The 8 Things I Did to Melt Off Body Fat

Before the move back to Cleveland in late March, I knew my body fat was the highest it had been in a long time. For the first time, probably ever, I didn't like to have my shirt off around people and I really didn't like what I saw in the mirror in the morning. I knew I had let myself go with the stress of managing a team, less emphasis on my workouts, and eating like an absolute asshole. The change of pace in my life that came after the move was the perfect opportunity to refocus on losing fat, getting shredded, and getting confidence back.

I not only decided that I was going to lose fat, but that I was going to use EVERYTHING I knew about fat loss all at once and see how fast I could get shredded. I put those things into a list in a general order of importance for you all. Number 1 is the most important and can get you some results and number 7 will do damn near NOTHING if you don't have the rest of the list down. There can be some leeway in the order but overall it sits pretty well. Bottom line is make sure you start at the top of the list and, once you've got that one down, work your way down. As for my results so far, I started this 2 weeks before I got to Cleveland but did not do my body fat. My first week a Life Time the Inbody put me at 15.1% and yesterday it put me at 11.6% which is a 3.5% decrease in 4 weeks. The goal is under 10% on the Inbody ASAP. Now to the list. 

1.Eat real food

This is the obvious place to start. Stop eating garbage and start eating things that are actual food. Clearly we all know this, but when it really hit home for me was when I was listening to a podcast with Mike Dolce (you'll probably hear that name a lot in this post) and he said "Stop poisoning yourself with synthetic chemicals, artificial sweeteners, and artificial colors. Just stop poisoning yourself". At that time, my meal prep wasn't super existent and I was living off of protein bars and Bang at work. It struck a cord with me and I catch myself saying it in my head multiple times a day. Another great and simple way to think about it is this; eat fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, lean meat, healthy fat and whole grains in the most natural and minimally processed forms are you can. Stick to this and you will be lean and healthy, guaranteed.

Some of the swaps I personally made were to be a real adult and cook some meals, switch my post workout Gatorade powder for OJ and cranberry juice, cut out most protein bars in favor of food, and vastly reduce my energy drink consumption for black coffee and green tea.

2. Eat enough real food to start, then decrease over time

Once you've made this switch to actual food, now we need to look at amounts. Notice I don't start right away with "Eat less!' but simply "Eat enough". As crazy as it sounds, most people spend most days not eating enough total calories and their metabolisms take a beating from that (especially when those same people overeat on the weekends). So we need to get your food up to a decent baseline to start before we can cut the amount down. One of the biggest complaints I hear from extremely successful weight loss programs like the Renaissance Periodization templates or Mike Docle's "3 Weeks to Shredded" is that there is so much food at the beginning that people can't even eat it all! I do the same thing with my clients to make sure their eating up to a caloric neutral before they start to cut.

Once you're there (bodyweight should be maintaining or decreasing) then simply make small changes in the amount of food you eat each day. Based on your body type and preference, I would reduce either carbs or fat. I would definitely not reduce protein so keep that as high as ever. Make a change then give it some time. Once progress slows then reduce a little more. You really do not need to over complicate it.

The decreases I have been making have been to reduce the rice and sweet potatoes in my meal preps, and removing some of my post-cardio, pre-lifting OJ and fruit. Next week will be almost no rice in my prepped meals (probably 1/4 cup) as my next decrease.

3. Drink a lot of water

I shouldn't need to spend a lot of time on this. Water is important so drink it! Plus, when you finally give your body the amount of water it wants, you'll actually reduce your bloating and water weight because your body won't feel the need to hold on to as much. That alone can make you look leaner! I usually recommend 1 gallon a day to most people so buy a reusable water bottle (preferably not plastic, I don't care if it says "BPA Free") and math it out to see how many you need to drink a day. Don't forget to add extra for workouts and more is not always better so you don't need to be putting away 2-3 gallons a day.

4. Progressive overload based resistance training 

Notice that this is ahead of cardio of a list about fat loss. Weight training will not only build more muscle to help you burn more calories, but it will also give your body better signals about storing and burning fat, as well as have powerful hormonal effects to get and keep you lean. Ideally, you should start a program that uses a lot of compound movements, has varying rep ranges, utilizes tempo time-under-tension techniques, and follows progressive overload. If you want all of that in one then keep and eye out for the release date of the Herceg Size Cycle 2.0 coming in the next few weeks. It has all of the above plus more! Fill out that annoying pop-up you probably clicked away from if you want access to a copy for yourself.

5. Fasting morning LISS

For a long time I thought fasted cardio was useless. Not that it was bad, just not any more effective than fed cardio. This opinion was based on people I trust and a meta-analysis of a ton of studies on both forms of cardio. BUT, when enough of the majorly influential fitness people in your life say they use it with everyone who wants to get lean, you set your ego aside and take a listen. Primarily, those two people were Jason Ferruggia and Mike Dolce, who I know you've seen pop up a few times in my blogs and posts. Check them both out for some awesome info. 

Long story short, Low Intensity Steady State Cardio (LISS) in a fasted state can be beneficial for fat loss. The LOW intensity part is super important and I think where most people mess this up. At lower heart rates, your body is more likely to use fat as a fuel source. Combine that with a fasted state (thus a lack of insulin) and your body is in the best state to burn fat. Again, more is not better so aim for a heart rate between 90 and 110 BPM. Too much higher and your body will begin to use carbs to fuel your workout. 

I have been cycling my LISS to prevent burnout so mine looks like this.

Monday: 60 minutes

Tuesday: 45 minutes

Wednesday: 30 minutes

Thursday: 60 minutes

Friday: 45 minutes

Saturday: 30 minutes

Sunday: off

I do 3 miles per hour and adjust the incline to what I need to keep my heart rate in that zone. This cycle also pairs perfectly with my weight lifting program and gives me a ton of time to listen to podcast and learn. It was actually where I came up with the idea for this post as well as a lot of other cool things to come!

6. Carb cycling based on activity

This is what Precision Nutrition would call a "Level 2 strategy" and something that most people shouldn't need to worry about. But since I want to get stupid lean this year I added it in. Basically, carbs are your main fuel source for your workouts so some days require more than others. Simply, you eat more carbs on the days where your workouts take more energy and less carbs on the days your workouts take less energy. I eat the most carbs on Mondays (Squats, legs, and core) and the least carbs on Thursday, and Sundays (off days). The other days stay pretty even as they are all about the same energy expenditure.

7. Supplements

Sometimes, this is the first thing people default to and skip aaaaalll these other steps above. Really, any fat loss supplements will not do very much and will do damn near nothing if steps 1-6 are not in check. If you have every one of these other steps down, there are some products I like by the company 1st Phorm that you can try. I started this cut with the DB-Overdrive Fastpack and since have gone back to a stack I've used in the past, the Royal 21 King System. Both are similar but the DB comes with a greens powder which is cool, and the 21 King comes with a sleep supplement that I personally love. Both seem good so far but the DB is a newer product are probably more potent.

