Hacking Your Health
Hacking Your Health Podcast with Ben Canning and Dave Kennedy - Two guys setting out to hack body, mind, business and beyond. We are here to provide a single source, bullshit free guide to understanding your body and how you can live better, for longer.
Hacking Your Health
Navigating Christmas Holidays Without Killing Your Progress - Episode 161
Who knew leg day could be both hilariously daunting and immensely rewarding? Join us as we humorously navigate the monumental task of facing the infamous leg press, diving deep into the mental gymnastics required to tackle those grueling 20 to 30 rep sets. As we discuss the joys and pains of embracing a new training block, we also offer practical insights on balancing fitness routines with the temptations of the holiday season—beware of those Christmas parties that can derail even the best-laid fitness plans!
Shifting gears, we openly share our evolving relationship with alcohol, particularly during festive times. Popular seasonal ales have lost their allure, leading us towards healthier lifestyle choices that prioritize better sleep and improved health. Discover how maintaining an active lifestyle doesn’t have to pause for the holidays as we explore the benefits of a winter bulking routine and the fine art of balancing cardio and weightlifting for optimal personal health goals. Reflecting on a night out with friends, we highlight the surprising joy that can be found in sober connections.
Our conversation takes a scientific twist as we discuss nutrition’s vital role in boosting energy and workout performance. Inspired by a Marine buddy’s unique eating habits, we emphasize the importance of a well-rounded diet rich in complex carbohydrates and proteins. Drawing from expert insights, including Andrew Huberman on dopamine management and Jay Cutler on injury prevention, we wrap up with strategies for optimizing sleep and morning routines to enhance productivity. Join us as we chart the course for setting ambitious goals for 2025, paving the way for long-term success and personal growth.
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Yo, welcome back to the show. I publicly apologize. And today for his future leg day and he's going to complete this afternoon.
Speaker 1:I did this morning and there was many moments that I was contemplating life like it's not often so much you're contemplating life that you thought about redesigning my training block, so I didn't have to suffer the same way that you did. Absolutely not if I, if I didn't, you're it.
Speaker 2:But it was definitely one of those moments I said, like what sort of psychopath wrote this?
Speaker 1:I was like it was me, it was me, um, but yes it will be a lot of forward to it and I am looking forward to it.
Speaker 2:It was uh, it was hum, I quite enjoy. I'm going to blame you because you were like push bill legs and I was like, well, I kind of fancy push bill legs, so I wrote it. Um, so I've done the first three workouts, but today those uh, the set that I mentioned in last week's podcast about the 20 to 30 reps in the leg press is something that you need to like start psyching yourself up for right now. I don't think I mentally prepared myself enough, and that's potentially the problem.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It sounds self enough, and that's potentially the problem.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it sounds horrible, by the way. Um, you know it's that. It's that back offset with leg press yep of what? 20 to 30 yep. So how many did you do? Because I'm gonna do 32, I think I did 468.
Speaker 2:No, I did 27 it's rough though it's rough, but you know what I got through it I I survived. Here we are, and I also threw in some arms at the end because I had an extra 10 minutes. So it was good. Survived, that's good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm planning on doing it next year, so we'll see how that goes.
Speaker 2:I think I've got time in 2032. I could probably get it in.
Speaker 1:What's going on, dude? Not much man. It's been a been a good week so far. I will say I really enjoy the new training block. I did uh pool yesterday, which is great, I tell you, though you know it's. It's interesting um, the, um, the, the, uh, the lift, you know, with the, with the heavy set and the back offset, it's like I'm not sure I'm getting enough reps into this. At the end of it I had a massive pump. It's been great. I'm enjoying it.
Speaker 2:I think the thing about it is it's probably just the change in how you were training in the last training block versus this training block. I think once you get into the flow of it and you have your working weights for those heavier sets, you'll you'll get a lot more from it after the next couple of weeks, once you've sort of been through a few rotations on it. I was laughing, though, because all of the I just put in the same for me as you that, um, the rest period is just as needed. I sat in that like press text and you like profusely for about for about 10 minutes after. I was like I think I need some more.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's fun because I will do what I like. About the last set that you have listed in there, it's usually like a burnout set, for lack of a better term. It's like 3 times 10 to 12 or whatever. So sometimes I'll just stack more onto there until I can just completely get full muscle fatigue to where I really can't even push any harder, and so it's been a good good training block. I've noticed, uh, you know, I think I've gained 47 pounds in muscle mass, uh, in the past two training sessions, so it's been perfect.
Speaker 2:so absolutely I do um. I will say, though, the wild yes, okay, doing the um, the 20 to 30 reps on the leg press is brutal. The bit that comes after it is infinitely worse. So I forgot about it while I was texting and I went back and read it.
Speaker 1:I was like shit.
