 When picking a protein powder, here are the two most important things you should consider. Number one. Make sure it's got protein in it. That's right. No. Number one. That is important. It needs to be free from impurities. Believe it or not, a remarkable amount of protein powders have high amounts of heavy metals. That's not good for you. Number two, is it easily digestible for you? That's it. Those are the two things you need to consider. Aside from that, I mean, what kind of protein you get, the flavor, all that stuff, not nearly as important. So free from impurities and is it easy to digest? This is what people need to focus on. Last episode before we go on vacation, I thought I'd fuck with you in your intro there. My intro there? Yeah. You did good. Didn't break stride. That's pretty good. So there is actually one more thing that I think is important to consider. At least I remember this being a challenge with clients when they would go out to go buy protein, right? So I would typically tell my client like, oh, here's a couple of brands that I like, right? You check these out and, you know, inevitably, you know, one out of three would come back with a brand that I didn't say, you know, and then they would be like, oh, I found this one. It was cheaper. It was way cheaper, you know. And one of the things that the, one of the hustles of many hustles that the supplement industry has, but one of the hustles in the protein market, because that's the most expensive part is the amount of protein in there. And then is it like third party tested? And is it actually got what it's saying, right? So the first hustle of the amount of protein it's in it, some of these protein powders, you'll notice need two scoops in order to get like the amount of protein that you're looking for. So it'll be like 40 grams of protein, but then it's like two scoops. So one scoop is only 20 grams. The protein powder that I wanted you to get was say 38 grams of protein and it was one scoop. And so, and then you're looking at the weights about the same. And so a lot of people don't pay attention to the serving size and the ratio of protein per scoop makes a big difference on the price point. A lot of times. And so it's one of those hustles that protein powders will do is they'll make it look like it's a better deal because it's cheaper. But in reality, you're getting half the protein in the, in the total job. So protein is a sugary powder. Yeah, 100%. Like here, so here's what's crazy with the protein powder market. If you look at the actual investigative studies on protein powders, they are dismal, okay? There were protein companies, large ones that were caught doing what's called amino acid spiking. So what is that? When companies go in to test the protein powder to see if it actually has as much protein as it says it has, they don't test all the amino acids. That's way too expensive. They'll test certain key amino acids and if they're at a certain amount, they can deduce and say, okay, there's 30 grams of protein per serving. So what do these companies do? They would have crap protein in there and then just spike it with extra amino acid powder so that it would show up on the test and it would show, oh, it's got this much protein. So they lied. Number two, remember that big study on vegan protein powders that came out? All the metals. Heavy, the heavy metal content in them was so bad that if you took a scoop of this every day, like most people do, and you did it for like a couple of years, you would have heavy metal concentrations in your system that would cause side effects, adverse effects, neurological effects, anxiety, inflammation, hormonal effects. And what sucks about that is you would have no idea it was your protein powder. You would go to the doctor, doctor would be like, I don't know what's wrong with you. You go to this person, I don't know what's wrong with you. I'm gonna test my gut, what's happening. And you think this protein powder couldn't possibly be it until you got your metals tested and then you'd have to like go through all your products. Now why vegan specifically? Like why did they? Herbicides and pesticides. Right, okay, okay. Herbicides and pesticides, the organic ones, believe it or not, were higher in heavy metals because organic pesticides are higher in some of these heavy metals. Now, at the time, this is- Why is it, oh, because they're pulling from things like beans and stuff. Okay, I was like, that was a good question, Justin. I was like, you know what, I've never thought about why. Yeah, but that's why. But that's why. Yeah, yes. So- Like what are the top four things that vegan proteins derive their protein from? I know- Soy, rice, peas, amaranth. They'll have pumpkin seeds. And all those are getting blasted with pesticides. They can, right? And so- Different than pulling from dairy. Yes, yes. Now, with milk, whey protein, that's where the amino acid spiking was happening. There could be other stuff in there that have been found in other tests. But I remember when that happened, we were all up in arms. We got this report, I immediately got on the phone with OrganiFi. This was years ago. And by the way, this is- When we first started working with them. This was a turning point. This was one of the most memorable moments in our relationship with OrganiFi because of how they responded. I got on the phone with them and I said, are yours tested? Because if they're not tested, we will stop selling them until it's verified that they're not high in heavy metals. I'm not going to advocate that my listeners take your product and I take your product and we're essentially poisoning people. And they said, no, no, no, already ahead of you. They sent me third-party testing very clean. So that's why that's important. And then the second one is digestibility because if you're eating the amount of protein that is considered optimal for muscle building, fat loss, for satiety, for recovery, all that stuff, it's a lot of protein. So if you're taking a protein powder to make up the difference, you're probably taking anywhere between 30 to 80 grams of protein versus worth of protein powder. If it throws your digestion off, it's causing more inflammation and over time you're going to get not just less out of it, it's causing more harm than good. Now I say this because a lot of people, myself included when I was a kid, I thought it was just part of the game. You take protein powder, you have gas, you have digestive issues, they call protein farts or whatever. No, that's not good. Taking an extra 30 grams of protein that disrupts your gut health is not worth the 30 grams of protein. So it should feel like when you take your protein powder, you should feel like that was so easy to digest. That was really good. And then it should be very clean. It should provide you, if you ask for it with testing, is this tested for heavy metals, Organifi takes it a step further and tests for glyphosate residue. They even test and show that their products are glyphosate residue-free. Glyphosates are the roundup, right, the herbicide that's sprayed all over genetically modified plants. That's been linked to non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and people who use it has been shown to potentially disrupt the gut microbiome and all that stuff. Today's giveaway is MAPS anabolic advanced. If you want to win that program, do this. Leave a comment below this video in the first 24 hours that we drop it. Subscribe to this channel and turn on notifications. If you win, we'll let you know in the comment section. We're also running a huge, huge promotion right now because it's the beginning of the year. Check this out. We have four program bundles, each one of them between 300 to $350 off. The first one is the new to weightlifting bundle. The second one is the body transformation bundle. The third one is the new year extreme intensity bundle. And the fourth one is the body transformation bundle 2.0. All of them on sale right now. Just click on the link at the top of the description below. All right. Back to the show. Well, that's crazy because even then like the plants would have to be covered because the rain itself they've tested has like glyphosate residue in it. So it's pretty difficult to abide by that kind of a state. You know what happens is some organic farms, they'll be an organic farm. Next to it is another one. That's right. And they'll fly the plane over and blast glyphosates over their plants and they'll be a little bit. There was a documentary. What documentary was that where they did that and there was like an organic farm that was just next to a bunch of other ones that was all they were failing all their tests and stuff like that because of just the wind blowing it over. Bro, it goes even farther. It goes even farther. So Monsanto corn, right? GMO corn, which is a product, a patented product of a company like Monsanto. They sell you the corn and then they sell you the glyphosate to go along with it. The corn has been modified to not die when spread with this herbicide. So they blast their fields of corn. Corn survives because it's been genetically modified, but all the other plants die. Did you know? This is what the documentary was about that it blew over and it changed this guy's crop. They sued them. They sued them. They're using the product. That's what the documentary was. I was like, I know I watched a documentary that was related to that. And that's what it was. That was horseshit. Yes. So they would go in this organic farmer who's not even planting your patented corn because some of the corn from the field over, obviously the wind blows, whatever some seeds come over, they find some in your crop, sued them and won. And this was like a game that they were playing. Oh, wow. By the way, do you guys know the history of how GMOs became? I don't remember what document. You must have watched the same documentary as I did. I've watched it a long time ago. It wasn't a documentary. I've just read about it. Oh, yeah. There's a whole documentary about it. That's terrible. It was really good. It told the whole story of the big loss because it happened to someone in particular that it really fucked them and they were trying to, they were intentionally trying to bully him out and that was like one of the strategies that they used. Do you know how they got these things to become patented? It went all the way up to, I mean, some of the top courts. Because you're not allowed to patent plants or nature. So they made the argument that this is not natural. But the argument was we're going to, we want this to be able to be patented because it's our product. We modified it in a lab. However, we also want to