bro. Peloton at one point was peaked at about 160 bucks. You know what it's at right now? Yeah, it's in 12 bucks. Oh, 12 bucks. 12 bucks. $12. I know. Do you see what happened to you? So Freddie and Fannie Mae came out with 30 year mortgage interest rates. We're an all time high since 2009. So it's up to low. I mean, yeah, compared to before 2009, but it's the highest it's been since 2009 inflation. So your time over over a decade. And I mean, and it's and they're coming out saying that it's going to continue. I mean, my prediction is 6 to 7% by the end of this year. I think that's a very conservative, safe prediction. Yeah, I don't think that's kind of I mean, they kind of said they were going to do 50 basis points, but it's happening so grow inflation grew faster than they said again. They said, OK, inflation is here. It's going to grow this fast, faster. Yeah. Every number that comes out inflation is getting. Oh, you guys want to hear something crazy. Have you guys been reading about saying others like shortages, supply chain issues or whatever? Yeah. Have you heard of the shortage that's going on right now? That's really sad. Baby formula. Oh, my buddy. He texts this baby formula to his friends or they both have newborns and they were texting each other back. Hey, how are you? How are you doing with getting the baby for it? He's like, dude, I was driving till midnight last night through town to town. Oh, that's just to find three cans. Dude, that breaks my heart right now. Yeah, just to find what are you going to do? I know they used to lock it up because people steal all the time. So 43% of baby formula is made in China, right? 43% is manufactured in China. China. I didn't know that. China is shutting stuff down right now because they're having their own epidemic and they're trying to you know, so you know what they do, they drop their their hammer on everybody. So so it's just that it's now here my hope and this sucks for people like your friends who need it today. Yeah. My hope though is that because you got a huge reduction in production, there's a shortage that means suppliers are going to work together now to try to meet because now demand is up and meet the demand. But it's it's going to take some time. Yeah. Do you know scary that we're not talking about like, you know, you can't just snap your fingers. Yeah, it's not like, oh, there's no bacon or yeah, I can't find any toilet paper. Like you can figure stuff out. Some people, you got a baby. Well, no, and especially in like my friend's situation because they they're not like they're choosing to do formula and they could be breastfeeding. Mom can't breastfeed. Yeah, they can't. So what do you do? You go to like wet banks, you know, like it's hard. Those are. Yeah. And I mean, I'm sure people are going there and I imagine their life through the roof. No, no, they're hard anyway. I know this because when we had Araleas, I researched it just in case right now. Think, thankfully, we were blessed and and Jessica was able to breastfeed it was still a challenge, but she was able to. Yeah. But before that happened that we talked about it's okay in the in the event that maybe something happens because this happens to some women where it just doesn't just doesn't work. So they have to use formula. And I said, OK, well let's find the best formulas. And then we said, you know, the best options obviously breast milk. So I was looking for these places. It is not easy. So that's already hard right now. Like, what are we going to do? There's going to be some babies that like, what are they going to do with these kids? I don't know, man. I mean, we're sad word. We're in it, dude. I mean, we've been talking about this for a few years. It hasn't come into a while. It hasn't hit it's it's the worst, right? We haven't hit the worst part of it, but we're in it. Like it's it's happening. And I think the next six months to 12 months is going to be a little painful. Yeah. And this is the time to for people to really kind of tighten up their game, you know, like I know there's been all this celebration of everyone making tons of money in stock market and NFTs and cryptocurrency. And it's like, don't you know, another thing I saw, we just hit a record 15.8 trillion dollars in consumer debt highest it's ever been in history. So people are using their credit cards and they're leveraging home equity. People are leveraging. That's a bubble. It yeah, no, it's it's kind of a scary time because we've come out of such a bullish run for so long. And obviously, there's still people out there that you know, are making money off of that. So they're still telling people that it's a great time to buy it's good this it's great that and, you know, my my opinion is this is the time to, you know, be conservative, tighten up, pay off debt, don't go get yourself into more debt right now because we got to we got a we got an interesting ride coming in the next storm coming I also think it's a good time. The cool thing is, you know, our audience obviously is a little biased because they're they're health and fitness interested at the very least, right? Or they're really into it. If you lead a healthy life, it's less expensive. It really is. You prep your own food. So you don't eat out as much. Yeah, your health care costs are much lower. You're more productive because you're healthy. And then the the discipline and behaviors that are connected to consistency with exercise are very easy for you to take those and transfer those towards spending less money, being less frivolous, being more concerned, I wouldn't say it's easy, but I do think that the behaviors that I mean, I think it's always difficult for people. But I think that if you've learned to do that, you know, that that transfers over to other applications in your life. So I do think that you can pull from it. And there's some value there. You know, I should shout out because a lot of the stats that I just shared all came from a single source. And I really this guy has been following us since the beginning. He's a big mind pump fan. And he would communicate with me via DM every once in a while. And I watched him kind of build and he's doing a really good job on Instagram. I think he's built up to like 40 something thousand. Is this the guy who showed us really? Yeah, yeah, Chris Naghibi. I don't should spell his last name. So I don't mess it up. I mean, because at any time I have my pulling from a source like that, where I got it right here, it's N a G H I B I yes, Christopher M. Naghibi. Yeah. So real solid stuff, dude, he's putting out a lot of good content that I like, you know, so he's talking a lot about all the stuff that I just shared came from his page. Hey, did he bring up that the information about the no, that was somebody else. That was Jason Calcanis because that blew my mind, dude. You got to share that. Did you see that? Yeah, I did. The revenue actually had the chart right here. I could like, so why you're pulling that out? So take us to take a shot in the dark in 2020. How many air pods do you think were sold? Yeah, money wise, right? No, just no total units. Oh, I have no idea. I mean, we know that they sell for like 150, 170 or 200 or some of them. So just say an average of $100. They were they sold a hundred and eight million. What? Well, so 108 million was only paired with Apple phones. Well, look at what is the revenue on that? Doug, what if you did an average because the average air pods are over 100. Well, they have the numbers here in the chart. So air pods revenue versus top tech company. So Tesla was at the top at 31.5 billion. Next came Netflix at 25 billion, third air pods, 23 billion. That's so crazy. I'd be honest, though, I've bought probably six, like two for my kids, one for a court and then I've lost like two and then kept replacing them. So I bought the AirPod Max. Have you seen those? I haven't. It's over ones. Yes. Now you get them. I bought them on Amazon. No, when do you get? Oh, I think maybe tomorrow or the day after I ordered them. I can't wait to hear what you say. I haven't tried them, but my brother's he's a huge he's big into headphones and stuff. And he says it's one of my gripes with over. I like over the ear headphones. When I work out, it shuts everything else out. It's the best sound. I feel like I'm in my space or whatever people. I'm less likely to be bothered. Your DJ works sometimes. Yeah, maybe. But one thing I don't like about them is often times they're not comfortable. Either they press on the top of my head or after a while, it makes my ear feel weird or whatever. My brother