2699: Is protein overrated?

Summary

Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth – Episode 2699

"Is Protein Overrated?"

Release Date: October 4, 2025
Hosts: Sal Di Stefano, Adam Schafer, Justin Andrews, Doug Egge

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Overview

This episode centers on the debate: Is protein overrated? The Mind Pump crew tackles the surge in protein-enhanced foods, challenges myths and propaganda about protein’s safety, and provides nuanced perspectives on the nutrient’s value in modern health and the food industry. The episode also features listener Q&A, covering highly individual training dilemmas, optimal health vs performance mindsets, and smart nutritional strategies.

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Main Theme

Exploring whether protein’s reputation for aiding muscle growth, fat loss, and overall health is warranted or exaggerated.
The hosts dissect how marketing, food trends, and fitness culture have fueled a “protein everywhere” movement — and whether the science backs it all up.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Is Protein Overrated? (03:14–22:38)

The Debate:

• Sal’s Position:
  “No, still not. I still don’t think so… Carbs are so accessible… we still have this massive addiction to carbohydrates, and that impedes on you getting your optimal amount of protein.” (03:14)
• Adam’s Nuanced Take:
  “Here’s where I’ll say it is overrated. It’s overrated in the sense that people are buying processed foods that are protein-enhanced thinking this is going to solve their health and dietary problems.” (04:19)

The Upside of Protein

• Essential for muscle growth and fat loss.
• Promotes satiety: “Higher protein diet helps with muscle building. It also helps with fat loss… it’s more filling or it produces more satisfaction.” (05:15)
• Can help with insulin sensitivity.

Overrated in Food Marketing

• Protein now added to everything—chocolate bars, chips, cereals, yogurt (“protein-enhanced processed food”).
• Adam: “What’s happened is… now you have protein in everything. It’s still heavily processed food. The market takes and twists stuff.” (04:45)
• Eating these foods isn’t optimal compared to whole-food sources.

Processed Protein Foods: Net Positive or Not?

• Sal Defends: They can help people hit protein targets, especially those otherwise snacking on junk.
  “If I’m going to snack on something, I’m going to pick one of those [high-protein items] and I can still hit my targets…” (07:23)
• Adam Counters: Protein is expensive and doesn’t promote overeating, which explains why the food industry was slow to add it.
• Justin: "I don’t see any downside to it if it leads to whole animal source protein options, but not as an answer for hyper processed foods." (06:58)

Evolution, Satiety, and Natural Intake

• “There are a lot of theories… one of them is that our satiety signals got triggered when we reached a certain level of amino acid intake.” (11:01)
• Historically, eating enough protein and fat meant good things for human health and performance.
• Overeating on protein-rich whole foods is difficult: “Have you ever overeaten jerky?” (15:44)

Addressing Protein Myths & Propaganda

• Debunking: No evidence that protein “leaches calcium” or “stresses kidneys” in healthy people.
• High protein diets don’t damage organs for the vast majority.
• High-protein diets: tend to result in more muscle, less fat even at equal calories (17:34).

Counter-Propaganda Origins

• Adam: “What you’re seeing now is a lot of counter protein propaganda… from the vegan lobby. It’s propaganda.” (19:00)

Historical & Survival Angles

• Humans have always relied on animal protein for thriving:
  “You can’t go back in history and point to cultures surviving and thriving without animal-based protein.” (20:36)
• Fat alongside protein is crucial—eg. trappers eating only rabbits would starve for lack of fat.

Trending: Lab-grown Meat & Eating Insects

• The crew touches on societal trends like lab-grown meat and bug protein, mostly with skepticism.
  “I’d rather eat bugs than lab-grown meat…” (22:08)

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2. Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• On satiety & overeating:
  “Processed foods have a long shelf life… but then what typically follows is the third thing, which they’re engineered to make you overeat… but not when it’s protein.” (14:49)
• Debunking detractors:
  “It’s the vegan lobbies that put out this propaganda… If your doctor hasn’t said [to cut protein] to you, this isn’t you.” (19:00)
• On bodybuilding & competition:
  Sal: “That is body dysmorphia on display and also radical dieting… the pinnacle of both those things. So to sign yourself up… in the pursuit of health is a terrible idea.” (29:18)

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3. Listener Q&A — Coaching Call Highlights

Caller 1: Kerry (Strong Female Lifters & Visceral Fat) [55:09–75:02]

• Issue: After significant fat loss and muscle gain, a (minor) uptick in visceral fat appeared in her scans.
• Key Discussion:
  • Normal for high-achieving athletes to experience small, sometimes transient shifts in fat storage.
  • Sal: “You probably feel your body is pushing back a little bit… not that you did something wrong.” (63:36)
  • Adam: “You have two paths: keep pressing performance (some health tradeoffs), or prioritize longevity (some performance tradeoffs).” (61:33)
  • Advice: Shift focus toward something new—mobility, unconventional lifts, or even coaching others.
  • Justin: “For competitive people, direct your discipline to restorative practices or coaching — give your competitive spirit a new purpose.” (66:01)
  • Sal: “I’m definitely going to encourage you to let go of one of the two things… either the body fat % chasing or the PR chasing.” (69:38)
• Notable: The crew encourages slow mindset shifts, not radical change.

Caller 2: Allison (Former College Athlete Adjusting to New Fitness Goals) [75:16–81:44]

• Issue: Wants to drop body fat post-college athletics without obsessive tracking.
• Advice:
  • Stay at (or increase) calories—her activity level is very high for her current intake.
  • Switch from 3-day “anabolic” programs to MAPS 15 for more flexible, lower impact volume.
  • “Eat more in a situation like that and you get leaner—that’s what happens!” (82:07)

Caller 3: Steve (SWAT Officer, Cancer Survivor) [82:16–85:42]

• Issue: Rebuilding strength post-cancer; seeking next step after MAPS Transform.
• Advice:
  • Transition to MAPS 15 or MAPS Performance for balanced mobility, strength, and resilience.
  • Skip high-volume phases for now and focus on sustainable progress.
• Celebrated: His recovery and muscle memory gains.

Caller 4: Lane (Struggles with Squat Progression & CNS Fatigue) [85:45–94:09]

• Issue: Can’t progress squats; suspects mobility and nervous system recovery issues from long work hours, inconsistent sleep.
• Key Insights:
  • “Less is more”—sleep and recovery trump aggressive progression.
  • “You don’t have to lift huge to be a good coach—you just have to be a good coach.” (88:02)
  • Switch to MAPS 15; consider nap strategies; seek support for squat mobility/form via forum videos.

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• Is Protein Overrated? (03:14–22:38)
• Food marketing and protein myths (04:19–09:42)
• Processed foods vs whole foods (07:23–14:49)
• Satiety & evolution (11:01–15:44)
• Counter-protein propaganda (19:00–22:38)
• Q&A - Kerry: High-performer mindset shifts (55:09–75:02)
• Q&A - Allison: Activity, body fat and nutrition post-athletics (75:16–81:44)
• Q&A - Steve: Rebuilding after illness (82:16–85:42)
• Q&A - Lane: Squat challenges & CNS (85:45–94:09)

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Original Tone & Style Highlights

• The hosts use a mix of science-backed advice, detailed coaching tips, and irreverent humor.
• Discussions flow naturally, often riffing off each other’s anecdotes or poking fun (“You know, you pay to go in the mud...?” (25:43))
• They are empathetic to callers, providing actionable steps while acknowledging psychological and lifestyle realities.

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Conclusion

Is protein overrated? Not according to the science — but the fitness industry has found ways to both over-hype and cheapen it. Focus on whole-food protein sources, use protein-enhanced processed foods as strategic tools (not magic fixes), and ignore the fearmongering (unless your doctor says otherwise). For both fitness and health, protein remains a foundational — but not miraculous — part of your nutrition arsenal.

Listeners wrestling with performance, body composition, or recovery plateaus get strong, realistic advice:
Shift your focus slowly, respect your body’s feedback, and use both movement and mindset tools to evolve your fitness journey.

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Subscribe for more myth-busting fitness talk and real-world solutions with the Mind Pump crew.

Transcript

[Sal DeStefano]

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[Justin Andrews]

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[Adam Schafer]

Website for more if you want to pump your body and expand your mind.

[Sal DeStefano]

There'S only one place to go.

[Adam Schafer]

Mind Pump Mind Pump with your hosts.

[Sal DeStefano]

Sal DeStefano, Adam Schaefer and Justin Andrews.

[Adam Schafer]

You just found the most downloaded fitness, health and entertainment podcast. This is Mind Pump. In today's episode, callers called in. We got to coach them through their fitness and health on air. But this was after the intro. Today's intro was 52 minutes long. In the intro we talk about muscle gain and fat loss and diet and health. Talk about family life. It's a good time. By the way, if you want to be a caller on one of these episodes, send us your question. Send it to liveindpumpmedia.com now. This episode is brought to you by some sponsors. The first one is Paleo Valley. Today we talked about their meat sticks. They're high protein, they're grass fed meat and they're great on the go long shelf life. So it's a good snack that's high protein. Go check them out. Go to paleovalley.com mindpump on that link. You'll get 15% off. This episode is also brought to you by Eight Sleep. This is the most advanced sleep system you'll find anywhere. It automatically cools and warms your bed with AI technology to improve your sleep. It even has a method of helping you with your snoring. It'll detect snoring. It won't wake you up, but it'll help reduce the snoring. It's amazing. Go check them out. Go to Eight Sleep. Use the code mindpump. You can get $350 off Pod 5 Ultra. Also this month, Maps GLP1 is 50% off. This is a workout program that also has diet recommendations and lifestyle guidance for people who are on a GLP1. So if you're taking semaglutide, ozempic, wegovy, tirzepatide to lose weight. This program is literally designed for you to maximize fat loss, minimize muscle loss, and actually help you get stronger. Go check it out. Go to maps glp1.com. Use the code GLP50 for the 50% off discount. All right, here comes the show. Protein. It's everywhere. They're adding it to everything. It's been linked to fat loss, muscle growth. It's great for health. Is it, is it overrated? Are people overdoing it? Let's get into it. No protein.

[Sal DeStefano]

No. Still not. I still don't think so. I remember when you, you called this. Anybody who's been listening since day one will have, remember this. But we, we had a, a debate about this and you were right that this would be the, you know, the.

[Adam Schafer]

What is that like 10 times now?

[Sal DeStefano]

Doug, keep track. 10. 10 out of 3000 ep.

[Adam Schafer]

That.

[Sal DeStefano]

So the, the rest Doug and I were right. So that's pretty, you know, pretty good.

[Adam Schafer]

It's not bad.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, no, it's. But I, I still think, I still think it's the right message. I still think that carbs are so accessible. Most carbs are highly processed. I think that we still have this massive addiction to carbohydrates and then that impedes on you getting your optimal amount of protein. And we know how beneficial that is. It's essential. And then it's even more beneficial in the pursuit of building muscle and so, and, and, or leaning out, losing body fat.

[Adam Schafer]

Here's what's interesting. So here's where I'll say it is overrated.

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh really?

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Now I don't. So let me explain because this, this will, this will kind of break it down. It's overrated in the sense that people are buying processed foods that are protein enhanced, enhanced thinking that this is going to solve their health and dietary problems. Right. Which a protein enhanced processed food in the context of comparing it to other processed foods is probably better, but it's not good. It's not great. So this is where I'll say It's overrated in the sense that what's happened is that this is what markets do, right? They'll take something. Lots of good information supports it, social media supports it, fitness influencers talking about it, and they're like, cool, now you have protein, everything. And it's still heavily processed foods. But that being said, I think protein is special because, you know, with carbohydrates, they're not essential, meaning you can avoid them. You could eat zero carbs and you're gonna be okay. Not saying that's ideal, but you don't have to eat them. Fats are essential. They tend to come around with protein. Now fats, you can have a fatty acid profile that can cause maybe some poor health effects. Okay. So with fats you still have to be a little bit more careful. Protein is interesting. Protein doesn't. Except for maybe special populations like people who have kidney disease or their doctors are saying, hey, your body has issues with processing protein, which is a small percentage of people. Like if your doctor hasn't said this to you, this isn't you. You can eat a lot of protein and have no negative effects aside from if you're eating too many calories, in which case eating overeating always has negative effects. Protein itself, like fat, you still have to look at the fatty acid profile. Carbohydrates, you can eat them or not. Not a big deal. Protein seems to always have benefits. Higher protein diet helps with muscle building. It also helps with fat loss. It also helps with satiety, meaning it, it's more filling or it produces more, more satisfaction. So it helps with appetite. It also helps with insulin sensitivity. It's, it's pretty remarkable. It's pretty interesting. So in most ways it's not overrated, but in the ways that the market takes and twists things, I would say it can be overrated.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah, I don't see any, I don't see any downside to it if it leads to whole animal source protein options.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

But yeah, to your fortifying kind of point in it leading to other hyper processed types of foods. And that being an answer, I don't think that's a valid answer. But it, I could argue still it's a better option than, you know, other processed.