be able to call it corn because we don't want the consumer to look at the ingredient list and see GMO corn. We know that that would not let us sell as many. So we want to be able to patent it, but also call it the same name as its natural counterpart. So dumb. Other products like this, I don't know if you guys know this. I don't know if you guys know this, where they, they'll get approval to name something, something weird. Aren't they going to go through this? They're going to go through the same thing with meat, right? Yes. I mean, we're going to have that same problem. It was like, they're going to want to name it meat. It's like, it's really not though, right? No. And there's also, there are other things that they'll, it'll be like AP 45 or something like that in the ingredient. You don't know what it is. Is that the doc right there? Dude, what's it called? Yeah, 2008, the world according to Monsanto. Yeah. Didn't Monsanto make Agent Orange? I don't know if that's the doc. I believe they did. They did. Okay. Cause I know it was like Bear did a lot of the poisonous gases. They did the poisonous gas in the concentration camps. Yeah. That's what Bear did, a German company. Really dark history. I know. But so Monsanto made Agent Orange, they used in Vietnam to clear, make clearings in the forest, in the jungle for to land their helicopters. And a lot of soldiers came back with, with illnesses and cancers. Was your dad exposed to Agent Orange? Yeah, yeah. He was? Yeah, he was a little bit to where he's actually now that there was like a class action kind of a thing that you had to go get Psyche Val and all this kind of stuff. And he's now receiving like medical benefits like slightly now. But he's like, I mean, he's late seventies, you know, at this point. So it's already done. It's, it's damaged. But yeah, dude, it's, you know what else was crazy? I was thinking about this, like, you know how this big hustle of like trying to repurpose like petroleum and then like turn into plastics and do all these things. You know, they actually made like sweeteners out of petroleum, like what the fuck? Do you know, do you know, if we were eating all this stuff, if we eliminated petroleum, how screwed would it be? Do you know how many products and medicines and plastics and yeah, of course, fuel and stuff is based off petroleum. It's crazy. If you look it up, yeah, that was the double edged sword, right? Oh yeah, there, there's a chart that shows, uh, the use of oil or petroleum and the worldwide population and it just, it spurred this explosion. So it's like, there's a lot of challenges with it, but also like, we can't take it away because. Yeah, we, it's essential, the way we structured it. Oh yeah. Yeah. Clothes and medicines and all kinds of crazy stuff. Yeah. With protein powders, people are so concerned with like, you know, which one is the, has the best amino acid profile. Which one is the most anabolic or whatever? Um, and yes, if, if they're, if they're all clean and they all are easy to digest, that's something you should consider. But if you have one protein powder that is not equivalent in terms of bio, you know, it's not as bio available. For example, let's look at, like you could go with collagen, for example, or, you know, bone broth protein, uh, versus let's say whey or vegan protein versus whey, whey is more bio available, more anabolic, but if whey, you don't digest well and vegan or bone broth, you do digest well, go with the one that you digest well, it's going to do you better, it'll do you much better. Yeah. So anyway, I've actually been doing the, the paleo valley one a lot. I did the bone broth, the bone broth one that you've finally, you got a song. What I haven't tried is I saw, we have a bunch of, we have a vanilla and we have the unflavored, I'm almost out of the, the one that you call the chocolate donut one. Oh yeah. Once that's done, I'll try the, the other one, but I just noticed that I can, I can push it all the way up to like 50, 60 grams and not have any problems with it. Speaking of paleo valley, you use their, their beef tallow? Oh yeah. So should anybody else use it? Yeah. I have, did she send all of us? So we all got it, right? So every year around Thanksgiving. That's an old school oil to cook with. Yeah. We cooked the potatoes like with it. Oh, off air. Doug and I were talking about that's what air fryer. That's what McDonald's used to use. Originally. Oh my God. It was like way better. Yeah. Crispy and everything. Do you know why they stopped using it? I cooked the steak in there. Oh, you did. Yeah. You put it in a pan and everything. Well, I mean, I, I slow cooked it first, right? So I took it, I brought it up to the temperature just like we talked the other day about, and then I, you know, reverse seared it and then I just finished it in the tallow. So the tallow, what's the difference between that butter, whatever that you used before, the flavor and. Yeah. So it has a little bit of, yeah, has that kind of beef flavor to it. So it's a little bit different flavor than like a butter does. It, you know, it, it burns off at a higher temperature. So like if you're cooking, like if you, if you sear a steak on like a cast iron and you use like, say butter or olive oil, well, olive oil, not so much too, well, olive oil too, actually, you'll notice that when you get it real, because I get it really, really hot, it'll, it'll start to, to burn off. Yeah. It'll smoke and burn off. The tallow like stays in there. So I didn't need to, I didn't need as much and I was scooping it like I would butter because I would like. It's supposed to be ideal for high temperature cooking. Right. Which means you don't need as much if you're just doing like a sear like I was doing. So I definitely overdid it on the amount in there, not thinking that about the temperature that it burns at. And so it stayed like, and so, which is kind of nice. If you're going to sear something like that, it would have lasted a lot longer than like, you know, you know, what's, what's clarified butter called again, ghee or butter or oil like that. So it's nice. Now I'll be able to just use like a little tablespoon of it where I put a pretty big gob on there that had like a deep fried my steak, deep fried my steak a little more than I was trying to. But I mean, it did make this, you know, beautiful brown crust on the steak and I had slow cooked it. So it was a good steak. You guys know why I mean, Donald stopped using beef tello? It got sued by a vegan because they said you didn't tell me that this. So off air, Doug and I were talking about this and I heard him say that he heard or believes that after that, when they switched over to vegetable oil, that they put something in it to still give you kind of that, that, you know, iconic flavor. Oh yeah, some kind of beef flavor. Oh no, they went if you, but it used to be beef tello. That's what we fry our fries now. They went to their engineers. They went to their engineers and scientists and basically engineered an oil and, you know, flavoring and stuff to make it taste like beef tello. So we went from beef tello, natural, one ingredient to franken oil and stuff. Yeah, I hope it tastes like it. Uh huh. Uh huh. I wish I remember because you said that was 80s, 90s. When was it? I think it was 1980 when they switched. I don't remember how the fries. Find out when it switched before then. I think it was 1980 80. This is like the fries are epic. I mean, that's the best fries when they're hot. Yeah. McDonald's fried. They've engineered the shit out of those. Is yeah, is they definitely have figured that I tell you guys. I had McDonald's like a vegan in McDonald's. Huh? Why are they hanging out at McDonald's? I'm wrong. It's 1990. So we grew up eating real French fries as kids. Yes. Yeah. So yeah, that's all silent now. Well, no, I'm just going to moment there. Well, what I'm thinking is how much McDonald's that I really have before. I mean, I did eat their fries. Somebody said nine years old from you, they switched over. And so I don't know how much McDonald's we have. I mean, when I was a kid. Like you, McDonald's was like a big treat. Oh yeah. So maybe a handful of times I had it. Oh, when I was a kid, McDonald's was a big deal. I ate most of it. You know, it's bad. I probably ate most of my fast food as a teenager and young trainer. Pretty good by yourself. Yeah. Yeah. So from, you know, probably. 12th junior. Yeah. 13th, 15th to, you know, 20th. Here's when I ate fast food. First of all, it was a big deal. Like we ate out once in a great while. And when we did, it would be either McDonald's or KFC or if it was a really big deal, we go out to pizza. But it wasn't often because it was too expensive for us. Or when I would go to work with my dad in the summer. So in the summers, I'd work with my dad and I'd be his helper and he didn't pay me. But what he would do for me is every morning on the way to the job, he would stop by McDonald's and let me order, you know, their breakfast sandwiches. You know what I think is one of the most interesting things about my journey of eating fast food and not eating fast food is that I wish someone told me, maybe when I was younger or even when I was in my early 20s and I was still eating it, is once you've disciplined yourself to get it completely out of your life, it never tastes as good as it used to taste when you were eating it habitually. You have to work in, you have to work it out. You have to eat it for a while. Which to me, it just highlights the level of processing that are in there. Totally. I experienced this with even like protein bars. I told you guys my journey with like the quest bars and like completely not eating them. And then coming back and going like, oh, these aren't that good. And then like still eating them and then going, oh, these are great. And then, oh my God, I'm craving these. I want lots of these. Like that's the similar journey like with fast food. Like, you know, my memories as a kid or early 20s eating all these fast food restaurants were, oh my God, it was so amazing and you craved it. And then I got rid of it like completely and didn't have it in my life for years. And then remember reintroducing it. Oh, you know, it's been so long since I've had a whopper. It doesn't taste as good as you remember. Oh, it's awful. It just, it doesn't hit. It doesn't hit the same. It doesn't sit in you the same. You know which one's the worst. It's like the best blessing in disguise is that you, you know, I know I'll never ever go back to wanting that all the time. And I know there's people out there listening right now who have probably never consistently cut, say fast food out for years out of their