said these are the most comfortable. Oh, so I think over the ear is so much more comfortable than in the ear. My gripe with over the ear is funny because I know we're probably going to look back in a decade or two and we're going to be made fun of like that. This era where we wore these big over the ear headphones while you work out. I know I probably look stupid doing it. I like it for, you know, it cancels out all the noise. It's the best sound. It's comfortable. It sounds amazing. It really I do like how I but when you wear them consistently and you sweat, he said the same. OK, so my brother said the sweat erodes. It erodes the things. I always have to end up. He says he doesn't sweat in them. He said that they're super comfortable. And then I asked them to compare the sound to. What's one of the tops? I said beats or bows. Yes, he said it's better. He said it sounds better. Wow. And he says they feel good because apparently they're metal. They feel like kind of solid. But then the part that goes over your head. Do you remember? I think they're like four hundred fifty bucks or something like that. So they're I mean like they're out there. They're premiums, right? But I'll let everybody know. Oh, I can't wait to. I can't wait to see them. I haven't even seen them. I don't know. That's crazy. Isn't that wild, though? Airpods? That's like billions. Just airpods alone. I mean, absolutely. It's like it's like Tesla, like Netflix and then Airpods. You're talking about beating out Twitter. You're talking about beating out Spotify. You're talking about beating out Square. Revenue wise. Yeah. Just crushing. That's what the margins are because that's total revenue. Right. Yeah. That's one of the run of a product. You you read the article and they're talking about the production on those have to be down to like two dollars. No. Yes, dude. There's not much. They got huge margins. Huge. Wow. I mean, let's say that that's grossly underestimated and it's ten bucks. Ten bucks. You're selling them for a hundred, two hundred dollars. 90 90 90 percent margin. That's ridiculous. Huge. That's incredible. Yeah. Hey, I read a cool article while it's not really cool. An interesting article on teenagers. So you guys know I have two teenage kids, right? My son's 16. My daughter is going to turn 13 this year. So she's 12, although she's acting like a teenager now. I did not know this. Very interesting. Maybe it's study on teenagers and one of the complaints parents will have with teenagers is they just don't listen to you. They don't listen to you or they ignore you. Yeah. I mean, like, it's super annoying. What the hell is going on? Part of it is not their fault. The teenage brain wires itself and changes from prioritizing their parents' voice. So young kids, their parents' voice lights up the brain differently and they prioritize mom and dad's voice over any other voice around them. And it just it's just they just hone in on it. Right. The teenage brain flips it completely. What? It deprioritizes the parents' voice literally compared to naturally happens. Yes. Oh, that's interesting. It makes them deprioritize the adult, the their parent voice, like the boot that kicks them out of the nest. Yes. And it prioritizes novel voices. So if they're in a room and look, if you have teenagers, you know what I'm talking about. You're in a room, your teenage kids over there, lots of people are talking and you're like, hey, yo, hey, yeah, like they're ignoring you and want to throw them through the window. It's not their fault part of it. Their brain literally shuts your voice off. I'm not going to tell my kids this. Don't give me anything. That's interesting. So when is it exactly happened? Is it around 13? Around 13. Yeah. And do you know what's happening on like a neurological level? What's like? Well, they did this. No, there's there's it's really complex, but they just tested it and studied it this way. But Justin was right. They said that's what they theorized. They said, well, that the teenage brain is it's rebellious. It's trying to leave the nest and to learn new things and to move out. And if you evolutionarily speaking, when you're a survivor on your own. So what an interesting fact. That's really cool. No, weird. Because if you think about evolutionarily speaking, you know, for most of human history, we were, you know, hunter-gatherers as a teenager. That's when you, you start mating. So when you start hunting, when you start having your own kids or whatever, it's like you got to leave. It's all self-discovery. That's really like parents imprinting on you. That's really great information because I think it also, as a parent, gives you a little bit of empathy and understanding to that. Right? Because I'd be very frustrating as a parent. I mean, I don't have a teenager yet, but I can only imagine. And I've seen parents before like, you're not listening to me. Yeah. And you bark at them because they're tuning you out. Yep. You know, and it's like, wow, well, you know, they naturally don't even they are subconsciously they're doing that. They don't do it intentionally. Correct. And you're right. I think as a parent, what you want to do because part of your instinct is to be like a hammer. Right. Like, no, you do it. No. But then you think to yourself, I want to be effective. I got to be real effective instead. And so this this actually makes you got to sound like a teenager. Yes, you start. You do voices, Justin. Yeah, I do characters. I'm a certain. That's pretty. That's not a bad idea. Talk of different languages. So so like I'm so proud of my daughter, right? She's she's turned. She's about to turn 13 and she's got hormones that are totally changing now. Yeah. And she's got these new emotions that she's never dealt with before. But here's what I'm so proud of, right? We'll have a difficult situation. I'll be talking to her and I can tell she's getting overwhelmed. She'll start to get real emotional. And then she'll say, I need pause for a second. I need a break. I'm like, wow. And so then she does. Then she'll come back. She'll apologize. And then we have a normal conversation. And I told her, I'm like, man, I'm so proud of you to be able to do that because you have all these new feelings. And so you don't know how to deal with them and in their new and you're at least aware enough to know that you need a second to figure it out before you continue to talk. Because what happens when you keep when you keep talking in these through these feelings that you don't really understand and know how to control or or work with, you say, shit, you regret, you know, you do a bunch of crazy stuff. So really proud of her. Very self-aware, mature, super mature. I'm very, very happy about that. It makes me makes me a proud, proud dad to do all that. So anyway, good stuff. Are you guys have you guys worked out while we've been up here? Or is it just Doug and I? No, no, I didn't know. Well, you guys trigger session doesn't really count. Yeah. Doug's always, he always knows. Where did you lift? The first day we're here. Yeah. I didn't know that. I mean, you know, after, what was that? Tuesday? I need a squat. That's on my, that's the, if I can knock that out while we're up here, I'll be happy. I just want to get squats over here. Oh, bench and overhead press. Oh, tomorrow I'm going to do all that stuff. But we have an early podcast, but I'll be up here. I'll be down here probably six. But you know, that reminds me to tell everybody that we have a new YouTube channel, Mind Pump Clips. So on that YouTube channel, it's just short clips of things that we've said in regards to fitness or whatever. It's a great place to like get just small bits of information if you don't have a lot of time. Yeah, no, we have a lot of people that are, so we used to do that on the Mind Pump Show podcast, right? So we're on the YouTube channel, but we were dumping so much content on that one channel that it was kind of oversaturating it. So we moved it. Now a lot of people thought we just quit doing it and quit putting that content out and got frustrated because that was one of their favorite parts of the clip. So just so you know, there's a whole nother channel, but because those other two channels are so big, if you just type in Mind Pump, you'll have to scroll all the way down. So you have to put in Mind Pump Clips, and then you still have to kind of scroll down. And they're good to share too. So if you want to share fitness, like if you want to like, you know, kind of sideways, tell your boyfriend or girlfriend something about fitness, check out this clip. Yeah, I