Speaker 2:Anyway. So today we're going to talk about how well I'm not going to tell anybody how to do anything, but I feel like I'm going to tell everybody how I'm going to do it and how I've been sort of managing things with clients over the past few weeks. This will be going out on Tuesday, the 17th of december, which will be eight days before christmas, I think, if I can do math, um, and just sort of what I have been talking with clients for for the past few weeks through thanksgiving and then obviously through the holidays, um, I think it's sort of the to give a bit of context as to what I'm going to be doing. Um, I think it's sort of the to give a bit of context as to what I'm going to be doing. Enjoying myself is probably the thing.
Speaker 2:The biggest piece of advice that I have been given across the board is to plug in the events where possible. Obviously, christmas day is going to be a word of it, but if you have any sort of other activities friends over or Christmas parties or whatever else, plug those in and make sure you navigate them as best possible. The biggest thing that I think lets people down is just showing up on the day. I mean like, oh, fuck, right, I have this thing to do, and then it throws progress over, uh, throws progress off across the board, uh. So programming those in as as much as possible is important, and I mean this goes across the board. But I think definitely at this time of year, people struggle with navigating holidays, parties, alcohol, food, etc. Because it's a very food-focused holiday.
Speaker 1:I'm finding more and more. I just don't like alcohol. It's interesting as I've gotten older, like yesterday. I went out to a business dinner yesterday to welcome aboard our new VP of marketing and we went to Fleming's and got a nice steak and everything which they overcooked my steak and I had to send it back. Unfortunately, I know I'm sounding kind of prima donna here, but I said medium rare and it was definitely medium well to well, there was barely any peek.
Speaker 2:That's not what we want.
Speaker 1:I'm like I can't do that man. I felt bad. I'm like I'm so old fashioned and I had two glasses of wine and I got home and I just felt like shit. I just tired and you know, just don't like it how I feel anymore on it. So, like I, you know, the other day I got in Cleveland they have we're famous for our Christmas ale that comes out from Great Lakes Christmas. There's also another one that's, I think it's called like the seven days of christmas or something like that.
Speaker 1:Um, there's like two really famous beers here that we produce out of cleveland, ohio, believe it or not and um, and it used to be like this rave where, like you, couldn't find them anywhere and people would be like like hawking stores at like six o'clock in the morning to get the shipments of this christmas ale and everything. And so I opened one up the other day. I took two sips and threw the rest of it away. I'm like I don't even want to beer anymore, and so I've kind of been doing less and less on the alcohol stuff. I mean, the more data that comes out on alcohol, it's like there's really no good amount of alcohol that's good for you in any way, shape or form. I mean it messes up your sleep, messes up your REM sleep specifically. You may be able to pass out, but your sleep is going to be horrible when you do it.
Speaker 2:It's a sedative instead of you actually getting sleep. So, yes, you will be potentially unconscious for an extended period of time, but it's not actual sleep. So you're not going through the sleep cycle like you said.
Speaker 1:Right, and what it does to your liver, to your biomarkers, blood work. To me it's just not worth it anymore. So I'm just kind of like on a hiatus of alcohol for the most part. And it's funny because, like I find like when I, when I take it out, like normally, you know, I'd have a couple beers and I feel I feel fine, but now it's just like I get tired. I'm just like, ah, I'm done, I don't even need to deal with this anymore.
Speaker 2:So, but it's similar because I think, yeah, I don't know if we've spoken about this, but obviously matt sovent was here a few weeks back and, um, matt's not really a big drinker and like I would you know, I just sort of mirror what he's doing, um, but for whatever reason, he absolutely sent it that night in the at the event and I was just I mean, we were drinking pints of guinness and we were having margaritas and everybody had a great time, but like it was, it was definitely the drunkest I have been in a very, very long time felt fine the next day, I was absolutely fine, everybody had a really good night. Like there was absolutely no regrets around it. But since then I'm just like, nah, it's not for me. Like I feel like I've completed it now, I've done it, I'm not, I'm not interested in it any like. I'll have a margarita, potentially with dinner or before dinner or whatever, but like that is, that is the absolute limit.
Speaker 2:So, yes, in terms of alcohol, it's, it's not. I'll say, I'll say this and this. Maybe it'll be a controversial. There's nothing good that comes out of it. Yes, okay, maybe you have a good time, but I mean I can have a good time without drinking yeah, same, same for sure.
Speaker 1:And, um, you know, and you mentioned during the holiday time frames, you know, with the eating and the, you know kind of even probably more sedentary because you're hanging out more family sitting down, you're not really going out and doing a lot of stuff. Um, you know, more important time to be out there and make sure you're hitting the gym, getting your steps in the things that you need to do during the timeframes. What I like that we've done is that my bulking period, my surplus period, is in the wintertime, so I don't really have to be too concerned about eating copious amounts of turkey or cranberry sauce or things like that. So that's always a good thing and if you can get to that point. It was funny because the only one mentioned of Orange Theory today.