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh, I'm going to defend it right now. I'm taking a different position on this than you are. So I, I definitely do think so. I mean I, when I think of just a handful things at my house is we just now took a recent sponsorship which are like these kind of high protein chips that you know, I snack on at the house. I have Greek yogurt that's processed that. Now it's not just regular Greek yogurt. It's got 20 grams of protein, added whey protein to it. One of the other companies that we work with that I love, I used to eat oatmeal for years. It's, it's got protein added to it. And so there's these, there's these, you know, I wouldn't consider them super highly processed, but they're processed foods where they fortified it with added protein that are now become, you know, if I'm going to snack on something, I'm going to, I, I'm going to pick one of those and I can still hit my targets protein wise. Whereas in the past, you know, I'd be guilty of snacking on some chips or having a bowl of cereal for breakfast, or, you know, instead of Greek yogurt, it would be ice cream. And so these foods I do think can really, really help somebody who I think struggles to hit protein, which I think includes pretty much everybody. Very few people, I think organic. You have those rare cases. I have a client that I, one of my last clients I talked to, she never missed protein intake. She also weighed 120 pounds and she loved meat, so it was pretty easy for her. But most people, generally speaking, struggle to hit the optimal amount. And so I do think that these things as alternatives than the typical processed foods are doing a lot of help.

[Adam Schafer]

You know, just to defend you. Here's why. There's two reasons why the processed food market didn't add protein to foods even after people kind of wanted it. There's two reasons why. One is it's expensive. Protein's not cheap. The other one is protein doesn't make you overeat.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Even in processed foods. Now, processed foods are engineered in ways that will make you overeat. In other words, a 30 gram protein serving in a processed food will, you'll eat more of that than you would 30 grams of protein in a natural source. However, a processed food with 30 grams of protein, you'll eat less of that.

[Sal DeStefano]

Right.

[Adam Schafer]

Than it's something that has no protein, just pure chips. Right. So to defend you 100%, where I'm going is, you know, where I see.

[Sal DeStefano]

This could be where you're going. Where you're going is there's candy bars now that are adding fortifying protein in there. And so it's just like, like, oh.

[Adam Schafer]

This is going to magically fix, yeah, a lot of things.

[Justin Andrews]

Protein, candy and everything.

[Adam Schafer]

Else.

[Sal DeStefano]

And it has happened it. I do. I, I see that as, as more as like a, a positive sign. Not because I think that's a good choice or a good direction, but is that the market has spoken so loudly that we want this. Therefore that tells me that, oh wow, consumers are finally paying attention to that. Not just my clients that I'm telling to do that sounds like general pop are starting to realize like, oh, I need more protein in my diet. And so of course now all these other clever marketers and companies that are don't really care about health, they care about you buying more of their products are like, oh shit, let's throw an extra 10 grams of protein in there. Maybe people will buy more of it. And so that's, I almost look at.

[Justin Andrews]

It as somebody going to the gas station and having options. And like, what are literally the best options you can possibly eat in a gas station? Because there's literally people that buy their food there, like in certain, like cities. And you just like, it's crazy. But you know, to, to have them steer a little more towards the protein options, they're going to better than they would anything else.

[Adam Schafer]

It's very interesting. There's a lot of theories as to why this happens with protein. One of them is that the hunger signals in humans, maybe through evolution, were our hunger signals got triggered, or I should say our satiety signals got triggered when we reached a certain level of amino acid intake. Okay. So when you're in nature and you're, you're, you're not, there's no agricultural revolution. So we don't have crops. Okay. Definitely don't have grocery stores. So we're finding food or we're killing food. And when you reach a certain level of amino acid consumption, your body knows a, you've got essential amino acids, essential protein, and B, you've got fat because in nature comes in it, you don't kill an animal that is pure chicken breasts don't, don't exist. You're going to kill an animal. There's a lot of fat on that animal as well. In fact, typically, yeah. In fact, hunters, you know, trappers in some cases would starve if they could only find rabbits, because rabbits are so lean, they would actually starve death. They could eat as many rabbits as they want because they'd have enough fat. But, but otherwise protein tends to satisfy us and then it promotes muscle growth. Why would it promote muscle growth? Well, we know what's happening mechanistically with the amino acids and protein synthesis, but evolutionary, I think this is the other part of it is you're a successful hunter. Your body is okay building strength and muscle knowing you're going to be able to support that new energy requirement because you're successfully hunting. And so it's got all these wild. Ben. It's interesting. It's very interesting. Like if you just hit your protein targets and stick to whole natural foods, that's the other part of it. Most people's caloric intake will fall right in the Goldilocks zone.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Like if you're overweight, it's a natural limiter. It's very interesting. There was this belief, I believed it, I believed it for years that we were eating machines. And the reason why humans are obese is because we have, we're surrounded by food. So yeah, we're gonna be obese. We just like we're goldfish. Like if you just feed, you know, you know how they tell you don't.

[Justin Andrews]

Overfeed your goldfish, you found ways to bypass it.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, I think that's not true at all. I think you're, I know this now by the data. You're going to eat enough to fuel your body fuel muscle growth. If you're sending the right signal, you're going to eat enough to lose excess body fat over time. The average person, of course there's dysfunction that can override this, but over time the average person just following those two rules will fall within a healthy body fat percentage and if their strength training will be fit. That's wild. I mean we just, that is wild.

[Sal DeStefano]

We just recently took a live caller that took himself from 218 pounds all the way down to 168 or 178. 11% body fat doing that. Some bands and some dumbbells and yeah, just whole foods go after my protein. That's it.

[Adam Schafer]

That's right.

[Sal DeStefano]

And got all the way to, you know, we do all ice. We're talking about this and today is one of our partners. But I mean paleo value, they're, they're meat sticks. Another great example of something that like I like these alternatives because now my, my pantry has got a lot of this stuff. And so when I still have those moments where I want to eat something where in the past in my 20s it would have been some high carb snack that is like just added a bunch of calories and didn't get me any closer to my protein intake, at least now I can grab these foods that have got 10, 20, 30 grams of protein in them and I can still stay on Pace. And then to your point, even though it's processed, it satiates me more than I have a beef stick. And that, like, holds me over.

[Adam Schafer]

You know, it's interesting about what you're saying. Processed foods have some value. I know we demonize them all the time, and largely you should avoid them. But there is some values to processed food. One of them is shelf life. Like, I don't want to. I want to be careful. Because if we don't produce foods that have a long shelf life, we have starvation in many places of the world. That's a real problem. You have to be able to produce food that you can put in cans or boxes or dried foods that lasts a long time. Because if we grow food here, ship it way over there, 50% of it gets lost. Now the cost of it is. Doesn't make sense or it doesn't work. And so processed foods have a long shelf life. And the other one for us in modern societies is that they're convenient. And this is also a real value. Like, life is busy, okay. Hectic, you got kids, you got to work, whatever. So those two things are real values. But then what typically follows is the third thing, which is they're engineered to make you overeat. Now, you brought up Paleo Valley meat sticks. Have you ever overeaten that?

[Sal DeStefano]

No.

[Adam Schafer]

And they taste good. They're delicious. But you don't eat a box of meat sticks.

[Sal DeStefano]

No, no. Maybe two. Because of two. I'm good.

[Adam Schafer]

Because protein is this natural limiter. It has a natural satiety. I can eat a box of any processed food that doesn't have a lot of protein when it comes like jerky. Who overeats jerky. Yeah. I'm sure there's someone in the world that exists has done it, but it almost never happens.

[Sal DeStefano]

No. No one. One bag of your typical. Typical bag of jerky.

[Adam Schafer]

You put a bag of chips in front of me, and I'll eat them until I hate myself. Way past. You know what would be appropriate. Yeah. So protein is very interesting in that sense. Now there's. In the past, there were some myths around protein. Like it could lead to calcium leaching. This was a. That's been way. Like, we've debunked that myth long time ago. So nobody really talks about that anymore. Stresses the kidneys. This is another one. Lots and lots and lots of studies have been done on high protein intake, very high protein intake and kidney function. And what they find is the kidneys adapt and there is no problem. Now, if you have already kidney Disease, whole another ball game. Now you have to work with your nephrologist. And believe it or not, early stages of kidney disease actually increase your protein because you're not able to utilize as much of it. But nonetheless, that's a myth, so it doesn't harm your organs. A huge meta analysis just came out on protein and arterial health, heart health, and they found no negative effects on protein. So it doesn't have. And then here's the crazy part. When you overeat calories, here's what's weird. Overeating calories on a low protein diet versus a high protein diet, same calories. The high protein diet results in less fat gain. Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

And what that is, is that's the being able to maintain the muscle mass and. Or build muscle mass. That's why it's offsetting that.

[Adam Schafer]

It's offsetting. It's very complex. One part of it is that protein has a very high thermogenic effect in the body, so it actually requires more energy to process. So one calorie from protein versus a calorie from carbohydrates, it's not really the same. The other one is what you said. Protein, especially if you're strength training, tends to go to building muscle. And then the metabolism is so complex. There's other things that are happening, but I find that fascinating. I find it fascinating. Same calories, same, you know, person burning X amount of calories over calories. One's high protein was low, they gain less body fat. And then on the reverse, a calorie deficit that's high protein versus low protein, results in more fat loss, the high protein. So, I mean, it's almost like the.

[Justin Andrews]

Body knows how to use it, but.

[Adam Schafer]

I mean, it's pretty incredible.

[Sal DeStefano]

And we've, obviously, we've been screaming this from the mountaintops on this podcast, but when my clients would just focus on that, a lot of the other stuff.

[Adam Schafer]

That'S the magic would happen.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah. Then all the other stuff just kind of fell in place because it is. It is pretty difficult to hit that protein intake. And so optimal amount, not the essential essential, is easier. But hitting optimal amount for your body weight is somewhat challenging. And it's actually, if you prioritize it, it's actually really hard. And you eat whole foods, it's really hard to overeat, like really hard.

[Adam Schafer]

And if you do, it tends to be turned into muscle.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Because your body has sent that signal.

[Sal DeStefano]

Right, right.

[Adam Schafer]

Which I. Which I love. I love this. Like, hey, if you just do this over time. Yeah. You're not you're a guy, you're not going to get to 9% body fat, but you'll probably fall around 15 over time. And a woman around low 20s. Yeah. And most people who want to lose weight or get fit, that's kind of where they would like to end up. They'd like to be around there. So it's, it's, it's interesting. It's now, now what you're seeing right now is a lot of counter protein propaganda. And I'm just going to say this right now, straight up, here's where it comes from. It comes from the, the pro animal, you know, don't eat animal lobbies.

[Sal DeStefano]

Mm.

[Adam Schafer]

It's the vegan lobbies that put out this propaganda. And it's exactly that. It's propaganda. It's the don't eat too much protein, it's bad for you animal protein. This, that and the other. It's all baloney. The data doesn't support it. There's again, there's lots of data on this and it doesn't, well, it's devoid of bologna. It doesn't support. If you look at the right controlled studies, it's, in fact, I brought up one in a previous episode, that animal, you know, protein intake was a great meta analysis actually showed a slight protective effect. So there is a lot of counter, kind of propaganda for people who really, really don't want animals to be eaten. And I get that if that's your moral compass, if the top of your hierarchy of values is we can't kill animals. Well, twisting and lying a little bit or twisting data, it's worth it. Right? Because I want to save these poor animals. So let's just take some data over, you know, over, over, blow it or, or twist it a bit. But it's interesting.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah. Historically, I mean, you can't really go back in history and point to, you know, cultures surviving and thriving without animal based protein.

[Sal DeStefano]

No, we have. That's why I love that show so much. It's such a great example for people. It's like we throw these people on an island, say, go survive.

[Adam Schafer]

They've had a couple vegans before, never figure it out.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean, even to your point about the rabbits, like the guy, there's guys on there that actually trap a lot of rabbits and they end up having to le. They can't, they can't survive. And the person, the person who always wins is the one who gets the big kill with the fat. The kills, the fat, the big. Either the deer or the, the boar or animal like that, that has got a lot of fat too. Because that person, if they can figure out how to store it, because that becomes the next problem to another one of your points is like storing meat for that long period of time is, is tough for them to do. Right. But those are the ones that win that competition. And the people that think they're going to live off of berries, nuts and seeds. Yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

Never miss ramping up again because I, I don't.

[Sal DeStefano]

I haven't seen it in a while.

