Stop Exercising to Burn Calories.... | JJ Virgin | DSH #1842

Summary

Digital Social Hour #1842: “Stop Exercising to Burn Calories… | JJ Virgin”

Podcast: Digital Social Hour
Host: Sean Kelly
Guest: JJ Virgin
Date: March 1, 2026
Total runtime: ~29 min (summary skips ads, intros, outros)

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Episode Overview

In this thought-provoking episode, nutrition and fitness expert JJ Virgin returns to Digital Social Hour to challenge traditional views on exercise, nutrition, and body composition. She and host Sean Kelly cover the pitfalls of calorie-centric exercise, the truth about protein needs, misconceptions around dieting and obesity, the connection between muscle, health, and longevity, and how to actually measure progress. The conversation is both practical and passionately contrarian, drawing on JJ’s decades of expertise.

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Main Discussion Points & Insights

1. Rethinking Exercise: Beyond “Burning Calories”

• JJ Virgin’s Stance: The focus on exercising to burn calories is misguided—exercise should be prioritized for its metabolic benefits, particularly in building and maintaining muscle.
  • Quote: “We've got to stop focusing on exercise to burn calories. We need to focus on exercise for the metabolic impacts that it has.” (00:00)
• Intensity Matters: Vigorous activity has disproportionately higher benefits.
  • “Turns out it's actually not a 2 to 1 like that. It's actually 4 to 10 to 1. Like, one minute of vigorous, like, say you ran up the stairs is worth about 10 minutes of walking.” (00:14, reiterated at 17:44)

2. Why Weight Loss Alone Can Be Misleading

• Body Composition Over Scale Weight: JJ emphasizes the importance of muscle over just losing weight, citing her forthcoming book The Metabolism Fix.
  • “We have done such a massive disservice by focusing on losing weight... instead of focusing on body composition, what your weight's made up of and how to improve that, and taking more of a muscle first approach to health.” (00:48)
• Diet Pitfalls and Muscle Loss: She critiques popular strategies like GLP-1 medications and poorly designed calorie-restriction diets.
  • “Any poorly designed diet without exercise, without protein is going to cause that problem... you lose too many—5 to 40% muscle.” (01:21)

3. Real-World Anecdotes: Manipulating the Scale

• JJ shares a story from her time on Dr. Phil’s weight loss challenge, where contestants gamed the weighing process with dehydration tactics rather than real fat loss.
  • “They just steamed themselves... they completely dehydrated themselves. I could see it on the body comp scale because that thing looks at total body water.” (02:16)

4. Protein: Quantity, Quality, and Age

• Age-Specific Protein Needs: JJ argues we need more protein as we age, especially to fight off age-related muscle decline.
  • “If you are... in your 20s and you're doing a lot of resistance training, you can get away with a lot... But as you get older... you need more protein as you age. You need more resistance training as you age.” (04:30)
  • “Starting at around age 30... we can lose up to 1% of our muscle mass a year... But it's not because you're aging, it's because you're not doing. It's because of your lifestyle.” (05:22)
  • “I did a dexa scan at 39 and 59. The same really.” (05:55)
• Plant vs Animal Proteins: She discusses the satiety and thermic effect of protein, highlighting that vegan sources often come with more carbs or fats.
  • “Protein and plant products comes with carbs or fat. There's no isolated protein in plant that you, you can eat unless you get a shake or something.” (03:56)

5. Muscle Quality, Strength & Longevity

• Strength as a Vital Sign:
  • “It's not just having muscle, it's the quality of that muscle... that's why I'm sure you've heard of grip strength testing.” (07:01)
• Why Grip Strength?
  • “Grip strength is the biggest predictor of overall strength... that's related to now all cause mortality, dementia, cardiovascular health.” (08:12)
• Leg Strength & Cognition:
  • “Quad strength... is actually the one that's most correlated with your cognition.” (09:14)
• Functional Training Approach: Emphasizes the importance of practical strength and mixed training modalities.
  • “It's better for you to do super functional stuff. Well rounded. Right. That focuses on fast moves, too. So that you've got both the strength, the power, and the endurance.” (10:19)

6. Exercise “Snacks” and Metabolic Health

• Short Bursts are Powerful: Even 60 seconds of air squats after eating can significantly benefit glucose disposal and metabolism.
  • “If you, after you eat, did 60 seconds of air squats, that would equal about going out for a walk, seriously, for 10 minutes.” (17:50)
  • “If you do air squats, you take that sugar, you suck it into your muscles.” (18:13)

