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-: Okay, so Natalie wants to talk lady part things.
What about working with women
and the impact of their menstrual cycle.
So you may see a fluctuation
in performance and tolerance to volume
across the menstrual cycle.
What I will tell you is that the healthier a person is,
the less fluctuation there is across the cycle.
So there are some people that,
they've really get deep into this,
and then there are others that tend to like
not focus on it too much.
My approach has always been,
I still look at the same things.
I look at sleep and I look at,
like I don't look at any different biomarkers,
because what happens is,
depending on B-vitamin status
and how well their hormones work, et cetera,
some people may have slightly different responses
during the luteal phase than others,
or whatever it may be.
So if I stick on looking at sleep, I know how,
like it doesn't matter to me that
the training's affecting the sleep
or their cycle's affecting sleep.
If I'm tracking their cycle
and I can make the correlation, great.
But sleep is the thing I'm looking at.
And food and appetite are the things
that I'm looking at.
So if I know that there is something
that comes along with their cycle,
will that be an increase in appetite,
decrease in appetite, whatever it may be,
I can be predictive and say like,
"Okay, are we gonna need to adjust the training?
Or are we gonna need to address the density
of the food that we're taking in an et cetera?"
To manage that, there are some people
that they will literally try and train cyclical like that,
and I think you're leaving a lot of results
on the table,
because a lot of times,
you may be over emphasizing how much of an improvement
or over emphasizing how much you're gonna de-load somebody.
And for me I just kind of follow the biomarkers
that are important for recovery at that point in time.
Now, if somebody has a very dysregulated cycle than that,
that may be an issue to look at there.
One of the people that I think does a really good job
on this topic is Rachel Guy,
I can't remember if that's her new last name or.
This is what happens.
People get married and then I forget
which last name is their last name.
But Natalie, I will shoot you her DM, if you want.
She goes, her handle, I think, is @athleticfox as well.
Alright. So Curtis asks,
"If you're using tension in a calorie deficit,
stay further away from failure?"
Not necessarily.
You just have to account for the volume.
It doesn't matter if it's volume from failure
or a set volume,
You just, essentially the, if you're, well,
if you're using tension in a deficit,
my question would be, "All right.
What's our goal here?
What are we trying to do?"
Because, obviously, if our goal is like then
muscle maintenance during fat loss,
then we're really pushing that volume further away.
And then you might, like that,
my question would be like,
"Okay, if we're doing this for maintenance,
would I choose exercises, maybe,
that are closer to the shorter side
of the range of emotion and things like that,
trying to reduce mechanical damage and stuff like that,
knowing that my recovery is going to be limited.
Those are the things that I'm going to be trying to look at
in terms of managing volume there,
so it's managing volume of what,
in that case where it's like,
"Okay, I need tension, but in the absence of damage."
So I may be kind of trying to do
like a heavier metabolic style exercise selection
in that instance.
And that's typically what I do,
like with a transformation client,
that is going in,
if I was going to do maintenance or low,
or to a calorie deficit,
and put hypertrophy in there,
I would treat it like,
almost like I was doing neuro style programming
with metabolic style exercise selection, if you will,
and kind of go that route.
Marty asks, "What's wrong with Coca-Cola?"
Coca-Cola says I am too white.
That's what's wrong with Coca-Cola.
So essentially, we don't use tension for fat loss.
Well, no, tension is a poor stimulus for fat loss.
You use tension to maintain muscle
while you let your calorie deficit
and your need to be the driver for fat loss.
So in a sense,
you're using tension to prevent muscle loss,
you're not using the tension work to promote more fat loss.
I mean, you're getting a little bit
of nutrient partitioning, whatever,
but we're talking about marginal things.
You're not going to get shredded
doing hypertrophy workouts in a deficit.
You're just going to get sad.
Let's see here.
Job asks,
"What can we expect on a hypertrophy tension program
with a deficit?
The same weight loss per week
as with a systemic or neuro fat loss?
Or would it be more weight-stable?"