Speaker 1:I was at Orange Theory today and I was talking to one of the gentlemen that was there that I've known for a while and he's like dude, you're looking really big. I'm like thanks, man, I appreciate that. And he's like what are you doing? I'm like well, in the wintertime I eat a substantial amount of calories to gain as much weight and I want to get to like 260, 270, 280, 350 pounds. You know, whatever, you know I don't have an exact number he's like well, why, why do you do that? And and I was trying to explain to him, like you know, you build the most amount of muscle when you're in a surplus. So what I do is in the wintertime, you know, I do my, my winter bulk, my grizzly bear bulk, where, where, you know, I try to grow a beard, I usually shave off which I haven't shaved off yet, by the way, still going, yeah, um and uh yeah and uh, and I also, you know, eat a lot of calories to build as much muscle.
Speaker 1:And then I cut that up during the summertime and it's just become kind of a regular cycle. And he's like, oh, that's, that's really interesting. I had never heard that before. I just come in and do cardio all the time. I'm like, well, I also lift six, you know, six days a week, or five days a week, um, you know. Or 17 times a week, um, you know as well. And he so he's like, oh, wow, I didn't. Yeah, that's crazy. Okay, so he's like I need to get my, my stuff, you know stuff into gear. And he started asking a bunch of questions and stuff like that. But you know, I think it's kind an amazing timeframe for you to enjoy all the foods you want to without having, you know, to feel super guilty about it.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, for sure, and I actually completely changed my approach with 95% of clients this year, whatever. It sort of came to probably mid November, cause I had to take Thanksgiving into consideration, then obviously, christmas for everybody. Um, anytime that I had a like a catch-up call or whatever, I sort of set expectations more than anything else and I think you know understanding that, regardless of who you are and what's going on, there will be excess calories consumed across holidays. You can't avoid it. There's parties, there's food everywhere and whatever. And the way that I framed it for the majority of people was like, look, let's just take calories up slightly and have that as a okay right. This is what we're going to do for the next six weeks four weeks, three weeks, whatever it is and focus on performance. So go through a performance phase. Rather than going we're in a deficit, we're in a surplus is like we're focused on performance. You're going to have additional fuel. Your workouts are going to feel great. Okay, maybe you're not eating the most ideal foods all the time, but if you have those excess calories, putting them to good use, um, putting them to good use in your workouts, is going to be obviously more beneficial.
Speaker 2:Um, and just saying, like the, if we can get through the months at the end of november, started this or the end of november, december and moving into the new year and sort of be in and around the same sort of markers with metrics. But we've seen improvements in terms of the gym and you're sort of feeling good within that and that's been the focus. That's a huge win, because I think people approach it in terms of like, they just hit the fuck up button whenever it comes the end of november and december, where it just becomes a complete shit show and they're not really going in and planning things, whereas if the plan is okay, we're going to consume, you know, maybe an additional 200 calories per day 300 calories per day, depending on what it is and who you are but we're going to utilize those in our workouts and that's actually the plan. It's worked a lot better because everyone's like well, this is the plan, this is. You know, this is where the way that's laid out and and this is what I'm going to do and then, once we get into the new year, whenever there's less distractions and less going on, if the goal is to move back into deficit, we move back into deficit. If not, the goal is to continue in a surplus or whatever.
Speaker 2:We'll build back up from that, but it's been really, really beneficial this year across the board and everybody's pbs prs in the gym. They're feeling good, they're feeling strong and I think it's just the the perspective shift and the mindset that they have of okay, right, well, this is actually part of the plan. It's. It's been much easier instead of thinking oh well, you know, I went over my calories this week because I had two christmas dinners and a party and then my brother was home and then all this shit happened. It was like that's. It was all taken into account before we even moved into the holiday timeframe.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I want to emphasize a thing that you hit on in there, right, with people PRing because of extra calories, right. What most folks don't realize is that when you eat more calories than you consume, your body has an overload of energy, right, and if the energy isn't used, then obviously it's stored for fat. So there's ways of tricking your body and you'll hear people say I think the term is called like refeeding, things like that. But if you're in a deficit type of phase and you're hitting a plateau, you can increase calories for a short period of time to give your body a new baseline of those calories and then drop back down again and you break through those plateaus. And what happens when you eat a surplus of calories is your body then is like hey, I got tons of fuel here. Let's go all out, buddy. Let's figure out what we can do. Let's hunt some more food. Let's go give you more energy to task what you can do for your family and for your household and for your community, your brain obviously being one of your largest energy consumers. So eating more food equates to more energy in the gym and for things that you do. But if you eat more calories and you're just sitting down and you're not doing anything, well then that directly goes to your fat stores, right? And so you can leverage this time period as kind of a quasi-bulk cycle for lack of a better term where you can literally put on more muscle mass and break through a lot of plateaus you might have been having. And then when you shift back down again, your body's like oh, I have less calories, okay, but you have still created that baseline level of muscle and muscle memory for being able to hit those PRs and stay consistent with those PRs without really dropping or losing it. And I think what most people really try to do is this game of calories is such a delicate balance because if you drop too low, you have way too less amount of energy to produce, and if you're not getting enough protein, then it starts to consume your muscle. So you have to be really careful on how many calories that you're really reducing. You don't want to reduce too much, because, one, you're going to feel like shit. Two, um, you're going to drop muscle mass, and that's not what you want to accomplish. You want to keep muscle mass on as much as possible, and we're going to do a podcast on um, ozempic and glp1 agonists here in the future to talk about kind of the the problems with that and specifically around the drop around muscle mass that's occurring with those GLP-1 agonists. So it's one of those things where everything's a balance in a lot of different ways and if you understand how your body works, you can really play with those numbers and maximize capacity.