[Justin Andrews]

I felt like it was calming down in terms of like the animal protein being targeted.

[Adam Schafer]

What you're seeing right now are studies showing that it's not just. It's not harmful, that it's beneficial. And then what's following that is the counter propaganda.

[Sal DeStefano]

Where are we at with the lab grown meat?

[Adam Schafer]

I don't know.

[Sal DeStefano]

Are you f. Are you not following that to see kind of like helpful.

[Adam Schafer]

It's like Bill Gates. I know. Pass laws against it. I think Italy passed laws against it, if I'm not mistaken.

[Justin Andrews]

I like how we, you know, we were told to eat bugs there for a minute and then that's where it died off.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

No, no. They wanted.

[Sal DeStefano]

I like that better than lab grown meat.

[Justin Andrews]

Well, I think that's probably get more benefit from that.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean don't. Wouldn't you think so?

[Adam Schafer]

Do you know how many parasites are.

[Justin Andrews]

In bugs, by the way?

[Adam Schafer]

Have you seen that?

[Sal DeStefano]

No, no.

[Justin Andrews]

Oh, it's problematic. Yeah. What was the other thing? It was like something about their exoskeleton that like does harmful things to your gut.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh, I didn't know that.

[Justin Andrews]

You look into. And it is. It's not. It's not a good option.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Oh, I know we're talking about hunters.

[Sal DeStefano]

But I mean I figured that it's got to be. I still, I still think it's better than lab grown meat though. Yeah. Probably.

[Justin Andrews]

I mean at least grubs like you see that like you could survive off grubs.

[Adam Schafer]

I got it. I got to tell you guys about this crazy. I follow this page on Facebook and they talk. It talks about like interesting people in history.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

And so I'll go and like, is this real? Like, is this a real guy? And I confirmed it. There was a whole Wikipedia page on them. There are all these websites on them. So there was a guy, 1947, there was a guy named Peter Fruchin. Fruchin, I think his name is Six' Seven. He was an Arctic explorer. First of all, 1947, to be Six' Seven was insane. Yeah. And there's a picture. If you look him. He looks like a beast. He was an Arctic explorer, an author, an anthropologist, and a resistance fighter whose life reads like legends. So check this out. He actually did this. He crossed 1000 miles of Greenland by dog sled, Lost a leg to frostbite after he amputated his own toes with pliers. He starred in an Oscar winning film. He wrote over 30 books. And during World War II, he fought with the Danish resistance, was captured, sentenced to death by the Nazis, and then he escaped to Sweden. Then he married an Inuit woman, a Danish heeret. What is that? H E r. How do you say that? Heiress. Heiress. Sorry, I don't know why I can't say this. And finally, a brilliant illustrator and food expert, Dagmar Khan. She. They were like this intellectual power couple, but you got to see. Oh, and then on a. He won $64,000 on a huge quiz show in America. This crazy life of this guy.

[Sal DeStefano]

They made a movie about him.

[Adam Schafer]

You gotta look him up, Peter. And then. F R E U C H E.

[Sal DeStefano]

Have they not made a movie about him?

[Adam Schafer]

Dude? And so he had like. He had. No, he had one leg.

[Justin Andrews]

Sounds like Shackleton. You know, that explorer of Antarctica.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

Sounds like one of those characters.

[Adam Schafer]

I hear stuff like this. I'm like, what am I doing? Like this kid. I know, it's a crazy stuff. Yeah. Look at this guy. There's a picture of him. I'm sure Doug will find 30 books, too.

[Sal DeStefano]

How do you write that many books?

[Adam Schafer]

And, you know, a thousand miles across Greenland with. On a dog sled, escaping the Nazis.

[Justin Andrews]

Dude, like, cutting his toes off himself.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Look at.

[Sal DeStefano]

Sounds like.

[Adam Schafer]

There he is right there.

[Sal DeStefano]

Sounds like urban legend.

[Adam Schafer]

No, it's real.

[Justin Andrews]

I know, right?

[Adam Schafer]

There he is in that big fur coat next to his wife. Look how big he was next to his wife, dude.

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh, is that a movie about him right there?

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, it might be, yes.

[Sal DeStefano]

He's.

[Justin Andrews]

He's just the hard dude.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

[Sal DeStefano]

No, I don't think so, man.

[Adam Schafer]

Like, you don't make them like that anymore.

[Justin Andrews]

No, they don't exist. Barely anymore.

[Adam Schafer]

Isn't that crazy? Yeah. Pretty cool, right?

[Sal DeStefano]

It makes you feel. Makes us feel.

[Adam Schafer]

Our generation so weak, you know?

[Justin Andrews]

Why so, like, gooey.

[Adam Schafer]

By the way, I found this. I found. I read this guy yesterday after we're complaining about how hot it is in the studio. It's good.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah. Compare us to, like, you know, some crazy outfits.

[Adam Schafer]

I'm so hot right now. This guy's like. He cuts his own foot off.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean, I see. I always think about too, someone like this, like, you know, if he were to be, you know, drop into our. Our era, our time, like, and then see people going in gyms and lifting weights and. And signing up for tough mudders, paying people to, you know, crawl through the mud. Like, I feel like people like this would just be so confused.

[Lane]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

What do you. Why you pay. You wait. You pay a membership to go in there and to. To do labor and wait. You pay for a group of men to go and what are you guys building? Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

It's all going.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

Nowhere.

[Adam Schafer]

I know. Pretty cool. I got another. Another interesting story. This is also true. This woman, she's a scientist and journalist, I believe her name is Daniel Danielle Koepke. She struggled with severe IBS for years, so she did a do it yourself fecal microbiota transplant. Okay.

[Justin Andrews]

Do it yourself.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. So apparently you can do this, which I don't recommend anybody do. She swallowed capsules made from her brother's stool. Her gut improved. She gained weight, but then she developed acne like he did. Then she used her boyfriend's stool. She then did it again from her boyfriend. So she did her brother's first, then she did her boyfriend's. The acne went away, but then she started developing depression like her boyfriend had. So she wrote all about this. About this is in a documentary called Hack your health, the secrets of your gut. Isn't that weird?

[Justin Andrews]

So she got better Conversations at Thanksgiving.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

How does that come. How does that come up? How do you ask that question?

[Adam Schafer]

You know what I've been thinking?

[Justin Andrews]

You're a pretty healthy guy.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. You know what I find fascinating, though? She got her brother's acne, and then she did it with her boyfriend and then started developing his depression. Wow.

[Sal DeStefano]

From the features, did she get anything.

[Adam Schafer]

Good from the tooth? Well, her gut got better. Okay. Her gut healthier.

[Sal DeStefano]

Congrats. Your gut's better, but you have acne and depression now.

[Justin Andrews]

It just shows you how much bacteria like programs.

[Adam Schafer]

It's wild.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah. So many facets of, you know, your health.

[Sal DeStefano]

Do you think in the future it is. This has got to be some of the stuff that we're gonna. We're gonna really unlock in the next couple decades. I think so, too. I think that's pretty fascinating.

[Adam Schafer]

Do you think in the future there's going to be like, like, really wealthy poo, you know, merch, you know what I mean? Like, super healthy, athletic.

[Sal DeStefano]

Who can we pin to?

[Justin Andrews]

Like, it's like the healthiest Person example right now.

[Adam Schafer]

Like, healthy skin, healthy everything.

[Justin Andrews]

We'll eat some Paul check poo.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. You should sell it, dude.

[Justin Andrews]

Try it out.

[Sal DeStefano]

I imagine that. Because imagine if that became like a viable revenue stream for people. And then also the motivator would be to be a healthy person.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

You could become very wealthy if you're just healthy and sell your.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah, literally just sell.

[Adam Schafer]

The bottleneck is, though, in the business, it's hard to scale.

[Sal DeStefano]

And you'd have to eat pretty shitty food to really kick it up. You know what I'm saying? So it's like staying healthy. You're only getting like maybe one or two a day at the most.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

As many customers as you can have.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, ye.

[Sal DeStefano]

I wanted to bring something up that we had on a live caller that. And the reason why I wanted to talk about it was because this was a. I felt like a pretty regular conversation that we used to have. Maybe it was because I was competing back in the days and so we talked about.

[Adam Schafer]

So weird.

[Sal DeStefano]

I was gonna go, oh, really? Yeah, it just, I mean, I felt compelled to talk about it because I was. As we were talking to her about this, I thought, you know what? It's been a while on the podcast since we've kind of discussed this, and it still is a popular thing. So it's really common, especially in the Instagram world, where people start to get in a little bit of shape and they want to use the competition to get further in shape. Right. So they've lost a little bit of weight.

[Adam Schafer]

So, like bikini content.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

And so they want, like a target to, like, now push towards.

[Sal DeStefano]

And I get it. It's the reason why challenges are so appealing to people. People like some sort of a target, a goal, a competition for them to compete against. And they think it's a good strategy for motivating them to get healthier. And I, I, you know, I, I can't. I can't say strong enough how much I'm anti that and how much of a terrible idea that is for somebody to go and use competing as a way to try and get healthy. Especially considering a majority of us have some sort of underlining body dysmorphia issues that got us into working out and, or some sort of a unhealthy relationship with food and dieting. That. That is the, the absolute pinnacle of those two things. I mean, that is body dysmorphia on display and also extreme radical dieting on dis. It's like the, the pinnacle of both those things. And so to sign yourself up in that in the pursuit of health is a terrible idea.

[Adam Schafer]

It's not healthy. It's not a healthy thing to do.

[Sal DeStefano]

No.

[Adam Schafer]

And if you struggle with any kind of body image issues like you said, or you've had any struggles with food relationship, whether it's overeating, under eating, of course, extreme cases, bulimia, anorexia, but even if you just like, yeah, I have trouble overeating or, you know, I tend to under eat, it's hard for me to go on a reverse diet. Or you're like, yeah, you know, I'm pretty critical of myself in the mirror or I weigh myself all the time. The last thing you should do is sign up for a competition where you get judged on how you look. Yeah, you are, you are setting yourself up for terrible dysfunction. Not to mention it's unhealthy. It's so unhealthy. The only people that can get away with it or people who go into it so healthy, with such a fast metabolism, they have such a long Runway that they end up okay. Otherwise. Where people tend to end up is hormonal dysfunction, crashed metabolism, and their body dysmorphia is 10 times worse.

[Justin Andrews]

Exaggerated crazy.

[Sal DeStefano]

And then possibly the best thing that could happen ends up being the worst thing that could happen to you. Meaning you do the competition, you white knuckle your way through it, it gets you there, you garner all kinds of attention, you become, you can famous. People praise you because what you, what you transformed into, what your body looks like. Now they're asking you for advice. Now you feel compelled that maybe this is my future career that is like the worst thing happened. And then now you have become this person who competes and does that and meanwhile never fix that underlying issue that you had of body dysmorphia or your relationship with. And then now you're celebrated for this thing that you've done. Oh, even worse.

[Adam Schafer]

Not good. I mean, just, just the numbers. You should be pretty lean with a high caloric intake. In other words, have a high maintenance, pretty lean. Not training like crazy. You just work out like normal, you know, four days a week, lift weights, a little bit of cardio. That's where you should be before you get into prep. If you're not already pretty lean eating a lot of food, you have no business going into prep because you got to cut it way down and work out even more. And where you're going to end up is in a, in a really bad place. Not to mention the mental part. Yeah, first of all, I'll be even more Aggressive, Adam. Someone with no body dysmorphia will end up with a little bit of it.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Because now you're on stage. And here's what happens, guys and girls, when you're on stage. This is what the judge says. Your glutes, a little undeveloped. You have a little. There's a little bit of softness in your lower back. Your right delt is. They're picking you apart.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

And you're. You're. You're posing that left quad like. Yeah. Like. Like what? Like the pursuit is perfection.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Of how you look in the sport. It's not a good. It's not. This is. Look, this is why when. When it was my turn to do the series, you know, Adam, you did one getting back into shape. Justin did one on a gargantuan overhead press. And I didn't want to do one because I knew if I did any kind of a fitness related series, either a lift or a look, I know myself, it's gonna spin me. Like, I'm not. I know you went for love. I'm aware. I'm aware enough to know. And I told you guys this.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

I said no. No. If I go into. You guys are crazy. If you make me do this, I'm gonna. It's gonna put me in a bad place. It doesn't matter what the fitness goal is. It's gonna put me in a really bad place. Luckily, I picked something that tackled that issue. But if it was knowing myself, you know, and that's not even a competition. That's just a video series, let alone, like going in speedos on stage and having people.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Break my body down.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah. Yeah. No. So then people ask me, well, then, you know, who is right for it or who can do it? A generic number I would give my women and then my men. You have no business competing if you're a woman and you're already under 2800 calories. So you want to be 2800 and.