life and then done that. And anybody who has, I guarantee, has experienced exactly what I'm talking about. And so if you're that person who wants to, and I do that, the trick is to, to eliminate it for a long enough period of time that it gets rid of that. Remember the documentary, Super Size Me? The guy was eating McDonald's every day. And he said, I don't remember what week it was, but maybe week two, he said, wow, now I'm actually starting to crave it. Whereas at first he kind of felt like, oh, this is too much. That's right, he did talk about that. He did talk about how it wasn't that good. And he was forcing himself and then you see him change, yeah, like, oh, so good. The worst one for that where you remember it tasting better than it was is Taco Bell. Taco Bell, when I was a kid, I don't know, I remember it tasting good, right? Have you ever had a bean burrito as an adult? What is that? It's literally, what is it? It's just, I don't know. It's like gelatinous. Yeah, dude, ooze. You're like, what is this? It's terrible. It's like a, yeah. My school served them. We actually, at lunch, we had bean burritos. Yeah, you should look that up because you brought that up and I told you that. Yeah, he's the pounder. It was, Taco Bell did have. You like that much? Yeah. It was something, they had a partnership with schools. Look that, look up Taco Bell partners with the education system or something, Doug, because there was a period of time when I was in high school when that was the only, like we had, I think two options. It was a bean burrito or something else. I don't know if I remember what the second thing was, but there was two things. All we had was bean burritos. Maybe it was only bean burritos. It was like one or two things. You know, we had, I don't know why I just remember this. There were two items at lunch that were like, like this is what you got. Chilupas. This is what you got, so what? It wasn't a chilupa? No, no. I just like saying that. That was way before, bro. Chilupa didn't come out until later. Chilupas were around when we were in high school. That's an American made up, that's not a real thing. Andrew Chilupa is not a real Mexican food, right? Bro, that's so racist. Why are you asking him? Because he's Mexican. Who else am I asking here? I'm not gonna ask you because you barely know. He knows. He counts. He's upset right now because he knows. I even asking him made him upset. It's not a real food. When I was a kid, it was in high school, either the bean burrito or cheese bread. We had something called cheese bread that everybody wanted to eat. The pizza. We had a round table, did a thing. Oh, you guys had a round table? Yeah, it was a cheese bread. Damn, bro. Too expensive school? Yeah, I mean, just. Oh, the cafeteria, the cheese bread? Yeah, I know this. Pizza. It was like French bread, pizza things. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Did you figure it out, Doug? Well, I see that Taco Bell did supply burritos to some schools. This was back in 1993, this article. Well, it was 96 when I was in high school. So maybe it was the leftovers from 93. Yeah, maybe. The Porkin's got it in 96. What was the cheapest, dude? That was the cheapest option. That's why everybody go there. It was brought to yours high school in 93, when every high school got it. My school got it, dude, in 96. Would they excel? You have to send these to Porkin's. They won't know the difference. Just freeze it, it's fine. To be clear on the chalupa thing, it is a Mexican tradition. It is? Yeah, man. It's basically just masa or corn, dough in like a boat shape, like a taco shape. Oh my god. It's a real thing. Thank you for pointing out something wrong again, Andrew. How about the chimichanga? Chimichanga, I haven't had a lot of those. Is that a real Mexican food? I wouldn't be surprised if that was. The Mexican pizza was the best thing to talk about, hands down. Oh my god, what are you doing? Mexican pizza was the best. By the way, going back to the McDonald's thing, it looks like they did that because of health reasons. Not because they were sued? Health? Yeah. Boy, this is what I'm hearing. I'm sure. I'm attacking vegans for no reasons. I'm sure. Health reasons, because of the trans, I mean, because of the saturated fats. So they replaced with trans fats. Yeah, they replaced it with trans fats. They've since twice changed their formulation. What's that have to do with this? Because the trans genders, we got no more of them. Trans fat is fat that identifies itself. Anyway, after they made that switch to the new oil, their stock went way down. Oh, it did. Yeah, yeah. Because people liked the old price. Did I tell you guys I had a bunch of McDonald's like four weeks ago? Really? Yeah, so we had a handful of times we've mentioned this in the parking lot, starting to believe that you have a little bit of a McDonald's addiction. No, no, no, no, no, no. We had a bunch of kids over to make cookies, Christmas cookies. So we had to all eat my cousins. I brought their kid my right toe about this. And then I'm like, oh, crap, we should get food for everybody. And it's a bunch of little kids. And I don't want to deal with like, what do you want? So you're like, I'm going to poison them with McDonald's. I ordered a big ass thing of chicken nuggets, bro. Chicken nuggets and a big ass thing of fries. So I had a few of them, OK? And immediately I could feel the depression. Like I ate it, and I felt like, ugh. So you feeding all those kids McDonald's, how is that different than the mom giving the six-year-old laxatives? Wow, that's a little bit of a jump. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. Come on, guy. That one mom, you might as well be poison to my kid. Walks out all angry after, you know, putting frosting on the cookies. Yeah, right. Cookie with frosting. That's that mom. Do you guys ever go to a birthday party where instead of a chocolate cake, it was a carob cake? Do you guys ever do that? It's a carob cake. Carob is a terrible, terrible replacement for chocolate. For some reason, health people thought this is like chocolate. No, it's not. I mean, look up carob. Yeah, I've tried it before. So there was a period where people thought chocolate was bad for you. And so they obviously like everything. They come up with some piece of garbage that is probably really, really bad. With a ton of sugar anyways, right? Chimichangas from Arizona, not Mexico. So there you go. Yeah. You know what I like about them? I don't eat the chimichangas. I don't even hear you guys. He mentioned it. You know what I like about chimichangas? You know what I like about American foods that are invented to sound like ethnic foods? The way they name them. That's such an American person going, what do you mean to call this? They've been something that's held Spanish. Chimichanga? Yeah. OK, OK, dude. What's the Italian version of that? I mean, you got Chef Borridi's creations. But that's not as actual. Do you know that? His real name is Bollardi. Bollardi. Yeah, they change the spelling. I told you guys about that. Hey, I want to hear about your incredible experience with the DOP. Why? You don't want to? Yeah, I do, bro. How now are they have they come up to 1990 standards? They're still behind. What's going on? So I bought a car. Oh, that's what you have to register it? Yeah. And if you don't register in a certain amount of time, like you get like all these like fines. Of course. And not only that, apparently you have to drive it there so they inspect it. So you drove it there? You need a cop friend, bro. A cop can come to your house and actually do all that stuff. Really? Yes, that's why I had just done. Remember when I told you? Yeah, yeah. Well, I do need a cop friend. Yeah, yeah. I didn't have to go to DMV at all. You know what your problem is? You know what your problem is? You're a lone ranger. You're never asking anybody to do it. That's right. That is your fault. He has a cop friend for you. I just wore this because I knew I'd be crabby today. Yeah. That's not why you wore it. You wore it because you beat crabs again. Good job. Congratulations. OK, so you went down there to register the car. Yeah. Without the car. Did you have problems? Yeah, I did have problems, yeah. And it wasn't because of that. I could have came back for that. But apparently, so I got it from a dealer who sent me the paperwork of the loan, all this stuff. And the guy didn't sign off a wet signature on this one form. This is like bureaucracy 101, dude. It's always like, and I'm like, I just knew it was going to be some form or something or some stamp or some person that's going to give me a hassle. So I was just like expecting it. And of course, you know, to no avail, like we can't process this because it doesn't have the wet signature from this. And so if I did that, you know, it would be invalid and whatever. Dude, I stopped listening and I was like, OK, lady, you know, what do I got to do? So she stamps it. I'm like, I just want to avoid the fines. And so I have to like write up something to try and plead the fact that I'm there. I'm on time. I'm doing my thing, but the dealer kind of screwed me because they didn't sign this thing. And so that's where I'm at. Oh, man. So it was a waste of time. Oh, my God. 100% a waste of time. Wow. It's always a waste of time. Wow. Because it's not really a business. No, dude. It's it's just a thing. It's like a if they probably. But I had to do a hassle doing the car was such a hassle. It's such a pain in the ass, all the things that you have to do. And and you add in the fact. I don't know what you're dealing with right now with insurance. Like insurance is a pain in the ass. Thankfully, like because it's an older car, like there was the Grundy. It's it they cover a lot of these older cars. It wasn't a hassle at all. The reason why it's such a pain in the ass. The reason why when you go to the DMV and everything looks like it's from 1995 and everybody's slow as hell and it's redundant as hell. The reason is because they don't go out of business. There's no competition. They don't go out of business. There's no competition. Imagine if we could say if we were the only fitness podcast that existed, yeah, gentlemen, we would suck. We wouldn't be really you know, you don't have to try. That's the thing I always like. And so I didn't have my earphones or anything. Normally, I would do that to try and like, you know, have my own little space, but I didn't. And so I'm sitting there and then you'd listen to all these conversations. People are having it like how pissed off everybody is about like, well, you guys didn't notify me. I'm here. I got all this, you know, just like this guy's raging with