7. Reframing Obesity: Focus on Fat, Not Weight

• More Accurate Metrics: “We shouldn't be looking at weight. We should only be looking at body fat.” (16:44)
  • “You really need to look at all of this. Optimize for protein, get people moving throughout the day, add resistance training, then start adding some intervals.” (16:44)
• Body Fat %, Not BMI: JJ reviews the shifting standards for body fat percentages and the importance of biological individuality (ectomorph, mesomorph, endomorph).
  • “A real athletic male will be somewhere in the 5 to 12%... healthy male, it's like up to 18%... Women, 15 to 22% athletic, up to 27% healthy, but now they say 32 is ideal — it’s not.” (20:33)

8. Muscle Quality Tests for the Real World

• Testing Ideas: JJ suggests a muscle quality score based on grip strength, squat tests, and push-ups.
  • “Grip strength... If your grip strength… between one hand and the other is 10% or more difference, it's a sign of early cognitive decline.” (22:44)
• JJ’s Benchmarks:
  • Push-ups: “For a woman, if she can do 12 to 15, that's fantastic. Guys, I would say at least 25.” (23:38)
• Pull-ups & Functional Moves: Endorses pull-ups, deadlifts, and farmer’s carries for practical strength and health.

9. Food Choices & Healthy Travel Tips

• Realistic Eating Advice: JJ laments how even stores like Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s are full of seed oils and processed foods, despite their healthy image.
  • “Whole Foods is... a seed oil extravaganza... If I can go to Sprouts, I'm going to Sprouts. First of all, it's like half the price... better options.” (27:07)
• JJ’s Tips: Travel with a coffee maker, order Instacart, and scrutinize ingredient labels.
  • “Everywhere we go, we just order instacart and put it in the fridge.” (26:57)

10. Personal Stories & Side Notes

• JJ’s Own Injuries and Rehab: Shares stories of her ballet- and gymnastics-inflicted injuries, how she’s using cutting-edge regenerative medicine, and lessons from her international teaching days.
• Education & Career: Discusses her academic journey in biomechanics and exercise physiology, and her current work at A4M (Amer. Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine), chairing their business/practice division. (13:55, 28:35)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Exercise Recommendations Reality Check:
  • “One minute of vigorous, like if you ran up the stairs, is worth about 10 minutes of walking.” – JJ Virgin (00:15, 17:44)
• Fruit Juice is the Devil:
  • “Fruit juice is the devil.” – JJ Virgin (18:14)
• On Muscle & Metabolism:
  • “Muscles as the place where you can dispose all the sugar, they call it the glucose sink. I call it a sugar sponge.” – JJ Virgin (09:26)
• On Changing Body Fat Norms:
  • “Now you look at and they go, oh, ideal's [body fat] to 32%. I was like, no, it's not...I think we're just trying to make these things okay as everyone's becoming more obese, and that's not helping anybody.” – JJ Virgin (21:01)
• On Modern Grocery Stores:
  • “You'll go to something like Whole Foods and you think you're going to a healthy place. And it's got seed oil, it's got canola oil and all these things.” – JJ Virgin (27:29)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:00 – 01:20 | JJ introduces premise: Exercise for metabolism, not calories. Importance of body composition over weight.
• 01:20 – 02:48 | Calorie restriction, GLP-1s, and muscle loss. Anecdote: Dr. Phil’s weight loss show strategy.
• 03:57 – 05:18 | Protein needs, vegan diets, aging and muscle loss.
• 07:01 – 09:26 | How to measure muscle quality; importance of grip strength and leg strength for cognition.
• 10:19 – 11:26 | JJ’s injury stories, functional training, and advanced rehab therapies.
• 13:37 – 14:23 | JJ’s academic background; why exercise and nutrition should be integrated.
• 15:45 – 17:44 | Redefining obesity, optimizing intervention order (protein, movement, resistance, intervals).
• 18:00 – 18:53 | Air squats to offset glucose, body fat percentage standards.
• 20:31 – 22:44 | Ideal body fat by type/gender; scale vs body composition testing.
• 23:34 – 25:15 | Functional movement suggestions, push-up/pull-up advice, farmer’s carries.
• 26:21 – 27:59 | Travel nutrition tips; pitfalls of healthy-sounding groceries.
• 28:35 – End | JJ’s ongoing projects, where to follow her, and sign-off.

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Where to Learn More

• JJ Virgin: jjvirgin.com
• A4M Practice Training: Profitable Practice Blueprint (chaired by JJ Virgin)
• Sean Kelly / Digital Social Hour: [Podcast Platforms]

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Summary Tone: Direct, evidence-based, and practical; JJ is unfiltered and passionate about busting fitness and nutrition myths while making healthy living actionable for everyone.