8. Green tea

Last thing on this list is green tea. Clearly the least important (could be swapped with 7) but it is something I added recently so I wanted to talk about it. This is another Dolce recommendation which he mentioned in a podcast and added to his "3 Weeks to Shredded" book. Basically, I added green tea to my meals 3 times a day. Green tea and green tea extract (found in many fat burners) has been said to have some thermogenic properties and can aid in some fat loss. According to Mr. Dolce 1 cup is good, 2 is better, but 3 is where you start to see some real fat loss benefits. 

Outside of that, green tea is just genuinely healthy and most people can benefit from it. I bought Salada organic green tea for a good price on sale and have been drinking that. 

So there you have it! Everything I've been doing to melt off body fat so I was able to regain my confidence and get ready for summer! Give these a try and don't forget to start from the top of the list!

Top 5 Tips for Every Aspect of Fitness

What's up y'all? First post back since my 84 day trek. I'll be posting about once or twice a week now just to keep getting you guys good info and working on different types of posts outside of just blogging. I've definitely been using Instagram more, mostly because of the increased post engagement vs Facebook, so make sure you're following me on there if you're not you can find me at

@Greg.the.Trainer

Today I wanted to do something basic and important and give you my top 5 tips for every aspect of fitness; Nutrition, Resistance Training, Cardiovascular Training, and Lifestyle. If I had to give someone a 5 minute breakdown of the most important aspects of each one this is what I would tell them. I'll post in list form for convenience then go into a small bit of detail in each one.

Nutrition

• Eat real food most of the time: fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds, lean meats, and healthy fats. This is healthy nutrition in it's most simple form. EAT REAL FOOD! That basically covers it. It's ok to stray sometimes but the vast majority of the time should be spent eating real, nutritious foods.
• Eat protein and veggies first and at each meal. This should be your priority each meal, regardless of goals. If you don't directly track macros then a good goal is 1-2 palm sized servings of protein and 1-2 cups of veggies each meal. 
• Eat slowly and pay attention to your food. This is a great way to eat less food, just eat slower. If you've ever eaten with chop sticks you'll know exactly what I mean. You can also try putting your fork down in between bites. Also, practice eating without any distractions (phone, tv, computer) and think about the food you're eating. 
• Eat based on your workout each day. If you have a harder workout, eat more carbs, if you don't workout, don't eat so many carbs. The harder the workout, the more carbs you get because you need to fuel your workouts. 
• Start tracking your food but learn not to have to. Tracking your food is important when you're just starting and is great for learning portion size and daily intake. Although I recommend everyone do this as the beginning, tracking should be something you wean off of as you actually learn portions and good habits. 

Resistance Training

• Focus on compound, multi-joint exercises. Squat, deadlift, push, pull, carry, rotate. These things should make up most of your program with some accessory work following. Perfect these exercises to the best of your ability and do them often.
• Try to get as strong as possible. Strong people live longer and strength is the most important controllable factor in longevity. You should be trying to get as strong as you can in the movement patterns listed above. 
• Try to build muscle, even if you're trying to lose fat. Muscle is extremely healthy and increasing muscle mass is one of the healthiest things you can do for yourself. Not to mention it makes you look awesome. 
• Keep workouts short and intense. Don't waste your time on 12 different chest exercises and 8 different bicep curls. Try to keep workouts around an hour using mostly the movement patterns listed above. 
• Lift 3-5 times per week. This will cover it for most people. Lifting more will not mean better progress and you need time to let yourself recover. Rest days are when your muscles heal and get bigger so make sure you have a few each week. That doesn't mean don't exercise, just don't have a hard lift. 

Cardiovascular Training

• Some days do low intensity, some days do moderate intensity, some days to high intensity. Variability is key here and no one form of cardio is terribly superior to the others. Walking is underrated as a form of cardio and is one of my favorites, but so is High Intensity Interval Training. To get the best results use a variety. 
• Cardio is great for health and performance but not great fat loss. This is one thing I need to try and break so many people of: you can't just do more cardio and expect to lose fat, as overall research shows it doesn't do much. This doesn't mean you should skip cardio, but just go into it with the right intentions. Cardio is great for increasing heart and lung strength as well as increasing recovery ability from resistance training. 
• Do it separately or the same day as lifting. For longer sessions you might want to do it on it's own day, which makes a good active recovery day, but shorter sessions can be don in conjunction with lifting. Do it before or after lifting, whichever you prefer. 
• Get outside sometimes. Don't spend all your time in a gym! Get outside for a walk, run, bike ride or water sport and get into nature, you'll be happier and healthier the more often you do this. 
• Do what you enjoy and stick to it. It doesn't matter what the "best" or "most effective" workout is if you're not going to do it. There's 1,000 different ways to do cardio so find what you enjoy because that's what you're going to stick with. 

Lifestyle 

• Reduce stress as much as possible. Stress, the bad kind, will make you fat. I have a full post planned for this but for now know that you should be trying to reduce stress as much as you can. Breathing exercises and daily meditation or two great ways that I do this.
• Sleep 7-9 hours every night. Not sleeping will also make you fat and it will kill you. Everyone has their excuses for not getting sleep but I don't want to hear it, I'm up at 4am every week day and still get my hours in. Want some good news? Naps count towards this. There's research showing that daily total hours is more important than just overnight hours. 
• Focus on building good habits, not quick progress. Health is a lifelong goal, not a short term sprint. Although everyone wants to lose weight right now, you need to think about building good, healthy habits that will keep you strong and healthy forever. 
• Get outside. Yes this is on here twice because it's important. Even if you're not working out outside you still should get some sun every day. One recommendation I liks is 20 minutes of sun and outdoors each and every day. 
• Move as much as possible. This one is big, maybe the biggest, at least from a health standpoint. Not moving will also make you fat and kill you and you need to try to move as much as possible. Just hitting a 1 hour workout a few times a week won't do much of anything is you're spending the other 23 hours a day sitting on your butt. Get up and move as much as possible each and every day. 

If you embrace each of these things you're setting yourself up for a long and healthy life, not to mention a hot body. Work your way through the list and see what you can do for each one. If you need help of have questions please reach out to me as I would love to help you. There's so much garbage information out there so I'll help you sort through it and find the good stuff.

What Works for You Doesn't Work for Everyond 82/84

I just wanted to write up a quick post to remind everyone of something; what works for you will not necessarily work for everyone, and whats working for you right how will not necessarily work forever. This can be about diet or exercise, both of which will change often during our lives. This goes back to my post a few days ago about the 3 goals of nutrition. Goals change and how you respond to stimuli changes, you must be ready to accept these changes and have a plan for when they come.

This thought also should raise up a big red flag to any quick fixes or blanket diets/ programs that spout off about how well they work.  Obviously, just because they worked for whoever is selling them doesn't mean they will work for you. This should also raise an even bigger flag to people who promote diets/ programs that they did and say you can get results like them if you use it!