this lady who chooses to work at the DMV. I would hate that. I don't think you do. That's like, that's like, dude, not that's I don't think I don't think any kid grew up. It was like, I want to work at the DMV when I get older. I think that's like, so the first person you meet, like, can barely speak English when I'm getting in there, too. And I'm like, what? Like, you don't have like, I'm sorry, but like your first person, your interaction, your meeting with to like direct you around like, like this is this is a problem. Yeah. Like it's a cluster. It's a cluster. So that's what I had. It's infuriating to me. It's infuriating. Makes you almost want to give the car back. Fucking keep the goddamn car. I'm going to be a leader. I don't even want this thing anymore. It's gas, you know, they don't like gas here, you know, already. Like, yeah, it's a full gas. It's a gas car. Yeah. Wait, that you had to mark that. Well, they almost try to make me smog, even though it's like 60s, you know, and I'm like, no, no, no, no. Like it doesn't need to be smog because it's an older vehicle. You're like, well, they want to know the they want to know the engine, everything, which they're real invasive these days. Yeah. California rocks. This was America. You ever watched that? It's not really America anymore. You guys ever watched that old, old video? It was like, it was like 1980. I think they filmed it and it was a town in Texas. OK, that had just passed the drunk driving law. It's the funniest video you've ever seen in your life. So they're interviewing people who are driving. And it's almost like these dudes driving home from work and they just passed a law. This is un-American. Yeah. You know, just want to have a beer after work and chill out. This guy's like, I work so hard. I just want to crack open the beer on the way home. What the hell is the problem? I thought this was America. I'm fucking dying. Put in a hard day's work, put in 11, 12 hours a day and then getting your truck in the least rain, one or two beers. They're making laws where you can't drink when you want to. Can't you have to wear a seat belt when you're driving? Pretty soon we're going to become this country. Do you speak Thai? We take it too far. Dude, I saw I saw this crazy video. I guess there's a place. I don't know if it's in New Zealand or somewhere else. I don't think it's America. But there was like this stunt where they had dogs driving cars. Like they literally teach dogs to drive cars and they have it all set up. So the pedals and everything in the shift, like the dogs doing all the things and turning. And I'm like, this is crazy. But then it started to make sense because they were doing this all to like for adoption, for for dogs. I was going to get you to adopt the dog. Yeah, it's like, oh, this dog is capable of so much. If you just teach him, there's my designated driver. Yeah, I always wanted to get pulled over. You're like, yeah, yeah, this guy was driving. He's all over the place. That's his beer. He saw a squirrel, dude. I just goes after it. He sees a cat driving. Car chase. We'll put that video. I'm not even joking. This is a real thing. Wow, dude, dogs, you know, you know, dog. I think was it a dog that was the first and like organic, like, you know, Oh, it's a good space, right? It was a dog. Dog or monkey? He was a monkey. I think it was a dog was the first. Let's not say chimpanzee. I thought the Soviet Soviet Soviet sent up a dog. I thought it was a chimpanzee. That's why the whole Planet of the Apes movie was all made based around that. No, was it made? I don't know about that. It's something to do with that. Isn't that what they think? I don't think so. But I know that I thought that was based. I thought that was. Yes, you're correct. It is a dog, but Nick, too. Wow. Yeah, don't make up for you being wrong earlier. I'm not going to give you that one. This cancels your chalupa, bro. All you do is cancel the chalupa. It's just cancel the chalupa. Yeah, we're at zero dogs. Hey, what's that dog thinking, too, by the way? Like he gets in there, like, he's looking at everybody. All right, guys. Oh, shit. Yeah, I don't think you made it back alive, though, right? I don't think so. Oh, really? Yeah, I think they just got him up there. And then that's a. That's a dark. That's fucked. Well, I mean. This is before Peter would have been all over their ass, for sure, Peter. Well, we got him there. Yeah, I said Peter, not Peter, Doug. I think I said Peter. No, I did not say Peter. We can send all the Peetos out the space forever. It's up there, shoot them all out there. Wow. Are you guys all. So what's everybody got for Christmas Day? Who's are you with a big family group? Are you with a big family group? It is Christmas. Oh, you do. We're doing Christmas Eve alone because, you know, we wanted to have a nice intimate setting. This is like one of the compromise, you know, things that we do because all of our all our events are with my, you know, massive. Yeah, I meant to ask you that. What has, what, what traditional things around the holidays have changed for you since you have Jessica now? What is she, what, what is your compromise on that? So help Katrina. Well, that's, that's it. Let's talk Katrina. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's it. We do, we do, we're doing Christmas Eve alone. And you normally wouldn't. Oh, never. Oh, okay. Never in my life have I done a big holiday like that without being with everybody. And then good on Christmas Day. Christmas Day we're going over. Okay. To the family. So what would you normally do on Christmas Eve? What's it look like? Family too. I mean, oh, but what? You just all get together in the house. We all get together. And it used to be this way, although with little kids and everybody's changed it, but it used to be we'd all get together and go past midnight, open gifts at midnight, and then go home and come back the next day. Those very similar Katrina's. Except for they all spend the night together at the same time. Yeah, that's next level, bro. Yeah, but it's literally that. They literally stay up. Like I said, so Christmas Eve, everybody stays up late playing games, drinking. And then they, we do white elephant at midnight. Wow. And then the kids you normally get to open one present. And then, you know, by one, two in the morning, they start calming down and then go to bed. You know, wake up at six. I don't think I've ever shared this, but here's something that's changed because it has nothing to do with our families. I never liked Christmas. I know. Really? No. Wow. No, interesting. I never liked it. You like Thanksgiving? Huh? You like Thanksgiving? Thanksgiving was my favorite holiday. I didn't like Christmas because. You're so different. As a kid, I liked Christmas, right? But then as I was growing up, I, especially when I was an atheist, right? I viewed the whole thing as like this commercialized. You go to the mall, it's packed. Oh my God. People are trying to find parking. Put an angry atheist way to go. 100%. Oh my God. You're going to associate the mall with it? 100%. It's over. I'm like, oh, you're obligated to buy presents. It's not really gift-giving if you're obligated. I don't go to the mall. I don't know. It's all crazy busy. Like everywhere I go, go to the mall. It's packed. Everybody's acting whatever. It sucks. You know, it's the weather. I don't like the weather. So I just, everything I don't like, I just didn't like the season. Of course, but I never did. Jessica is like Elf. Christmas to her is the greatest time of the year. Everything. Music. She'll play music in the house. That's Christmas music. She'll like Christmas candles. She'll decorate everything. She'll make Christmas food. It's just like she just lights up. She loves going to the mall. I hate it going to the mall. So gradually, I kind of developed this better experience around it and I really started to like it even before I became a Christian. Oh, interesting. Yeah, so that's something that changed. Yeah, that is, that's what we do. And then you, what do you, what will you do? Oh, for Christmas and Christmas, we do, we'll go to service on Christmas Eve with We're going to, we're going with you guys. We'll see you guys there. Oh, good. Yeah, I was going to see, yeah, because I know. Great show to. I know, I'd be with you guys, but we'll be at the, we have tickets to the enchantment thing. We did that. That's all the lights over there. Yeah, yeah, we bought tickets specifically on Christmas Eve and I already had that or else I would be joining you guys. It's pretty fun. Yeah. Do you know what your favorite, your son's favorite part is going to be? All the lights? No. What? The same thing that my son's favorite part is, as you're walking in, there's hella vendors selling cheap toys. Cheap light up toys, dude. Like balloons and swords and like shit that little point. I'll let you go, we'll see the lighting. He's pretty, he's pretty neckless. He's pretty into the, the decor. He's definitely like, like any time we come, every day we come home from school, like he always wants me to drive around the narrow, but I'm like, the lights aren't even on yet. He still wants to see it. Do you know what's good around there? There's the same, there's vendors outside leading in. So you walk down a sidewalk, hella vendors selling hella toys, they're cheap or whatever. And they also have hot dog vendors that are making like amazing hot dogs. They can wrap and they'll put onion, whole deal, it's really good. Oh, wow. Yeah, cause we were just there last week. Oh, you guys were? We were. Yeah, I know, so I haven't gone, so I didn't go last year cause the tickets sell out fast. Yes, they do. You gotta get them in advance. So we got them way in advance so we could do it specifically on Christmas Eve with the whole family. So I'm going to go to that church service that you're going to. Yeah. Have you been to it? Yeah, I've been so good. We've been so good. So do you go with just your immediate family or does your parents and everyone, who else, just Courtney's family, typically we'll do that and we'll share Christmas Eve with her side and then we do my family the next day. And so we go to church service, we go back and then we have this kind of like, it's like hors d'oeuvres and stuff and then we open up a presence with the cousins. Yeah. And so it's like a few there and then after that, like we go watch a movie at my house and then like everybody goes to bed. We wake up in the morning, do our own thing with my family, like just the kids and Courtney and then probably like mid afternoon, like my parents and then my brother and everybody and. When do you, when, when do the kids, when do