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Mind Pump: Raw Fitness Truth
2712: The 5 Biggest Fitness Mistakes Middle-Aged Women Make that Destroy Progress
00:33:19
The 5 Biggest Fitness Mistakes Middle-Aged Women Make that Destroy Progress This can be a difficult demographic to train. (1:23) The 5 Biggest Fitness Mistakes Middle-Aged Women Make that Destroy Progress #1 - Not prioritizing lifting. (4:43) ...
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A
Morning, Zoe. Got donuts.
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B
Jeff Bridges, why are you still living above our garage?
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A
Well, I dig the mattress and I want to be in a T mobile commercial like you teach me. So Dana.
- [00:12]
B
Oh no, I'm not really prepared. I couldn't possibly at T Mobile get the new iPhone 17 Pro on them. It's designed to be the most powerful iPhone yet and has the ultimate pro camera system.
- [00:24]
A
Wow, impressive. Let me try. T mobile is the best place to get iPhone 17 Pro because they've got the best network.
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C
Nice.
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B
Je free.
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D
You heard them.
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E
T mobile is the best place to get the new iPhone 17 Pro on.
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C
Us with eligible traded in any condition.
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A
So what are we having for lunch?
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B
Dude, my work here is done.
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F
The 24 month bill credit experience beyond for well qualified customers plus tax and 35 device connection charge credit send and balance due. If you pay off earlier, Cancel Finance agreement. IPhone 17 Pro 256 gigs 1099.99 and new line minimum 100 plus a month plan with auto pay plus taxes and fees required. Best mobile network in the US based on analysis by Oklahoma Speed Test Intelligence Data 182025 Visit t mobile.com if you.
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E
Want to pump your body and expand.
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C
Your mind, there's only one place to go. Mind Pump. Mind Pump. With your hosts Sal Destefano, Adam Schafer.
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E
And Justin Andrews, you just found the.
- [01:14]
C
Most downloaded fitness, health and entertainment podcast. This is Mind Pump. Today's episode. Look, we're going to talk to middle aged women who are struggling with their fitness. What they seem to be doing isn't working. What you're doing isn't working. We're going to talk about the five biggest fitness mistakes. These are so common. We see them all the time. If you fix these, watch what happens to your body, your fitness and your progress. By the way, we have a group coaching group where our trainers help women through this process. It's muscle. Mommymovement.com Everybody gets a week for free. Hop in there, get some free coaching. It's awesome. If you stick around afterwards, it's great. But a week for free for everybody. Also, this episode is brought to you by a sponsor, Seed. Seed is the world's best probiotic, hands down. Go check them out. Go to seed.com mindpump Use the code 25mindpump. Get 25% off your first month's order of their daily symbiotic. All right, real quick.
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G
If you love us like we love you, why not show it by rocking one of our shirts, hats, mugs or training gear over@mypumpstore.com I'm talking right now. Hit pause, hit head on over to mypumpstore.com that's it. Enjoy the rest of the show.
- [02:24]
C
All right, today we're going to talk about the five biggest mistakes that women in middle aged make when it comes to fitness. That completely destroys their progress. It gets in their way. It stops things from happening, prevents them from burning the body fat they want to burn and getting the body in fitness that they desire. We're going to break them down and talk about why they're huge mistakes. Let's get to it.
- [02:46]
D
Do our best not to mansplain. No, I feel like we have to.
- [02:49]
G
Say we had like 80% of our clientele is this category.
- [02:53]
D
Okay. Love that you say that. It's one of my pet peeves. When and we've gotten this, the 10 years we've been doing this, there's always a handful of people coming. I wish you guys would have a girl on the show. It's like I feel more confident training a woman, a middle aged woman, than I do a young teenage boy or an older guy. That was most of the what I helped. So I have, I have more experience training and I'm not gonna. By no means do I think I came out the gates an expert. I learned a lot of things the hard way and didn't know what the hell I was doing. But through years and years and years and hundreds of female clients that I trained, I think I got pretty, pretty good at doing that. I think you guys would agree too. That's most of our demographic still.