Well, so here's the thing, Job.
Is it's not really going to be dependent
on the hypertrophy workouts.
It's going to be dependent on how much of a deficit.
That's going to be the driver.
What you will find is that
if you're overdoing the hypertrophy work,
is that somebody's going to have a real bad time
in that deficit.
And they're going to,
basically, you'll see their performance drop really, like,
'cause in hypertrophy,
you're tend be spreading things out more,
so you're not doing total body or like half body.
Now we're getting more into like
third body ranges or whatever.
And so what you're going to see
is people have lagging soreness and stuff like that,
if you are not,
if you are doing too much volume for the deficit.
So that's the main thing that you're gonna work on there.
But I mean the, we'll put it this way.
If you're going for a rapid fat loss,
that's a poor combination of things there.
Essentially, you would use tension programs
as a way of like recomping between blocks
where you would be using methods
that are better for promoting fat loss.
So you could do a systemic phase
or an AMPK phase or whatever,
and then you could take a short hypertrophy like program,
but you would be looking at.
All right. We're really looking at dropping scale weight
on these other things,
and then we kind of do this hypertrophy tension thing,
maybe we're focusing more on putting that client's mind
towards where we comping.
So we don't want to see the scale drop so much.
We might see some body fat drop,
but if we're dropping a bunch of body weight,
like at that point in time,
you're probably not combining your stimulus
and your nutrition goals very well, in that sense.
You should periodize in, like more rapid weight loss
during more metabolic phases
and more recomp during more tension-based phases.
So you can think of it as like a de-load
from as big of a calorie deficit.
Curtis asks,
"Using tension to create a calorie deficit
to focus on a fat loss."
Okay. I think you're answering your own question there.
So awesome. Yes.
Adrian asks,
"Would you overshoot with calories
and get more fat or try and risk to nail,
but under-eat in the beginning with a client?"
I mean, I think this depends on what
that client's end goal is,
So if it's a body composition client,
then I'm probably not going to try
and overfeed them too much,
because if their goal coming to you is like,
"I want to lose body fat"
and it's not gaining a lot of muscle mass,
the last thing I want to do is put body fat on them
when that's the opposite of what their goal is.
They're not going to be very happy.
But if somebody's like, "Dude, I want to get fucking yoked."
'Cause we can cuss here, 'cause this is our own thing.
Then I'm not going to like be stingy on their nutrition.
They're gonna be like, "Dude, what's going on, man.
It's like, I've been training with you
for like months or whatever,
and I've gained like two measly pounds."
You'll be like, "No dude, let's get yoke."
And then when you're like,
"Hey man, my Tinder's swipes are going like down"
or like, "We need to cut the up a little bit," then cool.
Then we can like kind of work on those things.
But you have to kind of take into account,
what's going to best suit the client at that time,
and then I'm going to error in that direction,
'cause that's the main goal.
Curtis says,
"From a psychological perspective,
why do people take a surplus as an opportunity
to eat anything and everything?"
'Cause food is awesome, dude.
Pizza is amazing, and so are cookies,
and so are cake, like yeah.
I mean, I think that's,
I think a lot of that comes from the inverse.
It's the fact that when they're in a deficit,
they feel they have to be deprived
of all of those things.
So then when they're in a surplus, they think,
"Okay, now's the only time
that I can ever have those things,"
where if all of a sudden you teach somebody
to have a more educated approach of like,
hey, when you're in a deficit
and you're switch ups or whatever,
there are ways to like make your life not suck
and to still be able to enjoy food or whatever,
then you won't see as much of that.
And then there's just the logistics
of like for some people,
when they're on a deficit, they just,
they don't realistically have room
for any high density foods,
because then they're just literally eating like a rabbit
for the rest of the time.
And that's just,
so having that one really enjoyable food
makes the whole rest of the day suck.
So it really just comes down to logistics
and people having healthy relationships with food
and understanding, you know,
calorie balance and also quality.