your boys open their presence from you guys? Like first thing in the morning, just you guys. Just us. Yeah. So that's, that's what will be different this year for Katrina and I is that I. You're doing Santa where he wakes up and sees it. Yeah. And it'll just be, it'll just the presents that are for him from basically Katrina and I and, you know, Santa Claus and our family, my family, we will open ourselves. Do you guys do stockings too? Yeah, yeah. We have style here's a question to have for you guys. When I was not like stockings. Really? Yeah. And I'm like, those are the easiest. I love it. Yeah. I don't know why. I like like finding little things. Yeah. She's like, this is so pointless. I love, I love. You guys are like a, you guys are totally like a, here's what I want for Christmas. Buy it for me. Me? Not you. No, no, she's like that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. This is conflict. Yeah. No, no, no. I'm pretty talking about this. That's a sign you suck at it. That's what that is. Here, you're terrible at this. Let me help you. No. No. No, dude. It's analytical brain. You know, it's like, I can't, I don't listen. Yeah. So I don't listen to you. Yeah. I listen. Bro, it took me a lot. It took me a really, really long time to get good at this. And I don't even want to say I'm a master right now, but I've gotten pretty good at like. Throughout the year, I have, I literally write it down. Yeah. Or you pay attention like, Oh, I like this. And again, honey, I like it. Yeah. That was like, oh, in September. Yeah. I paid attention. So when I was a kid and I got up with Santa's gifts, they were never wrapped or in a box. They were out. So my parents would take whatever gift it was, take it out of the box. Now the, now the reasoning was, it looked more real like an Elf made it. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Jessica's family actually wraps Santa's gift. So we, so, okay. So I didn't do it that way. So I grew up that way also where like, it was, there was always, every year, we had like, traditionally we had one big gift and then everything was like knick-knack shit after that. And the one big gift came from Santa and it was unwrapped normally. Same. I think it had less to do. It was normally like a bike, a desk. Like, what else did I get? Like, I remember things like that. Yeah. And so, yeah, my dad in the middle of the night would probably, would put it together and then it would be out just right in front of the tree when you came out. Which by the way, that was my big thing with Katrina. It was like, like, and it's, I'm glad we're starting it now because he's not quite at that age where he's got a thing that he's wanting all year. Like I'm excited for when that happens, right? When there's a thing that he wants that he's been asking for for months. And I go, well, your mom and dad aren't gonna get that but maybe Santa will bring it. Maybe Santa will bring it. And there's that suspense of maybe he will and then I can have it all out and then I could video him coming in and being like, you know, surprised that he left it. So that's real. I'm looking forward to that. He's not quite at a thing where he obsesses about a thing yet. He likes all stuff. That's gonna be so much fun. My three year old has been obsessing. Obsessing since we came to your house over the garbage truck toy. Obsessing. That's hilarious. That's what he wants from Santa. That's all he wants from Santa. Did you guys get it already? Yeah. All he talks about is what it does, how you could put garbage in it. He talks about it. Tells me stories about it. You know. The back, you could put garbage in it. And you could take garbage out and you could drive it around. My sons are really into trash and all that. Like that was like their thing when they were his age. Oh, loved it. They'd run outside trash. That's Chris. They called people trash. You know. What? That's my buddy. I don't know why. That's Chris Nagibi's son who's the same age as our kids, right? He's got a little one that's four. That he, every, I think it's Friday when their trash guy comes. Like he's like his son, like. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and they gotta run. They stand out there to slippers. Oh, it's a really nice message. Watching them, watching them. It's bad. You know what's funny? I just thought of when you guys were talking about all that, like it's the Santa thing. Like, so when I was growing up, like Santa gave me this gift, but it's like something my brother already owned. Whoa! Like, this is bullshit, Santa. Your parents gave you hand-me-down gifts? Yes. As a Santa gift. What the fuck? No, they didn't. Yes! They did! I'm like, why was Santa like a Cheap Master? It's all extra, the knife in there, it's like, I just thought of that dude, he's like stressed out. I mean, it's so mad, you know, it's like. It looks like, it looks like this big wheel. Why is it, why is it? Yeah, I was like, wasn't this like Brandon's, like why is this- There's a gangster right there. Come on, Santa, do better. Why's the big wheel tire look all worn? What the fuck, dude? I was so angry about that. I want a big, I want a big wheel so bad, as an adult. Didn't you guys ride a big wheel right now? Didn't they try and bring them back? Then is there a company that is making them again? For adults? Well, I think they are, I think- I have fond, fond memories of them. So do I, so do I. Because the tires were- The power slide. Yeah, dude. The power slide. You got no, you know why? The big wheels are the best. And if you pedaled fast enough, it didn't get trapped, so yeah. You only made those for adults for a minute? That's what I was just saying. That's what I was saying. I think they did, I think, I thought I saw a company that was making them. Did you guys have the- That's you, like those are the- Dude. Out of here. How much is that? 136 bucks. There's no way you can't have a kid. No, that's for kids. That's for kids. Why the fuck was a big wheel a hundred bucks? Wow, look at that. That's like the OG ones right there. Look at it, you can adjust, remember the seats, like three levels. So I had, you know what kind of big wheel I had? I had a Knight Rider big wheel. Oh yeah. So the front of it had the Knight Rider- Is it a kid? Yes, it was kid. Like the car? No, it was David Hasselhoff. I was just saying, that's weird to ride. I don't think I've seen a kid, I don't think I've seen a kid riding those. Oh, look at that one. Dude, dude. Oh, look at that one. Hey, look up 1980s Knight Rider big wheel. Please, please, this is gonna give me such memory. Dude, see, this is something that I would have done. Cause you, that's a big nostalgic thing for you. You should have bought that for a Rayleigh as for Christmas. You can find one, I guarantee you. I know. On Amazon. I should have. My kids are too old for this now. Oh my God, that's it right there. See the visor on the top? Oh yeah, sick. Okay. Guarantee you can find someone selling that. All right, so you see in the back, click on that picture. You see on the back, the red thing? You pull a handle. And a little break came down and you would slide, bro. Yeah, the power slide, dude. You would pull it up and you'd be able to slide. Oh, I had such fun memories of that. Man. I don't remember that one. That's great. That's good. Yeah. That's so good. It was so fun. I rode that thing. See, you can buy one, Doug. Yeah. Okay. I bombed down hills, you guys. Now you got anything better to do. Come on. Yeah, yeah. Hey, let's have a race with those. We'll all drive around. All right, so I didn't, while you're looking for that, Doug, you, are you headed up to Seattle? No, I'm staying here. You just, you and Bree? Yeah, well, so I like to stay just close to home for Christmas. I don't like to travel. And so, yeah, Bree's gonna stay with me for Christmas Eve. Then we get up in the morning, you know, we sleep in, she gets her stocking. We start with that. I take a picture of everything she takes out of everything. Yeah. And I have like a whole collection of photos from years past. That's great. And then she opens her presents. Yeah. Unwrapped. I've never put out presents not wrapped. I always thought it was fun to unwrap presents. At what point did she stop believing in Santa? How long did you keep that going? Do you remember? I think she was 12, actually. I kept it going for a very long time, but then she also indicated that she kind of thought she knew, but she was just playing along with it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's for every Santa. So, you know, maybe it was younger than 12. She's like, I knew at eight, but she's like, I kept it going because Santa always. Well, hey, that's the value of being the oldest. I was the oldest of four. I got Santa gifts for a long ass time. Yeah. For the little one. Yeah, to keep it going. I mean, I want to perpetuate that for the longest time. I was so great for kids, even though it is a deception. You know? I know, it's a big lie. It's a big lie. You have the type of Christmas I like. So what did you, are you guys doing one alone then? I mean, not really. It's like literally like going to be in our room, right? So like everyone's at my house. So we're hosting. Hold on, hold on, hold on. So the compromise was that we get to stay in our room in our room while everybody's outside? Yeah. Oh. I feel like you lost that compromise. Yes, I did. Please, please speak to the camera. Please speak to the camera. I got a little bit of pressure, you know. This is not much of a compromise. This is like, here you go, guy. This is who I like. Here you go. You don't get a couple of presents in your room. Hey. Did she come up to you? She's like, you guys done yet? Honey, you know what we could do? Honey, I got something for you. Why don't we just stay in the bedroom and then that's it. You know what, I get it now. I understand what's happening. This is why she puts up with your shit because you do this for Christmas for her. Yeah. And every other holiday. Yeah. And twice a week, throughout the week, throughout the year. No, only dude. Well, they do a lot of family stuff. I mean, a lot of it's grown on me, too. Are you trying to do, do you want to do one of those days where it's just you guys? Is that like your dream? In a perfect one. So what we will do next year. So this year is not the greatest compromise for me. Yeah. But next year, the way it will look is on Christmas Eve, they were like, let's say it's going to be at her mom's house next year probably, which is probably what will happen. Normally Katrina and Max would spend the night there with everybody all over the floor with that. They will come home with me. We will spend all day drinking, eating, having fun. We'll go home. Christmas late, Christmas Eve night, I don't care how late, we'll come and wake up in our beds with nobody there and we will open presents for Max. And then. And then you'll go. Then we'll go over there. That's nice. That's perfect for me. That's all I need. To me it's like, that's all I want is, because all I want is that exact, that memory of when my son really starts to get into specific gifts is that suspense of did I get it or not? Did I get that? And I don't want it with 30 other people. I like want to be there for that moment. And if I want that moment to last 30 minutes, I want it to last that long. I don't want to feel like, oh, the next 15 people need to open their presents. So hope you like that, son. Let's go. Next kid. I don't want to do that. No, I get it. I get 100%. And I feel like that's a fair compromise because we're still going to go do all the other stuff. No, that's super fair. So that's what it's going to look like. It just so happened to be that we had already committed to everybody hosting at our house this year. So it's kind of, what am I going to do? Tell everybody, we're hosting. You all need to leave. No, no, you go stay at a hotel. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know what I'm saying? All right, see you guys later. So it's like, okay, this is the first year that we had this real like, you know, hard conversation around what the, what the compromise or what the future of the holiday is going to look like for us. And it's like, oh, it just so happened to be on the one where we're hosting. So it makes it a little more challenging, but going forward when it's at other people's houses, it'll be easier. Dude, look how much the Knight Rider Big Wheel is. 450. 450 dollars. Because it's just a collector right now. So here's what trips me out. Who kept that like that? A psychopath. How do you not ride a little geek? Yeah, dude. There's, there's definitely, People are like that. Don't you think that's interesting how like some people like they just Buy a toy and not do it. Did I ever tell you I would never open it? Look up Doug, I'd love to see the prices on this now. I went to high school with this kid. Okay, he was actually one of my first friends in high school when I was a freshman, when I first got to this new school. His name was Marcio. And he had under his bed, he had like, I want to say from the 70s or 80s, whenever they really started, maybe I'm getting the dates wrong, but when they first started doing the toys in the McDonald's. Oh yeah, that was more funny. He's got, he had every single one and he had them still in the plastic. So they never even opened them. And he had them in this big. He's a millionaire now. I want to see what there were. I think they're worth really good money. They were worth money back then in high school and he was collecting them and he never stopped collecting those things. Which one, guess right now, let's all take a guess. Which one do you think's worth the most money? It'll be things like, like the first when Batman was released, it'll be things like when a- You know which one I know will be worth the least amount of money? What? Grimace. Grimace. Terrible, dumbest, stupidest- Fat purple monster. Yeah dude. What is Grimace? Yeah, I like the burglar. The collaborations I think are the ones that will be the most valuable is when they collaborated with like a famous movie or whatever, see how Doug did on Google in here. I don't think we can find any prices there. No, they definitely have. I know I've seen it before. Just Doug's not the best player. Do you know what's- What was the other ones? There was like a- I'll tell you what's- Come on Andrew, let's go. Step up your game. I'll tell you what's- So the most valuable are Hot Wheels and then 101 Dalmatians. Do you have some prices, Andrew? Hot Wheels? What was it exactly you were looking for? McDonald's toys. Happy Meal Toys. Happy Meal Toys. How much- How much are McDonald's Happy Meal Toys worth, what? The full set of the Hot Wheel cars is around $875. Whole- Oh, let me see, $70,000. Yeah. Well, just for the cars. I mean, he had hundreds of these things. Just probably got thousands. Do you know what's worth a lot of money? I'll tell you what toys worth a lot of money. I didn't know this because I looked it up. It was Castle Grayskull. Castle Grayskull and Pristine Commission. Oh, it's like thousands of dollars. Oh yeah. Yeah, dude. I told you what I'm doing with Max now, right? So when I buy him, so when the Mario movie came out, because he's into Mario right now, they made like the Nintendo, Mario, Bowser set. So I bought him that for his birthday, but I bought a second one and I actually put it away. So it's in the box still, I did this because of this type of shit. So if it's like a piece that I'm like, oh, that's probably gonna be a collector that I buy him. I'm trying- Imagine he grows up and he's like, Dad, I'm 18, you know, my friend's dad had these investment accounts for him and all that. Here's your toys. You're like, I'm glad you asked Sonny about the toys. Toys. Okay. Here's what, my thought on it was this, is that even if they don't end up being super valuable, it'll be neat to be able to be like, this was like your first Bowser. It'll be nostalgic. Yeah, yeah. So I think at the very least. Oh, over $1,000 for Castle Grayskull, brand new. So you never got to the bottom of some of these McDonald's toys, huh? I found some right here. Okay, thank you. I know they're gonna be selling on eBay. So there's a bunch that are listed for thousands, hundreds of thousands, but the ones that are actually sold like vintage ones, you can see right here. Vintage Dukes of Hazard. They had Dukes of Hazard? For $800, 1990 Super Mario Bros. Happy meal for $600. See? Yeah, yeah, $400, $600. More vintage. So that's what my buddies look like that. He had all those like that. Huge lot of 80s and 90s. Wow. Wow. Dukes of Hazard would have been great to have. Isn't that interesting, huh? I mean, I thought to think to have, this is in the early 90s. This is like 96, right? You'll get any of the joy of playing with it. To think, to keep those as a kid. How much is a child's happiness worth though? You know what I mean, Justin? Yeah. Apparently you can play with it. A couple hundred bucks. So you can sell it for 500 bucks, 34, four years later. You know what I mean? Or you just let them play a couple days of hard work. Like old ladies that used to put plastic over there for a trial time. Your kid's like, oh, yeah. You're just stripping away their joy. This will cover my investment. This will cover my therapy for the next month. Thanks, Dad. Can you just imagine you're playing with them when they got all the plastic all over them? Dad, it just doesn't work. Don't touch it. Oh, just pretend like it's muffled. Oh, fuckers. Yeah. Also, now my mom threw away some action figures I had, dude. Oh, did your mom ever clean shop? Yes. Dude, you know what she threw away? All my muscle magazines. Wow. I had so many muscle and fitness. Ironman, Flex Magazine, Muscle Media 2000. I had all of them probably from 1990 to all the way to- How crusty were they though? Huh? How crusty were they though? Disgusting. Wrong magazines, Justin. That was a sears. Is that wrong? Doug, what day is this episode go live? What's the date? January 4th. So we have, so basically a little more than a week before we have the big three day training. Yes, for trainers. Yes. Sign up, mindplumptrainer.com. So this is a new year. It's officially the new year, even though it's not when we're recording this, but it's the new year when you're listening to this. So I'm excited because this is a massive shift, the biggest shift in our business since we started it. Yeah. And something that I know all of us are deeply passionate about and can't wait to see what- I am excited. Quipping trainers with everything we know. I'm excited. I hope it starts a movement. If you are not signed up for the three day free training, make sure you get signed up for the free training. Mindpumptrainer.com. Element makes an electrolyte powder that has natural sweeteners, no calories, and has enough sodium to power you through your workouts, help alleviate headaches, give you better pumps. This product is exploding. People are really discovering the benefits of added sodium to their lives. These are fitness fanatics, people that don't eat a lot of heavily processed foods. They benefit, they tend to benefit from this type of a supplement. Anyway, check them out. Go to drinkelementee.com forward slash mind pump and on that link, they're gonna offer you a free sample pack with any order. All right, back to the show. First question is from Hope Is Life 50. Do you think it would be detrimental for someone just to do zircher squats and not to do front squats? What are the unique benefits of each? I mean, it's not detrimental, but it is a very different exercise. First off, the weight is loaded lower on the body, so it changes the length of the lever, so the core activation is gonna be different. It involves some rounded back kind of lifting, so there's probably more back activation with the zircher. Front squat, I think it's very valuable. It's a very upright squat. Hits the quads a little bit more. Different core stimulation. I don't think one can replace the other if that's what the question is. They're both valuable, though. I mean, for the most part, too. And I would say, too, with some athletes, I mean, I've used, there's issues with wrists or in that regard, like in terms of the mobility of getting the bar to stay there. I mean, obviously, you can fold your arms and you can do that variation for front-loaded squats, but the zircher does provide a lot more core-specific work, which I like, and it's just a valuable exercise and it's on its own, so I definitely program that in wherever I can. The only place I see them being interchangeable or similar or it's like, oh, you know, if you did that one forever and you never did this one, it wouldn't be that big of a deal is if you were only looking at it purely from a leg development exercise. So if that, and that's the only way- It's a novelty, right? Like, you've been there for a long time. Yeah, yeah, so to me, like, so from a bodybuilding perspective, I could see this question, right? Like, hey, all I do is zircher squats, but I never do front squats or I'm gonna be okay developing my legs. Like, okay, sure. You know what I'm saying? If you're doing back squats and Bulgarians and you're doing all these other things and you just choose to always do zirchers and never do fronts or vice versa, but when you talk about functional or like overall what you're