[Adam Schafer]

You have to be relatively lean.

[Sal DeStefano]

Right. And be relatively lean there. I would want you somewhere in the high teens to low 20s. So high teens, low 20s body fat percentage and eating north of 2800 calories. My men, 3, 500 calories. And then the low teens. So 10 to 15 body fat. 10 to 15 body fat for male over 3, 500 plus calories. Now, I know that is a generic number and it depends on your body weight, lean body mass, all the things. But those are pretty good, basic, like, rules. Yeah. If you're listening and you're considering that and you're like, oh, you know, I'm. I'm about, you know, 19 body fat, but I'm only eating like 1600 calories. Yeah, not a good idea.

[Adam Schafer]

Where are you gonna go?

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, nowhere to go. You have nowhere to go. But. But you actually, you do. You have somewhere to go. Unhealthy. That is the only place to go severely. Yeah, there's. There's only. It only gets unhealthy from that point. If you're already eating a low calorie intake and then you want to take your body to an unhealthy body fat percentage, it will require you to be very unhealthy to even try and get there.

[Adam Schafer]

It's even worse. It's unhealthy for both men and women, but especially for women because on stage bikini, which is the softest quote unquote of the presentation sports for women. So, you know, figure, you got to be even leaner. Fitness, you know, it gets even leaner and leaner. Leaner. You got to be on stage. What are women handing on stage bikini 11, 12% body fat at the highest.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

You know what that body fat percentage does to a woman? You lose your period and you have hormonal dysfunction, you will have hormone dysfunction. Men are, you know, you're hitting the stage at 4%. Men are a little bit more resilient, but your testosterone is on the floor. It's gonna be, you know, hitting stage at 4% body fat. I don't care who you are. So. And that's with somebody who's healthy.

[Sal DeStefano]

And again, I actually think the thing that you think would be the best outcome would actually be the worst outcome.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Because you're getting.

[Sal DeStefano]

For you to do it well.

[Adam Schafer]

Confirmation.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yes. And do good and be praised for it and win. Heaven forbid that happens because then that comes with its own host of problems downstream from that. And then now you. I now you've created this Persona online that is attached to that. Real tough to break away from that. Not a fan, dude.

[Adam Schafer]

I gotta, I gotta tell you guys, what my, my two and a half year old did yesterday just cracked me up. So she's, you know, she's only two and a half.

[Sal DeStefano]

She'll.

[Adam Schafer]

She'll be three in a few months actually. And she's like, we're on the couch and we're all playing and she goes, bah, bah. I have superpowers. So I'm like, oh, that's cool. She likes. She's got super. She's think she has superpowers. She goes, watch this so I'm sitting on the couch. She goes to the end of the couch and she's standing on it and she runs full speed at me. And I swear to God, you guys, she does a flying kick to my throat. Like she runs, she jumps and boots me like, like my Adam's apple. Oh my God. And I'm like. And she's like, do you like it? I'm like, yes, I like it. Tried to kick me in the throat. So the rest of the night, the rest of the night, because I let the kids play rough with me. You know, mom doesn't like it. Jessica doesn't like when they play really rough with her. But I want to let them play a little bit with me and I'll let them push the limit. Like, I don't let them bite and tumble, man, or scratch or anything like that because she'll also bite. She thinks she's, she's cute. She tries to bite and I'm like, no biting. But yeah, dude. So she just over and over again, she run from the end jump and swing her leg and just. It was pretty good. I was impressed, bro. You'd knock out another two.

[Sal DeStefano]

So my, my son school has this thing where they ask him these kind of like, kind of, I don't know, creative, thought provoking questions. And I was so irritated the other day because I was, I, I had no answer. And I mean, I, I pondered on it forever and I could not come up with a good answer. And I felt like I failed my son. And I'm like, is it just a difficult question that, like, I.

[Adam Schafer]

What was the question?

[Sal DeStefano]

The question was, if you were invisible for a day, what would you do?

[Adam Schafer]

And what was your, your answer?

[Sal DeStefano]

I didn't have one. That was my problem. I could.

[Adam Schafer]

Anything I could think of.

[Justin Andrews]

Creepy.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yes, that's exactly. And it's my six year old son. And I'm like, if my buddies were saying I have a pervert answer to say back, that would be funny, but not like a real answer for my six year old son. So I was lost. What would I sign? What would I want to be invisible for a day? I think where would that benefit you?

[Adam Schafer]

It is because it either involves stealing or spying.

[Justin Andrews]

Yes.

[Steve]

Stealing.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah. Or being somewhere you're not supposed to be. Yeah, that's why I was like, I.

[Adam Schafer]

Thought there's a weird question you could tell them. Like, oh, I would play a funny trick on mom and I'd move things and make her think that what's going on? And then I'd laugh and tell Her. Hey, I'm invisible.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, it was.

[Adam Schafer]

You go with that.

[Sal DeStefano]

I know. Okay, good. So it wasn't. I just. That was a really tough one for me to answer was if I was invisible for a day, what. What would I. What would I want to do?

[Adam Schafer]

You said a women's locker room. Yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

I mean, that's like the Porky's 80s movie.

[Sal DeStefano]

Well, you know, eventually, what I had to say to him and explain it, even when it came out. Came out, it sounded really bad because I was like, I. I came up with eventually going to be in the. The warriors locker room so I could hear the plays before they go into the basketball game, which I'm like, that sounds really bad. Yeah. Saying that I want to go into a men's locker room. Yeah. I explained it. Why it's like, oh, so I could hear what the coach is telling them before they go game or whatever with that. But I could not think of a really creative, good answer to give my son. I'm like, man, they're asking my. These kids that. I'm like, what are they expecting to get from that?

[Adam Schafer]

Like, that's a.

[Sal DeStefano]

What is the right answer.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. I think you came up with a good answer. I don't think there's a great answer for that.

[Sal DeStefano]

No. It's like you say everything's kind of creepy. Yeah, that's true.

[Adam Schafer]

What a creepy superpower.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

Like, I would just watch everybody.

[Sal DeStefano]

Well, that was another one. They asked another question the. The next day or the day before. I don't remember what it was. Was if you could have one superpower, what would it be?

[Adam Schafer]

What do you say?

[Sal DeStefano]

Well, I said freeze time. That's what I said. So I could come up with one for that.

[Justin Andrews]

Nice.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah. Yeah. I thought freezing time would be cool.

[Adam Schafer]

Freezing time would be interesting, wouldn't it? Yeah. Like, what if. Okay.

[Sal DeStefano]

Especially if you can operate outside of that.

[Adam Schafer]

Now, here's what's weird about that. I've had this conversation. You freeze time.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Everybody stops aging, but you continue aging. So the more you do it, the faster you age in relationship to everyone else. There's a cost.

[Sal DeStefano]

That's actually kind of cool, because then it would keep it in check.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

You wouldn't abuse that power.

[Adam Schafer]

That's right.

[Sal DeStefano]

You would use it judiciously. You would be like, okay, this is a really good time. I just. I really effed up right there.

[Adam Schafer]

Let me rewind.

[Sal DeStefano]

Freeze. Let's do that over again.

[Adam Schafer]

Okay. That was worth it. You know what I'm saying?

[Sal DeStefano]

Versus. And you do it all the Time. You abuse that power every day. You're going to age really fast. Everybody's gonna be young.

[Justin Andrews]

I mean that or you could like go back like five minutes or something. Like just five small amount of time just to correct maybe something in the moment.

[Adam Schafer]

You know, what if five minutes wasn't enough though, to stop a major thing? You know what I mean? Like you five minutes isn't enough to stop this horrible disaster. Right? Suck.

[Justin Andrews]

That would suck.

[Sal DeStefano]

Well, yeah, because what if the horrible disaster was like a family member who lived two states over or something? Yeah, like you.

[Justin Andrews]

But that would be the check and balance in that too is like, you know, it's limited by the time.

[Sal DeStefano]

At least that one I thought was creative enough to do this right here. Create a good dialogue. I like that. But the invisible one for a day was just like, what do these kids say? How'd they answer that? And what, what is the right answer there?

[Adam Schafer]

Do you know?

[Justin Andrews]

Just to be able to explode somebody with one punch. Wow.

[Lane]

Amazing.

[Adam Schafer]

Justin. He's got some darkness inside.

[Justin Andrews]

I mean, it's be fun.

[Adam Schafer]

You know how strong a gorilla is, by the way? I learned this the other day. Do you know how strong a gorilla is? As strong as 30 average men.

[Sal DeStefano]

Well, that's where that, that thing went viral, right? That's where that came from.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, is that where it came from?

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh, yeah, that's what they came from. Yeah, because it's, that started that trend.

[Adam Schafer]

Stupid.

[Sal DeStefano]

That's what that started that trend was that a single gorilla could take on X amount of men, like like easily, bro.

[Adam Schafer]

You imagine being strong, 30 average men. Yeah. That's crazy.

[Justin Andrews]

Even then you're there with a bunch of other guys and you're trying to figure out like the attack, how does that work? Like, how do you, like, I'm gonna take out the ankle.

[Adam Schafer]

A bunch of people are gonna die. Yeah. In two or three, you're gonna get torn apart.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean, I, I 10 guys with the strategy going in, absolutely could do that.

[Adam Schafer]

No, no weapons.

[Justin Andrews]

Well, yeah, no weapons.

[Sal DeStefano]

If, if, if. Listen, no weapons. Four of you, okay, I'm saying with at least 10 men, right. If four of you are working, we're working together, and you go for the.

[Adam Schafer]

Legs with no weapons.

[Justin Andrews]

I mean, you'd have to be really organized.

[Adam Schafer]

But yeah, bro, let me tell you something.

[Sal DeStefano]

This is what, by the way, this is what made this go viral. I don't even the reason why I do this. No, you couldn't. Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Listen, were you all going to punch.

[Sal DeStefano]

Me at the same time with no strategy? I think with strategy.

[Adam Schafer]

I don't care.

[Sal DeStefano]

I think with just, like, rushing. No way.

[Adam Schafer]

Listen to me.

[Justin Andrews]

If you only get 10 guys to.

[Adam Schafer]

Pounce at once, here's what will happen. You'll go in with your strategy, and you'll see someone literally get torn in half every.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, everybody. Exactly.

[Justin Andrews]

He's gonna scare everybody. They're gonna run.

[Sal DeStefano]

I guess that's. As soon as he pulls someone's head right off their neck.

[Adam Schafer]

Bail. What was I thinking? We're. We're apex predators because we have weapons, dude. Without weapons, we're weak.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

We can't do.

[Sal DeStefano]

But that would. That. Obviously that. That's the great equalizer is that we would have a weapon or we would use it. We'd be smart enough to.

[Adam Schafer]

Have you seen. There was this all. There was this, like, Japanese game show, which. Doug introduced me to Japanese game shows a long time ago. They're really weird. There was one. There's lots of weird ones. They're weird.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

But there was one where people were competing against animals, and there was this. It wasn't even a gorilla, bro. It was a. It was like a chimp. Like, just like a normal chimp. And he was doing tug of war against a sumo wrestler. Big sumo wrestler. And he was. He was holding onto the rope, and the sumo wrestler was yanking I. The chimp looked like nothing. Like he just sat there, like he wasn't even trying. Yeah. In fact, he took his hand off at one point, and then he finally. Just, like, he figured out, like, oh, I'm supposed to pull, and he just pulled the guy like it wasn't a chimp. Like, 150 pounds.

[Sal DeStefano]

My favorite tug of war thing that they did. And this was on the Internet not that long ago that I thought was pretty interesting was the. I forgot. How many kids does it take to pull? Like, two bodybuilder guys. Like, so they use. I think. I think Thor did it. I think someone. Him and somebody else did it.

[Adam Schafer]

I can't remember really.

[Sal DeStefano]

And it was actually surprising because you would think that a bunch of kindergarteners, they would. They drag a whole school around. You know what I'm saying? Like, no way. But actually, enough kids. Just the weight and the leverage was enough to, like, pull them. And so I don't remember what number it was.

[Justin Andrews]

It was like, 50 kids or something.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, is that the one, Doug? I believe so, yeah. He found the video sumo wrestler versus a monkey orangutan. Orangutan. Oh, it was an orangutan. It wasn't a chimp. Four foot tall. Orangutan. 180 pound orangutan.

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh, my God.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, dude. And he literally just chills while the sumo wrestler just pulls as hard as he can.

[Sal DeStefano]

And is he like just hold on to the rope?

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, he just holds on and doesn't even care. Watch, you'll see. Watch. He's like, oh, look, he's just like, he doesn't even care, bro. He's got a diaper on because he's like a baby. Yeah, he just, he just pulls them across like it's nothing. Isn't that wild?