Speaker 1:And one of my buddies from the Marines was here a week ago or two weeks ago for Thanksgiving and he was like man, I just he's like I just eat once a day. And I'm like, okay, well, why. And he's like I don't know. He's like I just I'm just not hungry at all ever and I just eat once a day at night. And I'm like, okay, well, I mean, what are your energy levels like throughout these? Like low, you know, I'm like, okay, I'm like when you work out, how do you feel? He's like pretty tired, like, okay, I'm like, well, why don't we try doing something a little bit different? And like, like, an hour before you work out or two hours before you go work out, why don't you take some some like um, complex carbohydrates, like you know, uh, oatmeal, uh, wheat bagels, you know whole wheat bagels, those types of things and you know, throw some, some fat in there, some protein, and then see how you feel when you go and you lift and maybe try to eat a little more consistent throughout the day to keep your energy levels at a high rate. Because what happens is, as soon as we eat food, our body digests that food and it puts it to the systems that we need. So, for example, if we're taking carbohydrates, carbohydrates are a fuel source for us and if we're doing complex carbohydrates, it takes a fuel source for us, and if we're doing complex carbohydrates, it takes a little bit longer to digest that, to spike glucose and then from there send energy to our bodies. But what's good about complex carbohydrates is that it's kind of like an even burn throughout the day versus a massive spike with simple carbohydrates, and then from there you're able to have and maintain more energy while also not starving your body of the nutrients that it needs.
Speaker 1:And then, obviously, I was talking to him about protein intake and stuff like that and making sure he's getting enough protein, because he lifts consistently all the time. He just doesn't eat much, and so I'm like well, he's like I want to get bigger on the shoulders, I want to do this. I'm like that's cool, you need to eat, though. And he's like I want to get bigger on the shoulders. I'm going to do this. I'm like that's cool, you need to eat, though. And he's like okay. So he messaged me last week. He's like man. He's like, just by adding in a little bit of extra carbohydrates throughout the day and some more protein, he's like I feel great, my muscles feel fuller, you know, and I'm able to do more things.
Speaker 1:I'm like there, you, you know power lifters or bodybuilders a lot of times they'll take simple carbs before they work out, if they haven't eaten before, because they want that immediate energy for while they're producing. And what happens is so when you for me, I eat Gushers. Gushers were like my favorite candy as a kid. They're gummy bears, you know, with. They're filled with, like you know, just pure sugar. Basically, it's very tasty, and I take two of those, two of them. I take two packets of those and I eat them like 10, 20 minutes before I go in and work out, on top of, like, my intro workout, which is usually just BCAAs and creatine, and what that does is it spikes my glucose levels and it ensures that I have adequate energy that can be flooded into my muscles as I'm working out. And I noticed my intensity of when I'm working out is much different than if I was on a fasted stomach. So usually when I work out, it's usually the morning I'm usually on a fasted stomach, so I don't have time to take a bagel two hours before eat a good meal before to have those energy levels. Now, if I'm eating in the afternoon, I may not eat a gushers if I had a good meal prior to that, but if I don't have the energy levels there, I will eat that beforehand and then from there I'm able to fuel my body and ensure that I'm giving the maximum amount of workout that I possibly can. And it's just these little things that you can change that have a big impact on your overall input. And there's two things that I'm actually doing that are going to be different, and I'm actually going to do it today. I'm starting today with this.
Speaker 1:So I was listening to our Lord and Savior, andrew Huberman, and he just did a podcast with Sean Ryan and I didn't realize Andrew's background. He's an interesting fella. He had a pretty rough background growing up as a kid. He's like the exact, identical replica of me. He explained me. I was like I'm listening to me talk right now, because he hated school so he used to skip it and do other things. He was a skateboarder, I was a skateboarder and he talked about how when he goes into something, he goes all in and he obsesses on it. I'm like, damn, that sounds just like me.
