 Our next caller is Patty from New York. Hi, Patty, how can we help you? Hi, so I am, first of all, I love you guys. I listen to you guys every morning. It's so cool to be talking to you. I'm calling about my MAPS anabolic progress. So I ran an anabolic, absolutely loved it, was really happy with my squat and my deadlift progress. I tested my wonder at maxes before and after, and I was really happy with that, but my bench and my strict press, like, terrible progress, only five pounds on my bench and nothing on my overhead. So, and I've been stuck at the same weight since like the end of last year. So I'm looking to rerun anabolic and make some like modifications and changes to it so I can address where I kind of lagged in my progress. So I'm just wondering, you know, what do you guys recommend I should do? What should I be incorporating or changing to help progress my upper body as much as, or at least close to what I'm progressing on my lower body? Just one little wrinkle is I do have lupus. So my energy is kind of not always the most predictable. So I don't do any of the trigger sessions, two to three days full body seems to be my kind of happy spot. Okay, I'm glad you added that part because that definitely changes, you know, what my answer would be. So first number one, it's quite common for a female to see really good gains in lower body type movements and much slower gains in upper body movements. That's quite common, but the question you're asking is, you know, how can I get my bench and my overhead press to go up? And because you have the lupus, what we're not gonna do is just add volume to your workout, which is typically without. Yes, having to work. Yeah, typically I'd recommend that. So what we're gonna do instead is a volume transfer. Okay, so what I would have you do is reduce the amount of sets that you're doing for your squats and your deadlifts and add those to those exercises that you want to improve your bench press and overhead press. Yeah, so it sounds like you found your sweet spot for total volume. I would stay within that and then do that volume transfer. By the way, I've trained many people with lupus and if you find the right amount of volume, you can make great progress. But as you know. Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah, as you know, if you go over it, then, you know, it's a disaster. Yeah, it's a good word for it. Patty, how long have you been training for? So on and off for like maybe two years, but I finally decided to stop being scared of the heavier weights and really focused in more last year and then, you know, overdid it. So I've been really good, really consistent since September. I haven't had to take any breaks, which is actually a big deal. So that's when I really got more serious and my husband told me to stop being afraid of trying to see how, you know, how strong I really was. Awesome, awesome. I love that advice. Oh, you got plenty of room for gain still, then. That's great. Oh, yeah, I'm not pulling some great numbers, you know. So are you, are you working out from home or are you working out in a gym? Yeah, I have a decent home set up. So I've got an adjustable bench with one of those like adjustable racks over it. And I have a cable machine. Okay. So the other thing is this too. So, I mean, of course, we always encourage everybody to follow the programs to a T when you first go through them, just so you can kind of get the philosophy of the programming. And of course, many of those exercises are some of the biggest bang for your buck. But here's an example where you can start to kind of manipulate and change movements in here. So I would also recommend, you know, subbing out some of the, you know, shoulder press or bench exercise for other bench or shoulder exercise or chest exercises. So, you know, feel free to get creative. Now, I wouldn't completely leave barbell movements, but there's exercises in there that you can exchange or change out or add to your routine. And like Sal saying, if you cut back on two sets of, you know, your squats, you can do two sets of a total different chest exercise or a shoulder exercise, which you'll probably get good benefits from that because your body's not used to that exercise. Now, Patty, have you noticed any sticking points in those lifts? Like, are there any part of the movements that you feel like, you know, you lose strength in? Yeah, so when I'm doing my overhead press, I can definitely, I've tried playing around with push presses. I thought maybe that would help me build it up a little bit. So I know I can go heavier, but when I'm on my weight that I'm stuck at, if I try and go any heavier, I get stuck with the bar, like right about in line with my nose, and I can't quite get past that, but I can hold the thing over my head for like forever. Okay, so this is more like on the lockout portion, you know, for overhead. Do you feel it's a little bit unstable, so like in terms of like being able to control the weight or is this just like a, you know, you're pushing it up, you just don't feel like you have that extra to extend? Yeah, I feel like I don't have enough gas in the tank to make it past that one point. Kind of like it's like a bump in the road, I can't get over. Yeah, you could do carries where you're, so you said you're strong at the very top. Yes. I stand there all day, it's ridiculous. But it's when you're at your nose level that you get stuck. Yeah, I can't get past that. So you could do isometrics in that position. So you could literally get a barbell, put it underneath the rack so that you push up, you're not gonna go anywhere, and then do 10 seconds of pushing up with high intensity in that isometric position, and do some sets there. And what you'll get is this strength gain in that position at about 15 degrees up and down from it. I would love that as Epress here. Yes. I would love that as Epress. Oh yeah, that's a good idea. I would love to put a Z-Press, because you'll see carry over into your bench exercise from the Z-Press also. And when I get stuck or have somebody who gets stuck right where you're talking about, sometimes too, if I can develop their core strength, because that's kind of what happens. When you're ready to get to that nose point, you'll start to feel the tendency of the back wanting to arch or to kind of lean back for leverage. And if you have a really stable, good solid core, and you've built some strength there, sometimes that will engage and that will help you kind of get through the rest of the lift. Z-Press is great for that. I think that's money. That's perfect advice. Also, to add to that, I mean, I'm always voice and rotational movements. I think taking dumbbells or kettlebells through a rotational spiraling type of a press will really help to you feel a lot more controlled, a lot more stabilized in the shoulder joint, which then tells the body everything is secure so we can actually apply a bit more force. So the part of the recruitment process is really being able to generate that force in those parts of the lift, where you feel like there's a discrepancy. So to add things like that, to supplement, to really enhance the stability of the overall movement is gonna help. Okay, cool. All right, thanks for calling in, Patty. Thank you, guys. Love the show. Bye. Thank you. I love getting feedback like that from somebody that she's doing well, just has a couple questions. And that's, you know, exactly. If you follow one of our programs, first time around, follow as it's laid out, as you, when you're done with it and you go back through the second time around, now you can start to modify because there are always individual variances. This is why a personal trainer is such an incredible investment because they could train just you and not anybody else. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I love the Z-Press for this. Like, I can literally remember being stuck at that place with shoulder presses. And this was one of the things that I felt I broke through when I started to incorporate the Z-Press. And I also am somebody, now I don't know, we didn't get a chance to ask her on how much she trains core or not, but I do have a tendency personally to neglect it. That forces you to do that. It forces you to really lock that in as you're pressing and doesn't allow you to cheat the route. I think it's because, yeah, a lot of times it is your core, it's the lack of stabilization, especially when you're going for that last bit to lock out, because I was gonna, you know, point to the fact of the overhead carries like we, you know, that's usually like bringing it all the way up and overhead is usually a sticking point for a lot of people to feel like, you know, they don't have stability there. Or in the rack position, you know, there's a lot of loss of energy because, you know, just to get the kind of support and stability initially, you know, you lose a lot of that if you don't have that right away. So your lift gets affected.