- [03:41]
C
The largest demographic by far of people that.
- [03:44]
D
It's not even close. You will, it is, you'll go to a gym that has 10, 15 trainers and you may see three to four guys getting trained that day. Maybe the rest will be all be women.
- [03:55]
C
It's still, it's, it's the largest demographic still. It was when we were training clients. And this is a, this is a very difficult, this can be a difficult demographic to train even today. Not because there's necessarily anything that's happening physiologically that makes it very difficult. Now, I do know hormones change and we've had episodes talking about things like perimenopause and menopause that can definitely change how the body adapts and reacts. But the rules still apply. In other words, the things that work still work. And what we see with this demographic is there are common mistakes and common beliefs in this age group that still persists. And I know this because when we talk to people. When we do live events, when we talk to people on the show, when our trainers are training people in this age group, women in this age group, we have to talk them out of doing a lot of these different kinds of things.
- [04:51]
D
Do you think that's still largely due to marketing and how they're marketed to?
- [04:55]
C
Yes. And now the younger. So it's interesting you say that because the younger demographic, right, Gen Z and even millennial women, but definitely the younger demographic has figured this out. And it's largely because social media and media and the fitness industry has started to finally start to communicate the right things. But you know, 15 years ago when I was training clients, it wasn't like that. In fact, 10 years ago, when we started the podcast and we talked about some of the stuff that we're talking about today, it was actually controversial. We would actually get a lot of people who give it, give us a lot of pushback. Now all the data supports it, all of our experiences support it. We've known this forever. I've known this for over 25 years, training people. But still when we get clients here with our trainers, it's like we still have these conversations. Yeah, you still hear it because these beliefs still persist. So I'll start with the first biggest mistake. Now if you look at the, again, if you look at the demographic of middle aged women and you look at the forms of exercise that they prioritize, almost at the bottom of the list. And I mean prioritize, I don't mean the one that they do because a lot of women will do this to some degree, although they're not doing it properly, which we'll get to, but they definitely don't prioritize this and that is lifting weights. They don't prioritize lifting weights. The typical demographic of the middle aged woman's workout routine does not put strength training at the forefront as a cornerstone. And it needs to be at the forefront. So the things that will combat the signs of aging, the weakness that starts to happen, muscle loss, bone weakening, fat gain, hormone changes, muscle is what reverses all that. Muscle is a metabolically active, hormone sensitive, hormone producing, you can even say it's a hormone producing. Although it doesn't directly produce hormones, it does. Building muscle does create a promote, should I say a hormone profile that looks like a younger hormone profile through the muscle building process, their routines just don't. When you look at a routine of a middle aged woman, generally speaking, it typically looks like a lot of other stuff with some lifting weights sprinkled in and Then the way that they lift weights isn't even strength training. It's not even done in a way to build muscle. And that's a huge, huge mistake.
- [07:10]
D
Well, wouldn't you say that this was the main catalyst for us building the muscle mommy group? I mean, there's a bit of misunderstanding around that too. This is not a group that's just for mommies. It was really a group that was.
- [07:23]
C
A term that was. Muscle mommy means a woman who wants to build.
- [07:25]
D
Yeah, it's really designed, really designed for this exact reason for we wanted to put together a group of women that are focused on strength training to build muscles. You do not have to be a mom. You can be, you could be young, you could be old, you could be single. It does not. You could have five kids. It doesn't matter. But it's, it's a group to encourage women to continue to strength train and make strength training and getting stronger the cornerstone of their, their program and to let them see the benefits of what that looks like when you do.
