Transcript
Speaker: Welcome back to the fit ish project with your host Lathan bass where we make fitness and health simple for regular people like you and I It is that time of the week for another weekly episode before I get into that just a quick reminder if you can continue to leave reviews Share this with people to help grow this show get this out to more people who want to look better Feel better all those things that we all want to have. i appreciate your part in doing that The topic for this week, I'm building off of last week's episode where I gave you a bunch of tips that you can apply almost immediately to help you with your diet. But this week I figured I'd do one about training.
Speaker: I have been lifting since I was 16. I first lifted weights for the very first time when I was in middle school, but I didn't actually start consistently lifting till about my junior year in high school. when I was trying to really get better at sports. And so I've been lifting for about 17 years pretty dang consistently now. I've taken some time off here there, but a lot of that time I was an athlete in high school and college. So lifting was a mandatory part of that process and wanting to be a good athlete and all that stuff. But Since getting out of it and getting into the whole weight loss thing, I knew strength training was also a pretty big part of that. And so I've been lifting for a long time.
Speaker: My goal for a very long time has been to get in the weight room, get in the gym about four times a week. And I take time off here or there. I'll do a deload week or maybe a vacation. I'll go on. and I won't lift or work out a whole lot. But for the most part, I would say I'm getting in four workouts a week for most weeks. So let's say 50 weeks out of the year. It's about 200 workouts a year, 200 workouts spent in the gym. And you multiply that over 17 years.
Speaker: That's well over 3000 workouts. So I've spent some time in the gym. I feel like I've learned some things. I've learned a lot of tips and tricks. I've also been training other people since I was 22 years old with strength conditioning with being a personal trainer, with being a high school PE teacher and strength coach. So I've been around it a lot and also been able to just see different patterns, different trends, pick up different things that work really well. And so within this podcast, I want to share a lot of that stuff that I've learned through training other people and through my own experience. in the last 17 years. So getting right into this, these are 22 underrated fitness tips that you can apply and use today with your workouts in order to build more muscle, build more strength, feel better, get fitter, have better health, all those different things that Every single one of us wants to have, because if you're going to put the time into training, into fitness, into trying to better yourself, then why not get the most out of it? And I think for a lot of these tips, they're very low hanging fruits, things that you can start using very quickly to help make your workouts better, more efficient and and just see better results over time. So getting right into it. Number one.
Speaker: getting some lifting straps. I know that I have recommended this on other podcasts and talked about this in some of my other content, especially for your back training and your leg training. You do not want your grip to be the reason that you are not lifting as heavy as possible because we know that if we want to really make gains, if you want to build strength, if we want to build muscle, we need to continually lift heavier weights over time. And when it comes to back training and when it comes to leg training, you have to use a lot of weight, especially as you get stronger.
Speaker: Trying to hang on to 300 pounds while you're doing an RDL is difficult or trying to hang on to some extremely heavy dumbbells when you're trying to do RDL or trying to do some lunges or something like that is difficult. And you don't want your grip to be giving out before your legs or your back do, which for a lot of people as they get stronger, that is the case. Your grip will be the first thing to go. It won't be your leg muscles. It won't be your back muscles. It'll be your forearms and your grip giving out Before the other muscles give out and when that happens you're not able to push your muscles to the level that we need to push them in order to see the maximum amount gain so getting yourself some lifting straps for especially back training and leg training can be super beneficial they're very cheap you can find them for 10 $15 and I think I've had the same pair since right out college so I've had mine for over 10 years and I still use the exact same pair. Super small little tweak that you can add in, but it makes a big difference in how good your back training and your leg training sessions are.
Speaker: Number two on this list is to use supersets. Lots of people attribute not being able to get into the gym as a time thing. And if you want to save time and just be more efficient, you can use supersets. This is a little bit more difficult to do in a gym setting, like a public gym setting, because obviously you are sharing equipment with other people. You don't want to be hogging two or three machines at the same time. But if you're in a gym where there's not tons of people, if you're going to the gym at a time where it's not crazy busy or you're just smart about your programming, you can find really good ways to superset and cut down on the time that you are in the gym. So, for example, rather than let's say you have three sets of bench press as your first exercise in your workout, you would go, you do your bench press, you rest to maybe three minutes before you do your next set and then you do that one more time. So to get your bench press done, it takes you roughly 10 minutes. Now, let's say instead of doing that, you're doing a superset. So maybe you have bench press and that is supersetted with some pull ups. So you do your first set of bench press and then immediately after you rack that, you walk over to the pull up bar, you do your set of pull ups that takes you maybe 30 seconds to do those. And then you rest for another minute or two and then you get right back into your next bench press set.
Speaker: So it takes maybe a couple extra minutes to do these supersets together. But where it just took you 10 minutes to do three sets of bench press and maybe 11 or 12 minutes, you just did three sets of bench press and you did three sets of pull up. So you just did double the amount of work. and only added a minute or two to your actual time.
Speaker: So you can see how if you do this over the entire workout, you can save yourself tons of time and just be a little bit more efficient in the gym. So now maybe instead of spending 60 minutes in a workout where you're resting a ton and you're not able to do quite as much, you could cut your workout down to say 40, maybe 45 minutes, save yourself a good 15 minutes and you do that over a week a month a year you're saving yourself so much time you're able to get into the gym get a really good workout and still be able to do all the things that you need to do in the gym ways to use supersets you can do this with using similar muscle groups but for a lot of people's purposes that they're in the gym it makes more sense to use opposing muscle groups. So simple little frameworks that you can think about when using supersets is doing something like with lower body or upper body. So maybe you do like bench press and then you do some sort of leg training exercise. If you're doing full body workouts, you could do like a pushing versus a pulling movement. So think of a bench press and a pull-up like i gave in that previous example you could do opposing muscle groups so think of like a bicep curl with a tricep extension you could do shoulders with back training so maybe you do like a lateral raise and then you do like a cable row you could pair abs with pretty much anything so there's lots of different ways that you can do this there's not necessarily like or right or wrong way to do this. But for simplicity sake, typically using opposing muscle groups for supersets is a pretty good idea for most people. Because you also want to give the muscles that you just use, you still want to give them some sort of break. You don't want to do like bench press and then pushups and then chest flies. Like you don't want to be hammering your chest because you're not going to get as much out of those. Again, there's a time and a place to use those if that is your purpose.
