Adam Schafer (4:05)

If you love us like we love you, why not show it by rocking one of our shirts, hats, mugs, or training gear over atmypumpstore.com. i'm talking right now.

Justin Andrews (4:13)

Hit pause.

Adam Schafer (4:14)

Head on over tomy pump store.com.

Justin Andrews (4:16)

That'S it.

Adam Schafer (4:17)

Enjoy the rest of the show.

Sal DeStefano (4:19)

You want to build your butt? It's not happening. We're going to talk about why your butt is flat and what you could do about it. Right now.

Adam Schafer (4:25)

Let's fix that pancake butt.

Sal DeStefano (4:27)

Let's.

Justin Andrews (4:28)

Let's first discuss a little bit of the anatomy of the glute and what a difference the origin insertion can genetically put. Not genetically, but like organically, I guess.

Sal DeStefano (4:42)

No genetics, right? Yeah. Yeah. Because your genetics play a role, a big role in the shape of a muscle, in the sense of the origin and insertion. So if I were to use my bicep as an example, a long bicep has a larger muscle Belly, so there's more potential muscle in there. Now, that being said, a long muscle belly takes longer to fill out. Right. A shorter muscle will look rounder, faster because it's short versus one that's long. So you can see this with glutes. You have really long glutes. Once you build them, you can have a really big round butt, but it could take a lot longer versus the shorter origin insertion that kind of pops out sooner. So your genetics will play a role in some of this. Nonetheless. You could build a muscle regardless.

Justin Andrews (5:29)

Regardless. But I wanted to bring this up because this was very common thing that I. I would explain to somebody who came to me as a trainer and would.

Sal DeStefano (5:40)

Would.

Justin Andrews (5:40)

Would describe their butt. You know, I had this long, flat butt and I. My friend, so and so. Or they would point out a butt and I can tell by. I could see the person and tell you and tell you that there's a genetic difference here. Like you, You. You have this long origin and insertion. And so it's going to be this long surface area that's going to give the illusion of kind of having this longer, flat butt. And the girl you're pointing at and just showing me, I can tell, has a very short origin assertion, which before she. Even if she even squats or did all the things that you need to do to build a butt has already kind of got this kind of bubbly look that you're trying to. Now, that's not to say we can't build yours to have this incredible round, bubbly look, but a lot of times we get into this com. This comparison of I want that. That look or that butt, and like, you're.

Sal DeStefano (6:26)

It will.

Justin Andrews (6:27)

It'll look different. I mean, arguably could look better depending on what you prefer or what somebody prefers or not. But it's no different than the guy who, to your bicep analogy is like, you know, how do you build that peak? My buddy's got this, like, ball. It looks like a little cannonball with a hard peak like that. And I feel like I have this like, kind of long arm. And that's your origin and insertion determines a lot of the way you. You look from the start, but nonetheless, you build it.

Sal DeStefano (6:53)

It's a muscle.

Justin Andrews (6:54)

So we can definitely build and create that.

Sal DeStefano (6:56)

Yeah. And the cool thing about the glutes, and this is true for all muscles, but some muscles have kind of this notoriety for being difficult to develop. So, like, calves is a common one where people are like, oh, they're really hard to build. Some muscles seem to. I can't really point to any data, but what I can point to is, like, the bodybuilding world or the space of where people like to build muscle. And some muscles seem to respond really, really well to strength training versus others. Generally speaking, glutes are one of those muscles that if you do the right things, they'll build. Oh, yeah, they'll build. You know, it's some people that have stubborn glutes. Honestly, we're going to talk about the reasons why your butt may not be growing. This is almost always the case. What we're going to say right now, if you're listening and you're training and your glutes are not responding, or you've always had a flat butt or whatever, and you want to build them, like, you address these issues right here and then give yourself some time, they're going to build your group.

Justin Andrews (7:57)

It's always one of these things or a combination of these.

Sal DeStefano (8:01)

Yes.

Justin Andrews (8:02)

It's. It's. It's never not. It's. The question becomes, you know, which one are you, or which one of these things are you not doing or relates to you and. Or is it multiple and. Many times. It's multiple. Many times. It's a. It's a couple of these things that we need to tweak, which. I loved helping somebody in this situation because you take somebody who has been. Feels like they've been trying really hard to achieve this and has been failing at it for a really long time, and it's like, again, no different than a guy who comes to me says, I want to build my biceps. It's like, oh, it's. We definitely.