- [07:57]
C
When we say build musc, here's what tends to happen, especially for a woman in this age group, because she may have grown up where you hear the term building muscle and you automatically think of a bodybuilder or it sounds very masculine like, and, and for someone who's trying to, to build a physique or create a physique that's lean, sculpted, you know, toned will be the word that some people will use. They don't. They say, well, I don't want to get bulky. I'm trying to get leaner, I'm trying to get bigger. Yeah. So here's what happens through the muscle building process. Number one, obviously you build some muscle that balances out hormones, muscle sculpts and shapes the body. And muscle is very metabolically active. So this is, if you're noticing as you get older, your metabolism doesn't seem to be as fast as it used to be. Like, I eat certain foods and before I could get away with it, now suddenly I just gained body fat. That's because your metabolism is not being leveraged towards fat loss. Building muscle or even the process of building muscle does this. And then also muscle is very dense tissue. In other words, if you lost 10 pounds of body fat but replaced it with 10 pounds of muscle, so your weight on the scale stayed the same, you would lose about a quarter of the size.
- [09:08]
G
Your overall mass shrinks.
- [09:10]
C
Yes, because body fat, fat, a pound of fat versus a pound of muscle. A pound of fat takes up about 20 to 25% more space than the pound of muscle. So you've lost a quarter of the size. So you're, you're tighter even though you weigh the same on the scale and muscle off it offers shape. Right, because you built muscle, where'd you build it? Your butt? Your back? Your shoulders? So now you've got more.
- [09:31]
G
It's really your only insurance policy and anti aging method that you could apply. And so you know, to focus on muscle building it really. I guess the misconception is that cardio, you know, so focused on, you know, all the movement and the burning the calories because of the body fat, when in fact, you know, building the muscle actually is the, is the method that's going to produce all of those results.
- [09:56]
D
It also, you know, also prioritizing lifting makes their ultimate goal way easier.
- [10:02]
C
Way easier.
- [10:03]
D
So if the ultimate goal is to lose body fat or to shape the body, whatever, building muscle and focusing on lifting as the main cornerstone will make that process significantly easier.
- [10:16]
C
Fastest way to get.
- [10:17]
D
Because, because in our, an argument someone might make is like, well, my friend, my girlfriend, I mean she just started doing those marathons and running and she lost £15 or I, and you know, I used to run and when I would run I would, I would easily keep my weight down. And so I liked when I, so I've done it before this way. It's like, yeah, it's not, it's not, not possible to lose weight on a scale through other modes or modalities. But lifting weights will get you the desired outcome faster and easier and more sustainable. Once you do that, it is a no brainer.
- [10:47]
C
Well, it boosts your metabolic rate and it leverages your body to burn body fat. So here's what I'm talking about, right? So I like to use an investment analogy or making money. I could either work and make a certain amount every hour that I work, which requires my activity, right? Requires me to show up and work, or I could find a way to take the money I have, place it in an account that generates money on its own. Right? That's what happens when you build muscle. You actually teach your body to burn more calories on its own. You also improve insulin sensitivity, which leverages more fat loss. You also increase the amount of what are called androgen receptors. As you build muscle, you get more androgen receptors. What does that mean? That means the testosterone you have in your body. And yes, I said testosterone. It's just as important for women as it is for men. It's just different ratios. Testosterone in women does what it in women does the same thing as it does in men. It's libido, it's strength, it's fat loss. Energy. It's energy. So when you have more androgen receptors, whatever testosterone you're producing has more places, more places to attach to. So now again, you're leveraging your body in a way to burn more body fat, which means it's less work. This is less work. Less work done in the gym, more work done on its own is what happens through this process of strength training. Now, when we say lifting weights, that doesn't mean any form of exercise with weights. Now, this is the other, this is just a little side note here with this particular point is that a lot of women will say, well, I do lift weights, I do this