Speaker: But for what most of us want to do in the gym, it makes more sense to use opposing muscle groups that way you can still get some decent rest and get a lot out of those sets but you're also cutting down on your time in the gym number three use machines to push your intensity harder we all know that pushing the intensity really hard and training close to failure is how you build the most muscle that's how you get really strong that's how you make your body change and progress is to push the intensity and a really good way to do that is to use machines from time to time because what machines do is they allow you to be a little bit more stable and allow you to train really hard in a little bit safer manner you can still do this with free weights it's absolutely possible and as long as you are experienced and you're being smart and safe about this
Speaker: It still makes sense to also do this with free weights too. But with machines, you can really go all the way to failure in a lot of machines and be very, very safe. So for example, if I'm doing like a leg extension, I'm sitting down and I'm trying to train my quads on the leg extension machine.
Speaker: I can take that to complete failure where I'm not even able to get another rep. But if I'm doing like, say, a back squat and I have 300 pounds on my back, I'm probably not going to want to take that set all the way to complete failure. The other thing that machines do really well that you can't quite get with free weight exercises is they add stability. So if I asked you to do, let's say a really heavy squat,
Speaker: And then I asked you to do that heavy squat on top of a BOSU ball where you're trying to balance, you know which one you're going to be able to do more weight on. So when trying to build muscle, you want to create a little bit more stability. That way you're able to target that muscle and really focus in all your energy and effort on that task of just moving as much weight as possible. So taking some of the stability factor, taking some of the balance and some of the other things that you have to focus on with free weights can be helpful when using machines. Again, you don't need to use all machines and free weights are still a great thing to use. And for a lot of reasons, I do a lot of exercises and have clients do a lot of exercises with free weights. But mixing in some machines here or there is just a really good way to add in some intensity and really train hard without worrying about injury or without worrying about stability or different things like that not all machines are created equal and if you've been in different gyms you've probably sat on some machines that are supposed to do the same exact thing but they just don't feel nearly as good but you can play around with different machines find really good pieces of equipment and then use those to really push yourself to see better progress over time
Speaker: Number four, when in doubt, just train close to failure. Most people, I've trained lots of different types of people. Most people, at least part of the reason that they are exercising or lifting weights is because they want to look better.
Speaker: And there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. If you want to look better, you need to build more muscle. Part of looking lean, part of looking more tone, part of looking more fit or muscular is building muscle. And the way that you do that, as I mentioned just a second ago, is you train close to failure. You don't need to take all your sets completely to failure, but you want to be training one, two, maybe three reps shy of muscular failure.
Speaker: And I know that for a lot of people getting into the gym, one of the things that they struggle with is there's just so many new things that they are learning that they almost get this paralysis by analysis. So like there's so many different moving parts. There's lots of different factors. There's tons of little different things that you're trying to learn when you get into the gym that it can almost put you in a place where like you don't want to do anything because there's just too many things you're trying to figure out.
Speaker: And so when you can just remember this, just remember that when you train close to failure, you're going to be building muscle. That's the single most important thing that you need to think about when you want to look better, feel better, build muscle, build strength, all those things. You can simplify all this stuff and you can cut through a lot of the crap and not worry about some of that stuff as much. This also is really helpful. When let's say you're short on time, when you're traveling, when you want to swap different exercises in all these situations, you could be thinking about, oh, how am I going to get the perfect workout in this situation? But then you just remember, OK, as long as I'm training close to failure, as long as I'm pushing myself really hard, it doesn't really matter nearly as much what exercises i'm doing. If I'm lifting in a new place, if I'm not getting the exact workout that I plan on getting, as long as I'm doing that main thing, I'm still going to be making progress towards your goal. So when in doubt, just remember that one thing.
Speaker: Number five, use the right rep ranges. And when I say the right rep ranges, I'll explain what that means. There's two things that you want to think about. But when it comes to building muscle, studies show us that you can technically build muscle in a very wide rep range. So typically what you'll hear is anywhere between five to 30 reps. As long as you're getting really close to muscular failure, you can build a lot of muscle. Like there's not low reps versus high reps.
Speaker: you're going to build more muscle as long as you are again focusing on that main point of getting to muscular failure the thing that you have to realize with this is within that 5 to 30 rep range there's some different things going on so when you're using very very low reps this takes a little bit more focus this takes a little bit more skill there's a neurological component to lifting really heavy weights so let's say if you're lifting for a one rep max, if you're doing two reps, three reps, four reps, even five reps, like when you're really getting heavy with your weights, there's more focus, skill and different things like that that you have to account for when you're lifting really high reps. So let's say you're lifting 30 reps, maybe even a little bit more. it's just really hard to lift that many reps because that burn and just staying focused staying engaged doing the movement right it's hard to take those sets that are really high in number all the way close to muscular failure so that's the reason why you will often hear a lot of times when building muscle is the goal you'll hear that like 8 to 12 or like 8 to 15 rep range as like the sweet spot Again, a little bit more, a little bit less is perfectly fine too.