Transcript

[JJ Virgin]

We've got to stop focusing on exercise to burn calories. We need to focus on exercise for the metabolic impacts that it has. If you look at the exercise recommendations, they go, okay, it's 75 minutes of vigorous or 150 minutes of easy moderate they call it. Turns out it's actually not a 2 to 1 like that. It's actually 4 to 10 to 1. Like, one minute of vigorous, like, say you ran up the stairs is worth about 10 minutes of walking.

[Podcast Host]

Okay, guys. JJ, virgin back on the show. We're here at a 4M.

[JJ Virgin]

I know my hood.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, your neck of the woods. Let's go.

[Ad/Promo Voice]

The muscles are out.

[JJ Virgin]

Well, this is your neck of the woods.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, I'm filming here. Yeah, you're speaking, but looking good. What's new? Since I'm a senior, it's been almost a year now, I think.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah, Just working out.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, I could tell.

[JJ Virgin]

Working out. Working on a new book.

[Podcast Host]

What's this book?

[JJ Virgin]

Next year I can. Because it's my book, so I can do what I want. Right. It is called the metabolism fix. Restore your body's ability to build muscle and lose fat faster. And the real premise of it is we have done such a massive disservice by focusing on losing weight. And I think the GLP1s really exposed this instead of focusing on body composition, what your weight's made up of and how to improve that, and taking more of a muscle first approach to health.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. Because the GLPs are you're losing weight, but also muscle weight. Right.

[JJ Virgin]

Well, but here's the reality. It's not the GLP1s. Any poorly designed diet without exercise, without protein is going to cause that problem.

[Podcast Host]

Really?

[JJ Virgin]

Oh, yeah. Yeah. You look at any diet with caloric restriction, the difference with the GLP1s is you can actually stay on the diet.

[Podcast Host]

Right, Right.

[JJ Virgin]

With, you know, with a normal diet, you get too hungry and you override this. And so any poorly designed diet, you lose too many 5 to 40% muscle. Geez. Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

So caloric restriction.

[JJ Virgin]

So here's a funny thing. When I was on. I was on Dr. Phil for two years doing these weight loss challenges, they had a competition where they divided the group. We had 13 challengers. They divided them in half and they said whichever group collectively loses the most weight in this month is going to get to go to Canyon Ranch. Well, I was bringing a body composition scale in so I could see what was going on. And the night before the weigh in, that whole day before the weigh in, all they did, the one group that Won. Which they won by a half pound overall.

[Podcast Host]

Wow.

[JJ Virgin]

Okay. So the day before, they didn't eat, they, they didn't drink. They just walked on the treadmills all day long. And then the night before, I mean, this was really strategic and smart. Cause we didn't say you couldn't do this. They turned the showers on to high. They stuffed towels under the bathroom doors and so they just steamed themselves. They completely dehydrated themselves. I could see it on the body comp scale because that thing looks at total body water. And I'm like, oh, right. But I mean it was. They did like a boxer weigh in. That's crazy. Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

So they did a water fast.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah. Oh, they. And water fast in massive dehydration as well. And it worked great. They didn't, they didn't do a water fast because they drank no water either.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. So they won by half a pound overall.

[JJ Virgin]

Overall. Not each person overall.

[Podcast Host]

Oh, overall.

[JJ Virgin]

So the reality is the other group should have won.

[Podcast Host]

They should have won. Interesting. And what was the difference? Like, were they on different diets? Like, how did that work?

[JJ Virgin]

No, there was no. During that program, Dr. Phil had a book and so there was nothing specific. Like I was working with each one individually to tweak things. It was interesting. The people who didn't do well in that group were the vegans who were only doing cardio. We got the other ones. No, they did not do well. They were doing loads of cardio and they were doing loads of. Well, think about if you're a vegan diet, when you look at food overall, the most thermic satiating macronutrients. Protein. Protein and animal products is going to come with fat, although you can get it pretty lean. Protein and plant products comes with carbs or fat. You, there's no isolated protein in plant that you, you can eat unless you get a shake or something, right?

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[JJ Virgin]

And so you might be able to eat egg whites or lobster or chicken breast over on the, on the animal side and get pretty lean. But on the plant side, you're either eating legumes, nuts, you're getting lots of other calories with it. So they were eating a high carb, high fat diet as a vegan, which is an obesogenic formula to gain weight and doing loads of cardio. So they had the worst results.

[Podcast Host]

Interesting. Now I'm sure you've seen this recent protein debate on, on social media how people are really questioning like how much protein is enough. Right. And I'm sure you've seen some people are saying you don't need that much.