heard this. Just make sure it's not one of those like how to not be fat. Couple of guys say something about this. Dude, I got some friggin' bummer news today. I was reading something, I read it in another article. So, you know, obviously a chewed dude, right? The place I buy, I'm lazy, right? So I don't like waiting lines for sneakers I want. I go on, I use a website that's really popular and it's called StockX. And I pay a premium most of the time for a pair that I really want, but whatever they authenticate them and they're very super fast and they have almost everything I'm ever looking for. So I just, I love using them or whatever. I know I'm paying a little bit of a premium, but an article just came out in Hyperbeast saying that supposedly they were caught or they're busted and I don't know how much this, if this has been proven or not, but of selling fake Nike. Oh no, do you think you got, you know, I feel like I've been buying those shoes for so long that if I had a fake pair that I would be able to pick up, because I have bought like fake Jordans before. The pairs that say Mikey on them? No, I mean, they do a good, I mean, listen, there's a lot of people that are out there. We talked about this other day off air about like purses that are being. Oh wow. Country flag. Yeah, that are made, that are fake and so that, I mean, they do a really good job. Oh, I've seen some Fosace's out there. Well, and I've seen some Air Jordans that really looked apart, but you can feel the difference. That's where you, to me, and then also they're so cheaply made they fall apart quick. So I remember our buddy, our mutual friend, Lawrence, there was a long time ago, he was into hustling and selling these fake shoes, right? And yeah, sorry, Lawrence, throw you on the bus there, right? So I think he's okay. I think there's what's the law after so many years you can't go, you can't prosecute. Statue of limitations. Yeah, what is that? Seven years, man. Seven years, yeah, it's nine years ago. So nine years ago I bought these sneakers from them and I was like, all these are cool because they're so cheap and they look just like my favorite pair. And I like, I wore them for like a month and like the soles were all like, oh yeah. And they just didn't feel, and those were my favorite sneakers growing up. So I remember the feel, right? So they don't feel the same. So are the real expensive ones, do they have little like ways of identifying like underneath the sole or any kind of like imprint? So stitching, right? So in the sneaker world, like really high-end good sneakers that are well made, the place that you can normally see where if you got a good eye and you've seen the originals, you can normally pull an original pair up and then where they go is the stitching. Did you guys watch that movie about Versace? The one with Lady Gaga? Remember that scene where the guy took the shoe and he lifted the sole? And if it wasn't gold or whatever underneath and he goes, these are fake. Yeah, so they do stuff like that. Oh yeah. Especially in that world and bags and everything, they're crazy about adding those little details. Hey, you guys want to hear about some new crazy but weird technology that's coming up? Yeah, so people have been working on, I didn't know this was a thing. I had no idea. Maybe you know, Justin. This sounds like something you've been to. Right, Miley. Yeah. Smart toilets. Oh. Yeah, so what these... So what is it? Hey, you could just like talk to it? No, no, okay. So I'm gonna tell you what the toilets do. You guys are gonna think it's pretty cool but then I'm gonna tell you a part that's like what? So these toilets, they're smart and what they'll do is they'll track the types of poops that you have. It's analyzing all of your food that you ate and it can go far. The consistency, the time, how much, you know? Like is it, are you more towards constipation, more towards diarrhea? It could pick up blood content. Oh, God. It's disgusting. What kind of, man, what kind of... No, it's actually, you know, it's kind of like what's really interesting about this is like how many people really pay attention to their stool? We've talked about this before on the podcast. It's a big deal. It is a big deal. And it's like really good feedback on like where your diet and gut is and I being completely transparent. Poo tells all kinds of stories. In my 20s, it was something that, and this is such an old guy thing, right? To pay attention to this stuff now, right? You did not pay attention to that. When something would tear you up and you'd have like a really loose stool, you're just, oh, it's just part of it. You know what I'm saying? It'll ruin my day now, you know? So continue. I want to hear what's, because it's interesting. So like it'll weigh it. So it knows like how much you're excreting. It can also pick up, it can also pick up, you know, if you have like bacteria infections or I mean, it goes, it can go far. Here's the part that's weird. So one of these toilet companies came up with a way of identifying individual people. So it's, I had no idea that your butthole is like a fingerprint. What? I swear to, there's a term for it, by the way. Really? It literally will identify people. So when you sit down, it'll, it's your butthole. I'm so glad we don't have to stamp that, you know? Yeah, the skin of your butthole. It'll be like, hello, Adam Schaefer. Oh, you know who I am. Are you serious? I swear to God. Butthole identification technology. Where's the database that has all our names? That's the part that people are talking about. Cause people like, yeah. People like, I don't like this because it could also, you know what else they could see in your poop? Drugs or substances. And people like, yeah, I don't want this database. This whole search and seizures thing, real. Yeah. And they call it, interesting. So it's, it recognizes the user's anal print or here's the term that they use cause it sounds way, way not as bad. Distinctive features of their anal derm. Anal derm. Anal derm. That means the skin of the anal canal. So there's a camera in there literally and it uses machine learning. Just distinctive little winks. Yeah. And so machine learning algorithms to match stool samples. What are these things in a, what are these things in a retail ad? Do they say? No. I wonder how expensive that is. That's all biometrics and stuff like that. But here, okay. So this takes you, here's another step to this. Did you guys know that when the president goes to another country and especially if it's a country that isn't like our best friend or whatever. Yeah. They have assistants that collect their pre-season. They don't leave the poop in the country. The president poops, if he goes and travels. Cause they can find out the health of them. Health and they can make you get DNA from it. Medication they're on. Yes. No way. Yeah. That's been happening for a while. The president goes to China. China. Okay. Takes a shit. Secret service has it. Yeah. Takes it back to America. You are kidding me. No. I did not know that. Secret service hate when you visit McDonald's. Yeah. Cause they could pick up a lot of stuff about you in your poop. I had no idea. I know. Like how does that work? You poop and like don't flush. Okay. And how shitty of if you're that secret service guy. Like is that like the. You know what I'm saying? You fucked that last month. You're the grunt dude. It's like a. You're the new guy. It's like walking the beat. Guess what you get guy. Hey, welcome to the force. You're the shit scooper. Hey, just a little warning. Biden had Taco Bell last night. Anyway, stay close to him. It was a chill. I mean, you know, back to your, your smart toilet. It's actually kind of really interesting because I mean, look at, we're, we're working with Dr. Cabral right now. One of the test is a stool test like that. Imagine if it's smart that you don't got to package it. And you know what? That's one of the worst things. That sucks. How cool would it be to literally just like send that to your doctor? Or imagine you have a toilet, get poop, and then it reads it or whatever. And then on the screen, it'll tell you, Hey, it looks like this is happening right now or maybe you want to avoid it. Well, even if, like I said, even if, I mean, cause that would, I think would be even further technology, just simply being able to track the data for you and you'd be able to digitally send that to your doctor so he can manage it for you. Right. Just sounds, okay, that makes a lot of sense. I don't mind to like applaud for me after I'm done. Do you want to get a rabing every