body pump class, or I do this circuit training class, or we lift weights in a method that makes me sweat a lot or whatever. And really what you're doing is you're just doing cardio with weights. The lifting weights that we're talking about is traditional strength training where the goal is to get stronger. The goal isn't to lift weights faster. The goal isn't to do a bunch of circuits. The goal isn't a class. The goal, and literally what it looks like, is I lift a heavy weight for 12 reps with an exercise. I rest for two minutes, I do another set. The goal is build muscle. That is the goal with lifting weights. And that should be the cornerstone. And what's cool is we are finally starting to get female voices that are promoting this. People like Dr. Tina, Dr. Estina, Esteema, excuse me, Gabriel Lyon, Dr. Gabrielle Lyon. These are women who are also middle aged who are talking about like, and they're like. Dr. Gabrielle Lyon loves sharing the data and showing, like, this is how you get the body you want. This is how you become more resilient. It's through strength training. So the cornerstone of your routine should be strength training. That's the cornerstone. The second mistake that women in this demographic make is they do lots and lots and lots of cardiovascular, tons and tons of cardio, whether it's on a treadmill or classes or running outside. The belief is, I'm burning all these calories doing this activity. But the problem with doing lots and lots of cardio is cardiovascular activity trains your body to build endurance. So if you want endurance, that's great, go for it. But if you're looking for fat loss and you're looking for a sculpted shaped body with a good hormone profile, don't do tons of cardio. Tons of cardio counters the signal of muscle building. Okay, Having lots of endurance means you don't have big muscles or a lot of muscle. So lots of cardio activity actually does the opposite. It actually promotes muscle loss. Now, you're not burning muscle, but you are telling your body to pare muscle down. And so lots and lots of cardio produces with a low calorie diet, which we'll get to next, a skinny fat body with a hormone profile that looks terrible, a hormone profile that throws you into menopause sooner or causes testosterone, depression, and issues with estrogen progesterone. So you're doing all this work, all this sweating, and you're like, why is nothing happening? I'm eating so little, I'm doing less cardio. Why is my body not changing the way I initially lost some weight, but now I plateaued so hard. Well, what's going on? What's going on is you're literally teaching your metabolism. To put it very plainly, although it's more complex than this, you're teaching your metabolism to slow down. So don't do hours and hours of cardio. If the cornerstone of your routine is strength training, then do a little bit of cardio for your health. But the cornerstone should be strength training. Your goal is to get stronger when it comes to your workout. If you're getting stronger in combination with stuff, with diet, which we're going to talk about, you will get the body that you want.
- [15:03]
G
The variability you get from weight training is so much more significant. Like inevitably doing cardio too much and too frequently, getting this repetitive stress that adds up over time to where your joints actually start, you know, sending a pain signal. We get restriction there, and there's actually an aging effect to that if you stay in it long enough, where your body, you get this oxidation effect.
- [15:26]
C
They've done some studies on what forms of exercise are the best for the skin, and strength training is the only form of exercise. All forms of exercise, if done properly, if they improve your health, you'll get better skin. Okay, but only strength training promotes collagen synthesis in the skin. So it literally will make your skin look younger. Now, why is it, why is strength training promoting the building of collagen? The collagen matrixes in my skin? Well, it's when you're building muscle, you're sending a signal that says, increase protein synthesis. You get that locally to the muscles you train, but you also get the systemic effect where your body's trying to build, and it also builds your skin more youthful, healthy. And the data show this. The data actually shows this. So strength training is a way to actually give yourself the. Make your skin look younger, lift weights, if that's what you're looking for.
- [16:16]
D
I think it's important to note, or at least bring up right now, since this is where we're at talking about between cardio and lifting. The form of lifting weights that a lot of women are doing too, is not the proper form.
- [16:27]
C
That's what I said earlier. Yeah.