[JJ Virgin]

Well, our bodies are really adaptive. What's interesting is, and it really depends on, on how old you are and what else you're doing. If you are someone who is in your 20s and you're doing a lot of resistance training, you can get away with a lot because you're triggering muscle protein synthesis by your hormones. But as you get older, and especially when you look at how few people are actually hitting the parameters for what we should be doing, and our parameters suck and they're really low. So you look at what you really need to do to build muscle as you age. It's not happening with a small amount of protein. So you need more protein as you age. You need more resistance training as you age. Because as we age, left unchecked, and I don't believe it's happening because you're aging. I think it's happening because we're sitting and we're eating a low protein diet.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, because you start losing muscle mass as you age, right?

[JJ Virgin]

Well, you don't have to lose muscle. So here's the thing. Starting at around age 30, because of the shift in hormones, prior to that you were building a lot of muscle through insulin. But starting at around age 30, we, we can lose up to 1% of our muscle mass a year. It's usually about 3 to 8% per decade. That's actually not the problematic one. The problematic issue there is that you're losing twice as much strength and three times as much power. That's what really sets you up for the hip fracture, the fall. But it's not because you're aging, it's because you're not doing. It's because of your lifestyle. I did a dexa scan at 39 and 59. The same really.

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[JJ Virgin]

Yes.

[Podcast Host]

You didn't lose any muscle mass.

[JJ Virgin]

Nope. And lifting the same too. Because it's not just having muscle, it's the quality of that muscle. That's why I'm sure you've heard of grip strength testing.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. So say it's really important to have good grip strength.

[JJ Virgin]

So I'm working on a protocol right now for a metabolic score that will combine body composition with both a squat test where you just how many times can you go up and down over a chair in 30 seconds plus a grip strength to give a muscle quality score. Because we don't have any real way to look at that right now. Like when you look at how we're figuring out how much skeletal muscle mass we have. It's all predicted. Oh, really? It's not. Yeah. When you do a bioimpedance scale, they look at total body water, they predict fat free mass, and then based on that, they predict that about half of it is muscle. It's predicted. Even a DEXA can't tell for sure. You know what skeletal muscle mass. There's a test called a D3 creatine that can tell it, but it's only done in research studies right now. But the bigger piece of that is if you have a bunch of muscle, and let's say you're just a bigger person over fat, you've got a bunch of muscle, but it's not strong, it's not protective. It's gotta be strong, it's gotta be contracting.

[Podcast Host]

Hmm.

[Ad/Promo Voice]

Why?

[Podcast Host]

Why is grip strength so important?

[JJ Virgin]

Because it is the biggest predictor of overall strength. It's a proxy. Cause people say, oh, my grip strength's poor. I'm gonna squeeze the tennis ball. I go, that's not the point of grip strength. Grip strength is a proxy for how much strength you have overall.

[Podcast Host]

Okay.

[JJ Virgin]

And that is related to now all cause mortality, dementia, cardiovascular health. Because when your muscles contract, they release all of these messengers that say, hey, lower my blood sugar, lower my immune system, or boost my immune system, improve my brain function. So it's the best proxy. We have to indicate it, right?

[Podcast Host]

I used to use those forearm flexors all the time. I should start using those again.

[JJ Virgin]

No, no, no. That's not the point.

[Podcast Host]

Really.

[JJ Virgin]

It's not how strong your forearms are. It's that the grip strength is a proxy for how strong you are overall. In fact, if you were going to focus on any muscle, like you were going to say, okay, I can only pick one, that would be stupid. But let's say you can only pick, like one area. Quad strength. And the size of your quad muscles is actually the one that's most correlated with your cognition.

[Podcast Host]

No way.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah, but if you think about it, think about, like, what would you need the most in life to get through life? Would it be grip strength? Or would it be being able to get up the stairs, be able to ambulate? Right.

[Podcast Host]

Legs.

[JJ Virgin]

So legs. But also when you think about muscles as the place where you can dispose all the sugar, they call it the glucose sink. I call it a sugar sponge. You know, you don't have a lot of muscles here, but you got big quad muscles. That's a lot of places to put sugar. That's not going in your visceral adipose tissue. Right.

[Podcast Host]

So start squatting, guys.

[JJ Virgin]

Yes.

[Podcast Host]

What's your max on the squat?

[JJ Virgin]

So I have. When I was 17, I blew out my knee and so. And then I broke my foot. Gee.

[Podcast Host]

Squatting or just.

[JJ Virgin]

No, doing stupid stuff. I was doing point ballet. Now you know how tall I am.

[Podcast Host]

You're tall.