time? You know what? The more I'm thinking about it, I actually think it's going to do well. I do too. The whole butthole thing though, I don't want to identify it. I'd like to just keep it anonymous. Well, you see that, but there's an injustice point so it'll know it's you. Yeah, but I'll be user one. Well, that's fine. Mr. Andrews? Yeah. You look so clean today. Thank you. Appreciate it. Toilet? Have you been eating glass? That's terrible. All right, some cool science stuff. So remember how a while ago I told you how one of the, one way to increase your absorption of creatine. Oh, the lipopolic acid or whatever? Very close. Oh, close. Alphalipoic acid. I've been doing it. I've been doing it. I forgot the alpha in there. I mean, it's one of those things that I don't, I can't tell if it's working or not, but I remember you saying that and so I've been consistently doing creatine again. Then I just, so insulin helps drive amino acids and glycogen and creatine into the muscle, right? So if insulin goes up, then you get more creatine. So the old, I guess, non, you know, sophisticated way of doing that would be to have a bunch of sugar with your creatine. Just like back in the day, you know, you have muscle attack, it'd be 75 grams of dextrose and you'd get more creatine in your system, but you also get diabetes. Well, one way you can do this without eating a bunch of sugar is increasing the sensitivity of your body to insulin. So you can either raise insulin or make the current amount of insulin that you have make your body more sensitive to it, which produces a similar effect. That's what alphalipoic acid does. Okay, so tell me if I'm doing it right. Right now, what I do is I just, I squeeze the packet in my mouth, I take it, and then I basically just mix some creatine in water and then I just went right afterwards. That's right. Okay, so I don't need like 30 minutes ahead or something like that. Would it matter if I did it post? Post workouts usually better. No, no, no, I'm meaning, I know post workout for creatine. I mean, the alphalipoic acid, if I did it after I took the creatine. I don't think it matters. And I think you're splitting hairs because you take it and so the alphalipoic acid that we use is through LiveOn and they have that liposomal kind of technology, meaning they use pharmaceutical technology to increase the efficacious amount or the absorption rate of whatever you're taking. For example, glutathione. If I just take glutathione, it's all destroyed in the gut. None of it gets to my body, but through liposomal technology, it does get absorbed. And there's studies on this I'll show you that. Liposomal glutathione raises glutathione levels. Non-liposomal glutathione doesn't. So with the alphalipoic acid, it's in the liposomal packet. So when you get the LiveOn, it's like in the little gel packet or it doesn't taste great by the way. Actually, of all the ones, actually, I think it tastes all right. It has a different taste. That's because they set you up with the glutathione. Well, I think it's the best tasting. Of all the ones, it's the best tasting one. That was one of the reasons, I mean, the truth, that's why I'm consistent with it. You're such a baby. It's just like a little bitter. Yeah, it's not that bad. No, I don't think it's bad at all. No, no, it's not. It actually reminds me, so I can't remember what I remembered taking it and telling you guys, like this reminds me of something else. I mean, their packets are just, it's all designed for absorption and being efficacious. But yeah, take it with your creatine, makes you more insulin-sensitive. Now, there's a lot of studies on alpha-lipoic acid, in particular in combination with L-carnitine. So another product that Livon has is acetyl-L-carnitine. Acetyl-L-carnitine in combination with alpha-lipoic acid, they've done studies to see if they can improve the mitochondrial health of people. So without going too deep in the weeds, the mitochondria is like the powerhouse of the cell. If your mitochondria is healthy, healthy metabolism, healthy body, you're not getting chronic diseases much lower. Mitochondria health goes down, you can develop lots of problems because now your cells don't operate well. Well, carnitine with alpha-lipoic acid has been used in studies to improve mitochondrial health. Combine it with creatine, now you've got a incredible combination because creatine fuels ATP or creates more ATP, which fuels mitochondria. Oh, so I should take all that together then. If you take all three, that's like the one, two, three, bunch. Well shit we have on it, it may as well do it. So it's good stuff. Yeah, very interesting, very cool. Hey, check this out. Look, fitness and health doesn't just mean being super strict on everything. It means having a good quality of life, which means you also enjoy certain things like the occasional glass of wine or alcoholic beverage. The problem is you feel like crap the next day and it negatively affects your workouts. Well, check this out. There's a company called Zbiotics that makes a genetically modified probiotic drink that is specifically designed, okay? So it's just patented. These bacteria have been programmed to break down acetaldehyde. This is a unwanted alcohol byproduct. This is the primary culprit behind rough mornings after drinking. This stuff actually really works. I mean, legit works. You drink the Zbiotics, then you enjoy yourself with your friends and then you feel way better the next day so you can work out and not feel like total garbage. Go check these people out. Go to mindpumppartners.com, click on Zbiotics, then use code MINEPUMP22, MINEPUMP22 for 10% off your first order. All right, here comes the rest of the show. Our first caller is Kyra from Canada. Kyra, what's happening? How can we help you? Hi guys, I just wanted to first start out as I think everyone does and just say thank you so much for all the content and stuff that you guys put out. I just found your podcast probably four or five months ago and I've been listening pretty much every single day. First thing in the morning as I get ready and I have learned more in those four and five months and I think I have in my 10 years of doing this journey. So I just wanted to say thank you, that's awesome. Hell yeah. My main question here is I've just spent the last probably four months in a surplus focusing on strength gains in the gym following a strict program and shooting for like progressive overload, PRs, that kind of thing. And now summer's around the corner and I'm wanting to do a cut. I did start a cut probably four weeks ago now and I'm kind of wondering if there's anything I should be changing in my training specifically in regards to pushing for PRs, doing that progressive overload time and time again while I'm in a deficit if there's anything like, yeah, that I should be changing I guess in terms of that. Yeah, that's a really good question. And so the answer to, should you continue to try to essentially progressively overload while in a deficit? The answer is yes, however, there's more to this. There are many, many, many ways to progressively overload. So I wanna talk about that for a second. There's a great episode by the way we did on this where we covered, have you heard that yet Cara? No. I think so. Maybe Doug will look it up while we're talking right now but I believe it's titled something like the nine different ways to progressively overload. Yeah, because everybody thinks it's like just add weight to the bar. And that is one way to progressively overload but it has its own downfalls. Like one is you can't obviously get strong, stronger and stronger forever. It doesn't work that way. Especially at a deficit. Right, and then number two, exactly what Adam said, like you cut your calories, your overall strength is expected to drop even if, and this is important for people to understand, even if you don't lose muscle. So some people think, oh, I'm weaker therefore I'm losing muscle. Not necessarily, sometimes just having less calories means your CNS isn't gonna fire as strongly, your leverage is gonna change a little bit as your size changes. You're not gonna have the same amount of energy to push us hard. So I would still focus on progressive overload but I would change it, right? So if before it was lift more weight, well now it might be slow down my reps or maybe pause my reps or maybe a super set, right? Or maybe go with a higher rep scheme or a lower rep scheme or something different than what you used to before. What I like to tell people to focus on when they're cutting is to really perfect their form and