Speaker 1:But one of the questions that was posed to one of the sponsors from the audience was how do we take care of our dopamine levels, our overload of dopamine levels with? Today, our entire society is based off of immediate feedback, immediate gratification, immediate stimuli, whether it's taking drugs to increase those prescription or non-prescription, whether it's getting that instant feedback from social media and one of the things you talked about. He's really big on the whole light thing, right, and so when you wake up in the morning, we have these things called our circadian rhythm, which is basically our time clock of our body, and what data studies have shown is if you experience either natural light by going outside and looking at even if it's cloudy outside, whatever, it's still natural light or using high light in the morning like mood lamps, things like that bright lights it kickstarts your energy production in your body upwards of 50%. So if you're not getting that light early morning, you're literally losing 50% of your energy for that day, right? So you're half tank going into the day.
Speaker 1:So, just by you know, I have a moonlight in my bathroom now. That's a stand-up. My wife thinks I'm an idiot, you know, and I turn that on when I'm getting ready in the morning to keep the lights on. I have one in the morning to keep the lights on. I have one in the gym and I stare at that as I'm going through. I have red light therapy that I do as well, which is one of the things that I've done as a habit. But one of the things that he also said which I thought was really interesting is I know, no question, have a problem with like social media and checking Facebook all the time, checking Twitter or Instagram or whatever else. I'm checking it all the time and I decided to look at my usages yesterday and it was like three and a half hours.
Speaker 1:Three and a half hours, that's bullshit, that's three and a half hours. I can be doing other stuff and being productive when I'm not getting shit done. So what Andrew does, which he's like I, have the same problem If I have it on my phone, I'm always going at it. So what he does is he carries two phones and he limits himself to how much time he actually checks it. So he says, because his business is predominantly online, things like that he spends about an hour to hour and a half a day. So to me that's a good balance if I can spend an hour a day on social media versus something else. So I'm switching to two phones. I'm not going to give that one phone even a phone number. It's just going to have Wi-Fi on it and that will be my social media, one that I don't carry around with me. I'm not going to have social media on my phone and when I need to access it, or if I need to do something or want to check it, I have to physically go to that phone and create a new habit of going to do it. And he said it takes about three days to about a week to form that habit right and then from there you should be good to go. So my New Year's resolution is I'm gonna try to kick the immediate dopamine addiction that I'm having with social media by switching to two phones. So I'll report progress on that.
Speaker 1:But I just thought it was an interesting podcast talking about how we are manipulating our stimuli in our bodies and how we're essentially in dopamine overload, which is causing a lot of the low energy problems that we have Depression. Luckily I don't struggle with that, but I know a lot of folks do. And he's even said they did a huge data study out of the UK UK. I was leading the charge man did a big day study out of the UK whereby, removing social media elements, they were able to reduce a lot of the social aspect problems around energy levels, depression, health issues, things like that just by cutting off social media and being more refined with how you go and do it. So you know there's little things you can make changes with that have big impact on you, and that's of the ones I'm going to be working on I think, even without the to the point of training, like if you you have trained with helmy.
Speaker 2:But if you ever train with helmy, there's like no, he has a training phone that just has his training log and the music on it and no other access to anything else. There's no reply on the message, there's no social media, nothing else happens in training. Because I I mean I spent at least 10 minutes on my press texting you today you, you.
Speaker 1:You were complaining about your like. I'm so sorry you're on your phone texting me as you're going through the as I did with you, by the way, the other day with the effing cluster set.
Speaker 2:So yeah again. So a distraction from the thing, and I think that that overall is, you know, that's the problem, is you get distracted from stuff. And I even find that, you know, I've and this is potentially a bad habit I've got into, I've started having, if I'm working on my laptop, having social media and just swiping between the two screens, um, so maybe I'll join you on on on that habit. But back to the, the training and the fueling, the workouts. I think the biggest thing is, yes, you, if you go into the holidays with the mindset, okay, I'm going to have an increased amount of calories, that's absolutely fine.
Speaker 2:You need to make sure that you're staying at least in line with your regular habits around training, if not more. So, if you can get out, if you're off work and you can get out and you can spend more time outside, go for a walk, spend more time in the gym, even just do your basic sessions, but make sure you're utilizing those calories as much as possible Because, as you said, it's okay, it's more fuel, it's more energy, it's more energy to burn, but if you're not burning it, then that is whenever the problem lies and it just turns into, into unmulted body fat. So it's making sure that you're staying in line with those habits, making sure you're getting in, making sure you go in with a plan of like you know what I'm actually going to fucking send it in these workouts, and I mean, I know this from just increasing calories across the board, but I know not everybody has been through that cycle of being in surplus, but I enjoy the, the feeling of. It's funny actually, because I was talking to jen and you'll relate to this because you know, whenever you get in the depths of being in a surplus, you don't necessarily feel your best. You know abs start to disappear, you don't feel as light, you don't feel as sort of light on your feet, um, so it can get quite difficult and it's like, yes, okay, you can attach yourself to the when, that 30 seconds, whenever you're hyping yourself up after you've just hit a pr in the gym, that's the 30 seconds of benefit.