Everyone is going to respond to things differently and that means that professionals like myself need to be ready to adapt with their clients. You need to have multiple nutrition programs that work as well as multiple exercise program options. And you need to be able to move through these fluidly and adjust to your clients needs so you can serve them the best. Have knowledge of keto, vegan, Paleo, IF, and traditional diets as well as having knowledge of bodybuilding, CrossFit, powerlifting, and endurance sports. You don't have to be an expert in each but you need to know enough to find what's best for you and your clients.

How I Lost 20 Pounds Without Cardio 81/84

It's about that time of year again and everyone knows it. The days are getting longer, the weather is warming up, and the amount of clothing you're going to wear on a daily basis is getting less and less. As you start to pack up the winter clothes and unpack your favorite summer attire, you start to notice something that concerns you.

Your favorite shirt is just a bit tighter than you like. You have just a little bit of something hanging over your favorite shorts. Your favorite summer dress just doesn't seem to sit right. You're starting to realize that you've added a couple more pounds than you had anticipated and you can no longer hid that fact under your baggy winter sweats.

So what do you do about that? You know you want to get beach ready but you don't know where to start. You probably just need to hammer out endless hours or cardio, right? Or go on some crazy restrictive diet, right? Keto, you probably have to do Keto... Right?

EDIT: I went back and made some changes to this post to reflect what I've been doing in my most recent cut. Those will be in bold just like this. The main points of the post stay the same but I felt it was good to add some new insight to this topic.

Back in March 2018, I decided that I was tired of not having all of my abs and that it was time for me to go through I cut to drop my body fat down again. At that point, I was on a maintenance phase after massing up to over 250lbs while keeping my body fat relatively low, just over 10% or so. Through that maintenance phase I started to get pretty lax on my diet and my body fat started to go up, just enough to bug me. For years I was super lean, getting down as low as 4.9% body fat in college, and maintaining that through CrossFit for a long time. I was very used to being lean, I prided myself on it,  and I wanted to get down back where I was. I also wanted to prove a point, actually a couple.

Those two points were these; that I wouldn't need to do cardio to lose fat, and that I didn't need to count my macros and track my food. I greatly dislike cardio, as most people do, and I wanted to see what kind of damage I could do to my body fat without it. Through these last few months, not counting playing volleyball, I did probably 2-3 bouts of actually cardio, and usually just to get my last few MYZONE MEPs for the month to stay on track. It's safe to say that what little I did did not really contribute much to my weight loss. Main edit number 1, this cut I added in fasted walking 5-6 times a week to my fat loss journey. In the past, I was not a fan of fasted cardio and, based on the research I read, it was no more beneficial than fed cardio, and neither of them did a ton for overall fat loss. But when two of your most followed and most respected mentors in this field can effectively explain how and why they use fasted cardio for their clients, you can give it a chance. Simply enough, all I did was 30-60 minutes of low intensity stead state (LISS) walking each morning, keeping my heart rate between 90 and 120 bpm. I have done very little moderate or HIIT conditioning outside of this so far. 

As for point number two, there's absolutely nothing wrong with tracking food, I think everyone needs to do it in some fashion until they can learn what good portion sizes are and how to eat without it. You see, that's the end goal, you should be able to live your life without having to keep track of everything you eat. And you should be able to stay lean and healthy without it. At the point where I was, I had been tracking my food a lot prior, for years, and had a very good idea of how much protein, carbs, and fat to eat each meal. I also had an idea built into my head of how I was going to reduce calories throughout my cut, starting with decreasing fat intake and then in to decreasing carbs when I needed to. Main edit number two, I absolutely prioritized real food in every meal. My goal is to eat as much whole and minimally processed food as possible while still fitting in the general guidelines in the rest of this post. Real food needs to be the goal ALWAYS. Examples would be swapping out Gatorade powder for orange and cranberry juice, and reducing my absolute reliance on energy drinks and protein bars. I still use protein powder a couple times a day for convenience sake for now. 

Those were to two experiments I wanted to do but that's not all that went into it. As you guys probably know, I love intermittent fasting so I was obviously going to use that to help me. I extend the time of my fast so I basically ate when I was finished with my morning clients, which usually got me home and eating around 12-1. I also added a ton more veggies into my meals and prioritized them along with protein. I started each meal by eating my protein and veggies first, then eating my carbs and fats. Main edit number three is that I did not use intermittent fasting this time around. Due to my new schedule in Cleveland, IF didn't make sense as I had to workout earlier in the day. I simply added some steel cut oats, fruit, protein, greens, and juice after my cardio and before my lift. 

For my workouts I did an average of 4 strength training days per week. Nothing crazy, just basic bodybuilding and strength training sessions to help me maintain muscle. The intensity wasn't even as high as you would expect and some sessions were only about 45 minute long. Generally, I went 2 upper body and 1-2 lower body days working up to only 2-3 heavy top end sets.

Here was my plan written out in list form

- Extend fast to 12-1:00pm
- Eat more veggies and make them a priority  (1-2 cups per meal)
- Eat enough protein
- Eat some fat but reduce the amount as cut progresses
- Eat slightly less carbs than I was, usually 1-2 servings of fruit and 1 serving whole grains
- Very little cardio
- Lifting workouts focused on maintaining muscle and building up problem areas
- Strategic cheats days later in Cut
- Daily weigh-in when I got to work each morning

That's what I stuck to for about 4 months to drop about 20 pounds from my highest at 256 to my lowest at 236. Now I've been sitting around 238 on average and I'm pretty happy here. In fact, I'm happier with the way I look now than I have been in a long time. The best part about this is that I didn't do anything that anyone reading this post can't do. There is no magic to what I did to lose that weight and get my body and confidence back. It's not too late for you to do the same but you need to start TODAY if you want to be ready for summer. Sign up for that gym, stop poisoning yourself, get a Coach. There's still time to get beach ready but don't wait any longer! If you have any questions about this process of my experience, or if you want any help with your own weight loss journey then please let me know! I'm always happy to help.

A Better Way to Get Strong 79/84

Are you looking to hit new heights and break records with your strength? Then there's a programming technique that you're probably missing out on. Even if strength is not your main goal, this program can make you more durable and help prevent injury. The program is called Triphasic Training and it was invented by a man named Cal Dietz. Cal is the head Strength and Conditioning Coach at the University of Minnesota and one of the smartest dudes around. The full details of the program are listed in his book "Triphasic Training" but I will to over the basics and show you how you can add it to your program.

Triphasic Training gets its name from the three phases of a muscle contraction during a lift. These are the concentric, isometric, and eccentric contractions. The concentric is the shortening of the muscle, the part when you're doing the work and lifting the weight. Think of standing up in a squat. The isometric is when you're not moving and transitioning from eccentric to concentric. Think of the bottoms of a squat. And the eccentric is the lengthening or lowering portion of the lift, or going down into a squat. Most training focuses primarily on the concentric, but Cal realized that if you take time to train each phase then you can see crazy gains in strength and durability.