Speaker: But being somewhere within like that 8 to 15 reps when building muscle is the goal works really well for a lot of different exercises. Now, when I say use the right rep ranges, two things to think about.
Speaker: What makes sense for a certain exercise? Because for some exercises doing lower heavier weights makes more sense. For some exercises doing higher or maybe even for some exercises, it's like right in the middle, right in that 8 to 15 rep ranges. For example, if we take something like a shoulder raise, like a lateral raise, where you have your dumbbells at your sides, you're lifting those up to shoulder height. I'm probably never going to do that with five reps. Like I'm not going to pick something that's so heavy that I can only do it for five reps because my form is not going feel great. And also just using that much weight for shoulder raises is just not going to feel that great on my shoulders. Now, if I do that for, let's say 12 reps or 15 reps, that's going to feel a lot better. I can still take it really close to failure and get a really good stimulus, build up my shoulders, which is exactly what I want to do.
Speaker: If we look at something like a squat, doing five reps makes a ton of sense versus doing, let's say, 20 reps on a squat. Now, again, you could do 20 reps on a squat and there's actually really popular 20 rep back squat program that a lot of people have done. It's absolutely brutal. But if you're doing sets of 20 on a back squat, a lot of times you are going to run into technical breakdown. So like your form starts to break down a little bit more. Maybe you're feeling it more in your back. or feeling it in different spots versus actually feeling it in your legs where you want to feel it. Maybe your cardio becomes the limiting factor because if you've ever done 20 rep back squat set, it's absolutely brutal. And so thinking about doing something like a back squat or a deadlift or bigger lifts with a little bit lower reps probably makes more sense. Kind of a general thing that I think about when picking exercises, bigger compound movements. So think of movements that you're using a lot of muscles with. So like your deadlifts, your your back squats, your RDLs, things that are just using a lot of muscles.
Speaker: Typically in that like five to 10 rep range is a pretty good range to be in. When you're thinking about smaller isolation, more like single joint movements, so think of like a bicep curl, a tricep extension, different things like that.
Speaker: This makes more sense to be like 10 to 20 reps for a lot of different exercises in this category. I think an easy thing to remember is when you're doing like bigger movements, less than 10 reps is probably a good move. And then when you're doing smaller movements, 10 or more reps is probably a good thing to use. Again, this is not like a hard rule. You can do less, you can do more. But I think when you're thinking about these things, that's a really easy way to start to figure out what kind of rep range you want to use. And then the second thing that you want to think about is what do you actually like to do?
Speaker: For a lot of people, training in certain rep ranges is more enjoyable than others. I know for myself, I'm definitely a more lower volume type of trainer. So I like to do things that little bit heavier, use a little bit more weight. So anytime that I'm doing over, let's say 10, 12 reps,
Speaker: it becomes less enjoyable for me. I would much rather do lower style training. So five reps, eight reps, maybe 10 reps. But when I get up into like 12, 15, 20 reps on a lot of different exercises, I just don't feel like I enjoy that training as much. And one thing that you should realize when it comes to training Things that you actually enjoy doing, you typically train harder at those things. And if you're training harder and being more consistent with those things, you're probably going to see better results. So you want to think about what makes sense for this actual exercise. And then number two, what do I actually like doing? If you do those two things when thinking about your rep ranges, you're more than likely going to see better results over time.
Speaker: Number six is more of a specific one, but it's elevating your heels on squat or leg movements in order to hit your quads a little bit more. Anytime that you're getting your knees over your toes, you're going to be getting more quads involved. So this could be for a back squat, a front squat. This could be for a lunge. This could be for a step up. This could be for a Bulgarian split squat. Anytime that you're doing knee bending exercise, so a squat or lunge, anything like that, and you want to hit more quads if that knee is pushing closer to your toe or over your toe you're going to be getting more quads involved which helps you to build your quads if your knee is behind your toe you're probably going to be getting more glutes involved so that's just something to think about when you're doing your leg training if you want to hit more glutes then you want that knee to be behind that toe if you want hit more quads you want that knee to travel a little bit further get closer to that toe or even over that toe And one thing that you can do to help you do this, because I know a lot of people want to hit their quads a little bit more.
Speaker: I mean, there's also a lot of people that want to hit their glutes, but I think for men, generally quads is something that they're wanting to do. For females, they're probably trying to get a little bit more glutes involved. one thing you can do is to elevate your heels so that will help to get your quads or get your knees over your toes in order to hit your quads so you could elevate your heels on some small weight plates when you're doing your lower body exercises you could use heel wedges a lot of public gyms now have these they're like little ramp looking type things where you can step on and so your toes are kind of angled downwards and your heels are elevated you could use weightlifting shoes which i actually use as well in order to help you get a little bit more knee bend get that knee over the toe hit the quads a little bit more and just a bonus tip while we're on the subject of shoes when it comes to lower body training especially like leg training having some solid shoes can be beneficial for sure so getting some actual training shoes or like crossfit style shoes or weightlifting style shoes is going to be a little bit better than using something like running shoes because running shoes have a little bit more give to them and that is going to provide a little bit less stability so thinking back to that conversation that we were just having about stability
Speaker: you want to be a little bit more stable. So if your feet are moving around because they have more cushiony parts in them, it's a little bit harder to apply that force, let's say in a heavy squat or a heavy deadlift or different things like that. So if you're doing a lot of lunges, squats, different leg training like that, you wanna have something that's a little bit more solid, a little bit more stable. So just something to think about when you are training, when you're doing your upper body stuff, or your list or if you're using a lot of machines or different things like that, your shoes don't really matter all that much. But when you start doing more heavy leg training and things like that, and if you have a good solid pair of shoes, you will notice a difference from using like more squishy type of shoes or like running shoes or something like that. Number seven, learn to auto regulate, which is just a fancy way of saying learn to listen to your body.