- [16:29]
D
And so calling out the Barry's boot camps, the orange theories, the F45s, not lifting weights, this is that that form of lifting weights is closer to cardio than it is to actually lifting weights. And so there's. I think there's a whole cohort of people that choose to do all the running, like you're saying, and a lot of family members that still think cut the calories, go for runs. That's the way to get in shape is the method. That's completely wrong. And the circuit training type of classes of weightlifting is not that much better. It's like a fraction better than what just going out for a run is for them. Because the rest periods in lifting weights are one of the most important parts of muscle building. And so, and I know this firsthand from teaching Orange Theory classes, I used to stop my classes in the middle class and like, literally stop the group. And the reason why that is, and I can't speak for F45 because I didn't teach there, even though I know Barry's boot camp at F45 has a similar mentality around lifting weights and that they encourage the burn and the heart rate. In fact, in Orange Theory, you get points for keeping your heart rate up. And it is almost impossible to go there with your friends and not be competitive about who gets the most points. And you get the most points by keeping yourself in these elevated heart rates and keeping your heart rate elevated, like cardio training, which. That's what that is. While lifting weights defeats the purpose of lifting the weights, it makes the weight training. You may as well skip the. The weight part and just stayed on the treadmill for the extra 20 minutes, and you'll get the same benefits. And so there is this misconception of just because I'm lifting weights, that I should be getting these benefits that you're talking about. You only get those benefits if you actually do this in a more traditional form where you have rest periods and you rest between each one of your sets. And that looks very different.
- [18:25]
C
It feels different. So resting between sets isn't because I need the break. I think a lot of people think that, like, oh, I can keep going. No, no, it's not because you need the break. It's because we're training at adaptation that builds strength, not lots of cardiovascular endurance. Again, if you want lots of endurance, if you're going to run a marathon, then that's the way you need to train. But if you're trying to shape and sculpt your body, get leaner, leverage your hormones, get that kind of body that most women, I think want, then what you want to do is you want to leverage things in a way that builds muscle, which means rest periods. So lifting weights feels different. It feels like you're trying really hard for 10 to 12 reps and then you break for two minutes and then you try again. It does not feel like this continual calorie burn, sweat producing type of a workout. It's a very different feel. And some people when they do it first, they think, well, this isn't the same. This isn't a workout. I'm used to just moving and moving, moving. No, no. If you're getting stronger in your workouts, if you're lifting more than you did before, if you're able to add reps, you're moving in the right direction, keep going. It's not about continual movement. That's not what's going to produce this. Now the next mistake is they eat too little.
- [19:31]
D
Yeah.
- [19:31]
C
And this is just, this one is tough to kill. This one is in most demographics that are trying to lose weight, but is especially difficult or challenging with women, especially middle aged women.
- [19:42]
D
But it goes hand in hand with the lifting.
- [19:44]
C
Yes, you have to you, if you eat too little, your body will learn how to adapt to the new caloric intake. And one of the ways it does is it pairs muscle down. By the way, if you eat too little for too long, your body leverages things to store body fat. Okay, again, I'll use another investment analogy. If you're making so much money and then the intake of your money goes way down, you're going to reduce your spending. That's what ends up happening. You reduce your spending because I'm not making that much right now. If you're not feeding your body enough, your body learns how to burn less. And it does this through a lot. And it can get very complex. But one of the things it does is it pares muscle down. This is why when you look at the studies on people who go on a calorie restricted diet to lose weight, 40% of the weight that they lose is muscle on average, 35 to 40%. So somebody loses 10 pounds on the scale. Four of it is muscle. Now what's happened is you've lost some fat, but you've lost an almost equal amount of muscle, which means your body fat percentage hasn't changed much. So you're smaller, but your body fat percentage is around the same. So skinnier but similar fatness, essentially. But now you also have a slower metabolism. Now you're making future fat loss even more difficult. So if you eat too little, then it kills future progress. So what's the reverse of this? Fuel yourself to build strength and build muscle, set yourself up for effective fat loss.