The process to this is actually surprisingly simple. Here's what Cal recommends and what I've used a number of times now

2 weeks of slow eccentric training (go down slow)
2 weeks of isometric training (pause after you go down)
Continue with normal concentric training

That's it, that's all you have to change to see massive strength gains. 2 weeks of slow Hell and 2 weeks of pauses on your main lifts. Cal started using these for things like squats, RDLs, bench, rows, and pull-ups but eventually realized you can make even more gains by doing it with every exercise. If you're an beginner, I would not recommend  jumping right into eccentric training, but to get through an adaptation phase first where you're learning the basics. If you're an intermediate or advanced lifter then this technique can help you bust plateaus and hit new PRs. I've even taken it and added it to the Herceg Strength Cycle to make it even more effective that it was before.

As far as injury prevention, Cal has reported that some teams boast about a 70% decrease in injury after this type of training. Although that is not common, it has happened. The reason that Triphasic Training helps prevent injury is because it helps build the strength on the connective tissue just as much as the strength of the muscle. This means that, unlike most training programs, the muscle strength is not developing at a rate that the ligaments and tendons can't keep up with.

If you're someone who's prone to injury or has a certain issue that needs addressed like a knee problem then Triphasic can have a real benefit for you. Abs of course, if you just want to get stupid string then this is definitely a program to look in to.

The Three Goals of Dieting 78/84

What is your goal with your diet? There are many different outcomes of nutrition but most of them can be categorized into three different goals. Each one of these has their benefits and they all have some crossover with each other but there are definite differences between each one. The three different goals are; body composition, performance, and health/ longevity. Let's take a look at the benefits of each as well as where to start.

- Body Composition

This refers to any changes you want to make to body fat and muscle mass. The most important dietary factors here are total calories and macronutrients as these are the two things that have the most effect on body comp. You absolutely have to eat the correct amount of food and have it partitioned in the correct ways to see the best results here. The foods you eat don't make a super huge difference as long as the numbers are hit. That being said I would always aim to get 90% of your food from fruits, veggies, whole grains, lean meats and healthy fats.

To start with a body comp diet I like to recommend a pretty even diet of moderate to high protein, moderate carbs and moderate fats. From here, changes can be made in carb and fat levels to increase muscle mass or decrease body fat. Usually I will add or subtract fats because they have the most calories per gram, so a small difference in foods makes a bigger difference in total calories. Just like in anything, finding what works did you is important but I would aim to keep protein higher, around .7g per pound to 1.0 grams per pound each day.

- Performance

This refers to anyone who wants to increase athletic performance, including strength training and increasing power. This is similar to body comp in that total calories play a major roll as well as macronutrients. I would still aim at the fruits, veggies, etc above but there are some differences in macros here. The biggest thing is that carbs usually need to stay higher to optimize performance. The exception to this is for endurance based athletes who get most of their fuel from fat, but for most athletes higher carbs will be better for them. This includes strength sports and most field sports that require fast burst of energy as well as sustained movement. Moderate to high protein, moderate to high carbs and moderate to low fat works great here.

- Health and Longevity

This refers to eating to just be healthy and have a good quality of life. This usually becomes a goal after one of both of the other two have been attempted and the person is ready to focus on the most important piece. Tons of people will go through this transition and it applies to training as well. When a person is younger and mainly focuses on one of the other two goals, health is not the main priority. But once that person has finished their athletic career or gotten to a desired body composition, then priorities switch to making sure that they live a long and healthy life. I feel like this should become just about everyone's goal eventually. Unlike the other two, food composition plays a much bigger role now. Outside of total calories, the foods you eat are the most important factor in increasing health. Again 90% of foods should come from fruits, veggies, whole grains, lean meats and healthy fats but there are some macronutrient changes compared to the other goals. The big one here is that, when performance is not a concern, a low carb or ketogenic diet can be very healthy. This is also true for vegetarian and vegan diets. While I know there are a handful of bodybuilders and pro athlete who are vegans, it's probably not the best option for performance, although it is possible to still be very athletic. From a health standpoint it is extremely good and can always been considered a good option. Ironically, ketogenic diets and vegan diets are basically opposites in practice but both can be very effective for long term health. As for macros, I would still start pretty moderate and adjust to what works. Going vegan for moral reasons makes the choice obvious and trying keto for the hormonal and body composition benefits can be great as well. It all comes back to finding what works for you as an individual and being consistent with it!

The Real Benefits of Cardio 76/84

When people think cardio what's the first thing that usually comes to mind? Weight loss. Second is probably something like running a 5K or just being miserable. When you tell someone you want to lose weights what's usually the first thing you're going to hear? "You have to do more cardio!" Like it's the only thing to do to make yourself leaner.

In reality (yes I'm going to keep saying this) any kind of cardio doesn't have a major effect on fat loss. Yes there is some, but it's not what people expect. This is the same throughout any type of cardio wether it's steady state, high intensity intervals, sprint intervals, or low intensity. They all have about the same effect on fat loss and it's nothing to write home about.

So if fat loss isn't the point then what is? Do you even need to do cardio at all? What are the other benefits? To start off with, yes you still need to do cardio. It still plays a big roll in overall health and needs to be added into any exercise program in some fashion. So what is it good for?

1. Cardiovascular strength

Obviously this in the name, cardio helps build cardiovascular strength i.e. how strong your heart and lungs are. In an older post about predictors on how long you will live, I mentioned VO2max as the #2 predictor of longevity. You need to do cardio to be able to build that. Usually, for increasing VO2max, sprinting and HIIT will do more than steady state (because you're much closer to your max).

2. Increased recovery

When you do cardio, you start to develop more capillaries, which are the very ends in your veins and arteries that connect to the muscles. When you have more capillaries, your body can get nutrient to your muscles more efficiently. When you can do that, you will recover from workouts and heal faster.

3. Increased athletic performance

If you're trying to play any kind of sport at all, having a good aerobic (cardiovascular)  base will help you play better and longer. Even if your sport is mostly anaerobic like volleyball, having a better base will help you recovery between plays and allow you to express your full anaerobic abilities for longer.

Obviously there are many more benefits, especially in the health field, but these are usually the ones I discuss most with clients. So just keep in mind, just doing more cardio or conditioning without making dietary changes will not help you lose weight but there are still good benefits of doing cardio. No matter your goal you should always keep it in your training program, at least a a minimum

Eat More Food and Lose Weight 75/84

If you decided you wanted to start on a weight loss journey I bet the first thing you would say is that you needed to start eating less food. There's definitely a chance that this would be correct, but there's also a chance that it's dead wrong. There's a chance that eating less than you are now will actually kill any fat loss progress and prevent you from being able to lose fat for a while.