[Sal DeStefano]

That is wild. You'll have to look up the one with the kids, though. Look, look for the. How many, how many kids does it take to pull two bodybuilders? Strong, man.

[Adam Schafer]

So I'm all into this right now because I have a almost five year old boy. So he loves asking me these questions.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah, love like just pitting things together.

[Adam Schafer]

Well, he was like, there's a whole.

[Sal DeStefano]

Series of books on this.

[Adam Schafer]

I told you about it.

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh, okay. Yeah, I ordered him.

[Adam Schafer]

So did you get them?

[Sal DeStefano]

No, I haven't got him.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, your son's gonna love them.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, yeah, bro.

[Justin Andrews]

I used to make. You got to do this with him. And take like different types of insects and just put under a jar, let.

[Adam Schafer]

Them have them go out. What a great idea. Praying mantis wins everything.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yes, they do win a lot.

[Justin Andrews]

Every yard.

[Sal DeStefano]

Is it everything?

[Justin Andrews]

Oh, they are, dude. We are so lucky they're as small as they are. Oh, bro, that's like one of the most vicious ones.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, yeah, dude. And they're made to attack.

[Sal DeStefano]

Well, don't they kill their own mate too? Yeah, they eat the, the women eat the men, don't they?

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah, they rip its head off and they eat.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, Isn't it something like that? Like she gets pregnant and then she kills them right afterwards or something like that. Yeah, some vicious. Something like. Thank you.

[Adam Schafer]

We were looking up elephants the other day and you know there's videos on elephants going after like big trucks. Like they have these big tour trucks, these tour bus looking things and they have like a big like bull elephant charging it and you're supposed to stand your ground. But there was one where the bull elephant goes up to it and he just picks it up. Lifted it up. Yeah, he just picks it up like it's nothing.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, that would be. Imagine seeing that like in person. How scary that would be.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, terrifying.

[Sal DeStefano]

Did you look up, how many kids does it take to pull? You actually have the, the video here? Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

It looks like we're watching a commercial.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah, it's. Yeah, there we go.

[Adam Schafer]

Doug, we got to pay for YouTube supreme or whatever it's called. What's it called?

[Sal DeStefano]

I have no idea.

[Adam Schafer]

Is that the name? That's how cheap I am. I don't pay for these Burrito supreme.

[Sal DeStefano]

You found it though, Doug. There's a. There's a video on it, right? Yeah. I think Justin's right on the guess. I think it's somewhere. What's your guess? How many kids does it take to pull like two strong men? Like two strong men? Yeah. Two. How old are these kids? Little kids? Like they're right here it is. It was them.

[Adam Schafer]

100. How many kids was.

[Sal DeStefano]

No, not even 20 kids. 20 kids. That's it. I would. I would have thought they would have.

[Adam Schafer]

I feel like I could pull 20.

[Sal DeStefano]

I know. 20 kids. 20 kids averaging 50 pounds. A thousand pounds of kids.

[Justin Andrews]

Those guys are.

[Sal DeStefano]

They're all pulling together. Yeah. That's. A thousand pounds of just dead weight is hard to drag. Right. And then if they're actually pulling in the opposite direction. So this was one of those ones that I was like, oh, they should be surprising. It's totally surprising. You would not think 20 little 8 year old 7.

[Adam Schafer]

What you're saying is if a. If a classroom of children organized, they could totally overtake.

[Sal DeStefano]

Man, I wish I would have known that. Look at how much they're trying to pull.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, they're dragging them across the floor. Wow. Yeah. I would have never guessed.

[Sal DeStefano]

I would have never guessed that either. I. I would have thought like a hundred kids would look at. There's not even that many little kids.

[Adam Schafer]

Yay. Wow. Dude, that's wild. I got a crazy. I. You know this remind. Looking at these strong men, I just thought. I just thought of something. Sleep apnea, which is quite common.

[Sal DeStefano]

All these guys have that.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Yeah. You know. Did you guys know that eight sleep has the AI technology will identify if you're snoring and they have. It'll adjust.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

To make you stop snoring.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

While keeping you asleep.

[Sal DeStefano]

I want to try.

[Adam Schafer]

You have that one.

[Sal DeStefano]

I don't have that one. So that's the. Doug might have to look at the different levels or packages. There's another level from what I have which is. It's also the mattress. So it's not just the pod cover, but it's also the mattress. So it adjusts too. And I haven't slept in one or I want to.

[Adam Schafer]

Do you guys know how unhealthy snoring is? Do you have Any idea? Doug, look up the health. Don't do this.

[Sal DeStefano]

Don't do this.

[Adam Schafer]

Listen.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah, but isn't it. Basically anybody over £200 at that point is going to be susceptible. You got some kind of apnea.

[Adam Schafer]

You have a big neck. Yeah. Or you're a big dude.

[Justin Andrews]

You lift a lot of weights.

[Sal DeStefano]

Your.

[Justin Andrews]

Your tongue grows, too. And so that's a problem.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

Obstructing your area.

[Sal DeStefano]

That's why we can't dead hang either, Justin.

[Adam Schafer]

It doesn't look good, though. Before you read the stats. Before you read the stats, here's what finally got me to get a CPAP machine.

[Sal DeStefano]

Darth Vader machine.

[Adam Schafer]

This is what finally got me to get it. Okay. Besides my wife sleeping in another room, which was sad and made me sad.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

And I was stubborn. It was Dr. Gabrielle Lyon. We were doing a podcast with her, and we talked about it, and I said, oh, I, you know, I snore. And after the show, she comes up to me, she goes, get a cpap, like, in my face. I'm like, why?

[Sal DeStefano]

She goes, take shaves years off your life. Oh, I've read this.

[Justin Andrews]

I'm like, this close. I'm like, on the brink. Because it's been, like.

[Adam Schafer]

Dramatically increases your risk of heart disease.

[Justin Andrews]

Tired. Stroke over it, dude.

[Adam Schafer]

You get a stroke, heart disease, your brain. It's not good for your brain. It's not good, dude.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah, but, like, how did people survive, you know, before sleep apnea machines?

[Adam Schafer]

He just died young.

[Sal DeStefano]

Exactly. You just died. You just died five years earlier and you didn't know.

[Justin Andrews]

It's like, we didn't have these masks, you know, forever.

[Adam Schafer]

Like, we also didn't have antibiotics.

[Justin Andrews]

And this is true.

[Adam Schafer]

It's not that bad.

[Justin Andrews]

So resistance.

[Adam Schafer]

It's actually not that bad.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, it's not.

[Adam Schafer]

No, it's not that bad.

[Sal DeStefano]

No, no.

[Adam Schafer]

If you get one that you're. You're.

[Sal DeStefano]

You're also a morning sex guy. Not a night sex guy, though, too. So if you're a night sex guy, that's kind of bro.

[Adam Schafer]

You don't put it on while you're talking to your wife. You can't talk with. You only put it on when you're ready to go to bed.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean that sometimes that's.

[Justin Andrews]

I mean, that full mask and.

[Adam Schafer]

What do you mean? You mean you go to sleep and then your wife wakes you up?

[Sal DeStefano]

No, like, I mean, we go to bed sometimes and we go to bed. Like, we're just gonna go to bed, but then, you know, happens.

[Adam Schafer]

Well, then you take your mask off. I Don't know.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, but she's not my wife. If she sees me put the nasal strip on, she. Oh, we're not having sex tonight, I guess.

[Justin Andrews]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

It's like a turn.

[Justin Andrews]

Like, I'm an athlete.

[Adam Schafer]

I tried.

[Sal DeStefano]

I've tried to cover once. I tried doing the eye. The eyeliner underne. I was trying to hold. Justin. If I put that nose tip on, I may as well just chalk it up. I'm not getting sex tonight.

[Adam Schafer]

Hold on a second.

[Sal DeStefano]

So I already have that. Like, wait, like. Okay, it's not going down.

[Adam Schafer]

Hold on. But your relationship's a little different because she's usually the pursuer, right? She tends to pursue more than you do.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, yeah, I. She would. She would. She would disagree with that now, early on in our relationship a lot, but I would say.

[Adam Schafer]

So then you're the one. If you're pursuing her, don't put it on until you, you know. Yeah, yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

Well, that's what I'm saying. That's like the. The nose trip one is that I have to. I have to wait till. I just decided, okay, I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna go after.

[Adam Schafer]

And then you put the mask on, and then you go to sleep. You'll get better sleep.

[Sal DeStefano]

You get way better.

[Justin Andrews]

I'm literally probably going to do it, and I don't want to. Really.

[Sal DeStefano]

I am. So what I'm curious about is am I potentially having trouble breathing and that's what's waking me up. And then I have to go pee.

[Adam Schafer]

Yes.

[Sal DeStefano]

So what would be it? What would close me is if I actually slept through the entire night and I didn't get up to go pee, that would. I would. Would probably be sold right away that. Because if I still get up to go pee and it's disrupted anyways, and.

[Adam Schafer]

I'm like, well, who cares? Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

At that point. But still.

[Justin Andrews]

Sleep on your side with your mask.

[Adam Schafer]

No, you can sleep on your side.

[Sal DeStefano]

You can upgrade your sleep as well. Are you. Are you.

[Justin Andrews]

That's what I was definitely.

[Adam Schafer]

Well, sleep apnea is a whole nother level. Yes, that's true.

[Sal DeStefano]

But this should reduce some of that.

[Adam Schafer]

Anyway.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, I'm so. I don't know.

[Justin Andrews]

So I'm Bridge.

[Sal DeStefano]

I probably say one out of 20 times. One out of 20 nights. Katrina might say, oh, you snored a little bit tonight. But I'm not like a heavy. At least not where I was when I was.

[Justin Andrews]

I'm at the point where I passed on the couch and I was like. And I heard myself.

[Sal DeStefano]

Well, there's those days.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, no.

[Sal DeStefano]

I feel like everybody should get a pet. There's certain days when you're like exhausted from traveling or something like that. And you. If I pass out on the couch, I'm probably snoring because that means I'll make.

[Adam Schafer]

My grandpa. My grandfather used to snore so loud. Guys, that you would. I don't care what room in the house you were in.

[Sal DeStefano]

You heard him. That's Katrina's brother. When we. You know how our family, we always get together and we all stay. We have to put him in the furthest back room. Closed door, white noise between his. The door and him.

[Adam Schafer]

Wow.

[Sal DeStefano]

We have to. You have to set his room up.

[Adam Schafer]

Shaking everything.

[Sal DeStefano]

You have to set his room up so he doesn't disrupt all the other bedrooms. That's how bad it is. And you to crank that white noise up so loud so it's as like a. So it drowns.

[Adam Schafer]

Mine got worse as I got. As I got bigger, you know, getting on hormone therapy, building more muscle. Definitely got worse.

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh yeah. When I was bodybuilding, which is ironic, right? I was in a crazy body fat percentage shape. Best shape of my life at that time. But.

[Adam Schafer]

Well, let's be real, everybody muscle is healthy. Yeah. You push it beyond a certain point, you're not so true.

[Sal DeStefano]

That's just. Yeah. There's no. There's no getting our way around.

[Adam Schafer]

You're super jacked. You've sacrificed health in pursuit of.

[Sal DeStefano]

And a man like me that naturally no hormones. My body wants to be about a 198 pounds, maybe 200 pound guy. And I was pushing 220 pounds of lean mass my body. So it's like I'm 20 pounds, 30 pounds over my total weight. My body even wants to be.

[Adam Schafer]

And Justin was right. Your tongue grows.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

That's what happens. You gotta, you gotta.

[Justin Andrews]

I read that and I was like, ah.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

And then I talk a lot, so my tongue like getting all kinds of reps. Super hypertrophy, dude.

[Sal DeStefano]

Justin's got that working. I'm just imagine if you tell you imagine if you talk as much as he did.

[Justin Andrews]

I do drills and things warm up my voice.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean, Courtney's not mad about it, so it's not a bad thing. So yes.

[Justin Andrews]

All the different techniques.

[Adam Schafer]

All right, I think that's the end there, Doug. Just blue is methylene blue that you could take to boost energy, endurance, cognitive performance. Methyl in blue really works. Go check them out. Go to troscriptions.com that's T R O S C R-I P T I O N S.com mindpump on that link. If you use the code mindpump you'll get 10% off. Back to the show. Our first caller is Kerry from Massachusetts. Hi Kerry.

[Sal DeStefano]

How you doing Kerry?

[Adam Schafer]

Hello.

[Sal DeStefano]

Hello. Hi.

[Kerry]

I'm actually from Colorado, not Massachusetts.