doing, like there's more going on in those two movements than just leg development. So I think that's where questions like these come up is it's like, we tend to like try it. We want to- Yeah, isolate to a body part. Yeah, isolate to a body part and be like, well, is it really that much different than a front squat for the legs? It's like, well, yeah, okay. For the leg development, not that big of a difference for your quads. Like, it's not gonna make a huge difference. I think a zircher is gonna be more upper body and a front squat is gonna be more lower body. It's really if you wanna break it down. But you know what's interesting about zirchers? Nobody was doing them or talking about them for a long time. Zirchers were not even mentioned. Well, it's uncomfortable. It's uncomfortable. We started talking about it. We put it in some of our program, MAP Strong, we put it in MAP Strong. I feel like we did make it popular. And I swear to God. You know what? You know why? Okay, here's why. We're doing them back in the day for sure. Well, I think people started doing them and then noticing, well, if they get past the discomfort and get used to doing them, they started to notice some developmental benefits and some strength benefits. Like, I like zircher squats for grapplers a lot. I think if you're, I mean, in fact, if you look at old, there's old Soviet era videos of wrestlers, Greco-Roman wrestlers, and they're doing a lot of zircher position exercises like Jefferson Curls holding the zircher position, squatting, because it more closely mimics holding an opponent. So for grapplers, like that's one of my favorite squats. Hands down. Yeah, it's very functional. I mean, anything to like with a little bit of a rounded back sort of position like that. Upper back, let's be clear, right? Upper back. Like, oh, lower back. Not lower back. Rounded upper back. Yeah, I mean, but I mean, what you're gonna encounter in the real world in terms of like load, to get things more centrically loaded, for me has always been something that I wanna incorporate in my training because that's more likely I'm gonna encounter that. You know, the day to day. 100%, if you're gonna hold something and like, hug it and pick it up and squat down. I mean, that's a zircher squat or a zircher deadlift. And a front squat doesn't mimic that. But for pure leg development, I'd say a front squat. You know, if you had to pick one. Yeah. For just the lower body. The quads, yeah. That's why like questions like these are incomplete without hearing what the desired outcome of the client, right? If the client was asking me, you know, could I do just one of these? And then I, okay, what's your overall goal? If you just wanna be, if you wanna be functionally strong in the real world and you're looking for overall health and both are zircher for sure. If you have more of a body builder focus where it's like, I'm trying to develop my legs. And sometimes I do zircher. Sometimes I do front squats. Could I just eliminate one or the other? And if I were to, which one's better? Well, okay. Well, I think front squats, you're gonna get to a place where you can load the front squat more than you're gonna be able to do the zircher. And so for leg development, it makes sense for that. So it does matter the context of this question for sure. Next question is from Peck Youth. Bulking is a chore. Is there any natural means of increasing appetite? This is where, now for people who have a challenge with losing weight, when they hear a question like this, I'm sure that annoys them, right? Cause they're always struggling to not overeat. But for people with fast metabolisms who have a tough time gaining weight, this could be a real challenge. This was me growing up. I mean, it felt like no matter how much I ate, didn't matter and the scale wouldn't go up. I wouldn't gain any muscle, no matter how much I lift their weights and all that stuff. So I get this. So here's where two things really become valuable. One, drinking calories becomes very valuable when this is you. If you're bulking and you're having trouble getting enough calories to bulk, to be in a surplus, adding shakes in between meals or with meals or drinking milk instead of water, like very, very valuable. Number two, hyper palatable foods that we tend to avoid because most people are trying to lose weight. That's when these can become very valuable. So you're at the end of the day, like, oh my God, I need to eat another 800 calories. And I'm just, I really don't feel like anything. Think of something you crave. And then that might be the food that you actually go out. So it might be burger and fries. That's where there's value. And that's what I did to that one. I don't know if it was a challenge. Yeah, it was a challenge where they're trying to eat like ice cream out of a sink. And it's like, and the only way that because of the palate fatigue, they added in like salty fries, I believe. Yeah, so that if you go back to it. Countries, you go back to it. So it's almost like, you know, if you're in that kind of predicament, yes, using some of those tactics in terms of like changing the palate up a bit too to shift into that to keep consuming might help. So this was something that plagued me in my teens and early 20s. I mean, I just, I struggled so much with eating enough food to bulk and to put size on. Two of the biggest hacks. One was easily digestible foods. Yeah. So like oatmeal, rice and meats. And this was the other thing was those easily digestible foods tend to be healthier foods. What I was doing wrong was I'd have these, you know, quiz nose or Togo sandwiches and chips. And I would be, I'd eat these really heavy lunches and meals and it would fill me up for hours. And I would justify it because it was high calorie. But then what it ended up doing was it took so long for my body to digest that, break that down and utilize it that it would be four hours before I could even think about eating another food. When I was making things like chicken thighs and or with sweet potato or rice, man, I'd eat that. And I tell you what, an hour and a half later, I was ready to eat again. And so I was able to eat more frequently by eating a leaner, healthier, easier digestible foods. That was like a mind blowing thing for me because trying to chase calories all the time. I was looking for high calorie foods, which tend to be these, you know, breads and pastas and heavier, heavier meals. But then it takes a long time for my body to digest them and then I wouldn't be ready to eat again. That was a massive hack. Hack number two was actually getting a early start on my calories. This was a big one for me. So those two things- Yeah, cause if you slept in, I know what happened to you, same thing happened to me. You'd sleep in on a weekend, you'd wake up, you'd get out of bed at 10.30 and now you're trying to eat your 4,000 calories, forget about it. And what I found was if I, and this is why I love, one of my reasons why I was so excited when we partnered with meal one, right? The Creatures of Habit was that oatmeal is so easily digestible for me and that one that has 30 grams of protein in it. So if I get up and I make myself eat that, say at 6.30 or 7 in the morning, like right away, dude, an hour later, I want another meal. And so then my second meal, I'm eating like steak and eggs or another, like now I'm eating like a big breakfast. Now it's like 9.30, 10 in the morning. I've already got 1,500 calories down and I'm at 80 grams of protein and it's not even noon yet. And that just would set the table for my day. So those things, and for the last kind of hack, and I've talked about this many times on the show when it came to bulking, it was clutch to turn my dinner from the night before into like a scramble for, and that would normally be my second meal. I love the oatmeal thing right away, really early. And then my second big breakfast was normally, whatever I had for dinner, I would scramble it with some eggs and sprinkle some cheese on it. And now I'd have this massive, high protein calorie second breakfast. And I'm already well over 1,000 to 1,500 calories to start my morning off already. Yeah, here's, check this out. So I'm looking at this up right now because this was another big one for me. And I mentioned earlier, if you can have dairy, drinking 12 ounces of milk with each meal, that's 220 calories each time. 600 and you're gonna have- Yeah, instead of water. 660 calories automatically added, 12 grams of protein each time. So you've automatically added 36 grams of protein from good old fashioned whole milk, if you can have dairy. Yup. Next question is from Cody Mayfit. You guys advocate for more straight sets with proper rest, which I much prefer myself, but it seems difficult to achieve when it comes to training clients for only an hour. When you trained, did you stick to straight sets or more of a one ABC to ABC circuit style? When I was a bad trainer, I did circuit style. When I became a good trainer, I stuck to straight sets. Yup. You know, so spot on like this is, and by the way, I remember this thinking this way and being challenged. Well, I gotta fit all these exercises in a workout. Yeah, and by the way, this is just again to, not to make this a commercial for our MAPS 15 program, but I way over complicated the amount of things I needed to do to my client to show them great results. Yeah. Later on in my career, I realized, wow, we could do two, maybe three really effective exercises with good rest periods in between straight sets and get incredible results from my clients. Way better results. And I just, you know, and instead I felt like I needed to have 10 to 12 exercises in an hour, so my clients didn't feel like all we did was two or three things because I allowed that to dictate my programming because they were in my head like, we only did two things today. It's like, yeah, but if those two things are far more effective than the eight other exercise you did, you're better off doing that. You're concerned with entertaining them. Yeah. And like, you know, feeding into that expectation the client has, but yeah, if you show them results, they're gonna love you even more. And two, like in between sets is where you educate, where you, you know, you add dialogue and all that other stuff to keep them engaged. And two, it's not gonna take away from the experience. So, you know. Add to the experience because they feel good after. They don't feel like you just beat their crap out of them. They walk out and they're like, man, I feel energized. On average, with my clients, on average was, it would be between two, two on the high end with the clients who've been working out for a while and could