I'm not sure where the super-low calories diet deal started exactly, but I know that it's mentally effected just about everyone who wants to lose weight. They think if 1,800 calories means slow, consistent weight loss then 1,000 calories must mean SUPER FAST weight loss! It kind of makes sense initially but our bodies don't always work in ways that make sense to us. Instead of thinking about eating less food, start to think in terms of eating the correct amount of food. Not only will this help you build a better relationship with food, but it will also help you make the best progress overall. Plus, if you can eat more food and still lose sight then why wouldn't you? Why starve yourself more than you need too without getting any extra benefit?

People usually get pretty a little defensive when they look at the nutrition plan I write and see how much food I suggest. They often say things like "There's no way I can eat that much food", or "won't I gain weight if I eat this much?" Were so hell bent on eating no more than 1,300 calories to lose weight that the very thought of eating more is enough to turn people off. But here's the crazy thing about eating more food, it can totally work! Just under the right circumstance. I've seen this many times recently with my clients and I'll give you and example if one.

One client came to me after she had already lost a lot of weight but had hit a plateau. This is normal given that most people don't know about maintenance phases, but as we talked more I found out she had only been eating about 1,000-1,200 calories a day. No wonder she was stuck. All we did was slowly start to reintroduce calories back in, about 100 per day each week, and the weight started to fall off quick for her. What happens is that, when you eat too little, you bodies metabolic processes slow down and you burn significantly less calories each day. But, once you start to eat more, your body needs to start working again and you burn more calories. This is the example of the first circumstance when eating more is beneficial to weight loss: when you've been eating too little for too long.

The second circumstance comes back to the maintenance phase and how you need to start reintroducing calories to be able to cut again in the future. Let's say your calories start at around 1,900 and, over the course of a few months, we slowly cut them down to 1,200. Once we start the maintenance phase, we slowly start to add calories back in until we get to a point we're weight is stable, calories are high again, and we can start the next cut. This should take about the same length of time that it took to cut the weight off in the first place.  Obviously you need to closely monitor your weight during this time so you don't put too much back on and you'll be surprised how many calories you can really add without gaining any weight at all.

So the big take away is this; don't just rely on eating less, make sure you're eating to CORRECT amount of food for you to lose weight consistently. Here's my suggestion in how to do that, either email me and I'll do it for you, or try this. Use an online calculator or go into My Fitness Pal and see how many calories you burn each day. Set you BMR and activity level but when it asked for you desired weight loss per week, start at .5 pounds. Yep, avoid the urge to jump right to 2 pounds per week. Stick with this until weight loss plateaus then switch it to 1. Then 1.5. THEN 2 pounds per week after you've been through the others already.  I promise you'll still lose weight but you'll be so much happier with more food and you'll prevent yourself from doing any long term metabolic damage!

My Favorite Abs Exercises 72/84

People get pretty obsessed with training there's abs, even to a point where they have an entire day at the gym set aside to it (seriously?). Hundreds of reps of crunches, side bends, and leg lifts all for that flat stomach or ever-desired 6-pack. So how much that effort is really wasted and how is actually taking you closer to your goals?

 I've said this 1,000 times and I'll keep saying it; the only way to lose fat is to eat the correct amount of food. No amount of core exercises will ever make a difference in the appearance of your abs if you're still eating way to much to reduce that layer of flub over top of them. So what's the point? Why do so many people spend so much time on it? Honestly, it mostly seems like they're just misinformed, or know better but they're just hoping that somehow all of the science is wrong. Regardless, there's are a few good purposes or training your abs and core and a few exercises that are better than others.

Purpose 1 - Increasing core strength

This is the main purpose for what use core work for with myself and my clients. Core strength is essential for every day life as well as hitting big numbers in the gym. You'll never pull a big deadlift or hit a big squat with a weak core, so we spend time on it. It also keeps your body healthy makes sure your posture is good.

Purpose 2 - Increasing muscle size

Ok I lied (sort of). This is where core training can actually make your sixpack muscles pop a little more. Doing this won't help you lose belly fat but it will make your muscles more visible by making the muscle bigger. Obviously,  for the full effect you need to get you body fat low as well.

I always recommend people use some of each of these goals in mind when training abs so here are some of my favorite exercises for each one

Core strength
- Planks. Some people may disagree but I like planks for beginners. They teach you about maintaining a neutral spine and can build some initial strength and endurance. Once you can do a plank for 2 minutes you're probably not getting much benefit from them anymore.
- Farmers Carry or any loaded carry. Maybe one of my favorite exercises period. They build strength everywhere as well as jack up your heart rate. Plus they translate extremely well to daily life i.e. one trip grocery bags.
-  Pallof Press. A slightly more unique exercise that catches people off guard. This exercise builds oblique strength and help with anti-rotation
- Supermax Holds. More specific to powerlifters and weightlifters. This entails loading more than 100% of you 1 rep max on a bar and holding  it for a few seconds. This gets your core (and your whole body) used to feeling heavier weight.

Core Muscle Size
- Leg lifts and variations. These build size in your abs and obliques while keeping more of a neutral spine than sit-ups or crunches,  making them potentially safer versions. Start with leg lifts on your back and progress to straight leg hanging raises.
- Cable rotations. Parallel, low-to-high, high-to-low, I like them all. I use rotations on the cable machine for help build obliques in a way that is actually important in sport and daily life.
-  Full sit-ups. Way better than crunches in my opinion. Although some spinal flexion is involved, the increased range of motion and hip flexion help make it better in my opinion. If you're going to do a movement, do it full ROM
- Weighted Cable Sit-ups. The most "bro" exercise on the list but if can pack on some meat. I prefer the kneeling version when done correctly and you can really load up some weight on this one.

As you can probably tell, I'm not a huge fan of crazy exercises and variations. I like to stick with and around the basics as often as possible, they're the basics for a reason. Try adding these into your routine if you're not already or contact me and I'll do all the thinking for you. Abs don't forget, if you really want that perfect stomach, you need to focus on food

Flexibility vs Mobility 70/84

Mobility is a topic that has come into the spotlight a ton in the last 5-6 years or so. I believe CrossFit has played a huge roll in that with the popularity of guys like Kelly Starrett and his Supple Leopard book. For hundreds of years before that, people had been talking about things like yoga and the benefits they can have on flexibility. This is obviously still hugely popular today and you can't walk into a gym without seeing someone on a mat stretching out before a workout (which is a terrible idea, don't do that). Things brings up the question in people's mind about what the difference between flexibility and mobility is. Are they same? Are they different? What is the difference if they are?

If you would have asked me 5 years ago I would have told you that flexibility refers to a muscle and mobility refers to a joint. You've never heard someone say "that's one mobile hamstring you've got there" but they would say "your ankles are very mobile". While I think this is still true I've heard another definition as well. Julien Pineau is the founder of Strongfit and one of the smartest people I've ever come across in this field. He defines mobility as "flexibility under tension" which I like more the more think about it. I can't tell you how often I take someone through an assessment who is super flexible but still can squat below parallel. They may do yoga all the time or stretch every day but that doesn't mean they can get into the right positions and use all of that flexibility when muscular tension is added.