[Justin Andrews]

A little different.

[Adam Schafer]

Well, welcome.

[Kerry]

Hey guys, I'll just read my question so we stay on topic and generally my question is about visceral fat and the best way to target it. So I'm 5643 years old, 160 pounds 16 to 17 body fat. For reference, my SPD PRs are 402 squat, 232 pound pause bench, 435 pound deadlift. So I'm strong and I have low body fat. I'm very happy with my body comp and my strength. But the last place I hold on to fat is my midsection. I have been tracking with Adexa every three to six months since January of 23. I had been in a slow cut since then dropping from 192 pounds 24 body fat 139% or not percent 139 pounds of lean mass in January of 23 down to where I sit now which is 160 16% and 129 pounds of lean mass. But here's my problem. My visceral fat. So my visceral fat drops slowly from 1 and a half pounds a volume of 40 in January of 23 down to 1.2 pounds in 8 of 23. A year later it was down to just under half a pound and then in January of this year it was almost zero. However in August of this year it went back up to half a pound. Yes, a half a pound increase is within the margin of error, but in the three years I've been tracking it's never trended up. I'm not only I'm not overly concerned with the half a pound, the volume is within reason. It's nothing super unhealthy. It's all about the trending going up. My question is are you guys familiar with rehit or any other type of sprint or max effort training that will talk target visceral fat directly of note. This is splitting hairs but for me, a 20 plus year lifter and strength athlete, that's where I am. I don't do any real cardio other than lift my heavy weights faster. I lift heavy three times a week, eat 95% whole foods, HIIT protein HIIT fat, sleep eight plus hours, reduce stress, sauna regularly so I'm doing all the things. I really don't want to do any cardio for the sake of cardio. But from the research, I'm seeing this re hit or sprint training specifically for visceral fat. Maybe something I want to add in. I would love to hear your thoughts.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, good question. And you are really strong.

[Sal DeStefano]

I want to hear those numbers again. I was like. Did you say. Did you say. Did y' all hear a 400 pound squat?

[Kerry]

Yes, sir.

[Sal DeStefano]

402.

[Kerry]

And that was in a comp. So it's competition. Squat.

[Sal DeStefano]

Okay.

[Kerry]

232 paused bench, again in comp. And then a 435 deadlift.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, that's crazy.

[Sal DeStefano]

I don't think you're gonna like our advice. I think you're already unbelievably strong. You're already unbelievably ripped.

[Adam Schafer]

You actually said it in your question, splitting hairs within the margin of error. But if, I mean, if we want to play the splitting hairs game, first off, you mind if I ask you a personal question?

[Kerry]

Absolutely.

[Adam Schafer]

Okay. Are you on any hormone replacement therapy or do you use any performance enhancing drug?

[Kerry]

Interesting to know. During my max list, I was actually in the tank. I started TRT right out a year ago and I was at zero for everything. Even my cortisol had flatlined. Okay, so about a year. Yes. So this change goes along with starting trt. I've been on about four months of TRT when this increase occurred.

[Adam Schafer]

Okay, that's. That's okay. I'm glad. I'm glad I asked. Okay. So you're on hormone replacement therapy. Therapy essentially, not on. Okay, good.

[Kerry]

Yes, hrt.

[Adam Schafer]

Okay. So what you typically see with visceral body fat changes, and by the way, trending would be two or more measurements, not one. So typically I would want to see another measurement to see if we're trending. We're actually trending in a particular direction because it is within the margin of error. Okay. Typically, what you see with visceral body fat percentage on lean individuals, which is you are. You're sitting at 17% body fat, a lot of lean body mass. You could, you could equate it to hormones. So changes in hormones can change body fat storage distribution. Now, in high level athletes, what that looks like is too much stress. Now, I would, I would imagine, especially based off what you told me, where all your hormones were in the tank with your competition. And when cortisol's in the tank, we used to call that like stage. I think it was three. Adrenal fatigue.

[Kerry]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

Okay. So what that typically tells me is you've probably trained hard and, like, played with that line of doing enough and doing too much for years and years and years. And so the last thing I would have someone like you do try and cut well, either cut more or just intense cardio. Right now, if you want to do with intense cardio, we'd have to switch your. Your. Your goals to endurance and stamina. But if you want to continue pushing the limit with strength training, which it sounds like you really enjoy doing, it would just be overall steps. You would want additional activity that is also recuperative, not that. Not additional activity that's going to take away from your ability to recover and adapt from your strength training. Does that make sense?

[Kerry]

It does. So I have changed and gone away. About a year ago, I changed and got away from overdoing the strength because I totally went all in, as you can tell with my numbers. And so in the last year, I've really tried to embrace and refocus on less is more. A lot of what you guys preach, and so I'm definitely on that track. What kind of freaked me out was the visceral vat change. While I'm also trying to make this adjustment. More to less is more.

[Adam Schafer]

Okay, so you have. We have two. There's like, imagine a Venn diagram, and over here I have health, and over here I have performance. Okay? And there's a crossover in the middle. But if I push, too, if I push far in one direction, I lose from the other one. So if I go hard in performance, I'm sacrificing health. And this is just a reality for athletes. This is all athletes. I don't care what athlete you're. You are. If you compete at a high level, you are sacrificing health and longevity for performance. That's just, you know, there's nothing you can do with that. We all accept it if we push at that level. If you're looking for maximal. If you want health, then you have to be okay, sacrificing some of the performance. If you want to keep pushing performance, then this is a game that you're gonna be playing for a long time. And it's gonna be a game of, you know, splitting hairs, right? And so if we're doing that, you know, if you were my client and I'm looking at you, I'm like, okay, 17% body fat, maybe visceral body fat went up a little bit. I'm gonna look at things like, you know, carbohydrate types. I'm Gonna look at like, glycemic index, you know, maybe a cgm. Let's see if we can keep your blood sugar levels really stable. I'm gonna look at, you know, forms of activity that are recuperative, like lots of walking. Those are the things I would play with while, you know, continuing to track if we want to move towards health. You're gonna pro. Your def. Your body fat percentage needs to go up, up, and you may sacrifice a little bit of your strength. I mean, you're so strong. You have so much lean body mass. You're so far on that level that that's probably what's going on.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean, we rarely talk to people that have reached probably their genetic potential. You're. Yeah, you're that percent, that very, very small.

[Adam Schafer]

001%.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, you're. You're there like you, you already won. You won the game. You're like, you're as strong as they get. You're as lean as they get. I mean, if you keep going this direction, it just. I. Your body, what you probably feel is kind of pushing back a little bit.

[Adam Schafer]

That's right.

[Sal DeStefano]

It's not, it's not like you're doing something wrong. It's just saying enough is enough. We're lean enough, we're strong enough. You know, and then it's. It's not really like you did something wrong per se. I just think you were. You were flirting with that edge and. Yeah, something's got to give a little bit. Either you accept I'm going to be a little bit higher, which is not high, but a higher body fat percentage than I maybe like. Or you, like Sal said you might sacrifice some of the strength and. And then get healthier, you know, so.

[Adam Schafer]

But I mean, again, you're. I mean, I, I per. Personally, if you like what you're doing, I would stop looking at it so closely. I would. Yeah, just stop looking at it with a magnifying glass and just kind of move away from it a little bit. I don't mean move away from training. I don't think I can. Could. I don't think I could rip you away from training if I tried. But just. I just kind of, you know, taking the magnifying glass and then just, you know, maybe taking a big picture look at things and re. Maybe redevelop a relationship with it that isn't so connected to like extreme performance. I mean, that's one way to do it. I think that that way is going to be a way you're going to have to do at some point, you know, maybe not necessarily now, but you know, as you get into your 50s and 60s, you'll probably have to move away a little bit. But this is like, like I said, if we're splitting hairs, what we're looking at is glycemic index, blood sugar, hormone profile, you know, like growth hormone, you know, peptides may help a little bit with that. But again we're still within that margin of error, so. And we'd still be pressing into that kind of performance realm.

[Kerry]

Obviously. I knew exactly what you were going to say.

[Sal DeStefano]

I hear you.

[Kerry]

And probably a better question for the three of you is how the hell would you advise me to change my perspective? So yes, I've been an athlete forever, I've lifted forever, I've hyper focused forever and I'm really trying hard to refocus and this is just another thing that I need to refocus and see the bigger picture. So long term wise I'm trying to get there. But how would you guys help me, give me advice to.

[Adam Schafer]

Great question.

[Kerry]

Yeah, change that perspective. It's not about the 500 pound deadlift anymore. It's about staying strong and being strong. But then I like being motivated along the way. So like how would you advise me to help me change that perspective?

[Justin Andrews]

I think, I think because you're a competitive person, like to be able to take something like meditation or some restorative practices in a competitive, repeated, systematic process where you know, this is, this is something that's so important that now I'm just, I'm elevating this as a priority and how many times I can string days together where I'm applying these restorative practices and you know, it at least if that just opens the door for you to start shifting that mindset a bit. I went through this process myself, not necessarily the level you're at, but like college football and like training my entire life, like killing myself to the point where that's all I cared about to then dropping off and having to figure out, well, what actually makes me feel good, what you know, brings me closer to health and like Sal's example, the Venn diagram, I think if you kind of can visualize that of like where I am in that, in that diagram and how I can kind of maybe pull myself for a while in a different direction competitively and really challenge yourself to, you know, make effort in that direction.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Well, think about it this way. I'll give you some, I'll give you some. Just along the lines of what Justin's saying. I'LL give you some, maybe some specific steps. Okay. Somebody were to ask you, you know, you get some, some woman who's never lifted before, 20 year old, she's like, hey, I want to get a 400 pound deadlift. You're going to take her there step by step by step by step, right? So you've got this ultimate goal, but there's steps along the way. Your ultimate goal is I'd like to have a, and correct me if I'm wrong, I'd like to have a relationship with this where it's really about health and longevity. Okay. That's, that's far away from where you're at right now. Because right now you're like, you're like performance, max strength performance.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah, you're peak right now.

[Adam Schafer]

So let's look at some steps in between. When I've worked with people like you, I'll take them and I'll direct them towards something else that's competitive, that moves us a little bit more towards longevity. So like an example would be jiu jitsu maybe. Let's see if we can get you into Jiu jitsu, right? That's competitive as hell. You'll have to strength train less. You'll probably get really into that. Now that's not the be all end all. But that'll move you away enough away from what you're doing to kind of get a different perspective on, you know, what performance feels like that isn't so tied to strength.

[Sal DeStefano]

I like going the unconventional lift too, like getting into a Turkish get up, you know, or like, like really getting into like a specific movement that is so out of your normal realm and being. Because I get the competitive, I mean, this is how I had to move away from the kind of bodybuilding macro focused mentality I had. When we started this podcast to get away from that, it was like, okay, I'm gonna go the other extreme. I still like being competitive. I'm gonna be competitive about my movement now. I'm gonna get so kind of obsessed about the way I move and working on my mobility. That helped me transition from not caring about what I look like and counting the macros and doing that. So I found that works really good with clients that are like high performers. I use a, like, how do I take that mentality but shift it more. And I think jiu jitsu is a good example of that. I think getting into something, a movement or mobility is a good example.

[Adam Schafer]

Unilateral training might be great, especially if you're a power lifter. You don't do a lot of. Typically a lot of cycles of unilateral training. You know, map symmetry would be a good program to play with.

[Kerry]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

And, you know, after a couple months, you could go back and play with your squat and deadlift and get back into it. So that'd be an option. That's not so far away from what you're doing that it's scary. But. But right. It is different.

[Justin Andrews]

Shifting too far would probably be problematic.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, yeah. Yeah. If I try, you try to pull in the opposite direction. You're like, I don't want to do this.

[Sal DeStefano]

I'm definitely gonna. I'm definitely gonna encourage you to try and let go of one of the two main things that I think we gotta. Which is the 17 body fat or the PRS. So either.

[Kerry]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

One of those two has got to get kind of put on the back burner. It's like, okay, let's agree that it's gonna be the body fat percentage. We're not doing body fat testing. That's just. That's. We're gonna put. Throw that away. We're not even using that measurement right now. And we're gonna focus on these things we're talking about. Or Maybe it's the PR thing, since you're so. You could lose 50% strength and you're still stronger than 99% of everybody. So whatever one you feel more comfortable with, I'm going to push you in that direction. Like, okay, let's. Let's not be measuring both of those. And, like, using that as a North Star, let's get rid of at least one of them right now. And that's kind of how I'd start.

[Adam Schafer]

To move you in that direction ultimately. I mean, it could even be as easy of a step like this. You keep doing what you're doing, but you stop paying attention to number. You stop paying attention to how much you're lifting. You stop paying attention to the scale. You stop paying attention to body fat.