- [21:03]
D
Well, you're also, not only are you teaching the body to slow the metabolism down, you're more likely going to pare muscle down, down. You also are not giving your body the material to go build the muscle, which is the thing that helps you metabolically and is, is so beneficial to not only sculpting physique, but speed the metabolism up. So you could potentially be running a great program. Right, let's doing the resting rest periods and, and trying to lift heavier weights. And you're not getting stronger, but you're not getting stronger. You're not building muscle because you're eating too little, because you're not giving your body the material to go build the muscle. So it's like you're sending the signal, the right signal, and the body's going like, yeah, we need to build muscle. But then you're like depriving it of what it needs to go build the muscle. And then it's like, yeah, sorry, can't. I don't have the material. And so it doesn't do it. And so then you're frustrated because you're like, man, I'm doing all the right things. But then you're not fueling the body enough in order for it to build muscle. And this is such a challenging thing when you're helping a client who gets in front of you, and because their ultimate goal is fat loss, they'll say things like, I want to lose 15 or 20 pounds or 30 pounds, and then I like to, you know, sculpt my shoulders or my butt, or they'll describe body parts, or they're basically describing somebody who's, who's more muscular and less body fat. But we have to focus on building the muscle first before we try and trim down the body fat. You don't do them simultaneously. You're not going to eat in a caloric deficit to lose fat and simultaneously.
- [22:25]
C
Build Muscle, you have nothing to build with.
- [22:26]
D
It won't happen.
- [22:27]
G
This was the most frustrating part. When you go to body fat test again down the road and like you had mentioned skinny fat before, but like you being deprived of calories and nutrients for an extended amount of time, you're doing all the right things, all the activities there, all the weight training is there and yet and you're losing size. But your, your body fat ratio, it's.
- [22:47]
C
Not uncommon by the way. Body fat percentage is what matters, everybody, not how much total, it's about your percentage of body fat. So in other words, a 200 pound man with 20 pounds of body fat on him is 10% body fat. A 100 pound man with 20 pounds of body Fat would have 20%. They look very different. To put it differently, a 200 pound man at 10% body fat looks very different than a 200 pound man at 20% body fat. Same thing for women, right? 20% for a woman is considered healthy and lean. You could be 170 pounds at 20% or 170 pounds at 30%. They look very, very different. If you feed the muscle, build the muscle, it helps with the fat loss throughout this entire process, if you take muscle away makes fat loss very. By the way, it's not unheard of. It's actually quite common for people to lose weight the wrong way. They see themselves go down 10, 15 pounds on the scale and their body fat percentage either stay the same or goes up.
- [23:39]
D
One of the most discouraging and reasons I saw people quit was exactly that was busting their ass work wise as far as movement, sweating, eating less calories, disciplining themselves, sacrificing for month, months in a row, then getting on that body fat test and being told that their body fat percentage went up is unbelievably discouraging. Especially when they saw the scale go down 15 pounds and they, they were celebrating that. And then they get their body fat test and find out and they just can't wrap their brain around how is this possible? I went down £15. I was so excited about that. How this thing has got to be wrong. And it's like, no, it's not wrong. What happened was you lost a larger ratio of muscle than you did fat.
- [24:20]
C
That's right.
- [24:20]
D
And that is not.
- [24:21]
C
And the recipe for that, eating a low calorie diet with lots of cardio, that is if somebody told me there's.
- [24:28]
D
Only one fastest way to do that.