Adam Schafer (8:34)

This isn't an accessory muscle. This is a major group. A big body benefits from having, you know, that type of, like, strength and size in your glutes. So, you know, your body already wants to build and develop. We just have to give it the right materials and right stimulus.

Sal DeStefano (8:52)

Yeah. It's interesting you said that, because if you look at athletes, in particular, athletes that compete outside of the water, your hips, these muscles, the glutes, I mean, keeps you standing up. This is what makes you. This is what gives you power. It's also a distinctive human muscle. So when you look at primates, one of the muscles that is distinctly different in humans are the glutes, because we stand upright, so we have these really big glutes. And if you look at a gorilla, like a gorilla's got big, muscular gorilla. They have small glutes. Yeah.

Adam Schafer (9:24)

Because they walk, they're not upright as much.

Sal DeStefano (9:25)

That's right. So this Muscle has the potential to develop, you guys. And if you do these things that we're going to talk about, it's going to happen. And you got to give it time, too, okay? So things don't happen overnight. Keep that in mind.

Justin Andrews (9:37)

I also, since you brought this up with, like, how important. Okay. Don't make the mistake of. Okay, so you'll see sprinters, ice skaters, volleyball players, they tend to have great glutes, right? And so what we tend to correlate with that is, oh, those exercises. So they jump a lot, and they do ice skaters as an exercise, icing explosives. Right? And so you try and emulate a lot of these athletic movements that those athletes do in pursuit of having a butt versus realizing, like, oh, no, the fact that these.

Sal DeStefano (10:10)

These.

Justin Andrews (10:10)

These girls have good, good glutes. That's what makes them good at their sport.

Sal DeStefano (10:14)

That's right.

Justin Andrews (10:15)

Versus. You know what I'm saying? And so don't make that mistake, because that's a big mistake that I think some people make is they.

Sal DeStefano (10:19)

They look.

Justin Andrews (10:20)

And guys are just guilty of doing this also. They look at a sport like football and they're like, oh, I want to look at that guy. So they do these drills like football players do, and it's like, no, that's not how. That's not how.

Sal DeStefano (10:28)

No, there are. There are genetic polymorphisms that will give you an advantage in particular sports. And for many sports, having big, strong glutes gives you that advantage. So it's not that volleyball builds your glutes. It's that if you probably have strong glutes along with other things, probably going to be tall and other things, then you're gonna be better at volleyball. That's right. This is like. This would be like me saying, if I swim a lot like Michael Phelps, I'm gonna have really short legs. That's not gonna happen. But the fact that he has short legs gives him an advantage in the pool. So let's start with the first one. And now most people who are. Who really want to build their butt are women, okay? So men typically don't hire trainers and say, number one for me is to build my butt. They may something like, say something like, I want a better squat or I'll be strong. But this is not typically a muscle that men are really focused on developing.

Adam Schafer (11:18)

A perky, bubbly butt.

Sal DeStefano (11:19)

Which, by the way, is interesting to me, because when women rank muscle growth.

Justin Andrews (11:22)

They talk about they like it.

Sal DeStefano (11:23)

They like it in men. Okay? But nonetheless, typically, it's women that we're talking to. And so the first thing that we're going to mention here is very common among women who strength train, and in particular in women who strength train, who struggle to develop any muscle, including the glutes, which is they're not eating enough. They're just not eating enough. And this is because they're strength trained to get a lean, sculpted physique. And so they go into it and this is what they do, they start strength training. I want to build muscle, but I also want to be lean. And so I'm going to eat very little and, and strength train. You're not going to build anything if you don't eat enough. It's just not going to happen. In fact, if you eat little enough, you can strength train and actually develop osteopenia and even osteoporosis. So strength train all you want. Send the perfect muscle building signal with the perfect routine. If you're not eating enough calories, if you're not eating enough protein, you're just not going to build. You won't build a butt. In fact, I can think of, off the top of my head now, at least three clients that I trained where this was the only issue. Yeah. Everything else was good calories. They hired me and they were like, at 15% body fat and they wanted to build their butt. I'm like, we got to eat more food, watch what happens. And then, boom, the butt builds.

Justin Andrews (12:38)

Well, to use Justin's material analogy, and I used to love to give this, it's like, okay, I've got the great program. You're pushing hard enough through the exercises. So we have the plan, the blueprints, we, we have all the tools, but then you're not giving me any material. Yeah, I have no wood and you want me to build a house. Yeah, I can't. I, I can have all the best plans, all the greatest tools, but I cannot build a house without the wood, without the material.

Sal DeStefano (13:02)

That's right.