And knowing that those don't have to come
at the expense of each other,
and they're not rules
that need to be adhered like every day
for the rest of your life.
Natalie asks,
"What are your thoughts on the frequency hitting body parts?
Do you see greater app adaptations
with higher frequency if recovered?"
I mean you have to look at frequency and volume
as two inputs into the equation.
They always have to be balanced.
As one goes up, the other goes down.
Now, for given stimulus and given individuals,
there will be a sweet spot for efficiency.
And that's essentially
what you're always trying to work out.
But it's not one is more important than the other,
especially across stimuli.
So essentially, what happens is the more
you need to put stimulus within a given workout.
So basically you'll have a threshold on you.
You'll need at least this much volume in a workout
to drive the stimulus.
As that goes up,
your ability to maintain frequency goes down.
So depending on how often you're doing
that type of stimulus,
you're going to drive yourself away
from being able to tolerate frequency.
But then you periodize away from it for a while,
And then you may be able to come back
and tolerate a lower volume at a higher frequency,
and then you start that path again,
of driving at volume to the point
where your frequency goes down.
And you could use that as one of your decision-makers
of when you want to like leave phases or whatnot,
is just maybe you work to the point where it's like,
"Okay, cool."
Now in terms of how we would like your split set up,
or frequency or whatever for,
whether it's a logistical reason,
lifestyle reason, whatever it may be.
It's like, "Cool, we're going to go do something else,
and technically detrain these things,
so we can come back in at lower volume
and still get adequate stimulus
and therefore be able to tolerate the frequency.
Let's see here, Curtis ask,
"How to go about someone who wants
to constantly take everything to failure?"
I mean, you can have the serious talk with these people,
or sometimes these are the people where you just like,
you just throw them in the deep end of the pool,
and you let it be a life lesson.
You really kind of got to read the room.
And in that case,
I would definitely not do that with a new client
or something like that.
Maybe it's a client you're not too worried about losing.
You're like, look, either they're going to get on board
with it or not, but you're like, "Cool."
You're like taking everything to failure,
like, cool. You just give them this workout that's like,
there's going to be trash, you'll be like,
"Okay. That sucks. Look, your performance is going down.
You're still sore, whatever.
How about we try it my way for a week
and see if you don't get stronger and feel better
and look better or whatever."
Sometimes that's what you have to do.
So it depends on whether or not
this person needs to be educated,
or they need a life lesson or some combination of both.
But what you can tell,
like the big thing, I think,
in terms of them thinking whether or not
they need to look at every set to failure
is that you can get them to separate all sets
from being like the working or stimulus sets,
that you can say like,
"Okay, look, we're doing six sets today.
But these four sets, these are prep sets.
And these other two sets, these are the stimulus sets."
And then in their mind, it's like,
"Okay, I need to take every set to failure."
But now they're only thinking of those two sets
'cause those are the similar sets.
And the other sets were like,
"It was a practice sets, warm-up sets,
primer sets." Like whatever.
Put a label on them that just separates the,
where you really want to put the effort
versus the stuff leading up to it.
Adrian says, "Go up for a longer time,
one to one and a half years,
and gain a bit more body fat or many cuts
more frequently to keep everything healthy,
goal is max muscle gain."
So here's the thing.
So I mean, people have been talking
about P ratios and stuff like that on podcasts and whatever.
And to be honest, that's, I mean it's,
I would say it's interesting to listen to, but it's not.
It's boring as shit to listen to.
Here's the thing,
is, what matters is metabolic health and recovery.
So that like, so it really doesn't matter,
'cause from one person they might put on 10 pounds
and their recovery is dog shit,
their metabolic conditioning is dog shit,
which is going to affect their ability to recover.
So it's literally going to negatively impact
their performance recovery for hypertrophy.
So they need to move it back in the other direction.
Another person may build,
maybe be able to put on 20 or 30 pounds
before they would get to that same point.