[Sal DeStefano]

Tell. That's all. Tell that to all them gold medals up on the wall there.

[Kerry]

That's really hard to not think about the numbers, but I definitely like the idea. And I've been trying to add in some new things. You guys just did a podcast on the eight exercises you need to do for longevity, and I literally yesterday did lateral walks for the first time.

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh, cool.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Kerry]

And they were amazing. So really like, the idea of embracing something new that I can still be strong at.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yes.

[Kerry]

But it kind of adjusts because I'm. I'm on a good path. For lessening my training. And I'm in that direction. So I like the idea of adapting that more. And maybe down the road I can stop worrying about body fat as much. But I think embracing it one piece at a time is a good recognition.

[Adam Schafer]

You know, I love that I can't and it's one thing I forgot about. And this in. If you look at the data, what helps people in your situation quite a bit oftentimes is to. Is to switch from competing and doing to coaching. And it brings so much purpose and value to high level athletes who are trying to make that transition is they then start to coach other people.

[Justin Andrews]

It's a natural evolution.

[Adam Schafer]

It's a very. And it's. And it feels so purposeful.

[Sal DeStefano]

Are you not a coach already?

[Kerry]

Yeah, I've been certified since 2010. I just don't do it actively as much because we move quite a bit. So I don't have any clients or anything right now. I just continue to learn on my own. But I, you know, I'm always the friend that has the advice. They're always the friend that says, let's go squat. I'll teach you how to squat.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Kerry]

So it's definitely part of my personality.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, man. Yeah. If you're interested in coaching, do you. Do you work otherwise? Would this be something I do? Okay.

[Kerry]

I work from home, so it's just something I. I've only really done it for friends and is like a piece of just me is who I am. Not really embraced it as far as employment or for money or anything like that.

[Adam Schafer]

If you ever. If you're ever interested in doing it as a. As for like, as a coach, like working as a coach, apply with us. We're looking to hire and I'm telling you it's. If I didn't train people, as bad as my relationship can be with fitness, if I didn't train people, I don't know if I'd be here. It saved me quite a bit because I care so much about the other. It's so easy for me to train people well because I care about them. That it was. It made me look in the mirror quite a bit and it kind of put some. Some rails on the stuff that I would do.

[Kerry]

So looking in the mirror can be pretty scary. But yes, good advice.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Yeah. So awesome. Well, well, is there anything else we could do for you? Anything we can help you with otherwise?

[Kerry]

No, I appreciate the perspective for sure. I love what you guys do and I'll definitely be following you.

[Adam Schafer]

Thank you. Right. All right, Carrie, thanks for calling in.

[Kerry]

Thanks, guys.

[Sal DeStefano]

It's not every day that's gotta be the strongest woman. By far. By far. We haven't had anybody who squats 400.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, well, first of all, that's super rare. Rare. Yeah. Ridiculously rare. Yeah. But even more Rare is a 260 pound bench press for a woman.

[Sal DeStefano]

Well, and. And carrying yourself at 17 body fat. Any. Any chick that's pushing that kind of weight is normally a big girl too. That is crazy that she is that ripped. That age and then that, that, that. Oh my God. That's crazy. Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

And that's gonna be so hard to pull away from because you've gotten so much.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

So many accolades, you know, so just so much encouragement for how well you do.

[Justin Andrews]

Reinforced. And then you're starting really at the peak.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. And then you reach a point, you're like, wait a minute. I mean, she's calling about a. Within the margin of error of visceral body fat increasing on a DEXA scan.

[Sal DeStefano]

Part of me thinks so. She knows us well enough that she knew what we're gonna say. I think part of it, she just wanted confirmation. Yeah. She just wanted. I think she. I think that's the whole point of bringing that up is just. I need to hear it from these guys telling me that because it sounds like she's already making those steps. The fact that she took that episode, did the lateral drags and stuff like that.

[Justin Andrews]

It's like she's wrestling with it mentally.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean, I. Someone like that. If I. When I've had clients like this. No one at that level, by the way. She's like very, very rare. But I've had clients that are obsessed about working out and moving away. Like do really good with finding like a Turkish get up or a windmill.

[Adam Schafer]

Redirect it.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah. And get them like really into. Because you get. That's a really cool exercise to get really strong in. And it's very difficult and it takes time and it's very rewarding when you get strong at it. And it's just. It helps.

[Adam Schafer]

I think she'd be an. I think if she became a coach, it would really.

[Sal DeStefano]

I thought that's good advice. No, no, I think that's good advice to. Even. Even. So if she listens this. Even if you don't do it for a professional living. I think even like creating content that's kind of around that. Even if that's exactly so.

[Adam Schafer]

I mean, there's a lot of female power level.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean, build a. Build a. Build a following on Social media that's related to that, where it's an outlet for you to, to teach. You don't necessarily have to be paid for classes and on a rigid schedule. It's like when you have time make a video and post it.

[Adam Schafer]

Our next caller caller is Allison from Indiana. There you go. Hi, Allison.

[Sal DeStefano]

How you doing, Allison?

[Allison]

Hey, guys. How's it going?

[Adam Schafer]

Good. How can we help you?

[Kerry]

Good.

[Allison]

First of all, just the traditional thank you guys for what you do. You're literally part of my testimony. I've been listening to you guys for a long time. So excited to be here.

[Adam Schafer]

Thank you.

[Allison]

So my question, I'll go ahead and read it. After a long time of playing golf at an elite level, including three years at a high level D1 university, I'm not really sure what comes next. I've been weightlifting for years. I'm pretty strong, but I've never really been at that, like, goal physique. Since I started playing college golf, I've tried not to worry too much about being at my perfect body fat percentage because I recognize that my body was doing really cool feet and I was already at the place I need to be at to compete while. But now I have one more year at school and I had to step off the team for personal reasons. But I get the chance to kind of play around with my fitness on my own schedule now. I'd love to lean out a bit. I'm at about 28% body fat and I kind of think like 23, 25% might be my ideal, but I'm kind of stuck on how to get there. I've been doing golf programs that are kind of similar to anabolic for a long time. But I'm wondering, like, fitness wise, where do I head next?

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

Have we tracked macros and calories? You have any idea what you're doing?

[Allison]

I try not to track too closely. I've had problems with that in the past. But I do hit over 100 grams of protein a day and probably 2,000 calories if I had to estimate.

[Adam Schafer]

Okay. So typically the strategy, by the way, great goal. I mean, 23 to 25% body fat, very healthy, super achievable. It typically looks like this. Hit your protein. Small calorie deficit, focus on strength training and focus on daily steps. And so if you do those things on a consistent basis, what you should see slowly over time is a nice body change in composition. So you should see yourself recomp. So slowly get stronger. Protein is consistent. My caloric intake is right around maintenance, sometimes deficit. And you'll see your body slowly change over time and you'll probably get from 28% probably within three months you should be down to right around where you want to be.

[Sal DeStefano]

So what about program wise for her? Because I feel like, I mean she's right at that calorie range where I don't know how much I want to cut. Cut you from 2000. And so we technically could lean out just by good programming, hitting your protein intake and kind of hovering around maintenance, which I'm totally okay with that. Which is kind of that suggestion. If she's running something that is similar to anabolic, maybe going a different direction program.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah, totally.

[Adam Schafer]

Do you know what your steps are daily, by the way?

[Justin Andrews]

Symmetry, maybe.

[Allison]

I don't have a number. It's probably 15k.

[Sal DeStefano]

Wow.

[Allison]

On a college campus it's a lot.

[Sal DeStefano]

Of, it's a lot of movement.

[Adam Schafer]

Oh, you're good.

[Sal DeStefano]

Are you playing any. Are you playing golf for like, like, like fun or doing it that also. Or okay.

[Adam Schafer]

How often?

[Allison]

Yeah, I mean golf. I, I also rock climb.

[Sal DeStefano]

Oh, wow.

[Allison]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

Okay. That's a lot of movement for only 2,000 calories.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

If you are stepping 15,000 steps a day, you are, you are rock climbing, playing golf.

[Adam Schafer]

And strength training.

[Sal DeStefano]

And strength training. 2000 calories. We need to go up, we gotta go up in calories. And that might be why you're kind of hovering or staying where you're at. Is you're due for like a reverse diet and need to like slow build. Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

How many days a week are you strength training? Training?

[Allison]

Three. Three days.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Okay. You know, we can switch up your program. We could probably put you on something like symmetry would probably be a good program for you just to change things up and you know, slowly focus on getting stronger. And through that process you should see yourself recomp because you go on a cut with that much activity already at 2000 calories. Probably not a good idea.

[Sal DeStefano]

No, you're not going to see. You might see a little bit of results in the first week or two and then after that you're going to hit a hard plateau. How many days a week would you say you were rock climbing or playing golf consistently?

[Allison]

I probably like three days of like rock climbing or golf and then three days of weightlifting and I always have a rest day.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, I think she should go Mass 15 or Performance 15.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, I think he's right.

[Justin Andrews]

Yeah. Adding up all that activity, I think.

[Sal DeStefano]

I mean I'm assuming rock climbing isn't a 20 minute thing. I'm sure it's hour or hours. Right.

[Justin Andrews]

Well, then you have to really consider that.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Justin Andrews]

Like if you just follow the 15 protocol and it's going to complement it well.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

If you get stronger with your strength training and you're eating healthy and continue your activity, then we're moving in the right direction. So that's what I would pay attention to. So I do agree with them. I think Mass 15 would be good and I think you'll get stronger pretty consistently week over week on that program.

[Sal DeStefano]

I'll have also have Doug put you in the private forum so you can kind of keep us posted as you go through this. But if I'm hitting it right, I think you can. You can follow the nutritional advice that Sal's giving, eat that way and just follow Mass 15. Continue doing what you're doing because you love doing all those things and I think we could do it. I think you might just be kind of tipping over as far as the amount of activity and training you're doing with as low of calories. And you need just a little bit of a bump in calories and a reduction in probably the amount of physical activity. And I think you're going to see positive changes.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Allison]

Okay. Awesome. It is a little hard for me to get to the gym that often because it's like a, a, it's like a 15 minute jog away.

[Sal DeStefano]

You can double them up. You could double them up. So the way maps 15, it could be three, three days or it could be six days.

[Justin Andrews]

So.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, so there's two exercises. Basically there's two exercises a day. And all you would do is put day one and day two together, day three, day four together, day five and day six together. So if it's more convenient to just go three times, but the amount of volume that's in there is what I'm looking for. I actually think that, you know, symmetry or anabolic or any of those other ones are a little more volume than I want you doing with all the stuff you have going on. I think you'll see better results with that.

[Adam Schafer]

Yep.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yep.

[Allison]

That sounds great. Thank you guys so much. All right, bye.

[Adam Schafer]

I like that her goal was good.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yeah, it's a healthy goal. Yeah.

[Adam Schafer]

That's a lot of activity.

[Sal DeStefano]

A ton of activity. I'm glad you asked for only 2,000 calories.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, I'm glad you asked that.

[Sal DeStefano]

That, you know, this is. This happens to a. That's why I was like, it didn't. 2000 calories is not necessarily bad, but with that much activity, with that much activity where she's at her body is just adapting. Did you know it's gotten to a point where it's like, hey, she's only going to fees as much and we're doing a lot of.

[Adam Schafer]

It's so counterintuitive. Right. People don't get it. You eat more in a situation like that and you get leaner. Yeah, that's what happens. Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yep. Our next caller is Steve from Texas.

[Adam Schafer]

Hey, Steve.

[Sal DeStefano]

What up, Steve?

[Steve]

Hi, guys.

[Sal DeStefano]

You doing.

[Adam Schafer]

How can we help you, man? Great.

[Steve]

So I'll just jump into the email that I sent to Margaret. Talked to her a couple times back around January or so right before I started my cancer journey. December last year, right after Christmas, I was diagnosed with throat cancer and just I knew I was gonna. Treatment was gonna take a lot off me. So I wrote and said, you know, told her a little bit about my story and she took it to you guys and y' all recommended the MAPS Transform program for me. So completed all my surgeries and treatment. Latest scans just as of last month showed cancer free and just kind of on the road to remission and recovery from there. Made my way through MAPS Transform and I'm feeling great. Treatment took 35 pounds off me that I wasn't really willing to lose. I've gained back 20 pounds while building muscle and staying lean and that muscle memory that you guys talk about is a real thing thing. And I just wanted to take the opportunity to thank y', all, thank Margaret for her help and then just kind of see where to go from here. Professionally, I'm a police officer. I work on a full time SWAT team. So strength, mobility and then resiliency is my main focus. I just turned 45 this year. I got two young kids, so I want to be around and stay mobile for all that.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah.