Speaker 2:But you have to live. You have to live with yourself and the feeling of uncomfortableness for the rest of the week and so trying to attach yourself to that as much as possible whenever it comes to the workouts and utilizing the calories as much as possible and then, as you said, moving into, you know, bringing them back down and moving back into deficit at the end of the year and I find sometimes not even just around the holiday time frames, if you know and you know I've experienced this as well if you're moving from being in a deficit to being a surplus, you go through that sort of maintenance phase in between times. There is still a potential in that time because calories increase and because I put, intensity increase. You can still drop weight within that time because you, because you're playing like you're manipulating that balance of calories again. So it doesn't need to be like completely one end of the spectrum where you're like going from 1800 calories to 3800 calories.
Speaker 1:It can be just a case of a slight increase, navigating that and then making sure you're utilizing the calories as much as possible in the gym I have definitely noticed that, um, when I'm running now in my surplus, I am much slower because of the weight that I've added on right and I can still do the all outs and everything else, but the endurance ones are definitely killing me. So, like normally, I'd be at like a seven and a nine and I'm at like a six and an eight and so, but which is fine. Again, trust the process. You know, once I start knocking the weight back off again, I'll get back to being.
Speaker 2:you know, once I start uh, knocking the weight back off again. I'll get back to being, you know, back into that. What you need to do is start matching it on the way back down. So say, whenever we start to move back into deficit as you lose pound for pound, start to put a weighted vest on so you can go to that uh class, that's good idea. They will not name but say you've lost 10 pounds, 10 pound, with a vest.
Speaker 2:So then, whenever you take it, whenever you start putting it back on, there'll be no people gonna be like you look like an idiot running at fine, though, like that is as if you give a shit um, but yeah, you could match it that way so that whenever you take it off, uh, you can, you can move into it that way yeah, I know, I agree and it's.
Speaker 1:It's not that you know I'm obviously stronger. I mean, all my, all my um lifts are at an all-time high. I feel great in the gym. I recover faster, which again is is another perk of being in a surplus recovery. How you rebuild your muscles, how fast you're able to recover, is much faster. So I'm less sore as I'm going to the gym and, knock on wood, I have been injury-free for a very, very long time, which is a huge accomplishment. If you know lifting and things like that, I really feel like I'm in the point of my life where it would be very difficult for me to injure something. Based on how I do my workouts, the techniques and the form that I use them, I feel very confident and even like um.
Speaker 1:So today is a good example. When I was doing um rdls today. Um, I was doing dumbbell RDLs and I used to get a lower back pain when I do it and primarily because I was probably lifting with my lower back because my hinges weren't great, popping the butt out and doing that hinge movement and I was using the. All they go up to is 80 pounds over there. So I was using two 80 pound dumbbells and I was just cranking through them, you know, like, like they were 20 pounds and um, you know. So I noticed, you know, from just even a a recovery perspective, I'm able to recover much faster and I had just done a pool day yesterday. So my back, you know is, is pretty sore and rough and I I still did um, you know, part of the exercises today was um, uh, dumbbell and I still did them, no problem.
Speaker 1:And again, it's just, there's a lot of things that if you plan your health accordingly, you can hit exactly the objectives that you want to accomplish without having to worry about injury. And I was watching Jay Cutler recently was talking about how he never ego lifts. Right, that's his big, his big thing of how he's been able to stay, you know, injury free pretty much his entire career. And you know he would intentionally plan his deadlifts at the very. He loves deadlifts, by the way, you get bodybuilders or like deadlift sock. You know, I think sam sulik doesn't do any any type of deadlifts, he just hates them. But you know, jay was like I do my deadlifts at the very end, when I'm already taxed and I'm gassed, so that I don't try pulling some stupid amounts of weight as I'm going and doing it.
Speaker 2:So everybody has kind of their own different. Paul's going to be fully warmed up. His body's fully warmed up at that point, so he's in a good spot with it 100%.
Speaker 1:So it's one of those things where I think, overall, you can hit the objectives that you want to if you plan them appropriately right you can hit the objectives that you want to if you plan them appropriately.