This is not to say that flexibility is not important, you still need to be able to take a joint through a full range of motion (ROM) and proper stretching can help with this. But, what I like to do more often is to build people's flexibility while doing the exercises they need to be better at. RDLs (Romanian Deadlifts) are a great example of this. RDLs are what's called a "stretch position exercise" which is exactly what I sounds like and it takes the hamstring through a great stretch when you do it. This means it's a great tool for teaching flexibility under tension (mobility) in the hamstrings. Other examples of exercises like this are chest flyes, Incline curls, Jefferson Squats, Bulgarian Split Squats, and overhead Tricep extensions. Each on of these exercises takes the muscle through its largest range of motion and give you a chance to work on mobility.

So basically, instead of spending time in a forward bend to stretch the hamstring, we practice a perfect RDL to increase mobility. Or instead of a side split we do a Jefferson Squat to increase hip mobility. This allows us to increase the length a muscle is allowed to go while also getting us into better positions that will translate to exercise. If you want more examples of those or videos on how to do them, Julien has a great set of videos he calls "openers" that help you work on flexibility under tension in different muscle groups.

This also brings up a good point about how much range of motion you need to use in exercises. Often times exercise have a prescribed ROM  that you're expected to hit like squatting below parallel or touching your chest on a bench. But most exercises really don't have one, so what do you do? I tell people to take a exercise through the largest ROM they can while still keeping tension in the muscle. So say I'm doing a dumbbell bench press, sure I can bring weight down and touch my shoulder each time but what if I lose tension in my pec 4 inches before that? I say it's better to stop when you lose tension on that prime mover instead of going through a full ROM just to do it. You end up dumping tension into connective tissue, which can put you at risk, and you're probably not even getting extra benefit from it. Instead, work through the range you can under tension and try to increase that range as much as you can. If you can't keep pec tension on through the full ROM now, eventually you'll be able to and you'll get the full benefit from the lift. Obviously then, when you go do this, you know that you mobility in that area has increased.

Give this a try next time your at the gym and see what kind of ROM  you can get you body through while still maintaining that tension!

Kicking Ass in the Real World: Why Barbells are Not That Functional 68/84

I'm going to be honest, CrossFit got this one wrong. Generally considered the king of functional training, CrossFit relies way too much on a training tool that barely relates daily life in the least. Very rarely are you going to find an object in nature that has been perfectly proportioned for you to lift it. No, usually it's going to be some weird, unbalanced shape that's going to need to crazy maneuver to pick up. For example, my in-laws live on a small pig farm and one day we were having trouble getting a young pig from the barn to and outdoor pen. I decided the easiest thing to do was for me to lift it into a wheelbarrow and wheel it over. They informed me that the pig weighed about 175 pounds, not much considering I've deadlifted well over 500 before. But you know what? That was damn near one of the heaviest things I've ever needed to lift. The pig was moving, the balance point was weird, I could not lift with a perfectly flat back, and I need to do some crazy one-arm-over-one-arm-under thing to lift it. Plus, something like that is way further from your body and center of gravity than a barbell is, making it feel much heavier. If you have ever done Strongman stone loading then you know exactly what I mean. The bottom line is that you need to focus on way more than barbell training if you really want to be functional.

While CrossFit and other functional training methods spend s lot of time with barbells, they obviously use other tools as well. Kettlebells, medicine balls, body weight, and sometimes Dumbbells (much more now than they used to) are all seen on a daily basis. And while these things are all great, they still may not accomplish the goal of helping with every day living. There are some other great tools that I love and I wish were used more often then you see.

The biggest one of these is sandbags, and I don't mean the ones with convenient handles. These can be a great tool for functional training. They're big, heavy, awkward, and their weight shifts as you lift. This makes them great for learning to move real world object. Lift them, squat then, press them, carry them, just move them in some way. Another great option is atlas stone or any odd shaped stones. Just find a big rock, pick it up, and carry it. This will do wonders for your leg, core, back, and arm strength as well. To be honest, anything you can pick up and carry can be functional to an extent. Yes, this includes barbells (think farmers carry) and pretty much anything else. When we're looking at exercises that are "functional" in terms of relating to every day lifeit's hard to beat pickup something up and carrying it.

The other problem with barbells is the fact that 90+% of exercises are done bilaterally, meaning with both arms or legs at the same time. While this allows you to move the most weight, it limits you in your options. If you want to be truly functional then single arm and single leg exercises are a must for your program. This can show you imbalances, potentials for injury, as well as helping a ton with balance and stability. If this sounds like most of your training, then try adding in some unilateral work and you might be surprised how much stronger one arm or leg is than the other.

The point is to make sure that your training stays carried and doesn't lock you into only a few pieces of equipment. The more variety you're going to do, the better and healthier you're going to be.

Tracking Food Without Tracking Macros 66/84

So bottom line of food tracking, tracking macros works. It just does, assuming you're doing it right and willing to weigh and measure all of your food for the rest of your life. If you want to lose weight tracking macros will help, if you want to gain weight tracking macros will help. I still start all of my new clients out by giving them a macro based plan because if they follow it they will make progress. The issue comes in when you have a client who just hates doing it. Sure, you could tell them to suck it up and just do it, but I think that makes you bad at your job. As a personal trainer, your job is to find a good nutrition and workout plan that your clients enjoy and will STICK TO. If they don't like it they won't do, that's the truth. It doesn't matter how amazing and perfect that plan you wrote is, if they don't like it it's not happening. If this is the case, I always have a backup plan.

So, you come across someone who hates logging all of their food into a phone app, what do they do? Are they doomed to be fat and unhealthy forever? Of course not, we just need to find a different way to track. Probably the simplest way is just to write your food in a notebook, not amounts or calories, just what you ate and when. This alone can be pretty eye opening for what people are actually eating. Another good way that I love is the "measuring" techniques taught by Precision Nutrition. These techniques involve using your hand as your only measuring tool for you food each meal. I would recommend Googling the pictures to get a visual but I'll obviously explain here (I don't want to post them because they're not mine).

Protein - Palm sized
Veggies - Fist sized
Carbs - Cupped hand
Fat - Thumb length

As a starting point, men should aim for 2 of each of those per meal and women should aim for 1 of each. Use this as a baseline then you can adjust as needed throughout a Bulk or a Cut. Just as with macros, I would suggest you start by increasing or decreasing fat as you go. All of the other procedures still apply such as make protein and veggies a priority, get your intraworkout shake and spread your food out evenly.