[Sal DeStefano]

Awesome, man.

[Adam Schafer]

Congratulations, by the way, on your diagnosis. That's great, man. That's awesome. Mass 15 performance would be a great transition. Transition from transform.

[Sal DeStefano]

Love that.

[Adam Schafer]

That'd be perfect for you right now.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yep, yep.

[Adam Schafer]

Okay, easy.

[Steve]

I'm in the middle of anabolic right now. I bought, I bought anabolic after I was done with this just to give that a try on week four. And my lifts are back up to pre, pre diagnosis before I got sick and probably surpassing that now.

[Adam Schafer]

Wow, that's great. Hell yeah.

[Steve]

You know, shoulder pain, you know, dealt with shoulder pain for a lot of years. None of that is present on any of the lifts, on any of the presses, so. But yeah, I'll give that 15 try.

[Adam Schafer]

Skip phase three. Skip phase three on anabolic so when you're done with phase two, go straight to performance 15.

[Steve]

Okay.

[Adam Schafer]

And you'll still. You'll keep getting stronger. Yeah, that's it, man.

[Steve]

Fantastic.

[Adam Schafer]

Easy, brother. And I'd love to hear back from you.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yep, sure.

[Steve]

Yeah, I'll stay in touch. I'll email back with Margaret, let her home, you know, let her know how it goes.

[Sal DeStefano]

And.

[Steve]

And just keep listening to you guys. You guys are fantastic. I appreciate it.

[Adam Schafer]

That's great, man. I appreciate you telling the story too. That's great, man. God bless.

[Sal DeStefano]

We'll send that over to you.

[Steve]

Sure thing. Thank you.

[Adam Schafer]

That's great, dude. That is really great news. Year ago, lost all that. Gained it back through it.

[Sal DeStefano]

Curious too. It'll be interesting. The 15. I think the right answer right away after transform was what you said. The fact that he's been doing anabolic and seen such good results.

[Adam Schafer]

That's because. Well, he's in phase. He's week four. So he just finished phase one. Yeah. He's in phase two. Phase three ramps up the volume, and I think that wouldn't be a good idea to jump into that. I think he's feeling strength because of phase one and because of the muscle memory. So finish phase two. You know, that's like your 8 to 12 rep range still. Volume is still. That's okay. Yeah. And then 15 performance will keep them going.

[Justin Andrews]

Hit them with that frequency.

[Adam Schafer]

That's right.

[Sal DeStefano]

Okay. Our next caller is Lane from Arizona.

[Adam Schafer]

Lane, what's happening?

[Sal DeStefano]

What's going on, Lane? What's up, guys?

[Adam Schafer]

Yo, this is crazy.

[Lane]

It's really good to meet you guys. Thanks for having me on the show. You guys are amazing. Been listening to you guys for years. I'll get right into my question if that's cool.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, let's do it. Do it.

[Lane]

All right. Just gotta pull it up here. I. I'm very nervous, so I'm gonna read straight from the question. I see why people do that now. Um, so, yeah, I cannot squat. For years now, I've been able to progressively overload four of the five big barbell movements pretty successfully except for the squat. I'm not the strongest because I've always struggled with discipline and consistency. Been chasing that 225 bench still, but nonetheless, I have been able to go from about a 115 to a 190 bench in the past five years. I've been training on and off. I know, pretty pathetic. But again, consistently is. Consistency is key. And I failed at this that I've been able to squat 200, though my form is probably questionable, which is probably part of the problem. More recently, I've tried programming a full body day once a week consisting of these big five movements. And I cannot seem to squat comfortably anymore, regardless of the weight. Even the bar is hard for me. I struggle to get get even 10 reps with it. The best way I can describe the problem is a combination of poor mobility and a lack of neural drive to my cns. Maybe not the proper term, but you get where I'm coming from. It just feels so much harder than it should. I assume as with most things in life, the reasons for this issue are just that. Reason, reasons, plural, not just one thing. Again, probably poor form early in my lifting journey, which I have attempted to correct and I think have made improvements on. I also work in construction and have done some damage to my knees, hips and low back as a result. I also live in Arizona, so working in the summer certainly drains a lot of my energy that I would otherwise be able to take advantage of in my training, especially being on my feet 10 hours a day. I assume that alone can affect my ability to squat, but I may be wrong. I also don't get enough sleep, which is on me. But at the same time, getting up at 4am means getting to bed by 7 or 8pm at the latest, which is rarely realistic for me. Granted, I am planning on leaving the construction construction industry and pursuing what I love, fitness. I'm currently enrolled in the Issa certification program and I'm going to become a personal trainer. But if I'm being honest, I don't want to be the trainer that can can't even high bar squat the bar. I'm wondering if there's anything I can do to get to a place where I can make real progress without making the problem worse. Thanks, guys.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. First off, you don't have to be. You don't have to be able to lift anything to be a good trainer. You just have to be able to be a good coach.

[Lane]

Sure.

[Adam Schafer]

That being said, I mean, you said it. It feels like a lack of neural drive, which is probably the case, and it's probably due to the sleep and or nutrition. Okay, so that's it right there. The program I would have a guy like you follow would be Maps 15, no more than that. And I would really try to string some days of sleep. You would be shocked at the difference sleep can make. Or to put it differently, how the difference lack of sleep over time will have on the body. And it does very, very strongly impact the central nervous system. It just fries it Just fries the body, dude.

[Sal DeStefano]

So maps 15, have Doug send that over. Right. And then I also, I'd like to throw you in the forum because I'd actually like to see the squat. Because if I can see them, if I can see the squat, I can actually give you like more precise bicep. Typically, hips and ankles tend to be the go to place that I got to address. And so if I actually see you moving, I can give you even more advice like, hey, let's work on the 90 90s. Let's do some combat stretch while we also do that. And also keep in mind too while we're working on these things, you know, Bulgarian split squats are fine. You know, lunges are fine. But I think your, your question is good because I think you shouldn't just give up that, oh, I'll never squat. It's like, why am I not able?

[Lane]

I refuse to do that.

[Sal DeStefano]

Right, right, right. So I appre. You know, timing, we'll do Bulgarians, whatever that. But then we can start working on these things. And again, I'm just spitballing and guessing because I haven't seen it. But I'll put you in the forum so I can see it.

[Justin Andrews]

And I mean, frequency is key, like you had mentioned as well. And to do that as well, like body weight squats are great and valuable.

[Sal DeStefano]

You can.

[Justin Andrews]

Even so I always tend to kind of point people towards this dumpy squat. Reason being is because what I'm trying to do is to increase that tension and to be able to produce more force output. So. So to be able to sit where you know it might be your weakest point of the lift, to then transfer that to come back up to recruit as much and maximize that process, to really focus on that isometrically and you know, between that and box squats and really kind of like taking that head on to start really driving more connection there and maximizing your force out put is going to help a lot. You know, obviously the, the mobility and the limitations, you know, need, need work and attention with that. But I mean that's the majority of, you know what's really going to drive your, your numbers up.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. Lane, I can't stress this enough. Right. So because I've had a few clients with some pretty difficult situations. Less is more. I can't stress, stress this enough.

[Sal DeStefano]

Yep.

[Adam Schafer]

So you could try, you could start with massive. If you don't see yourself getting stronger like right away, then you could go maps 15 every other day. You could follow the program and do day one on Monday. Day Two on Wednesday, day three on Friday. You're not even on a seven day schedule. You're just every other day following routine. I've had clients like you where we had to scale back, scale back, scale back, scale back. And then finally we saw some progress. Give me an idea what the sleep does look like. Like honestly you wake up at 4 on average. On average. What time are you falling asleep on average?

[Lane]

I mean between 9 and 10pm on a regular basis. And then I also know what's just as important or what's just right under the importance of the amount of sleep is sleep frequency in a circadian rhythm. And I always make the mistake of waking up way later on the weekends than I do on the weekdays. So that's a huge issue too. But throughout the week, week it's, I mean I'm getting five to six on a regular basis.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, yeah. Less is more, dude. So when you get mass 15, if you don't see yourself getting stronger by week two, scale it back and keep scaling it back until you see yourself start to progress. Yeah, for sure.

[Lane]

And then one, just one more thing. You know, I, I agree and I, and I know that the sleep is, is really the foundational thing here. Is there any tips you guys have? Also having busier lives than me. I would argue how you guys can get to bed and wake up on a regular basis even. Even though you know it's difficult to do.

[Adam Schafer]

Are you able before bed? Yeah. Do you have a lunch break?

[Lane]

I do. I have multiple breaks throughout the day.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. How long is Your longest break?

[Lane]

30 minutes.

[Adam Schafer]

Do you, are you able to take a nap?

[Lane]

Nah, I'd be napping on a steel table if I did.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, yeah, there's, there's not in my car.

[Lane]

I guess I could take a nap in my car.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah. You know, honest to God, 15 minute naps, they actually, they make a pretty big difference when you string a bunch.

[Sal DeStefano]

Together if you can do it.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, they make a pretty big difference. Difference. That would be it, bro. Because you're in your, your hard labor, you know, you're waking up early. You know, you could have a sleep routine and do all that. I would say, oh, don't sleep in on the weekend, but that's probably saving your butt right now. I know it's to sleep in on the weekend.

[Lane]

That's what I feel.

[Adam Schafer]

Yeah, yeah, it's a trade off, dude. It's like, you know, when you wake up at 4 on Saturday and Sunday too, you'll be, you'll be more fried.

[Sal DeStefano]

Than you feel Now, Yeah, yeah, for sure.

[Lane]

I appreciate it, man.

[Sal DeStefano]

I do like the routine advice though, with Justin's saying, I do think that. But trying to create some sort of consistency around, you know, this is what time I hit dinner. And by this, no later than this time, I'm at least in bed with no electronics and just trying to.

[Justin Andrews]

Trying to get calm the system as much as possible.

[Adam Schafer]

Two supplements I would. There's a few supplements I would recommend to you that you could look at. Ashwagandha is at the top. Rhodiola would be another one. Panax ginseng would be another one. They all just kind of help the body kind of handle stress. But Ashwagandha at the top.

[Lane]

Okay, Absolutely.

[Sal DeStefano]

All right.

[Lane]

Awesome, man. Guys. And you know, Yeah, I love you guys. You guys are amazing. And as a lot of people have said, you know, on the show, Sal, I. I commend you and, and your courage for your faith. I'm also on that same walk and just recently started to give my life to Christ. So, man, I. I love you for that.

[Adam Schafer]

Thank you.

[Lane]

And I love the rest of you guys, man. You guys have so much wisdom and, and you're so respectful and humble and you guys just are amazing. And I. I try to turn people onto your podcast all the time.

[Adam Schafer]

I appreciate it, man.

[Sal DeStefano]

Thank you, Lane. Thank you, Lane.

[Lane]

Thanks, guys.

[Adam Schafer]

I had a client just remembered this. I've had a couple clients like this, but I had one guy that I trained. I'll be careful how much I say, because he was a high level executive. I'll just say that, like, you think of, like some of the top tech companies in the Bay Area. He was second. Okay.

[Justin Andrews]

Okay.

[Adam Schafer]

And his schedule was ridiculous, like crazy. And he hired me to train him, and I knew he had a crazy schedule. And I worked with him two days a week. And when I started with them, I thought what I was doing with him was appropriate intensity and volume because it was very little, and we would just not progress. And I'm like, is it. Am I doing still too much? Like, what's going on here? And I scaled it back. This is what our workouts look like. Two exercises twice a week. That's when you start to see strength gains. It was. He would come in and we would do squats and bench, and I'm talking like 75% intensity. And then the next time he came in to do two more exercises, and that was when we finally started to see strength gains. I had to scale it so far back because he was just this stress. It was just so much. That bucket was full man, and that was the only way we can make progress. Look, if you like Mind Pump, come find us on Instagram. We'll see you. It's mindpumpmedia. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump.

[Sal DeStefano]

If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health.

[Adam Schafer]

And energy, and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB super [e-mail].

[Sal DeStefano]

The RGB Super Bundle includes Maps, Anabolic.

[Adam Schafer]

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[Sal DeStefano]

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[Adam Schafer]

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[Sal DeStefano]

Video, the RGB Super Bundle is like having Sal, Adam and Justin as your own personal trainers, but at a fraction of the price. The RGB Super Bundle has a full 30 day money back guarantee and you can get it now.

[Steve]

Plus other valuable free [e-mail] if you.

[Sal DeStefano]

Enjoy this show, please share the love.

[Adam Schafer]

By leaving us a five star rating.

[Sal DeStefano]

And review on itunes and by introducing.

[Adam Schafer]

Mind Pump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support and until next time, this is Mind Pump.