So it really just kind of depends
on the person and what happened,
like for some person,
it may be like,
if they put on, after they put on five pounds,
it's not the five pounds,
it's the fact that it's been eight weeks
since they've done anything metabolically challenging.
That's the thing that's affecting them.
It's literally just the time away from the stimulus,
the body fat that they've accumulated isn't the issue.
For another person, the body fat may be a bigger issue,
because whether it be genetics
or just let their lifestyle and nutrition,
when they gain more fat, it has a little bit more
of an inflammatory or negative impact on them.
So it's all of these things coming together.
So you really, you just have to look at how
it's affecting their metabolic health,
their performance and their recovery.
Here's a simple thing.
If something is not producing great results,
it's not a fruitful pursuit.
Periodize out.
So there's no reason to try and stay in a faith
where you're making gains 10% of the rate
that you were earlier.
Periodize out, and then come back in
and make progress faster.
Your net progress will be faster.
"Can you put on muscle mass effectively
at any body fat percentage?"
I mean, not at 100%.
So, I mean, the answer is very similar
to what I was just saying.
Like, it depends on what your metabolic health is
in that instance.
So there's going to be a buffer area in there.
Now, there's tons of things to consider with this.
I mean, for some people like, look,
what other things might literally be like,
they want to put on 10 pounds of muscle,
but they need to lose 60 pounds of fat.
Losing that 60 pounds of fat
might do wonders for their recovery
because it increases their ability to move around.
Their neat, their range of motion.
There's a lot of things that body fat
can have an impact on.
Tying your shoes. Right, Adam?
Barney says,
"My last question. How can I get a hold
of one of those N1 hats?"
So we will be, these are all samples.
But what we are going to do
is like the one that Cody has, that style of hat,
probably in the next month or two,
we will be taking an order
and get a whole bunch of those made.
We'll probably get some shirts and stuff made
around the same time,
so that you guys can get like swag bundles
if you're going to pay that shipping
all the way over to the UK.
All right.
Looks like that's the last of my questions.
Going once, going twice,
no special orders, Natalie, sorry.
Maybe in the future, when we get really big,
then we can afford to have more hats and stuff.
All right.
Last question here that Adrian put in.
"Cardio and the rest days and hypertrophy phase's
a good idea to keep metabolic health and recovery?"
Well, it depends on what you qualify as cardio.
Whether it's low intensity,
whether it's hit-based training, et cetera.
And basically you just have to look
at how that stress would impact things.
Essentially, if you're doing hit training,
like a very low volume,
you have the systemic and the metabolic aspect.
As you start getting into the more moderate, longer cardio,
not neat, but like moderate cardio,
where it's like,
okay you're working at moderate to higher intensities
for 20, 30, 40 minutes,
that's where you actually
will affect nervous system recovery,
as well as the the metabolic stress and stuff in there.
So really, what you have to look at is,
if you're focusing on hypertrophy,
you're going to be giving up some metabolic adaptations,
unless you're like closer
to the sarcoplasmic side of things.
But doing extra aerobic work out of that
in anything other than that low intensity
is going to take away from your performance
and your recovery.
So the only cardio that I would really add
in hypertrophy phases would mainly be low intensity stuff,
and just focusing on getting your neat.
So those two things, I think, would be beneficial,
and then use periodization.
You're going to get much better results
doing four weeks of hypertrophy,
and then taking a week of really focusing
on bringing your metabolic adaptations back up
and stuff like that, and then jumping back in,
then you are going to be trying to put in
enough cardio-based work
to maintain your metabolic adaptations across.
You're just going to fail at both of those things.
You're going to do both of them less good than if you would.
So if you looked at, over a period of time,
of somebody periodizing versus somebody trying to maintain,
the person periodizing is going to have
much better results over time, so, you know.
And I mean, it serves as your dealer process and kelp,
like it just has such a synergistic benefit
to use periodization over trying to be greedy.
Because in reality,
the way that we tolerate lower volume at this
and still get good stimulus,
is by letting things detrain.
That's the reality.
And in reality, the best way to gain is to detrain.
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