Justin Andrews (13:02)

And you, and, and so you've got, and it's not like you can't swing by and give me just two planks of wood and then leave. Like, you consistently. No, you consistently have got to give me material until that house is built. And I think that's the. One of the biggest mistakes is like, so that might hit for somebody. They go like, oh, okay, yeah, that analogy kind of makes sense. Like, I'll bring some extra wood. You bring extra wood one time and then you don't again. It's like, it goes like, you have to. Until it is built, you've got to consistently be in this, building this calorie surplus, in order for us to put.

Sal DeStefano (13:32)

It, to put it differently, you need to eat enough protein, enough fats and enough carbs. Because, yes, carbs help with building muscle as well and enough total calories to make this happen. And if you don't do that, nothing you do will get your butt to grow. And to put it differently again, you got to gain weight. Oh, everybody's gonna get scared now, but you wanna build, you're gonna probably gain a little weight. You guys, if you're listening right now and you're like, I wanna add 2 inches to my butt, but you don't wanna gain any weight, how's that gonna happen? Are you gonna get any leaner? No, you gotta. With air, you're gonna, you gotta, you gotta gain a little bit. So you have to eat in a calorie surplus, eat your target body weight and protein, and don't avoid carbs and fats. You gotta eat those as well. Because you can also hit your protein targets but have so low a calories that it's still not going to happen. You're still not going to build well.

Justin Andrews (14:22)

And it feeds right into your second point, which you're fueling your body in order to get strong.

Sal DeStefano (14:28)

That's right.

Justin Andrews (14:29)

Because getting strong in a calorie deficit is really difficult to do. Even if you. Especially if you've been training for a while and you've gotten past those newbie beginner gains and your body's become adapted to whatever you're doing and you're kind of plateaued. Like your body needs a calorie surplus for you to continue to get stronger. And that should be the main focus.

Sal DeStefano (14:51)

Yes. So here's what we mean by this. If you're trying to build anything, right, that's your goal. My goal is to build my butt. Well, here's the real goal. I want to get stronger. Because getting stronger will lead to build at your butt. So many women will strength train with the attempt to shape a muscle, sculpt a muscle, build a muscle like the glutes, but they don't pay attention to how strong they're getting or not getting. So to them, an exercise is just an exercise. So I'm going to go in, I'm going to do my five sets of this, my three sets of that. It's the same weight I used last week and the same weight I used the month before. Nothing's going to happen. You're going to have to get stronger, especially if you're in the first Four years or so of your training. Get stronger and the muscle will follow. So your real goal is this. When you go to. This is your goal here with strength training, you want to build your butt. Get strong at the exercises that build the butt. You add 30 pounds to a squat or a hip thrust or whatever, your butt's going to look different. Yeah. So get strong. The next issue. Now, this one is frustrating. This next one's super frustrating because you may be eating enough, you may be doing some of the best exercises, and instead, what's happening is your hamstrings, your quads are growing. Everything else seems.

Justin Andrews (16:02)

And you might even be getting stronger. Right.

Sal DeStefano (16:04)

And you're getting stronger. But why is my butt not look any different? And so we call this sleepy butt syndrome. Now, this is. That's not a technical.

Adam Schafer (16:12)

You just don't. Yeah, you don't feel that stimulus in the glutes. You're really feeling a lot. Your quads, typically.

Sal DeStefano (16:17)

Yes.

Adam Schafer (16:18)

It's taken over, by the way.

Sal DeStefano (16:19)

You know, this is really common.

Justin Andrews (16:20)

Very common.

Sal DeStefano (16:20)

This is really common in women who did a lot of running.

Justin Andrews (16:24)

Yes.

Sal DeStefano (16:25)

For years. And then they go to do strength training.

Adam Schafer (16:27)

It's hardwired.

Sal DeStefano (16:28)

They become. They become quad and calf dominant from running. Then they go squat and squats are one of the best exercises for building your butt. It's at the top. But you can quad squat. You could squat in a way to where a lot of the load is on the quads and the glute is just playing a supportive role and not a prime mover.

Justin Andrews (16:46)

Well, simplify or break down. What's happening on a neurological level when we run repetitively for years, years. What are. What are you training the brain in relation to the quads and the calves. And then when you decide, because this is such a common story, a very common story you're telling right now, where somebody has used running as their primary source of exercise for maybe years or even decades sometimes. And then, okay, they caught the. All right, it's time to lift weights. I get it. I understand it. That makes sense why I want to build muscle. Okay, I'm now doing. And then they start to do the right movements, feed the. Do all things. But then they're like, my quads just keep going. Explain what's happening on a neurological level, why that is so difficult for that X runner, X group, X class person to get their butt to grow. And there just seems. Their quads seem to go.