really keep up a good pace and a five. Two to five exercises is on average what I would do with clients in a session. When I was good, this is when clients stuck with me forever. We got great results. They love me. They never skipped the workout. It was two to five. In the early days, I was like 10, 15, I was just garbage. I was always trying to come up with weird ways to combine them. I went through a phase just like this, where we would go over and it would be bench press, bicep curls, then shoulder presses. And it would be like, do that exercise, do that exercise, do that exercise, rest. Do that exercise, do that exercise, do that rest. And then we moved to another area. Oh, it would be a barbell, back row, then it'd be a lateral raise. And it would be these three exercises. That way, at the end of the workout, I got 20 exercises in the part. So ineffective. It was. You know, and again, you'd be better off as a trainer, okay? With the average person spending the entire hour, perfecting a squat. Literally perfecting a barbell squat. And I had plenty of clients where that was the entire hour, where I was perfecting, gripping the bar, staying tight. Okay, we're gonna start with this high box. Let's see how that feels. Okay, I noticed a little deviation here. Let's activate this muscle over here. Let's try again, lower box. By the end of the hour, we're doing full barbell squats with the barbell. And then they would leave and they'd feel amazing. And this, again, this is when I was successful, when clients didn't leave, because I got phenomenal results. Well, this speaks to your fitness tip that you gave the other day about, you know, treating the exercises as a skill. And that, you know. I learned this way too late. You get way more out of the movement when you focus on perfecting that one movement, then you would be throwing four or five exercises on there. Which is funny that we don't see it that way because everybody who's ever played a sport knows that. You used the analogy, I think, with the Bruce Lee, I think that was where the fitness tip came from. One kick 10,000 times. Yeah, but we don't treat exercise like that, but it should be. And you should understand that you getting your client to increase their ability to connect in a squat by, say, 10% is far better than you teaching them 10 new random exercises. Like, you're way better off. You're not even teaching them. You know what happens when you do it the other way? Is you're not teaching them exercises. No, they're just going through them. They're just walking them through and getting them tired. They're just burning calories. When I got really good, my clients, if they were with me for six months or a year, they could do all the good, basic barbell dumbbell exercises with good technique, good form, and good, and this is why many are not off, not all of them that I haven't trained for years now continue to work out. And if you're a trainer, so I understand too, you know, as you're developing, right, in your journey as a coach and as a trainer, learning to have this conversation or having the confidence to have this conversation is probably the biggest challenge, right? So, okay, you hear us, you're like, okay, I believe. It's like, God, how do I convey that? Clip the shit. Like, I mean, this is the stuff like that I always get frustrated with coaches and trainers that, okay, if you're early in your career, you don't feel like you have the confidence to convey that or articulate why you want them to do it a certain way. Utilize us as an authority in that situation. That's what I would do. If I was two years as a trainer, that's it. And I'm listening to this podcast with these three knuckleheads that I respected what they do. And I'm like a new guy and I'm like, man, I don't know how to explain it as good as Sal does. Like, I'm just gonna clip it and be like, hey, listen to this. I just, this is the reason why I only have you do the squat and overhead press and we don't do eight exercises for this reason. Listen, the easiest thing you can do, this will help is set the expectation. If the client's expectation is that they're gonna come in and be cycled through 15 different exercises and sweat and feel like they're gonna puke and everything's gonna burn. And you then go, you don't set the expectation, just take them to teach them how to squat. Yes, you're gonna get some pushback. But if you start the session and you say to them, Mrs. Robinson, today we're gonna master, we're gonna practice mastering the most effective exercise for your lower body, the barbell squat. Today I'm gonna teach you how to really activate and connect to the muscles that are required for this exercise. And the reason why I'm doing this is this exercise can give you such phenomenal results. So today we're gonna just practice how to do this. And I'm gonna break it down into five different parts and we're gonna practice all the different parts. And hopefully by the end of our session, you'll be able to do a full squat. If not, don't worry about it. We're gonna continue to practice this so that you can get good at this amazing exercise. Now you set the expectation. Now when they start the session, it's not a problem. They know what they're gonna do. Do you wanna build muscle and strength or you just wanna sweat? Next question is from Hoopgolf89. What are your thoughts on the best gut health supplements? So with gut health supplements. Is there generic answer for this? Yeah, yeah, there is. So you have to, there's kind of two categories of gut health supplements. Category one are general supplements that have been found to benefit the gut, help rebuild the gut, wall or nourish the cell, the wall or the mucosa lining. So something like probiotic like C. Or probiotics, right? We know that there are beneficial bacteria that we've identified that seem to have wide-ranging beneficial effects that also seem to balance out the microbiome by crowding out, let's say the bacteria that can cause negative things. There are things that help feed good bacteria that we know, prebiotics, okay? So there's that category. Then there's a category of gut health supplements that are specific to what you need. If you have SIBO, you use these supplements. If you have CFO, which is a small intestinal, small intestine fungal overgrowth, there's these supplements. Sometimes there's crossover. If you have issues with producing enough digestive acids or enzymes, then there's these supplements. So you have to know kind of which category you're looking to, but I'll talk more general because I can't talk specific, obviously this is a general answer. And the number one thing you can do is take a high quality probiotic. And high quality probiotics have been shown to improve everything from skin to mental health effects so that this have anti-anxiety effects, anti-depress effects. They have positive effects on digestion and inflammation. So that'd be the first thing. I think most people would benefit from a good high quality probiotic. Seed is by far the best. I have yet to meet any company or see any company that comes close to seed. Second would be consuming foods with beneficial fibers that feed healthy bacteria. So you wanna have an adequate fiber intake in your diet and that's kind of it. I mean, you can look at like Do you say digestive enzymes? Digestive enzymes can be in there that might help as well although probiotics, it's approved by the client. That's what I meant by this is tough because it's not really, is there really a generic? But you said it. So a probiotic probably is the generic answer. Then the more specific answer is based off of what your issue is. 100% Because you could have a lot of different things going on with your gut and based off of that, there then becomes better supplements to take. Yeah, like for example, some people, there's a lot of people with acid reflux and the cause is they're not producing enough of the digestive acids that are required. So you could supplement with What is it? It's a timing issue. What is it? HCl pills. HCl, hydrochloric acid. You could supplement with this. Apple cider vinegar. Apple cider vinegar. Now, for some people that's great. For other people, like me, that would make my gut go off and that's why it's a little bit more specific to the person. I mean, I tried that and it's turned out to not really work well for me too because I had different issues. So yeah, it is so individualized like that but I would imagine that and like you said, the just eating fibrous foods to move things kind of long and create it's the actual system. This also highlights to the value of going through this testing at least once. I mean, this is part of the reason with partnering with Dr. Cabral and his team is that and having that free forum for you guys to have access to is to get in there and is to communicate with that community and those doctors. It's free to you guys. You guys are followers of Mind Pump to get in there and ask these type of questions but it's also worth the investment to get tested at least one time test. So you have an idea of what are the offenders and what are the best supplements for you. You know what? I'm gonna say one more thing because I'm just starting to learn about this and this is a, I don't wanna say merging theory because it's actually been around for a little while but I think it's getting more accepted that the central nervous system plays such a big role in your gut health that the reason why some people continue to have gut health issues has more to do with their central nervous system than it does with what's happening to the gut. Now the central nervous system, that can throw things off and then you can get things like SIBO reoccurring but it's actually quite interesting. The effect now, what's funny is it sounds, it's actually quite obvious. We know this, when you get nervous or stressed out, gut issues pop up, either indigestion, people say, oh my God, you're giving me indigestion or getting really anxious will give someone diarrhea, for example. So that's another category of potential supplements that you could look at, things that help balance out your central nervous system based on whatever your issue is. So I could see that category starting to emerge. There's like something called vagal, polyvagal theory which is really interesting. I'm just learning about it so I'm not gonna comment on it but if you have reoccurring gut issues, look that up. It's actually quite interesting. Look, if you love the show, head over to mindpumpfree.com and check out all of our free fitness guides. You can also find us on Instagram, Justin is at Mind Pump, Justin. I'm at Mind Pump to Stefano and Adam is at Mind Pump Adam.