Speaker: You can change your training based on how you feel that day. And the more that you get into training, like the more advanced that you become. the more important that I think this becomes. And it's something that you get better at over time. When you come into the gym, a lot of it is just building up that discipline, building up the habits, learning to work really hard. But over time, you really want to get more in tune with your body and learn when you need to back off, when you need to tweak the plan a little bit, when you need to maybe pivot a little bit, because the whole goal of this is to play the long name. If you want to look better, if you want to feel better, if you want to have better health, then lifting weights and getting in the gym and working out is something that you want to do for
Speaker: a long, long time, hopefully for a good majority of your life for decades. And so it makes sense to train in a smarter way. It's not always about just going hard and just lifting as much as possible and sacrificing form and pushing through and everything like that. Like there's a time and a place to push through and to really dig deep and train hard, even if you don't feel like it. But as you start to train more, you start to learn when those moments are.
Speaker: So when you learn to auto regulate, you come in, let's say you're really tired, you're really sore, you slept like crap, you feel much weaker, like you do your first couple of sets and you notice that you're just not able to lift as much weight or that weight just feels extremely heavy. Then maybe on that day, it makes more sense to lower the weights a little bit, maybe do some higher reps. Maybe you cut back on the volume a little bit. So instead of doing four sets on each exercise, maybe you're only doing two sets. Maybe you tweak the plan a little bit and then that sets you up better for the next day. The more that you can start to do this over time, I think the better results that you get, because again, we're trying to play the long game here. We're not, we don't care so much about a single individual workout or a week of workouts. We care about what you're able to do over the months, over the years, over the decades. And learning to listen to your body is a big part of that.
Speaker: Number eight, hit a muscle group multiple times per week. If you can hit a muscle group multiple times over a week, you're going to have a little bit better results. Now you don't need to get crazy neurotic about this because it makes a difference, but the difference isn't going to be massive. So if you're not able to train a muscle multiple times per week, it's not something that you need to worry about or feel like you're leaving a ton of gains on the table with this because you also have to keep in mind what are you actually going to be able to do consistently and what do you have time for for some people they're only getting in the weight room twice a week and it's going to be very hard to train every single muscle group if you are only getting in the weight room
Speaker: twice a week. So if you're not able to do that, then I wouldn't worry about it too much. Like if you're covering your basis, if you're hitting each muscle group once a week, that's not that big of a deal. But if you're able to split it up into two different training sessions, you're going to see a little bit better results. And the simple logic behind this is, let's say you're training your chest. If you go in and do 10 sets in one workout versus if you go in, let's say Monday, you do five sets chest. And then Thursday, you come back in and you do five sets chest.
Speaker: which one of those days do you feel like you're going to be able to push it on each and every one of those sets if i'm doing 10 sets in a workout by that seventh eighth ninth tenth set i'm definitely feeling a little bit fatigued if i've been pushing those previous sets really hard but if i only have five sets of doing this workout i can push all five of those to the max really really hard and then i rest up for a couple days i come back in on thursday and i'm doing five more sets of chest I'm just able to push each individual set a little bit harder. So over time, I'm able to see a little bit better progress. Again, this isn't a huge deal, but if you're able to do it, like if you're somebody who's lifting three or four days a week, you can do this by training like full body sessions where you're able to hit the muscle group multiple times a week. or even like an upper or lower where you're hitting most of your upper body muscles twice a week you're hitting most of your lower body muscles twice a week you're able to get just a slightly better benefit out of that if that is possible for you to do number nine is to follow a program this is such a simple thing to do but i still oftentimes see so many people not doing this they just don't follow a program and now there's just so many different ways that you can find a program i mean you can find tons of programs for free
Speaker: online. You could also get a coach, you could get a trainer, you could work out at a gym in a group. You could even use something like AI now can give you a pretty good place to start now. It's not going to give you everything. And there's a lot of nuance that is missing from AI. Like all these things that I'm sharing with you right now, like there are things that I've learned through experience over time and seeing trying a lot of things, seeing what worked, what didn't work. And AI is not necessarily going to be able to give you all that and give you the practical context with all of that and just give you the things that you need personalized for your where you're at training level, like the equipment you have, different things like that, that like AI won't be able to tell you. But as a place to start, it can give you a good format of different things you could do. So even that's an option. But when you're picking a program, you want to pick a program that is focused on progressive overload. That's that will help to get you the results that you wanna get with looking better, feeling better, gaining strength, building muscle, all those different things. You want the program to actually be something that you like. You don't need to like every single part of it, but hopefully it's enjoyable to you. Cause again, if it's enjoyable, you're going to do it more consistently and work harder at it. The third thing is it needs to match what you're actually able to do. So doing a six day a week program is not going to do you a ton of good if you can only get in the gym two or three times a week. So making sure that it actually mixes with something that you can be consistent with. getting a program following a program you will see better results right along with that number 10 is to track your progress as i've mentioned progressive overload that is the key so you want to make sure that you're tracking your weights over the weeks and months you're not going to get stronger every single workout especially as you get more advanced it takes more time to see that strength over time So you want to make sure that you're just tracking over the weeks, over the months to make sure that you are progressing in the right manner and making sure that you're getting stronger so that you know that you're getting more fit, you're building muscle, those different things. But also understanding when it comes to tracking progress, there'll be a lot of days where you come in the gym and that strength is just not where you want it to be. Like I could come in, let's say one day, I do 225 on the bench press and I hit 10 reps as my top set. There could be another day where I come in just a week later and I only hit seven or eight reps. So I hit two reps less. So if I'm just looking at that from day to day or week to week, I might think that I'm getting weaker, that I'm doing something wrong. But just understanding that when you're tracking these numbers, there will be days where those numbers are down.