[JJ Virgin]

I was doing gymnastics and point ballet. Like, I don't know why someone didn't say, these are not your sports. Why don't you play basketball, girl?

[Podcast Host]

Could have been in the wnba.

[JJ Virgin]

So, yeah, so I blew up my knee, messed up my hip. So I've had knee replacement, hip replacement. So squatting heavy is not my thing.

[Podcast Host]

Got it.

[JJ Virgin]

But leg pressing, you know, pull ups, push ups. And I think that it's better for you to do super functional stuff. Well rounded. Right. That focuses on fast moves, too. So that you've got both the strength, the power, and the endurance.

[Podcast Host]

A lot of people do get hurt squatting and deadlifting.

[JJ Virgin]

I am not. I love deadlifts, but I like to do single leg Romanian deadlifts. Ooh.

[Podcast Host]

Those burn very hard.

[JJ Virgin]

So I like doing things like that that really cause you to focus on stability. Yeah. But yeah, I actually tore my groin doing those stupid single leg deadlifts. But I'm back.

[Podcast Host]

You gotta hold the kettlebell while you do it, right.

[JJ Virgin]

You gotta hold it, you gotta balance. And because I have the broken foot.

[Podcast Host]

Oh.

[JJ Virgin]

You know, I'm like, I can do this.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. So I gotta get some stem cells in there or something.

[JJ Virgin]

I. Right now I'm doing something called regener kind. Have you heard of this? So There is a doctor I should connect you with this guy. He's amazing. So he is in Scottsdale. He's one of eight doctors in the world that are licensed to use this therapy. It's the thing that Kobe Bryant and a bunch of other athletes used to fly to Germany to get. So it's like PRP on steroids.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, I heard of this.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah. So I've been doing that into my foot because literally the thing's just a complete mess. It's like, you know what happened? I was living in Japan and I was teaching aerobics against my parents wishes. I'd taken a little time off at ucla and so they disowned me. And so I'm in Japan teaching aerobics and I'm doing gymnastics and I break my foot on a Sunday and they were going to send me home. So I cut the cast off and held onto a chair and continued to teach so that I wouldn't get deported. So I.

[Podcast Host]

Wait, they were going to deport you for that?

[JJ Virgin]

Well, because I didn't have. I was in Japan teaching aerobics, like, if you can't teach. So I was like, I'm fine.

[Podcast Host]

Wow. So that probably made it way worse.

[JJ Virgin]

Just slightly.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. Damn. I want to go to Japan one day. You've been back since those days?

[JJ Virgin]

I went twice during that time. Haven't been back. But we're. Apparently, I'm part of a group called the Transformational Leadership Council. And there's one guy, Ken Honda, who wrote Happy Money, who's this big guru in Japan. So he's going to bring us all over.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, I think we linked it up yesterday. They're the healthiest country.

[JJ Virgin]

It's such a. Like, I will tell you, living there. So I. I was living in a sorority house at UCLA and I moved to Japan. I've got a chauffeur, a bodyguard. I'm living in this amazing penthouse. I love the food. I'm like, this is the greatest thing ever.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[JJ Virgin]

And then I had to go back to school and back into this sorority house. And I'm like, this is like the socks. It was great. I felt more homesick leaving there than getting there and missing America. I really missed it.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, they're clean over there.

[JJ Virgin]

Just, oh, my God.

[Podcast Host]

Everything's clean. The food is clean. People are pretty nice.

[JJ Virgin]

You would have for breakfast. I remember the only problem at the time was you'd get a cup of coffee and it was like this big. I'm like, where's the. Where's the pot? You know, like this does not work for me, but you know, all that. I came home addicted to sushi and sashimi and here I am now back as a college student. Now, fortunately, it was, it was during the time in LA when all the sushi parlors popped up. But still, you know, you're like, college students don't normally spend like 30 bucks for lunch on sushi every day. Yeah, yeah.

[Podcast Host]

So did you make it through college?

[JJ Virgin]

I did. Yes, I did. I made it through college, went immediately into grad school in biomechanics, then went over into doctoral school in exercise fizz and then kind of spiraled out because I found nutrition and I've been running around ever since. It's kind of hard to find one place to get all the information. That's why A4M has been.

[Podcast Host]

That's why I. Yeah, it's super hard actually, because if you dedicate your life to one thing, you kind of don't know about other things.

[JJ Virgin]

Right. Well, and you look at. So what was really wild being in the exercise science departments is they didn't talk about nutrition. And you're like, how can you do all the exercise piece without the nutrition piece? So that's why I finally was like, I've got to go learn the nutrition piece. I actually ran out of class classes in exercise science, but it just seems so stupid to not put it up.