The whole point of this post is that there is more than one way to do just about everything in this field. The other point is that we need to be able to learn good habits so that we don't HAVE to relay on things like My Fitness Pal and Fit Bit to tell us what we're doing is right, we just know it. You need to be able to develop the skills needed to be healthy without the over complicated technology. Personally, I've dropped about 20 pounds in the past few months without tracking a single day in my phone. Was my Cut optimal? I don't know, but I've retrained plenty of lean body mass and my body fat is way down, so I'd call it a success.

How Everyday Products are Making You Sick and Fat 64/84

Today I've got a really good one for you guys. This information is all coming from a podcast that I listened to a couple months ago and I've finally had the time to take legit notes and write it up for you. This was from an episode of Renegade Radio with Jason Ferruggia and his guest was a man named Dr. Anthony G. Jay. Dr. Anthony G. Jay is a PhD Scientist who spends his time studying fats, hormones, and cholesterol. In this episode, he goes into detail about artificial estrogen and how it's making the world fat, sick, and infertile. He lists off the top 10 artificial estrogens to avoid and where to find them. He also recently wrote a book called "Estrogeneration" which is just ordered on Amazon. If, after reading this, you want to order it as well you can do so HERE

So to start off we need to talk about what estrogen actually is. Estrogen is the female sex hormone, it is responsible for the development of female sex hormones and reproduction. Obviously, estrogen is super important and is necessary for both men and women to function normally. The problem comes when the levels become way to high and start to cause major problems. Normal levels of estrogen for women range between 20-400 nanograms per liter (ng/L) depending on what time of the month it is. The problem that were seeing  is estrogen level up to nearly 2,000 ng/L, which are the levels we see in pregnant women and levels in men that are normally where women should be.

These increase are caused my estrogneic compounds which are compounds that act like estrogen in he body. These things cause estrogen levels to skyrocket and cause some huge problems. So what problems are associated with high estrogen levels

• Fat cell increase - Estrogen makes you put on fat, which makes sense when you look at it from the perspective of pregnancy. Fat has a ton of energy that mothers require to make sure their baby stays alive. It also makes you store fat in the way women typically do like in the hips or breasts
• Depression - Artificial estrogen is messing with natural estrogen levels can cause problem with depression and can decreases motivation 
• Allergies - When women get pregnant is suppresses their immune system so that their body doesn't kill the fetus. High level of estrogen from artificial sources can decrease the immune system and leave you open to illness and allergies 
• Infertility - Because estrogen is the female sex hormone it can cause some crazy problems in men. The biggest of these is infertility and other reproductive problems 
• Increased cancer risk - Breast cancer rates are up 250% since 1980 and have increase even more in different parts of the world. High estrogen levels are known to be one of the main causes of this.

So obviously this can all be some pretty terrible stuff, so what do you do about it? Here is Dr. AJ's list of Top 10 Estrogenic Compounds to avoid

1. phytoestrogens 
1. This compound is plant hormone that acts like estrogen in our body (just like this whole list)The biggest culprit of these compounds are soy and flax.
2. Micoestrogens 
1. This are also called zearalenone and they are a mold estrogen. In the U.S. we have these huge silos where were store grain. This grain starts to mold while it's in there, and it molds quite. The U.S. has no regulation or legal limit on how much mold can be found in our grains so other countries take advantage of that. When the UK gains have too much mold in their grain they ship it over here and we eat it. Isn't that great? As it turns out, non-organic grains are way worse because they are mass produced. Although you might think that organic would be worse, the large numbers result in lots of mold. Corn and wheat are equally bad when it comes to mold levels
3. Atrazine 
1. This is the second most used herbicide in the North America and it's totally illegal in European Union. CORN is by far the biggest problem for atrazine. The only real way to avoid it is to get organic corn. Studies have found 200ng/L causes reproductive abnormalities in frogs and cows that are fed with corn can have leves of atrazine of 700,000ng/L!
4. Triclosan/ alkylphenols
1. These two are soap estrogenics (found in our soaps) Triclosan will be listed on label but alkylphenolas will not. Make sure to keep a lookout for these two on your prodcuts. Because so many products have these compound in them, you can see what products Dr. AJ recommends on his website here  http://www.ajconsultingcompany.com/whatiuse.html
5. Oxybenzone/ benzophenone/ 4-methoxybenzophenone
1. These are the sunscreen estrogens and they are found in basically every big name sunscreen we use. Check the above list for good options or just look for organic sunscreen or one that have 20% zinc. By the way, BP is completely illegal in Europe.
6. Red 3 and Red 40
1. These two are obviously food coloring. Red 3 has been brought to FDA over 20 times to make it illegal but they keep getting shut down. These products require massive labels in Europe because they realize they may cause harm in children. A better option is to use beet juice instead.
7. Parabens 
1. These are perfumes estrogen and they are used as a preservative in the product. There are many different names and varieties "Methol- Propal- Benzol-" so keep a lookout for differnt ways they try to hide them. An interesting fact about parabens is that they move through blood and you pee them out. This results in public swimming pools have Paraben levels that are "concerning for children". They have also found high levels in Polar Bears because it is circulating in the water. 
8. Phthalates
1. This is a plastic additive that companies use to make it more rigid. Plastic #2,4,5 are the "best" ones for you to use by in reality you should try to avoid plastic when you can. Researchers have found up to 15% phthalates even in the better plastics listed above. Phthalates are actually far worse than BPA in this circumstance and products listed as "BPA Free" means they use phthalates instead.
9. BPA
1. This become popular years ago when people started to figure out how bad it was. It's not illegal nationally but the research is clear on how bad it is. There have been over 12,000 research papers starting how harmful it is. Even though it's not illegal nationally, 17 states made it illegal instead in some way or another. To combat that bad press BPA got, companies using BPS instead, which is basically the same thing.
10. Ethinyl estradiol (EE2)
1. This is the artificial estrogen that is found in birth control. Because of the high quantities our country takes birth control, it is found in pretty high qualities in the drinking water, especially in cities. Another big issue is that the human body doesn't break it down, because it is created that way. This means that it sticks around for a long time and creates a ton of problem.  

Ok I know, lots of super big chemistry words in there. I tried to make it as simple as I could but I also wanted to keep the actual names of the compounds in there. Now that you know the list we'll look at a couple of things you can do to stay away from these things. 

• Filter your water, especially in the city.
• Check labels if you're worried about this. Look for the crazy names listed above and check the list of good products I posted
• Buy things that are  fragrance free 
• Avoid plastic when you can, aim for stainless steel or glass instead.
• Avoid non-organic corn and wheat if you can. This also means grass fed beef is going to be a better option. 

I also recommend that you listen to the entire podcast yourself so you can hear the info straight from the source. You can always refer back to this list when you're done so that you have everything written out for you. You can find the podcast HERE. 

The 3 Best Predictors of How Long You Will Live 63/84

When we think about health and mortality everyone knows that exercise has it's place, but what we're starting to realize is exactly how important of a place that really is. If I where to ask you what one single factor was going to be the best predictor of mortality what would you say? Seriously, think about that for a second. Maybe family history? Stroke risk? Diabetes risk? They all seem like reasonable answers but they're not even close. Not even in the ballpark.