Speaker: not every single workout is going to be great it's very normal for your strength to vary 10 15 even 20 on any given day and that could be for a lot of different reasons maybe sleep was bad maybe you didn't eat enough maybe you're stressed out there could be so many different reasons why you are not seeing those strength gains from week to week so tracking over time like being able to look back a month from an now or a couple months from now and see oh i raised my bench 10 pounds or i raised my pull-ups i have been able to do five pull-ups and now I'm doing seven or eight consistently. Like when you can look back over time and see those trends from over the months and even over the years, and you know that you're progressing in the right way. Number one, that's very motivating, but number two, you actually know that you're getting the results that you want to get. So tracking progress is important and tons of ways to do this. Again, a lot of programs are on apps now and they make it very easy for you to track progress, but maybe it's something as simple as even just tracking your top set of each workout. on your phone or on your notes app. I have a lady in the gym that I work at and she just tracks my note cards. So she looks back on different note cards at exercises that we've been doing for a while or maybe we come back to a new phase and we hit an exercise that we haven't hit for a while and that way she can see her progress over time. So it doesn't have to be real crazy complicated, but just making sure that you are tracking your progress over time can be helpful. Number 11 is to use music.
Speaker: Music can increase your intensity. It can increase your energy. it can increase your focus. and There's even some studies and research showing on this that you can squeak out a few extra reps on sets by choosing music that you like.
Speaker: Super simple tip and it helps a lot. I'm sure you've been in a workout where like you had a good playlist set or you were in a gym that was playing really good music or in a setting where there was good music playing and you just feel better. Like you're in the workout a little bit more and you probably had the opposite effect where maybe you're lifting in a public gym. You forgot your headphones. The music they're playing is absolutely trash. And it kind of just ruins the vibe of the whole workout. And you just don't feel like you can get into it as much. So picking a playlist before you lift, just set up 25, 30 songs on a playlist or just having some playlists that you can refer to for your workouts. Super simple thing, but it makes the whole feeling of that workout more enjoyable. I know there's times where like, I don't do this. Like I'll go on a run and I'll just... hit the shuffle on the music or I'll go down in the gym and I'll start up a shuffle on my Spotify and it just keeps playing music that I don't want to listen to when I'm working out. And so I feel like I'm constantly just like trying to find the right song and then it takes me out of the workout or the run. I don't feel like I'm engaged in that workout as much. And so doing this beforehand, just setting yourself up with a good playlist can help to give you a better workout.
Speaker: Number 12, use a timer for your workouts. You can use a timer to help you out with just the floor your workout, but also just so you're not wasting a ton of time in the gym. Again, lots of people say they don't have time to work out or they struggle to find time to work out. So you wanna to be efficient with your workouts.
Speaker: Using a timer is such a simple thing that you can do. When I work out in my home gym, I have a timer that sits on my marker board and I always start that timer when I go in there because it helps me to keep me on track for rest times, but also just for the overall workout.
Speaker: I know that after a certain point when I'm in the gym, after typically for me, it's around an hour, sometimes 75 minutes. If I'm in the gym for longer than that, I just know that I'm not going to be getting as much out of that workout as I would like to. I just lose focus. I lose engagement. if I lose energy, all that different stuff. And then I'm not able to get out of that workout what I want to get out of. For some people, maybe for you, it's 45 minutes in the gym. And then after that, you just feel like you don't get as good of a workout so setting a timer and being accountable to that timer can be helpful with the whole flow of the workout and just staying engaged and just making sure that you're doing all the things that you want to do but it also helps with rest times too because a lot of times i see people for women typically they're not resting long enough and then for men they end up resting too long or they're just wasting time because we've all been there like You finish the set, you get on your phone, you're scrolling, and then you realize seven minutes have passed and you need to do your next set. So you go back, you lift, but now you're less engaged. you're not really focused on what you're doing. You have to like amp yourself back up, focus back in, and you're just not getting as good of a workout. So using a timer and just having that visual to keep you accountable and just keep the flow of the workout working better can help to give you better results over time.
Speaker: Number 13, right along with this put your phone on D&D during runs or workouts. You'll get better workouts, you'll be better focused, and you'll also be doing what's called less task switching. So you probably heard that you can't really multitask. You can multitask on things that are not closely linked. So for example, like if you're walking and talking on the phone, like you can do two things at once. But if you're trying to constantly do two things at once or you're switching back and forth that takes mental energy and that takes you out of the flow and that requires more focus more energy so again if you're in that situation where you're constantly looking at your phone going back and forth from workout to phone workout to phone you're probably not going to feel like you're as in to that workout and getting as much out of that workout if you would just not be on your phone and i'm so not saying that you can never do that like there's definitely times where i'm on my phone during a workout or have to check something or i hop on there for whatever reason i got a text or something but for the most part i really like to try to stay off like social media or stay off different things like that while i'm on my phone because i notice that my workouts are just better i think this is one of the reasons that i really enjoy running because it's really hard to be on your phone i mean you can do it like they answer a text while on a run or something like that but
Speaker: for the most part, like when I'm on a run, I'm not on my phone. Like I can't be on my phone. I have to be in that moment. I have to be running. I have to be focused on what I'm doing. And that just takes your mind somewhere else. It allows you to actually just relax a little bit, give you some time without screen or different inputs coming in. And I think that's something that a lot of us miss now we're always on screens we're always focused on these things we always have all this input coming in we have people that want to get a hold of us we have social media we have all these things so we never give our mind just time to kind of idle or focus on other things and i think that's something that a lot of us miss and when you have all that input coming in for too long and you never give your mind a chance to just relax or have a break or focus on something else we kind of start to lose that ability and we notice that it starts to affect our mind and our mental health and different things like that so Simple little thing to try is just to put your phone on D&D. I'm very, very confident saying you will have better workouts if you do that.