[Podcast Host]

They don't have classes.

[JJ Virgin]

I think now they do. But this was a long time ago, right? This was like 30 years ago. They used to like, they were, they were in completely different parts of campus. So apparently now like my buddy runs a physique lab in Florida and so he does all the like female bodybuilders. It's really cool. So they have the nutrition and fitness together because it makes sense. I'm like, why wouldn't you?

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, now it's a no brainer.

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[JJ Virgin]

Well, I mean, back then as a trainer, everybody wanted to lose weight. And it was really clear to me very fast that you could not, you know, just lose weight through exercise alone. Of course, now I look at this all by the way, in grad school, we were literally taught, do not have someone lift weights till they lose weight.

[Podcast Host]

Really?

[JJ Virgin]

It's so backwards, which I completely went up. You know, I did the opposite because it seems stupid to me. But yeah, there was no. Like, you didn't exercise to lose weight. You had to go do the diet. And then you did the diet and then you would go fix it with the exercise. It was like, well, that.

[Podcast Host]

Actually, I have heard this with obese people not to do cardio right away. I have.

[JJ Virgin]

Well, with. If you. If I was starting today with someone who's obese, which is my favorite group to work with, and you know, I remember way back when there, there was very hard to find them. Now it's two out of three. It's 40% of the population.

[Podcast Host]

Oh, 40%.

[JJ Virgin]

It's. Well, so obese is 30 pounds or more overweight. Really, we shouldn't be looking at weight. We should only be looking at body fat.

[Podcast Host]

Right.

[JJ Virgin]

You know, because sometimes we'll have someone who's overweight and they're perfect in their body fat or that they're normal weight and they've got high body fat. So you really need to look at all of this. But I think that if we just were starting and the very first thing you did was optimize for protein. Most people tend to not overeat. As soon as you get their protein in check. Right. And then you started making sure they just were moving enough throughout the day. Then you would add in resistance training, then start adding in some intervals. And I don't know if you've seen the research on exercise, snacks, on vigorous activity. This thing just came out. So one of my contrarian beliefs is that we've got to stop focusing on exercise to burn calories, that we need to focus on exercise for the metabolic impacts that it has. So the study just came out because if you look at the exercise recommendations, they go, okay, it's 75 minutes of vigorous or 150 minutes of easy or moderate they call it. Turns out it's actually not a 2 to 1 like that. It's actually 4 to 10 to 1. Like one minute of vigorous, like say you ran up the stairs is worth about 10 minutes of walking.

[Podcast Host]

Wow.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah. So if you, after you eat, did 60 seconds of air squats, that would equal about going out for a walk. Seriously, for 10 minutes.

[Podcast Host]

Air squats?

[JJ Virgin]

Air squats.

[Podcast Host]

That's insane.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah. I mean, what it does. And the amazing thing is, let's say that you wanted to go have. Are you drinking orange juice?

[Podcast Host]

This is electrolytes.

[JJ Virgin]

Okay. I was like, I was going to pick on you.

[Podcast Host]

I don't drink fruit juice.

[JJ Virgin]

Okay? Fruit juice is. I was on a TV show, a morning TV show, and I said, fruit juice is the devil. And they're like, no, kids are watching. And orange juice Minute Maid sponsors us. I'm like, I'm so sorry, there goes that sponsorship. I was like, okay, I won't come back. But let's say that you had a cookie. If you do air squats, you take that sugar, you suck it into your muscles. So now you're getting it out of circulation and you're not going to then, if you've got too many calories, store it as fat. So now I'm not saying go eat cookies, but if you happen to do

[Podcast Host]

some air squats, you mentioned obesity should be more related towards body fat percent. What body fat percent would you consider obese and overweight?

[JJ Virgin]

So here's what's really interesting. When I was in graduate school, we spent, or actually this was doctoral school. We spent a whole semester just on body composition testing. And the norms we were taught back in the 80s are totally different than the norms now. It's just like the clothes and size I wore back then, I wear two sizes smaller. I'm the same. I'm no different.

[Podcast Host]

Oh, really?

[JJ Virgin]

It's because they're making things so that people go, because a woman says I'm a size four. Well, she's not a size four, she's actually a size eight.

[Podcast Host]

Wow. It's just clothing companies.