Speaker 2:Right for sure, for sure. So, yeah, it's just comes down to having a plan. So like, look at your week this week. Understand the days that you're going to over consume on calories if you're traveling back home for holidays, wherever you're going, whatever you're doing, know that there are days that you're going to increase. Plan your workouts after those days. I always enjoy, generally, I'll train on christmas day anyway, because there's always a gym that's open 24. I'll be able to train here, obviously, this year, but the day after I always enjoy my training because I'm feeling good and I'm feeling strong. So, increase your calories, manage your expectations. Look at it as a performance phase. Don't skip out in the gym. Get out for a walk, make sure you're moving more and be okay with eating calories. Yep, simple as that 100% and listen.
Speaker 1:We're going into the new year right and this is the time to start planning, to think about how you're going to approach health. I had a friend reach out to me yesterday saying that the podcast that we did earlier this week was very, very helpful around doing that factory reset right. And a lot of this is doing factory resets, often recognizing behaviors that you can optimize or get better with. You know like a good example is. When I first started off with deadlifts, you know I did sumos all the time and you know now I do conventional, because most of the people were just bitching that I was doing sumo all the time.
Speaker 2:He wants too many Jeff Nipper, chris Bumstead videos and you're like how do you know? I'm like this.
Speaker 1:But you know it's always changing things and doing things differently to see what works best for you. And you know I'd always have right shoulder issues, especially like right in the meat in between, where your shoulder blade hits kind of the the, the section of your, your pec. And you know, by by switching out some of my workout routines and how I look at range of motion has completely solved that issue for me. But also I've built up enough structural mass in that area that even when so one of my biggest triggers for shoulder pain was overhead press with a Smith machine or dumbbells and I'd always get that right pain, that always, and it would take months and months and months to go away because I wouldn't stop lifting as part of it. As part of it, which you know like it's just an annoying pain, it's not like it's broken or hurt, it's just you can tell something's not right there. I haven't had that pain in probably a year and a half. Right, and you know it's managing it, figuring out ways around it, figuring out different exercises that allow you to get better with it Once you're comfortable with ones that you're comfortable with and when you're first starting off with resistance training. I think it's important to note too that you want to master the range of motion and the form of that before you even think about increasing weight and you can get a phenomenal workout with lower weights and just fatiguing the muscle. You want to get to where you know your muscles are to completely deteriorate, to states where you can't even push them overhead again. But you know, like getting that range of motion, how far you should come down and where your arms should be in the placements of that and making sure you're not stretching out too much. You know those are all important things to master first, before you even start looking at going up in weight as you're going and doing this. And that's one of the things that I've learned over time is that you know the exercise that I'm doing. I'm focusing very heavily on that range of motion and that muscle group.
Speaker 1:So if I'm doing, you know, lat raises I will not do, by the way, unless I actually, unless I'm in a hotel or something like that I will not do dumbbell lat raises anymore. I cut them out 100% because one it's not an efficient workout for your lats it's okay. You know, if you look at Nippert's ranking of S tier to F tier, I think lat raises are like in the D tier, because you know when you're coming up in a lat raise, your most amount of tension is going to be up here and then when you're coming down you have the least amount of tension. So you're basically allowing your muscle to relax. The lowest part of the exercise, where the your arms are down more towards your side, are going to be where you have the least amount of resistance or tension. So by just switching that out with either, you know, a lat raise machine that keeps constant tension, more like a cable type, type S type of thing, or switching to like a cuffed um know lat raise that keeps continual tension over your, your lat I'm sorry, over your um delts as you're uh, moving up, those are the things that will, you know, maximize your growth but also doesn't require a lot of weight to get those.
Speaker 1:And what I thought was really interesting, I was, uh, I was looking at uh, was it dr mike? Um, he's always crazy, he's, he's, he's freaking crazy. But he was talking about how he hates overhead shoulder press, because it really is just working your front dealt, which gets a lot of engagement on bench press, you know. So when you're doing incline bench press, chest presses, anything chest related. You're hitting that front dealt regardless, right? So that front dealt gets a ton of workout already and that overhead shoulder press really isn't working.
Speaker 1:What you want to get from a 3D looking shoulder and so he's like I on my shoulder days I don't do overhead shoulder presses, I just focus on, you know lat raises, you know cable raises and hitting that, that, that side delt the most and obviously rear delt. You know, as you're trying to build kind of that, that 3d, you know uh, shoulder, uh, look. So there are things that you you probably think of as being like a staple exercise that you may change over time, that that you know you learn as you go along, or as you read more, as you do more things that that allow you to kind of get to where you want to go for sure, and I think the the lateral waist conversation definitely, if you can do it with a cable or something that you can keep continuous attention on, is and I mean I would avoid, especially if you have any issues with shoulders.
Speaker 2:There's no point in pushing anything over your head, and I think you know whenever we first started.
Speaker 1:It's funny because you, you, you you were the first one, I think, to tell me this, by the way, which is you don't like doing over a surface because you want it jacks up your shoulder because you have shoulder issues for about two years I didn't do anything overhead press and I think I was training with you one time and you were doing something like all right, fuck it, I'll give it a go.