Speaker: Number 14, squeeze the bar or the handle as hard as you can. This does something that seems like it makes you stronger almost instantly, but it's called irradiation. And all this means is that by gripping something really tight, it forces you to engage other muscles. And so you create more tension and you create more stability, and then you're able to produce more force.
Speaker: So it seems like you are stronger. So for example, let's say you are going to do a bench press. If you squeeze that bar super, super tight, like as hard as you can, you will notice all different types of muscles start to line up. So your forearms and then your biceps and then your lats and your shoulders, even like your lower back. If you do it like with your glutes and your lower body, you'll just feel like you're a lot more stable and a lot stronger. And you do this just by squeezing really hard. So you can do this on tons of different exercises and you'll notice when you do this. You not only feel stronger, but you may actually even be able to get an extra rep at different times. So you're able to push a little bit more, and do a little bit more volume, get those sets closer to failure.
Speaker: And again, you can do this on any exercise where you're gripping things. So you could do this on upper body stuff like pull ups, like bench press, like rows. You could do this on deadlifts. You could do this even on like squats. When you're under the bar, you could hold the bar really hard.
Speaker: All different types of things where you're gripping a bar or a handle or a dumbbell. If you're using this little tip, you will feel stronger. Number 15, use back offsets. What I mean by back offsets is let's say you go in and you have three sets on the lat pulldown.
Speaker: you're taking these sets really close to failure, you're working really hard. Let's say you have sets of eight to 10 that you're trying to do. So you do your first set, you rest a couple of minutes, you do your second set, you rest a couple minutes. Let's say on that first set, you get nine reps. On that second set, you only get seven reps.
Speaker: If you did this third set with that same exact weight, you're probably only going to get five reps, maybe six reps. So you're not getting as close to that eight to 10 rep range that we want to get. So rather than using the same weight, you could do what's called a back offset. So for that third set, you take that weight down, let's say 10 to 20%. This way you're actually able to get more reps because again, we want to put what's called mechanical tension on our muscles so that we can build muscle. That is what builds muscle is creating that tension. And if I'm only able to get five reps on that last set, I might be a little bit better off by lowering that weight. So I'm able to get a few more reps. And so my form doesn't get too sloppy. So I'm able to just create a little bit more tension and see better results over time. So this is something I'll do quite a bit. And I've just done it sort of by experience. Like the more that you lift, the more that you just realize, okay, I just did two really hard sets. I know that if I try to do this third set, I'm barely going to be able to get any reps in this set. I'm not going feel like I get as much out of it. So instead of just using that same exact weight, I'll use a lighter weight and I'll just go for more reps on my last set. Something that I really like using and it's something that I've mentioned to clients to try and lot of people really like this method as well. Number 16, train with somebody else. Lifting partner, a coach, a group, anything like that works because you will go harder, you will lift more, you will challenge yourself more, you will do some of those things that you don't necessarily want to do.
Speaker: And we've all probably been in this situation. If you play team sports, you know exactly how this works. If you've ever lifted with a group, you know that it's much easier to push yourself when there's other people around. And if you're doing this constantly, you're going to see better results over time. One of the things that I think a lot of people fall into is that they're just not seeing the results that they want to see because they are just going through the motions. Like if you're lifting by yourself all the time, it's really hard to stay motivated and to train really hard when you're doing it alone all the time. But if you're in a group, I hear this too, like now that I train in a gym and I train people in a group setting, a lot of people say that the reason that they come in and they really like coming in and training with other people is because it's much easier to push themselves. They always push themselves harder when there's a coach telling them that they can do a little bit more, when they can do a few extra reps, when they can do a little bit more weight.
Speaker: And there's other people that are doing this hard thing with them. So when they're going through a brutal exercise or a circuit of exercises, they're not just struggling alone. They're doing it with other people and seeing other people do it is motivating. If you're a little bit competitive like I am, seeing other people do a lot of weight or doing it faster than you are doing it can be super motivating. So training with someone else from time to time can be really helpful. in helping you to just see better progress over time. There's a reason why the best athletes in the world have coaches. There's a reason why a lot of people who are like bodybuilders or different things like that, they will train with other people or have a training partner because it's easier to push yourself when you have other people.
Speaker: Number 17, use drop sets, rest pause sets, or density sets. There's two main reasons that I use these. And these are just simple little, what I call modifiers or intensifiers when it comes to lifting weights. So drop sets would be like, let's say you are doing a dumbbell bench press. Let's say you do a set of 10.