[JJ Virgin]

So they're making everything okay. Just like you look at our lab values and they're like, okay, this is okay. No, it's not. It's not ideal. So if I look at body composition, here's how this works. You've got. I think you have to go back to the old way we used to look at body size, where you have that ectomorphic person like my husband over there is an ectomorphic person, he's a super lean guy. They struggle to put muscle on. Then you have the mesomorphic person. I'm more of a mesomorph. Easy for me to put muscle on. Then you have the endomorphic. They're the curvies. Right. And then within those, you would have different levels of ideal body fat. A man has 3 to 5% essential fat. That's how much fat he needs to have to survive. Women are like 10 to 13%. So we already have higher body fat so that we can, you know, breastfeed, survive a famine, have kids, all that. Then you look and go, what type of body do you have? Where are you best? But even with that, a real athletic male will be somewhere in the 5 to 12% and depends on the sport. Swimmers will be higher. Right. More buoyancy. So swimmers have higher body fat than, say, a track runner.

[Podcast Host]

Makes sense.

[JJ Virgin]

So depending on the sport, but it's usually 5 to 12%. And then a healthy male, it's like up to 18%. We were taught in graduate school that 21, 22% and above was, like, bad. And then for women, somewhere, the athletic woman would be somewhere in the, like, 15 to 22%. And then somewhere in the 18 to 22 or 25% was healthy up to 27%. But now you look at and they go, oh, ideal's to 32%. I was like, no, it's not.

[Podcast Host]

32 is ideal.

[JJ Virgin]

That's not ideal.

[Podcast Host]

Sounds good.

[JJ Virgin]

That's not ideal. It's not ideal. I think we're just trying to make these things okay as everyone's becoming more obese, and that's not helping anybody. But also, we're not really looking either, right? I mean, it's like, yeah, people just

[Podcast Host]

hop on a scale and think, that's enough.

[JJ Virgin]

I was. I was going to the doctor to get some PRP in my elbow, and they were putting me on the scale, and I go, I'm just curious. Like, you, you're putting me on a scale for PRP in my elbow? For what reason? And what are you doing with that information? Like, you've done nothing with this. Why am I getting weighed?

[Podcast Host]

Yeah.

[JJ Virgin]

Doesn't make sense. And for what? And if you put someone on a scale that didn't tell you anything, like my husband when we went to do our dexas at 59, he was 25% body fat. As an athletic male, he's now 10%. Wow. But he didn't know this because he was getting on a regular scale. Once he saw what that weight was made up of, it's like, oh, okay. Needed to do some testosterone, added in, upped his weight training game, upped his, like all the stuff I was telling him to do, he finally did it right. But I mean, big shift. But he would not have known that based on his clothes. Like, he lost 2 inches in his waist. But you know, these things creep up and you go, I'm the same weight I've always been. Well, you might be the same weight, but you're not the same body composition. So we gotta be looking at this all the way along, just like we need to be looking at muscle quality. Because even if you're the same weight in the same body composition, your muscles might not be as strong as they used to be.

[Podcast Host]

How do you measure muscle quality?

[JJ Virgin]

That grip strength is a great one. So I think there's three things that can be super helpful. Grip strength is such an easy one. You can buy a $30 little grip dynamometer.

[Podcast Host]

I've seen those tests. People walk around with them.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah. And you know what's cool about it? So you can tell, you know, we've always looked at, how do you know if you're over training? The reality is most people are under training. So I think we worry too much about overtraining, just like we worry too much about cortisol. But with grip strength, if your grip strength is decreasing as you are training, you probably need to take a little break. If your grip strength between one hand and the other is 10% or more difference, it's a sign of early cognitive decline. So there's some really cool stuff that we could be doing with this. But if you put grip strength together with squats, with push ups, and I love pushups because then you're really testing core too. And you're also testing your stamina, your endurance, because you see how many pushups you can do in good form.

[Podcast Host]

What do you think people should, like the average person should be able to do push up wise.

[JJ Virgin]

I think for a woman, if she can do 12 to 15, that's fantastic. Guys, I would say at least 25.

[Podcast Host]

Most guys cannot do 25.

[JJ Virgin]

Really? You're kidding.

[Podcast Host]

I doubt it.

[JJ Virgin]

25.

[Podcast Host]

I doubt it.

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[Podcast Host]

Yeah, I don't think so. We'd have to test it, but I'm pretty sure, like, obviously your husband can

[JJ Virgin]

but like make him do some push ups.

[Podcast Host]

Right now my best was like 50, 50 something.

[JJ Virgin]

What about that? There was that. That woman who did like a thousand or something insane. And then people were attacking her for her form. I'm like, she has to a thousand push ups. So you need to shut it.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. What about pull ups? Most guys can't do pull ups.