the tempo of the reps. I like that because psychologically speaking, going lighter can mess with your head a little bit. It does with me. But if I know I'm going into a phase where like, okay, I'm gonna just slow my reps down. I'm gonna have to go lighter anyway. So it's less of a impact on my psychology when the weight drops because of the deficit, right? So my weight goes down, but I'm like, you know what? I'm slowing my reps down and I'm perfecting my form. And the reason why you always want to aim to improve, and again, you gotta train appropriately, right? Don't over train. But the reason why you want to aim to improve is when you're in a deficit, it's very important that you still maintain an effective, appropriate yet effective muscle building signal to mitigate the metabolism slow down that is inevitable to, that'll happen with a calorie deficit and also to keep muscle. And in rare cases, people will build muscle and deficit, but really what it is, is you're just trying not to lose it. Kaira, are you following any of our maps programs yet? I'm not, no. So give me a little bit of a breakdown of, I see written up here, you're doing three full body workouts per week. Kind of give me a little rundown what your training looks like. Yeah. So I'm following actually, I don't know if I should be mentioning other people's names or programs on here. Oh, that's fine. We don't care. Okay, cool. I'm following Brett Contreras right now. Okay. I'm following his programming. So yeah, it's three full body workouts per week and it's focusing on, I guess, strong lifting, I guess is his like definition of it. So the main lifts are your squat, your deadlift, chin ups, military press and your bench. So those are like, we practice those definitely all throughout the week. So you're hitting it more often. So I would say, like we already have in the programming like pause reps and that kind of thing like that too, but his main way that he structures his program is week one is a deload week. So it's on a monthly basis, right? So week one is a deload week. Week two and three, you slowly progress. And then week four, you're shooting for your PRs. So that's, I guess, where I was kind of like in week four, am I still supposed to be shooting for those PRs or should I be shifting and doing something else? So first of all, Brett's brilliant. So his programming is gonna be solid. This is very similar, although there are some differences I hear already with, but like as far as the core lifts, this is like our maps anabolic program, like similar to that. And the reason why I was asking is another strategy to add to what Sao has given you that I love to do when I transition into a cut is actually to like go after like a new stimulus, like a total different type of program. So for example, if you were, this is closely related to our maps anabolic program. So let's just pretend you were running maps anabolic of ours and you had that same question to me and then Sao gave you all advice. Another piece of advice I'd say is, hey, here's a great time to switch to let's say maps strong or maps performance, which are radically different from anabolic, which has got the traditional lifts. And now you're training a new lift, a lot, lots of new lifts. And because that's a new stimulus, you're going to get lots of benefits of either building muscle or at least maintaining muscle because of the new stimulus while also being in cut. And since it's, they're new, you're not so focused on, oh man, I used to do, I could squat normally 185 pounds and now I'm only doing 150. And that kind of plays with your psychology. You're doing a brand new lift like a Zercher squat, which you probably haven't done in a long time or ever. And you're like, I don't even know what I'm good if I'm good at this or not. So you're going to see progression in it because it's a new lift like that. And your starting point won't feel like you're so far behind because you've done that lift before. Such a great point. I mean, what Adam's talking to is the most important thing that you need to manage is your psyche, your behaviors and your psyche. The hardest part about a cut or a bulk is your own head. Really is, this is just your truth. And I look, Contreras is an excellent trainer. He knows what he's doing, his programming is very solid. But you probably do want to change. You know, we have a program I think that would be amazing for you during this cut, especially considering the kind of workout that you've been doing. I'm familiar with some of his programming. Again, I like Brett a lot. I think he's a great trainer. And his programming looks very somewhat similar to like some of our programming. So I'm going to recommend that you do something like map symmetry. I think map symmetry would be wonderful during this period of time for you because I guarantee you're going to be doing exercises in ways you haven't done before. It's going to feel very different. You're not going to have something you can refer back to. So like what Adam's saying, you're not going to do it. You're going to do a lift and you don't have something to compare it to. So you're going to be like, oh my God, I'm getting weaker. You're like, it's a new exercise. It's very focused on control, very focused on stability. It's very different from any other kind of programming. Unilateral. It's all unilateral focused. At the very end, you do have a five by five phase which I think you'll enjoy. But the first a few phases are totally different from what you're used to. So if you don't, you obviously, you said you didn't have a math program. We'll send that to you. So I think that'll be something. Yeah, that'll be good. Thank you so much. Yeah, no problem. Thanks for calling in, Kyra. Do you have any other questions? No, that's it. Thank you so much for your help. No problem. Yeah, it's funny. When you get, when you have really good experienced trainers, they all at the end, very similar, right? Yeah. When we talked to Brett and he would communicate fitness. He was like, oh yeah, we see the same thing. That's because he's an experienced and he's a good trainer. But what you really communicated is so important. It's like, you got to manage your head more than anything when you're doing stuff like this. Yeah, and I want to be clear that that doesn't mean she couldn't just continue following his program. Okay, but one of the things that I think is unique to us in our experience is that we always factor that piece in because we've trained enough people to know that it isn't just always like the X's and O's that I have a challenge with with clients more often than not, it's the psychology. It's them getting in their own way and then their own head and then being discouraged because, oh my God, I'm so weak and, you know, oh, I don't know if I like, I don't know if I want to finish this. I think I'm going to go back the other way because when I was fed, I felt so much better and I think I looked better. I think I was stronger in the gym. Like, oh, I can't, I must be losing muscle. And like you start playing these mind games where one of the best ways I have found for myself and clients is to completely shift the focus on something completely new. Totally. They don't have a baseline to refer back to and go, I'm doing terrible. And I think most people intuitively know, like when that plateau is on the forefront and the horizon, it's like, they just don't know that there's other options out there. Should I just keep like, you know, applying the same formula and just grind my way through it and just, you know, bypass my own reserves in terms of like, my body's just not responding. You know, there's other ways to do it and it's just adding novel stimulus. And so I know Doug looked up that one episode but it's a great episode for progressive overload. Yeah, it'll be in the show notes but Justin, you hit the nail on the head with that which is you do the same program, you change up your diet, messes with your head and then what do people end up doing? Oh, I gotta work out harder. I need to push harder because that's what it is. Yeah, and it's really tough. Like for me, when I cut, what messes with my head is I feel smaller. Before I look leaner, I just look smaller. I have to get lean to a point where I could start to see the benefit. So the first like four weeks is just me feeling smaller. I'm weaker in the gym. I don't have as much stamina, the pumps are not as good. And if I don't change my workout, what I'm doing is I'm comparing it to what my workout felt like before and it feels like a failure, right? So, and everybody's a