- [24:29]
C
There'S only one way to lose muscle faster and that is to be bedridden on a low calorie diet. But if somebody was like, hey, I don't want to be bedridden, how do I lose muscle as fast as possible? Oh, this is what you do. Tons of cardio. Eat a low calorie diet, you're gonna burn. Your muscle's gonna go. It's gonna go down. The next part, the next mistake is not eating enough protein. Now, most people eat enough protein for what is considered essential. Yeah. So most people are not deficient in protein, but there's a big difference between what is essential and what is optimal when it comes to fat loss and muscle gain. Now, what is optimal? It's closer to about a gram of protein per pound of target body weight. Okay, so if you're a woman listening to this and your goal body weight, let's say, is 140 pounds, aim for 140 grams of protein a day. And for most people, that is way more protein than they've ever eaten before. Okay, that's a lot. That's like three. That's three meals at, what, 35, 40 grams of protein each meal. That's a decent amount of protein. I think about breakfast, for example, two eggs for breakfast. That's high protein. That's 12 grams. You gotta go find another 30 grams somewhere. So eat about a gram of protein per pound of target body weight. In combination with strength training. Watch what happens. And the data shows, by the way, even in calorie deficit, when they compare two calories with groups of people. Sorry, two diets with groups of people, same calories, Everything else is essentially the same. But the difference is this group is high protein. Like I'm saying, the other group is, you know, essential protein, but nothing higher. The group with the high protein, even though the deficit is the same, loses more fat and keeps more muscle than the other group. And then when it comes to building muscle, everybody knows this higher protein diet will build more muscle. So eat the protein, don't underfeed yourself, lift weights. By the way, you mentioned our muscle mommy group. The majority of the women in the muscle mommy group right now are following what's called a reverse diet, meaning we're bumping their calories, bumping their protein, they're lifting weights. And you know what? A lot of them are finding they're actually getting leaner through this process. Leaner. That's not unheard of. Lastly, it's not managing stress properly. So what does that mean, managing stress? I think some people think that means I just do less stressful things. But sometimes that's not realistic. It's like, okay, my job is kind of stressful. I've got a family to take care of. That's kind of stressful.
- [26:46]
D
Yeah, I got three little kids.
- [26:47]
C
That's super stressful. Like what do I do? How do I manage? Well, here's what the data shows. Do things that give you a sense of purpose and do things that you enjoy doing. Those actually mitigate the effects of stress. And what does that look like for some people? It looks like yoga or walks, prayer or meditation. It could look like reading a book. That is something that you're interested in. It could also look at reframing things in your life. Like I have to work. Well, I like to work. I want to work. You know, that's another reframe. But the data and the reason why I'm saying this, and this sounds hokey to some people, but when you look at the data on stress management and they've compared people taking things away except for extreme things. Right. Because there could be extreme things in your life that are very stressful. But I'm talking about the average person. They'll compare people with average life average stresses, take things away versus people who just add things that give them purpose. And the people that add things with purpose or change mindset along with it have better stress management. So that's, that's the.
- [27:45]
D
It also means managing and modifying the amount of intensity and volume you train with.
- [27:52]
C
That's a stress.
- [27:53]
D
There is. So exercise is a stress. Now it's a good stress because you stress the body. It has an adaptation that's positive to the body. But the 20 year old single version, going to school or out of school with no husband, no kids, no, no job, no nothing going on, could handle a total different workout style than the 42 year old version with two kids, married and, and has also a job that they're trying to manage and a family they're managing. Totally different.
- [28:20]
C
That's right.
- [28:21]
D
That, that same woman at different parts of their life, no different than a man. Where we at different periods of our life can handle different loads of stress and different levels of intensity inside the gym and sometimes their application of intensity in the gym, they're all or nothing. It's either they're not working out at all and then when they decide to do it, they're going, they're going as hard as they possibly can and running these circuit type classes, high intensity type training circuit, like, no, like getting after it every time they work out because it feels cathartic, because they get a cortisol spike afterwards. And it feels good initially right afterwards. But it's actually the worst type of training for that person based off of the level of stress they have. And so that's always a very common thing that we have a lot of fun.