Speaker: You hit that set of 10 and then you are going to grab, let's say the 35s and then you're going to max out and do as many as you can with barely any rest in between there. A rest pause set would be I'm gonna use the same weight, but I'm going to do a quick rest and then do a few more reps. So example, I might be on a cable row machine. Let's say I have 150 pounds on there. I do 12 reps. I rest for about 10 to 15 seconds and then I keep that same exact weight on there and I'm gonna try to get a few more reps. So let's say I get five reps. And then maybe I do that again and then I get another five reps. So that would be what's a rest pause set. And then a density set would be like I set a timer and I'm just trying to get as many reps as much or as much volume as possible in that set. So let's say, for example, want to do pushups. I'm going to set a three minute timer and I'm trying to just get as many reps of pushups as I can in that three minutes. I can do them in any kind of sets that I want. I can rest as much as I want. I can do sets of 10 or 15 or 20. can do a set of 20 and then rest and a set of 10 and then rest and a set of 20. There's no real rules around it. You just have a certain amount of time and you're trying to get more volume in that amount of time. There's two main reasons that I like using these things. One, if you're short on time, it's a way to cut down on some of the time that you spend in the gym. So very so similar to supersets. It's just a good way to save some time. And number two is they're just fun and they keep things more engaging. So changing up your training a little bit, adding a little bit of variety, doing something that's a little bit and different can help to just keep you engaged in your workouts and make them fun and enjoyable because that's a big part of this is just being able to do things that you enjoy doing and actually like how you're training will help you to get better results over time. These things aren't magical. And for a very long time, like bodybuilders and different people like that used to swear that these things would give you way better muscle building benefits and things like that. And when you look at the studies, there's just not a lot of evidence to support that. But that doesn't mean that they are detrimental either. Like if you enjoy doing these things and if you want to throw these in to save yourself a little bit of time, then I think there's a time and a place to use these things.
Speaker: Number 18, set up minimum weekly workout target. Be flexible in how this gets done, but as long as you get your workout sessions done in a weekly period, you are getting the work done, you're getting the volume in, you're getting the sets in, you're getting the reps in, you are going to see progress over time. Because if you look at anybody who's built a lot of muscle or got really fit or got really strong, a huge part of that is just being consistent for a very long period of time. As I mentioned at the very beginning of this podcast, Four workouts a week has been my standard for a very long time. And so I hit that target 99% of the time. It's very, very rare that I don't get my four workouts in unless that is something that I plan ahead of time because I know that it's something that I can do.
Speaker: I know that it's going to give me the results that I want and I know it's going help me feel how I want to feel. So that is my target. And how I get those done is flexible. Like there's some days where I'll take a rest day or recovery day or something comes up where I'm not able to get my workout in. So I'll push the workout back.
Speaker: We're all sometimes there's even different times where I'll do two workouts in one day. Now you don't have to do that, but I'm just saying having some sort of weekly minimum target is super helpful. I think for most people, this is going to be two to three times a week. It's a really good place to start. And I think just with understanding that you can get. tons of really good health benefits with working out just twice a week. I think sometimes people underestimate just how much better they can improve their health or just see those benefits with even just two really good strength workouts per week. So maybe for you, it's two times a week, maybe it's three times a week, but just make sure that it's something that you can do consistently no matter what, whether you're busy, whether you're stressed, whether you have a ton of stuff going on, like you want to make this a target that you can hit no matter what and make that your weekly target. And then later on, if you want to go from two to three or three to four, then by all means do that. But I think having this baseline, no matter what's going on, unless I plan this ahead of time, these are the amount of workouts that I'm going to get in per week. You can
Speaker: build or at the very, very least maintain all the progress that you've made, the muscle you've built, the strength, all that stuff on two workouts a week. Number 19, we got, i think three or four left.
Speaker: Use the 80-20 rule for your workouts. So I've talked about the 80-20 rule with diet. This is something a little bit different where with your workouts, I think, again, you want to do things that you enjoy doing. You're not going to love everything that you do in a workout and As I'll mention here in a little bit, there's a lot of things that I've done in weightlifting or with fitness or with different things like that, that I actually hated when I started, but now they're things that I do routinely. But I think when you are working out, trying to get 80% the stuff that you like and look forward to, that should make up the bulk of your workout. And then 20% of the stuff is maybe stuff that you don't love, maybe things that you avoid, but things that you probably need. So maybe certain exercises, maybe it's a certain muscle group. Maybe it's a certain style of exercise, something like that, because you want to play the long game when it comes to exercise. And the way that you do that is to actually enjoy what you do.
Speaker: Once you understand the main principles of exercise, like progressive overload, once you understand those things, the methods that you use to get there, like the exercises, the rep schemes, the style of training, using machines versus free weights, all that stuff is really interchangeable. Like once you understand progressive overload, as long as you are following that principle, the method is whatever, like you can do whatever you want. There's this old saying that I heard that's always kind of stuck with me. And it said, methods are many, principles are few. The methods may change, but the principles never do. Once you know the principles of something, as long as your method is within that principle, you can use it. And since there's so many different methods, styles of training in this example, you can pick the one that you actually like.
Speaker: because as long as you are progressively overloading you're getting stronger you're building muscle you're getting fitter you're getting healthier you're looking better then you're probably on the right track and there's a lot of ways that you can do this i think for a long time and even today sometimes people will overthink these things or get too far into the weeds or think about all the little intricacies or little details but there was a really really long period of time um where we didn't know a whole lot about lifting weights when you think about the meatheads who just wanted to throw some weight around those guys got huge now they might not have always did the right thing But one thing that they did was they progressively overloaded. They were consistent and they were intense. And they also really liked what they were doing. So they got really good results. They didn't know all the science. They didn't know all the studies. They didn't know all those different things. But they were doing something that they actually enjoyed doing and they worked really hard at it. and If you can do that with your workouts, you're to see really good progress.
Speaker: Number 20, don't skip your cardio. I know that people think about cardio and they think about just like building up their endurance, but it actually has carryover to your workouts and to your strength workouts as well. If you're in better shape, that means you have a bigger capacity to do more work.