little different but you gotta manage your psyche, know yourself ahead of time and say, okay, or for bulking, some people for bulking, like, oh my God, I'm getting heavy. My pants are tight, like change the focus so that your mind doesn't get in your way so you can stay consistent and save the course. All right, our next caller is Clint from Illinois. Clint, what's happening? Yeah, hey guys. Thanks for choosing my question and having me on. And secondary, there are probably three things real quick. One is just for all the content you put out. I've been following you guys for, I don't know, three or four years now and it's always entertaining. And second, I'd like to thank Timie Beard for his recommendation on Raised by Wolves from HBO. You get extra credit for using Timie Beard, bro. Extra credit. It was a great show and it was sitting in my watch queue forever and finally when he brought it up, I decided to bite the bullet and watch and it was not a disappointment. So. Yeah, you know, when people listen to me, good things happen. I'm pretty sure I was the one, I was the first guy to talk about it. Anyway, continue. I remember that part. Timie Beard for the win. Yes. So, quick bit of background. So I'm 38, father of three and I come from just a hodgepodge of fitness. So I started out in track and field. I was a high jumper. I did a little bit in college and then from there, I switched things up and got into weightlifting because we did a lot of stuff in the gym there. And then I bulked up to 200 pounds and got my bench press to a respectable 300 pounds. And I decided once I hit that goal, I would switch it up to endurance sports. And so I got into five Ks, 10 Ks, half marathons. I ran 100 miler, did Ironman, qualified for Boston and ran that gamut. And so then being where I'm at with the three kids, I decided I should do something more like life oriented. So that way, like when I'm older, I can throw my kids around and throw my grandkids around and just get overall healthier and stronger and not be stuck in this chronic cardio phase. So I've ran at the ball, ran maps to anabolic a few times in the past. And so now I'm back on it again. What I'm coming across though, unlike most men, I don't have stubborn calves, but my quads and hamstrings seem to be lagging behind everything else. Like for reference point, I started anabolic again I wanna say it was the first week of March, weighing in for my six foot, three frame, 180 pounds. And I weighed myself this morning after a good solid bowel movement and I was at 200. So I put on 20 pounds since March, made my waist and my pants all fit the same, but I'm starting to have issues with rolling up my, you know, dress sleeves on my shirts and the buttons in the front don't really button all the way across my chest. And so upper body develops quick, but lower body just seems to lag behind. So that was my question of, you know, what could I do to try to get my quads back up? Glutes seem to be coming in, which is not a complaint, but, you know, quads and hamstrings seem to be falling behind. I'll defer to Adam, cause he has, this is his challenge too. So we'll let him answer. Well, the calves are mine, right? No, I mean, you've done a good job building your legs. That's always been a challenge. So they were, they were absolutely right. A challenge for me. A couple of things that really made a big difference for me. One, being honest with myself and being consistent with my frequency. Like if in the past, if there were things that I would skip out on to be legs cause it would kill me, you're obviously falling anabolic. So as long as you're following the program to a T, I know that's not happening. But another big one for me was actually my squat depth. I lacked the ankle mobility. Being a six foot three guy, it was really tough for me to get down into depth. And so I had like this, like breaking, just barely breaking parallel squat and actually really working on my range of motion did wonders for my quad. I was able to lift lighter weight and develop my quads more than I was when I was lifting heavier weight but not going all the way down. So what's your mobility look like right now? I wear, I'll either go barefoot or wear inobates when I'm doing squats. And I have no problem going complete ass to grass. Sometimes when I'm working, right now I'm working from home, but like when I'm working in the office and I want to get some extra mobility, I'll actually sit in a squat position in my desk chair and work like that for an hour or so. I have no problem. Oh, awesome. So you got good mobility. So then the other direction I would go is like, I would go like a maps aesthetic program and I would put my focus on quads. So the way we design maps aesthetic is that you have your kind of foundational full body routine similar to anabolic, but instead of trigger sessions on the off days, you have what we call focus sessions where we encourage you to pick one to two muscle groups and you could just do quads if you want to or you could do quads and hamstrings and that would be your focus days. And so we're going to increase the volume on it. And then I would do like specific things like, you know, I would do like goblet squats, things that are going to really target the quads on like days like that. That's going to help out. But without me seeing your squat and, you know, the help maybe potentially with former technique, the obvious answer would be to go to aesthetic and then increase frequency by the focus days. That's especially since you're saying that you're able to get acegrass because that was a big thing for me. I think that's great advice, Adam. Especially considering you probably have a lot of stamina in your lower body, considering all your past history of endurance sports. So frequency you'll probably respond really well to. Really focus on getting a pump, focus on feeling those muscles, getting good form. Start every workout with legs, okay? So even if you follow other programs, always start your workouts with legs before you hit anything else. And if you feel like you can't connect to your quads or your hamstrings well, it's perfectly fine to do an isolation exercise for quads and hamstrings and then moving to the compound lift. So if your glutes are really taking over and you feel like you're, and this is rare, usually it's the other way around, but if you're like my glutes respond, which is what you said, I don't feel my quads and hamstrings as much, you could do like sissy squats and single leg deadlifts or leg curls and then go to your barbell squats, your front squats, your leg press. Do it first. Yes. If you don't do a Bulgarian split squats, add that in your routine too. That was another one that blew my legs up. It was a movement that I stayed away from because it was so damn hard for me for the longest time. And then I decided, okay, I'm gonna focus on that. So, and maybe that's not Bulgarian split squats for you. Maybe that's something you do all the time and then that's not, but I would look for something like that in my routine. And you really feel. Yeah, so. If you have access to a sled, this is where I'm an evangelist again to add more volume for your quads, your calves especially too. Just driving the sled without a lot of damage. You can get a whole lot of- I would love that on focus days. If you had access to a sled and you're following maps aesthetic, you can get a lot of sled work on focus days. Clint, have you identified if heavy weight and low reps or lighter weight and higher reps? If one of those two, your legs tend to respond better too. Have you identified that? Not yet. It also feels like the strength portion as well as the size seems to just be lagging. Like my, I haven't tested in a while because I haven't gone back to phase one in a bit. But I can tell you that like my bench and squat are pretty equal. And it could be, a lot of my muscle gain could be muscle memory regain from my early lifting days where I didn't do a whole lot of legs because I was running so frequently but I blasted my upper body. Not to admit that I was a pro, but maybe that's part of it that all this regrowth is just coming back from starving myself and running. I think exactly what's happening. I think what you just said makes a lot of sense. Look, here's the other thing too. If you're, it's not uncommon for someone's bench press to be right around where they squat, especially if they're really tall, that doesn't mean that you're necessarily weak in your legs. And if you have a squat, look, I tell you what, I know a lot of guys that bench press 300 pounds, they can't