Sal DeStefano (17:35)

Yeah, if you do a lot of distance running, then what's happening is you're getting a Lot of quad and calf activation. It's not strength training, but they're activating quite a bit. And the glutes are kind of playing the supportive, stabilizing role. And so you're. You just get really good at using certain muscles. Then you go to do a squat, a barbell squat, and those muscles essentially do most of the work. So you may add 30 pounds to your barbell squat, but really it's like 25 pounds of it went to your quads, and maybe 5 pounds went to your glutes. So your glutes may respond a little bit, but not much. In fact, you start to create more of an imbalance. You start to look in the mirror like, well, my quads really don't match my glutes now. Yeah. And so what's going on here?

Adam Schafer (18:14)

It's just a lot of volume over time of, like, conditioning the muscles to contract to take the work on. So you're just repetitively presenting this stimulus, like, to your quads and to your calves, into this operating system. Anytime there's stress, any kind of load, like, the work is going to go here. And so to. To now have to kind of peel back. We have to, like, show it a completely. A different operating system now. So that way our Gl get stimulated.

Sal DeStefano (18:44)

Yeah. So here's what. I've used this example before, but let's say you've always typed with two fingers. And you can get up to like 60, 70 words a minute with two fingers. And then I come to you and I go, hey, there's this faster way to type. You can use all of your fingers. Now you're gonna be slower at first with all your fingers. But what if I come up to you? I show you.

Adam Schafer (19:01)

Takes a lot of practice.

Sal DeStefano (19:02)

I show you the first day. This is the right way to type. You're like, cool. And then I go, ready? We're gonna type as fast as you can. And you're like, well, I gotta go as fast as I can. I'm gonna go revert back to the other way. Cause I'm still faster doing it the other way. So if you move a particular way, then you go put load on your back and you stress your body, it's going to go right back to what it knows, which is using those other muscles and not the glutes. Now, there are some exercises. First off, it's a technique thing. But second, there are some exercises that are really good for this. Yeah, hip thrusts.

Justin Andrews (19:29)

Well, this is why I actually think eliminates it, why Rhett Contreras became Famous.

Sal DeStefano (19:34)

Yes.

Justin Andrews (19:35)

I mean, his. His research that he did on this with glute activation and the value of it at just the right time that I feel like women's strength training was really starting to take off, really highlighted how valuable of a movement like that is for. Especially for somebody who has ran most of their life and. And has been trying squats. And squats just aren't building the buzz.

Sal DeStefano (19:55)

Right.

Justin Andrews (19:55)

And that's why. That's. This is why the hip thrust looks so popular or why many people will argue and debate it as superior than squats are, even though we know that in. In the. In the. The context of, like, twin studies or we have people that actually can't.

Sal DeStefano (20:11)

Good activation across the board. Yeah, squats are great.

Justin Andrews (20:14)

Yeah, squats are incredible. But what. What happens is it's very common that you have quad dominant people and a hip thrust movement does such a good job. But. But you don't want to stop there. Right. So, like, I always. So I use the hip thrust to always teach a client because of how valuable it is. But I always wanted to explain, like, well, we want to still get to the place where you can squat and actually fire your glutes too. Like, that's. We're using this as a prime, as a primary lead exercise.

Adam Schafer (20:38)

How you recruit it.

Justin Andrews (20:39)

Yes.

Adam Schafer (20:39)

And so, like, that whole process of practicing that. And, you know, the hip thrust allows you to actually somewhat isolate your glutes that way. Now you can feel it. You get the feel of it. How to recruit. And now we bring that over to the squat, which we load now.

Sal DeStefano (20:54)

Now a hip thrust, it's way easier to make it a glute movement than other exercises. So this should be. This is definitely gonna be in your arsenal. Barbell squats are still great, and so are deadlifts. Then there's also a technique to all three. You could also mess up the technique on a hip thrust. It's harder, but you can still mess it up. So the technique and how you do the exercises matters a lot. We actually, I know Adam, with one of our top trainers, did a free butt building where you went through exercises. So just, you know, before we get to the rest, it's maps booty.com you go there and he goes through and teaches the right technique to maximize butt development with some of these exercises. Next up, your intensity and your volume is too high. This is actually quite common where you're just doing too much and you're training too hard. Okay. Strength training is a balance of sending the signal and balancing that with your body's. Ability to recover and adapt.