[JJ Virgin]

So he can do pull ups. So pull ups are one of the things that I think we should all be doing. Because you do a pull up and then at the very end just hang right. And that's gonna improve that grip strength too. So just like another great functional exercise is to do farmer's carries. And I really like the luggage carry, where it's like you do one really heavy hand. Cause that's more typical of life. You're at the airport hoisting things around. We call it luggage crossfit at the airport. Cause we jack our suitcases up to 70 pounds each. We literally travel. Like this time we Trav traveled with. We always travel with coffee maker, red lights, all this stuff.

[Podcast Host]

You bring your coffee maker.

[JJ Virgin]

We bring our coffee maker with us. Well, especially here. Here. We actually even ordered a refrigerator. We had instacart delivery.

[Ad/Promo Voice]

Wow.

[JJ Virgin]

Well, we're.

[Podcast Host]

You go hard.

[JJ Virgin]

I starve to death in Las Vegas. It's a start. It's hard to eat here. I mean, because you'll go out to dinner, right? Yeah. I mean, dinner's fine. Dinner's. But breakfast, you know, I don't want to go. I don't want to go wait for 30 minutes at a restaurant and lunch is impossible. So we just have a refrigerator in the room. Instacart it.

[Podcast Host]

I do find it hard to eat healthy while I travel. Whether it's Vegas or just.

[JJ Virgin]

That's why we do anywhere we go, we travel with our coffee maker. If we can't do that, we have purity. Coffee makes these sacred cups, little instants that are actually amazing. And then these coffee tea bags that are incredible.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah, it's microplastics in the tea bag.

[JJ Virgin]

Nope. They're very. They're very anal about all their stuff. Yeah. But they're little like instant coffee. Sounds disgusting. These are amazing. So travel with those. I travel with the coffee maker because I'm a big baby about coffee. Huh? I'm really baby about my coffee. And then everywhere we go, we just order instacart and put it in the fridge.

[Podcast Host]

Good. Whole instacart?

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah. You could get sprouts on there.

[Ad/Promo Voice]

Just.

[Podcast Host]

I don't know if Whole Foods is

[JJ Virgin]

on there, but I am. I think Whole Foods is. Is pathetic.

[Podcast Host]

Really?

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah. Like, look at their hot bar. Their hot bar is like a seed oil. Extravagant.

[Podcast Host]

I don't eat the hot bar there.

[JJ Virgin]

I mean, it just. If I can go to Sprouts, I'm going to Sprouts. First of all, it's like half the price of Whole Foods and has better options.

[Podcast Host]

They got force of nature there. They got some good brands at Sprouts.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Podcast Host]

You got to know what you're looking for though. I feel like grocery stores are tough to navigate if you don't.

[JJ Virgin]

Well, especially if you think you're going to a healthy place. I mean, this is, this is the thing. Like you'll go to something like Whole Foods and you think you're going to a healthy place. And it's got seed oil, it's got canola oil and all these things. And then they've got agave.

[Podcast Host]

Same with Trader Joe's. You know, Trader Joe's is even worse.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah.

[Podcast Host]

Have you read some labels there?

[JJ Virgin]

Yes.

[Podcast Host]

Oh my gosh.

[JJ Virgin]

Because I was trying to do a thing with Trader Joe's to show and.

[Podcast Host]

Oh, sorry. I don't want to ruin your deal, but.

[JJ Virgin]

No, no, no, no. I wasn't trying to do a thing with them. I was trying to do a thing where I could show people all the prepared foods that you could buy at Trader Joe's.

[Podcast Host]

And I'm like, it's hard, right?

[JJ Virgin]

You really can't.

[Podcast Host]

I went through the whole store. I found like three things.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah. But they have great produce there.

[Podcast Host]

Is it organic, though?

[JJ Virgin]

Oh, yeah. They have great. Like, they have the best selection of mushrooms. Like, I'm an obsessed mushroom person.

[Podcast Host]

Love them for brain health or just taste wise.

[JJ Virgin]

I just love them. I think they're just great. Taste wise but immune health. Yeah. So no, I'm obsessed with mushrooms and they have all the different types and they're hard to find.

[Podcast Host]

Yeah but you go through the frozen aisle there. Oh my gosh.

[JJ Virgin]

Yeah. Very sad. I know.

[Podcast Host]

Well jj, other than the book, what's next for you? Where can people keep up with you

[JJ Virgin]

and you know, been over here at A4M chairing their business, their practice business. It's called profitable practice blueprint. So all their business training for their practitioners which is super cool and then everything out there about metabolism and muscle. So everything. Jjvirgin.com Check her out guys.

[Podcast Host]

Thanks for coming back on. Good to see you again.

[JJ Virgin]

Thanks for having me.

[Podcast Host]

See you guys.

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