squat a proper 200 pounds all the way down. A 300 pound bench and a 300 pound squat with good form, that's not too bad. So don't be too hard on yourself. But yeah, definitely place more focus on the legs, more frequency, work them out first, get a good pump in the legs, you have that good connection. You might wanna start with an isolation exercise first. We're gonna send you MAPS Aesthetic, if you don't have it. That program, I agree is gonna be perfect for you. I think it'll be the perfect routine to help you bring up that, your lagging body part for sure. So like my ability to recover between exercises, I'm just borderline ridiculous at this point with all the, I think it's probably with the running where, like I could go out and run a marathon on a Saturday and then I pulled up to a 10K race on Sunday, it was within a minute of my PR. And then it seems to be the same way with weight training. Would there be any benefit to like German volume training for legs just to try to get that to pull back up? Or is that gonna be too, like should I not focus so much on volume because of how high my endurance is? Yeah, okay. I'm starting to smell something here, Clint. Yeah. Dammit, Justin. Well, it wasn't me. No, it's not you guys. Okay, you made a comment about it's been a while since you've been in phase one of MAPS and Ebola. We already know you got a running background, you can handle, you just said again too, you can handle a ton of volume. You might be my client who has a really hard time resting for three minutes and really pushing the weight and not wanting to go, go, go through your workout. It doesn't matter if you feel like after a minute you can go. The three minute rest makes a difference. Oh, I do the three minute rest. Okay. Okay. Yeah, we're good here. Like I had a, I did have a strength coach for a while at a CrossFit gym that worked me through the form for squat, deadlifts and some of the more power base moves. So. Yeah, it's, to me from your, because of your background, we would, I would actually push you more in the direction of like five by five than I would like German volume. Okay. Yeah, so more power lifting style and MAPS and Ebola phase one, what you're going to get that by the way in MAPS aesthetic, MAPS aesthetic looks like that. The real big difference between aesthetic and an an anabolic is it has got more volume. So it's something that you will, you'll be fine there because we already know how to handle the volume. And on the, instead of trigger days, you're doing these focus sessions and it's literally designed to target an area that you think is lagging on your body and bring it up. So it's the right program for you. Follow that to a T. I just, you were saying some things that made me had to ask some more questions that could be potential, but sounds like you get the rest period thing down. So follow aesthetic, I think you're going to be fine now. Yeah, I think you'll be, I think you'll be happy with how your body starts to respond with it. Now with one last thing. So with aesthetic, is there like an ad home version with that as well? Right now I'm doing most of stuff at home, which is, I mean, I've got a squat rack and a bench and all that stuff. Is that programmed aesthetic as well as an anabolic? Yep, cool. Yep. Awesome. You got it, man. Thanks for calling in. Yeah, thank you much. Appreciate it. Thank you. You know what he said that made the biggest, I think he's making the biggest impact here is he has muscle memory for his upper body, not for his lower body, because he avoided hitting legs hard with weights. All he did was the endurance work. So what you're doing essentially is you're comparing muscle memory for one part of your body. And the other one is like new growth. New growth is always going to take a lot longer than muscle memory, just the way it is. And if you tend to like the higher rep, high volume type of training more and you lean more towards that, I still feel like, I mean he made the comment about not doing phase one in a long time. He can handle a lot because of his running. I feel like he probably needs to be spinning more time. You'd like to see his effort in terms of loosing the weight. Yes, that's what I want to see. I want to see. I mean, it sounds like a guy knows what he's doing. He's got to coach him like that. So I don't, I mean, it's hard for me to coach over a fucking microphone or a phone. But some of the things that he said and because of his running background, I've been like, I'd want to. Is the mindset and the focus there on like the intensity of this lift and then rest? Or is it like, you know, how do I get through this? Yeah. You know, another program that I mean, if he's probably going to listen to this, another program to look into after aesthetic would be power lift. I think power lift would be a great program for him afterwards. I think he'd see that too. So hopefully aesthetic, he sees what we're looking for after aesthetic and maybe run into power lift as the second program. Our next caller is Nick from Connecticut. Nick, what's up? How can we help you? What's up, Nick? Hey, hey, how's it going? Pretty good. First off, I just want to say thank you guys so much for the show and the entertainment. My older brother told me about you guys and I've been listening for about two years now and we talk about you guys all the time. So thank you. Good deal. Brad, good older brother. Yeah. Yeah. So my question has to do with lower back pain and just some background information if it helps. I'm 26 and I've been lifting for about three years now. I started because I was a little bit overweight. I was 220 at 510. So I was pretty unhappy with that. So I decided to cut down on my calories and I started weight training and I was able to lose 40 pounds in about four months. But so I really started to just enjoy weight training. I didn't care so much about the weight. I cared more about getting stronger and looking good. But I would say for at least the past year I've been dealing with this lower back pain on and off. And just for my programming, I've done a lot of different things but last year I did anabolic. And then at the beginning of this year I bought performance and aesthetic. But I wanted to start from the beginning because I know you guys talk about doing those three in order. So I did anabolic again. It went really well. And then I just started performance. And it seems that when I squat, I get this lower back pain. You guys are really tight. It's really hard to proceed with my sets. And then from there, like any bent over exercise it really tends to hurt and to flare up. And so really my question is, where should I start from here on fixing my squat? So I'm pain free and that I can proceed with my lifts and get stronger. Okay, Nick. So two things. One, you don't have to squat. Two, if you don't squat, you'll never be able to squat. So consider that, okay? Now it sounds like you want to squat. And I'm just saying that for other people listening right now, because you do get advice on social media of people saying you don't have to squat to build up your legs. But if you don't practice that skill you'll never have that skill. So we think it's very important to practice such a fundamental movement, okay? Here are the main, general main reasons why someone's low back bothers them when they squat. Now this doesn't mean that I'm gonna hit on one that is your issue, because you're not in front of me, I can't do an assessment, I can't work with you in person. Generally what we've seen are these three things. Yeah, so I'm gonna give you like the most common ones, okay? Could be ankle mobility or foot stability. So it could be down in the feet and the ankles. That one's relatively common. It can be the hips. So it can be hip stability or hip strength or mobility. It could also be core stability or core weakness that could be causing the issue. And then finally, the last one I would say is upper back instability. So the thoracic area where you might lack some stability and lack of mobility. So any one of those or combination of those can cause undue stress on the low back whenever you do an exercise like a squat. So what's the next step? The next step would be to do specific movements, mobility exercises, connecting movements on those areas to really identify what your problem is. Do you have Maps Prime Pro? Cause that's what'll have everything. I'd prime, prime them with the assessment. Do you have Prime or Prime Prime? I do not. Okay, we're gonna send both of them to you. Now what I want you to do in those programs is number one, go to Prime, do the