- [29:06]
C
Generally speaking, for most people in this demographic, two days a week of strength training for about 45 minutes, traditional strength training, 45 minutes to an hour is plenty. And on the other days, make sure you get a decent amount of walking. That's a wonderful routine. You combine that with a high protein diet, whole natural foods. You're not trying to deprive yourself, you're fueling yourself. Stick to whole natural foods because it's far better for you. And then watch what happens to your body. It's miraculous. The other option is like maps 15 type of program. This is a program that we have where you're doing about two exercises a day. So instead of two days a week, it's six days a week. But you're only doing two exercises every day, which takes about 15 to 20 minutes. Very similar. It's most appropriate. It's one of our most popular programs for that reason right there. And it produces tremendous, tremendous results. And lastly, this isn't one of the big ones, but I do want to throw this in as a bonus because I did some and this was a common thing for my female clients in this age demographic. And I looked up the data on this. I said, okay, because I remember having these conversations with these clients of mine. I looked up the data. What is the average amount of alcoholic drinks that the average middle aged woman will have in a week? And it's between four to five a week. Okay. Those calories are wasted calories. That's anywhere between 600 to 1,000 calories a week. Alcohol does not have a positive effect on hormones. Does not have a positive effect on fat loss or muscle gain. Yeah. And it negatively affects sleep. Alcohol also lowers inhibition. Even one glass of wine will do this. And the food choices that tend to follow tend to not be the best food choices. So in my experience, when I've worked with people in this demographic, getting them to cut alcohol out was like an easy 7 to 10 pound fat.
- [30:43]
G
Ironically, if the the point before it's used a lot for managing stress.
- [30:48]
C
That's right. It's not a stress management, especially in.
- [30:50]
D
The context of the, the beginning of this journey. Because I always used to like to communicate that to my clients too, is just that, listen, I am not an anti alcohol person and I think there's tremendous value in the glass of wine. Or two with dinner with your husband once a week or with your family or your girlfriends, like 100%. I'm pro that. But where we're currently at when you normally hire me and we get started, where you're at already, super low calories, super high stress, it is an absolute waste and it's slowing down our pro, our progress now take give me six to eight months with you where I build five to eight pounds of muscle on you. You're eating 25 to 2600 calories now we're having a couple glasses a week total. Different scenario than when you're eating 1500-1800 calories and 600 of them calories every now and then are coming from alcohol. Not a good strategy and is not helping the cause. So it's not a. You can't ever have it and be healthy and fit. No, you absolutely can have a balance of having drinks occasionally in your lifestyle and be extremely fit. But in the context of when you're starting this journey and you're trying to build muscle, get fit, speed your metabolism up and you're in coming from a place like that where you use alcohol to mitigate your stress, you're low calorie, you're over trained or not training at all and you're doing it, it's killing our gains. Whereas if we could put it aside for a little bit, focus on the high protein, eat, feed your body what it needs, build some muscle, then we can reintroduce it.
- [32:13]
C
Whole different ball margins are whole different ballgame, much bigger. And here's what we're going to do. So we have, we do group coaching for women and this is led by our trainers. And by the way, if everything that we're saying sounds crazy, I'll tell you what's crazy. Doing what you've been doing and getting nothing in return. If you're like spinning your wheels in the dirt, you're like, I don't know why my body's plateaued, it doesn't want to respond anymore. Try what we're saying and watch what happens. Give it a couple months and watch what happens. But again, to go back to our group coaching, it's musclemommymovement.com everybody listening right now will get in there for a week for free. So get some free coaching for a week by our trainers. They'll give you more details on this kind of stuff afterwards if you want to stick around. That's phenomenal. And coaching is one of the most effective ways to help you through this process because you're going to have questions and there are going to be some roadblocks along the way. But nonetheless, even if you don't do that, take our advice. Follow what we said. Watch what happens to your body. Look, if you like the show, come find us on Instagram. We'll see you at mindpumpmedia.
- [33:11]
E
Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. If your goal is to build and shape your body, dramatically improve your health and energy, and maximize your overall performance, check out our discounted RGB super bundle@mindpumpmedia.com the RGB Super Bundle includes Maps, Anabolic Maps, Performance and Maps Aesthetic nine months of phase expert exercise programming designed by Sal, Adam and Justin to systematically transform the way your body looks, feels and performs. With detailed workout blueprints and over 200 videos. 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. Plus other valuable free resources@mindpumpmedia.com if you enjoy this show, please share the love by leaving us a five star rating and review on itunes and by introducing Mind Pump to your friends and family. We thank you for your support and until next time, this is Mind Pump.