Speaker 2:And the funny thing about it was like I'd been doing a lot of raises and it wasn't that I wasn't training my shoulder, but just not in that specific movement. For literally for two years I didn't do anything overhead because it was giving me ships my shoulder. There was still a decent level of strength there. It wasn't that necessarily I would keep them in to work my shoulders and I would prioritize lateral raises over doing anything overhead press. But it's. It's one of those things you think, because it says shoulder press and you're training shoulders, that you need to do it, but you definitely do not need to do it. I think, as you mentioned and they're coming in the new year, maybe next week we'll do a podcast on goal setting and how to navigate things because, as I'm sort of building out what the program is going to look like, I'm going to take each week as one individual topic and sort of habit stack it versus throwing everything at once. So it'll allow us to talk about goals and how to navigate things and, you know, one week's going to be around movement and exercise execution to make sure everybody's comfortable with it, instead of just throwing a workout at them. So I think that we can record that next week.
Speaker 2:Um, and just to your point about the factory, you said I know it's only been three days. Last night I was fucking exhausted, so I've just sort of like I had the fucking moment on sunday. I was like right, I'm just gonna get up at 5 am from now on again and just get back to normal routine. Monday was fine. Yesterday was tuesday. I was absolutely exhausted last night and then I woke up this morning I was like fine, and that was it back to normal. And I have, like I said to you before we hit record like I've been as productive as I have been at any other stage. So even just making that conscious decision to get back to your normal habits and routines has it's helped me over the past couple days. I feel good again yeah, I may.
Speaker 1:I may actually try to start getting up a little bit earlier. You know I go to bed usually around 10 o'clock and I usually sleep till like seven, which is around nine hours. I don't necessarily know if I need that Now. My recovery scores are phenomenal. I showed you the text message of my HRV my resting heart rate, everything else it's the best it's ever been. I'm wondering if I can shave an hour off of that and still maintain those benchmarks and get up just a smidge earlier to be a little more productive.
Speaker 1:An extra hour in the day can be fantastic, right? So I'm going to try to get up at 6 o'clock in the morning. It's not 5 o'clock, that's too early, that's ridiculous. But 6 o'clock is a good timeframe for me, where and here's the thing I find myself rushing in the morning because if I get up at 7, you know, I got to do my testosterone injections, I got to do my morning supplement routine, then I have to take my pre-workout, then I take my gushers and then by the time I'm in the gym it's already been like 45 minutes and I'm always rushed to get in there with, you know, not necessarily having enough time for me what I need to do. So if I can get up an hour earlier, relax, you know, get things in a more methodical state, get some stuff done and, you know, before I go and work out, I think I'll be in a better spot. So I'm also going to try to, you know, shave an hour off and see how that works. I'll report back on how that's going.
Speaker 2:Cool. I mean you've been hitting some serious sleep scores so I mean I can't argue with it.
Speaker 1:I don't know. I'll tell you like I used to struggle this discussion. There's some crazy people out there. It's a very small percentage of population that only needs like five or six hours of sleep. It's a specific mutation in DNA. They've actually been able to identify the specific DNA structure that allows people to only sleep five hours a day, and it's crazy because if you add that up over time, you're actually saving like 10 years of sleep, which is crazy. Right, I'm like damn it.
Speaker 2:Why didn't I get that gene?
Speaker 1:I definitely don't have that supplement that modifies my dna, um but uh. But I definitely need like seven to eight hours of sleep. Is kind of my, my baseline of what, what I need, based on the recovery scores that I have in the data that we have right, and so you know, like recognizing that, I wonder what my exact sweet spot is. Is it six and a half hours? Is it seven, seven, is it seven and a half? Is it eight? And taking a look at that. So it'd be a good exercise to run through my stats if I shave an hour off and see how my scores do.
Speaker 1:You have to be real specific, off of not introducing other things that may throw that off as well. So like, for example, alcohol throws all your sleep metrics off right. So I need to take a look at that and say, well, okay, I'm not going to drink during this period of time as well, which is fine, I'm not doing that anyway. Caffeine intake later at night, I'm not going to do that. So take a look and do the exact regimens that I'm doing today and incorporate one hour less of sleep and maybe, if they all stay the same, maybe I'll shave an hour and a half off and find where that's at and see if my benchmarks stay there. So trying to optimize my sleep and my time and everything else. I think it's a good exercise to go through.
Speaker 2:For sure, and just again in the continued experiment of everything that we're doing here Life, yeah Right. Tune in next week We'll talk about goal setting for 2025 and what I've got planned and how you can sort of set yourself up for success longer term.
Speaker 1:Thanks, everybody Appreciate it. Tune in to us again next week, as Bennett said, and I appreciate everybody listening to us, all of our listeners out there and we'll catch you again next week, same time, same place.
Speaker 2:See you next week.