Speaker: Or in other words, you can do more volume. If somebody is very out of shape, even something lifting weights where a majority of your time is spent resting can be very difficult if it's a real struggle for you to recover in between sets or in between workouts or different things like that. and improving your cardio will help to increase your capacity and just give you more energy and allow you to recover better between workouts between sets all that different stuff is going to help you to be able to do more in the gym and see better results over time when you think about it like this like healthy people are active people and the more active you are the fitter you become and so including some cardio is only going to help you when it comes to
Speaker: increasing muscle mass, getting good results in the gym, being able to push yourself a lot more in the gym. And so having just a good baseline level of cardio, so doing things like getting your 10,000 steps a day as just a very bare minimum, and then also starting to add in some lower levels of cardio two to three times a week, something that's lower intensity. So maybe it's jogging maybe it's biking maybe it's the elliptical maybe it's swimming maybe maybe it's rowing doing that for 20 30 40 minutes at a time couple times per week is super beneficial and then maybe even adding in some higher intensity type of stuff once or twice a week so things where you're getting your heart rate way up just to help you improve your cardio so that you can also see better results in the gym
Speaker: Number 22, or excuse me, number 21, we got two left. Don't be afraid to try new things. You will suck at a lot of things, especially at first, but don't write things off right away or don't be afraid to be bad at things for a while.
Speaker: I was really bad at running. I was really bad at pull-ups. I do not like mobility and I have gotten much better at all of those things. Like when I started, i couldn't do a pull-up. Now I can do a pull-up with a hundred pounds around my waist. When I started running, hated it, was not good at it, have gotten a lot better at it. Mobility is something that is starting to grow on me. I still don't enjoy it, but it's something I'm getting better at because I see the value in it. So just because you don't like things originally, you have to give it a sufficient amount of time to actually get better at that thing. And when you get better at something, there's a good chance that you're going to like it more. I had to laugh a little bit the other day because all the things that I started my morning doing were things that I absolutely hated at one time. So a lot of mornings I'll wake up, I'll have some coffee, I'll do a little bit of mobility, and then I'll go on to run.
Speaker: I literally hated all those things for majority of my life. I didn't like coffee, don't like mobility, hated running. Now I'm doing all those things regularly. And to be honest, like I enjoy those things most of the time.
Speaker: because I let myself be bad at those things for a while and i actually put in some time to get decent at those things, seeing the value in those things. And now they're not things that I hate as much anymore. So I say that because when you get into the gym, when you start lifting weights, there'll be a lot of things that you don't enjoy, but you have to try them for a while. A big theme or a big common trend that I keep coming back to in this podcast is doing things that you like, but just because you don't like it originally, if you don't like it the first time you do it or the first week,
Speaker: Even the first month, sometimes that doesn't necessarily mean that you should write it off right away. You have to give these things a little bit of time to get better at these things, actually learn the skills of these things, see the value in them. um then once you've had a sufficient amount of time to actually judge whether or not it's something that you want to continue to do, then you can make that decision, I think, in a little bit better mindset.
Speaker: Last one of the podcast, train for something. Have a goal, have a reason, have a why. Something that keeps you motivated or engaged is super important to staying consistent and training hard at something. So for some people, that's a race. For some people, that's an event, maybe a powerlifting meet or high rocks or CrossFit competition. For some people, maybe it's a certain milestone. For other people, it might be learning a new skill, getting up their first pull up or something like that. Maybe it's hitting a new PR. Maybe it's something completely different, being able to play with your kids pain-free or not being out of breath when you go up the stairs or being able to go on a long hike with your friends. like It doesn't really matter what it is, but having some reason or some why or some goal to train for, i think is important to help you be consistent and to train hard.
Speaker: I recently had this experience because like I've been lifting for a really long time and lifting in the last year or so has just gotten a little bit more, i won't say boring, but it's just not as engaging to me. And that's a huge reason why I've started to shift a little bit more into focusing on running. because i needed something to focus on again to challenge me to really get me excited about just doing something that was physically challenging me and continuing to help my health both because i'm always going to lift weights that's always going to be part of my routine but if i was just lifting weights right now without a goal or without doing something else i just know that i wouldn't be getting as much out of it as i want because i'm not super motivated at the moment to be in the gym and Hopefully down the line, you know, I'll find a new goal or there'll be something that comes along that gets me excited about being in there again and gets me really amped up to train and lift heavy or do whatever. But I think just having some sort of goal to train towards is really helpful in seeing really good results. And With that being said, that is 22 of the tips. This one went a little bit longer. It's probably the longest podcast that I've done in quite some time, but hopefully you were able to gain some knowledge or a few tips or something that you can try right away. That is always the goal of this podcast is to give you some information that you can apply to yourself right away because the quicker that you can apply it, implement it, start solidifying that to actually help you, the more that that is probably going to stick. And so hopefully there was something in here. I think just summing this up like two main things that I kept coming back to was just understanding progressive overload, like training hard and getting close to failure is the most important thing when you want to look better, when you want to build muscle, when you want to improve your health. When you understand that you can cut through a lot of BS, different tips and different things that you hear. It doesn't help that one principle that it probably doesn't have a ton of value.
Speaker: Number two, consistency and intensity are two of the most important parts of seeing results. Since that is the case, you want to do more things that you like because you will train harder and you will get better results. So listening to music that you like while you work out, following a good program that you like, doing exercise that you like, lifting with people that you like. lifting at a gym that you like using rep ranges that you like using different exercises or different things like that that you like trying to find more of the things that you like is going to help you with this whole process to help you make this a lifestyle and be able to do this for a really long period of time so don't be afraid to try new things don't be afraid to try some of these different tips or tricks that i've thrown in this podcast or things that you hear from other people because it'll take a while to find a lot of things that you like or find a style that you like or different things like that so don't be afraid to just try some new things and with that being said as always i appreciate you listening the one-on-one coaching link is in the show notes if you found this valuable or think somebody that you know could get some good pointers out of this you can share this with them leave reviews all that good stuff continue to grow this show but i appreciate you listening and we will see you next week