compass test, see how you do with that. And then two, go through those areas that I talked about, do movements in there and see how you feel and how you do. And do them before you do a squat. See if you notice a benefit. If you do notice a benefit, stick to those movements and get really good at them. But it's the odds are, I'd say probably 85% that it's one of those areas. I wanna, can I stick them in the forum too? Yeah. Can you hook them up with the forum? You get a lot of free stuff next. Yeah, well, I was gonna hook them up with the whole bundle. I was gonna set you up with Prime and then stick you in the forum because we could stay here and guess all day with our experience. And I think Sal hit it on the head. Those are probably the four most common but it could be a whole host of different things potentially going on with you. The best way we can get to the bottom of this is if I actually saw you squat and so you could do that in the forum if you like. So, I mean, first if you wanna try and troubleshoot it yourself, go through the Prime compass and do what Sal is saying to try and get to the bottom of yourself. If you're still struggling, get on the forum and do a video of yourself from the front and the side. So we can take a look at your form and technique and then maybe we can see where there's a breakdown and then coach you from there and do it barefoot if you do it. So do it barefoot for us and give us like 10 squats from the front and the side view. And from that, we should probably be able to get a pretty good idea of what's going on but definitely what Sal's saying are the most common things that we see. Yeah, generally it's an instability. I mean, a lot of times people will then avoid the squat completely. And to Sal's point, there's like many camps out there that are more than happy to kind of show you how to do that. However, we think it's a fundamental movement that everybody should try to maintain as much as possible. So it is gonna take some work. So, identifying this is gonna take some work on your end to really kind of go through that and assess where that instability lies, whether it's coming from ankles, hips, somewhere in your back, core instability. So where you don't have that strength and control, we can do the work to build that back. So there is an answer. The good news is you're 26 and you're already trying to troubleshoot this now. Oh yeah. This typically is something that people wait years and years and years. And that's harder. Yeah, and it just gets more difficult. So the fact that you're already kind of trying to troubleshoot this and figured out and get to the bottom of it, and you will. You'll unlock something, we'll be able to get to the bottom of what's limiting you or what's causing this. And then it'll just, from that point, it'll be a matter of you putting in the practice to work on that, whether it's a weakness or instability or whatever it may be. But the fact that you're researching it, trying to figure it out at 26 right now, I think this is gonna pay you back 10 fold in the future. So you'll be able to know what you need to do as you get older and these things start to get progressively worse. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I appreciate it. I've definitely gotten to that point where you feel like you wanna give up squatting. Maybe I should do unilateral stuff, just something, because you obviously wanna keep progressing, but at the same time, I feel like I'm being held back. So that makes a lot of sense. Yeah, smart, very smart at your age to address it this way. So good job. Hey, I appreciate you guys so much. Would it be okay if I shout out my brother real quick? Go for it. That's fine. Yeah. All right, so my brother's Ron. This is a 10 year anniversary this month. So shout out to him, happy anniversary. That was really good, Ron. That was a really nice younger brother. I thought he was gonna say something snarky towards me. I was expecting him to do that. You stink, Ron. Happy anniversary, Ron. Yeah, very nice. Thank you guys so much. Again, I appreciate everything you guys do and I love the podcast. You got it, Nick. Thank you, Nick. Yeah, so I wanted to address that crowd on social media that says that. So I'm gonna say something that's so ridiculously silly and obvious, just to highlight how silly their argument is. It's like, imagine if you went to the doctor and you're like, oh man, it hurts when I walk. And the doctor's like, well, don't walk. Here's a scooter. It'll drive you around everywhere. The only reason why their argument carries any weight whatsoever is because it's what people wanna fucking hear. Yeah. That's the only reason why. If it's because people want to hear that because it's the easier path. Oh, okay, I'll just quit. I'll just do something different. Or I can't do an overhead press. Oh, it's okay. Don't do that anymore. It's like, well, you never wanna be able to reach over your head with some strength. Squatting, standing in squat. It's like, name another leg exercise that is as functional in real life. I mean, you're gonna have to squat at some point. Strengthen, don't lose that ability. So when people are like, oh, I can't squat, it hurts. And then you've got these stupid social media coaches who are like, you can develop great quads without ever squatting it. Well, okay, maybe technically, but why? That is a fundamental movement. He's got pain with it. Let's figure out what's going on. I think I'm so passionate about it because this is where at 26 or so is about where I'm at, where I am abandoning it. I'm having issues and I'm abandoning. It wasn't until I was like 30 before I really started to work the other direction. And I tell you what, I'm so glad I did because I find myself probably, I don't know, 50% of the time when I'm with my son, I'm in that position. And I'm comfortable. I'm comfortably down in that position and able to play with him on the floor. And I don't have to be like, and I do, I have vivid memories of seeing my stepdad and like other dads of that who was like, lay on their side and stuff to like play with their kid. Yeah, it's like you're 35 or 40 years old and you can't even get down on it, get down. And their knees are too bad to get down on a knee. They can't squat all the way down. It's a compound effect to that too. If you can't squat, what's that gonna do your knees? What's that gonna do to your ankles? Like your entire kinetic chain is gonna be affected by that decision. So you might as well like put the work in now. So long-term you're pain-free. Look, when I can't do a common exercise, there's a lot of crazy stuff out there that I can't do. That's totally fine, okay? I can't walk on my hands. That's okay because I'm never gonna need to walk my hands. But if I can't do a common exercise, then what I'm trying to do is figure out why. Why can't I do this one common movement? Why is it hurt? Let me fix that. Let me figure that out so I can do it because I don't plan on not working out anymore in five years. I plan on doing this for the rest of my life. And I feel like there's two big ones that are commonly let go and that's the barbell overhead press and the barbell back squat. Those two movements I think are so important to be able to do. And if you can't do them right now, then you should be working towards that. I am not gonna call anyone out, but I do remember specifically when we were going through fitness models to find people for our programs. So if you buy one of our programs, you'll notice we're not the ones demoing the exercise anymore, it's fitness models. And I specifically remember Justin coming in the day after interviewing these people, having physique competitors and bodybuilders do exercise and then coming back to me like, they couldn't do an overhead prep. I mean, develop muscular shoulders, everything. Yeah, they look great. But yeah, they couldn't even do a basic function of an overhead position. Yeah, so, and do you wanna lose that ability? That's silly. So I know it's nice to look good, I get that. But if you hear a fitness influencer tell you, no, don't worry about that, it hurts, try something else, it's much easier and you'll still develop a nice looking physique. Change the channel, don't follow them, they're morons. Look, if you like our information, head over to mindpumpfree.com. You'll find a ton of free guides that can help you with almost any health or fitness goal. You can also find all of us on social media. So Justin is on Instagram at Mind Pump, Justin, Adam is on Instagram at Mind Pump, Adam. And you can only find me on Twitter at Mind Pump, Sal.