Adam Schafer (21:48)

Yes.

Sal DeStefano (21:49)

You can't be out of balance there. If it's too hard and too long, you overcome your body's ability to recover, heal and adapt. And so you just end up breaking down constantly. And so you go to the gym, you work out, you get sore, soreness goes away, go back to the gym, workout gets sore. And I keep doing this week over week over week, and I'm not getting stronger.

Adam Schafer (22:09)

You're getting nowhere.

Sal DeStefano (22:10)

Even though I'm training my butt off and I'm training hard and I'm throwing the intensity, in fact, I'm going to even train even harder now because it's not working. Oftentimes you're doing too much. Scaling back starts to get the muscles to develop. Oftentimes.

Justin Andrews (22:22)

I mean, this is, this reminds me of training a lot. I trained a lot of group X instructors and they did not lack the discipline or the intensity. I mean, if you ever have ever been through one of those classes, they're. They're intense, they kick most.

Adam Schafer (22:35)

They do a lot of exercising.

Justin Andrews (22:36)

Yes. They do a lot of movement, a lot of sweating, a lot of elevated heart rate. So they do not lack the intensity. In fact, what, what happens a lot of times is that that way of training ends up making its way into traditional strength training. And then traditional strength training stops looking like traditional strength training. It starts looking more like group X training where they have these short rest periods, tons of volume, tons of exercises, lots of movement, Very, very short rest periods. And that is just not a clear recipe, especially if you add in any of these other things that we talked about before. So if you're, if, if this is a thing that you do and you're not eating enough. Right, Exactly. You, if you're already. If this, if this, if this resonates with you, you love classes. You love that kind of short rest periods and doing that. And then in addition to that, you don't eat enough calories. Or in addition to that, you also don't connect very well to your glutes. This is the recipe of why you have not been building your butt right here. It's like you've got. You have to get out of that mode of training and less can be more. I mean, literally focusing on just one or two of these big movements like the hip thrust or squat or deadlift and just getting good and stronger, that one thing, and you did nothing else is going to build those glutes with the other things. We're talking about everything else.

Sal DeStefano (23:45)

Totally. And on the other end of the spectrum is it's your intensity is too low. You're going in, you're going through the movement. You stick to the same weight. You're not challenging yourself. This is oftentimes, this is the client or the woman that's afraid of pushing the weight.

Justin Andrews (23:57)

Yeah.

Sal DeStefano (23:57)

She's afraid of struggling under the bar because of either fear of hurting yourself or fear of dropping the bar. I don't know. And so the workout kind of looks the same each time. You have to challenge yourself in order to make things change. You have to challenge your muscles in order for them to grow.

Justin Andrews (24:13)

I also think that this is, to Justin's point earlier about what a big mover the glutes are. Part of the psychological changes is you'd be surprised how strong your glutes already are. And so a lot of times you load something on your back or even on your hips, you're about to do hit, thrust, or get ready to pick something off the ground, and you're like, that is way heavier than anything else I do. That's way over that shoulder. Plus.

Sal DeStefano (24:40)

Oh, that's hard. That's heavy.

Justin Andrews (24:41)

Yeah, that. That must be. That can't do that. But that is one of the biggest, strongest muscles you have in your body. And so I had a lot of clients that would surprise themselves that they would put a weight on the bar, and they're like, I can't do that. And I'm like, oh, I'm watching the way you move.

Sal DeStefano (24:57)

Yeah, I would add the weight to the bar. They'd be like, I can't do.

Justin Andrews (25:00)

Yes, you can. I just watched what you did. 5.

Sal DeStefano (25:02)

You just did.

Justin Andrews (25:03)

You just did 5. With. With 20 less pounds, you're going to do easily get a couple of these, no problem. And I'll let you know. And a lot of times they surprise the of themselves because it's a big mover, it's a big muscle, it's very strong and powerful, and once you learn to really connect to it, you'd be surprised how much weight you can move.

Sal DeStefano (25:18)

So the question is, what does this look like? You know, volume and frequency for most people now, there's a big difference from person to person. But generally speaking, if you train your glutes and your lower body two or three days a week, each workout, three to six sets total. That's about it. That's about it right there. You're resting about two minutes between sets, getting stronger, eating enough. Everybody listening Right now. You're going to build your butt. If you do these things, it will build. And again, if you want a masterclass on technique, it makes a huge difference. Technique makes a huge difference when it comes to strength training. Go to mapsbooty.com and it's got Adam on there teaching you how to maximize each of those incredible exercises.

Mind Pump Announcer (25:57)

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