Most of this information was received by me from a couple of podcasts done on the Barbell Shrugged Podcast years ago. These podcasts featured a guy named Dr. Andy Galpin who, if you have been around with me for a while, you might recognize. Amongst other crazy knowledge bombs that Dr. Galpin always seems to drop, he mentioned the top three factors that predict mortality, and I'm sure they will be surprising to some of you. I'll discuss these top three in reverse order, starting with number three.

3. Lean Body Mass (LBM)

Lean body mass basically means anything in your body that's not fat. Muscle, skin, and bone are all included in this but for our purposes muscle will be the most important to us. For years people were under the assumption that muscle was just dumb tissue that did whatever the nervous system told it to do. Contract, relax, contract, relax over and over and that's it. What Dr. Galpin discusses is that muscle is actually super smart and regulates a
TON of hormone functions in the body. And the more muscle you have, the healthier you are (to an extent obviously). Combine this  with the fact that more muscle means more active and less injury prone in your later years and you can see why it's so high on the list. To increase LBM you simply have to hit the weights and get your muscles bigger so they work well. Stick in the 8-12 range most of the time for some good muscle building.

2. VO2max

Your VO2max is the maximum amount of oxygen that your body can take in at one time. The higher the VO2max, the healthier your respiratory and cardiovascular systems are and apparently the longer you're going to live. Obviously, if you can keep your heart and lungs strong for a long time, you'll be more active and less prone heart disease. To increase VO2max you need to do a combination on low, moderate, and high intensity cardiovascular training like spring intervals and walking.

1. Leg Strength

Yep, it's true, how strong your legs are is the single best determinant of how long you're going to live. In fact, it was a better predictor than wether or not you've ALREADY had a heart attack! Crazy right? I've heard Dr. Galpin discus that grip strength can be added along with this and I think it's safe to say that strength in general can be included. I assume leg strength was just the strength metric that they tested which came out the highest. This crazy fact could be the result of a few things, but in my professional opinion it can be linked best to 2. First, having stronger legs when you're older most likely means that you had been relatively active throughout your life, meaning you're probably healthier. This is definitely going to lead to a longer life.  Second, stronger legs means reduced chance of falling or getting hurt as well as increase activity, mobility, and independence when you get older. Basically, you can do more stuff on your own for longer and do it better. Sounds pretty great to me. To increase leg strength or strength in general you have to lift. Not only that but you have to lift pretty heavy stuff. The best strength gains come from around 3 reps to around 6 reps with at least 90 seconds rest in between.

So there you have it; lean body mass, VO2max, and leg strength are the three best predictors of his long hours going to live. Now, obviously if you excel in all of these it doesn't guarantee that you're going to love a long life, but it does put the odds in your favor

Advanced Hypertrophy Techniques 52/84

When a person first starts to try and gain muscle, they can start to put on some size relatively fast. Being new to lifting, your body starts to freak out and adapt super quickly to the stimulus that you're giving it. Anyone who has every tried to get big before has probably experienced this and it's pretty great. You start to see differences really quick and it feels awesome. But, obviously, these quick gains aren't going to last forever and eventually it can even become pretty hard to add even half of what you have already. Honestly, at this point you should heavily consider doing a maintenance phase and then starting over again. It's also probably time to switch up your program and let your body start to get a different stimulus. When you do this, there are a few advanced techniques you can use to break through some of these barriers and start adding muscle again.

Note: These are called advanced for a reason. You have no business trying these unless you have already been lifting hard for a couple years. Yes, you will see other people doing them but that doesn't mean that they are right.

Here are a few things you can try if you feel like you're ready.

Drop Sets

I would hope most people have heard of drop sets by now. They are very popular in the bodybuilding world because they make you look hardcore and they can hurt pretty bad. To do a drop set; pick a weight that you can do for 8-10 reps and do as many as you can under good technique, drop the weight by about 10% and do as many as you can again, then drop one more time and rep to failure. This technique will give you a huge pump and can spark some new growth.

High Rep Sets

Tom Platz is famous for having the best legs in bodybuilding. He is also famous for squatting 225 for 2 minutes straight. High rep sets can be another growth igniter if you use them right. Don't get stuck in the old myth that high reps are only for muscular endurance or toning. The super high time under tension can do some serious damage and create new growth and researchers have seen hypertrophy in sets as high as 100 reps.

Finishers/ Burn Out Sets

This is ending your lift with one all out set to failure on whatever exercise you're doing. Like most of these, you'll want to save this for the end of your workout and give it everything you've got. You can even force or cheat a few more reps out to get every last bit of energy used up.

Technical drop sets

A good example of this would be using a bicep curl and a row. Let's say you're finishing your pulling day with some EZ Bar curls. On your last set you rep to failure then immediately drop down and start doing rows with the same bar. You're basically going from a weaker exercise to a stronger exercise to squeeze whatever you can out of your biceps. You're last and shoulders will take some of the work but your biceps will continue to get fried.

Eccentrics/ Negatives

This one is my favorite and is the one that you don't need to be super advanced to use. I often program slow eccentrics in workouts for my clients who want to get bigger and/or stronger because it can be amazing for both. The eccentric, or lowering portion of the movement, is where almost all of the tissue damage occurs. And when the tissue gets damaged, it must rebuild itself and usually comes back bigger and stronger. For most people who want to get big, I recommend a 2 second eccentric on just about every exercise they do. Sometimes, based on what phase were in, that number can go up to 5 or even 10 seconds if I'm feeling particularly snarky.

I just want to reiterate, outside of the eccentrics you should have a lot of experience with lifting already before you even consider trying these. Most people have no business training to failure on any exercise and even if you do try these you should only do them for a short time. They are meant to spark growth and break plateaus, not become a regular part of your training.

Why I Quit CrossFit 50/84

50 days in! Holy crap I can't believe I've managed to do this for this long. A lot of great stuff has happened since this started and I'm super excited to see where it will do from here! Anyway, for those of you reading who have known me for years know that I spend about 3 years training, competing, and coaching CrossFit. I did it basically every day without fail and got to the point where I was actually pretty competitive. But now it's been about a year since I've done a WOD and I wanted to write a post about why I made the switch,

I want to start off by saying that I still love CrossFit and even though I don't do it anymore I still have the utmost respect for it. I still closely follow what's going on and some of my best friends still compete, and we talk every day. Also, I use very CrossFitty workouts for most of my weight loss clients and it still works great for them. Although I've adjusted a few things that I feel are normally missing, I run those sessions very similarly to a CrossFit class.

I competed in and coached CrossFit from the time a finished undergrad and volleyball in 2013 until just after the 2016 CrossFit Open. During that time I gained about 30 pounds of solid muscle, added 100+ pounds to my deadlift and snachted 300 pounds, something that only a handful of people in the world will ever do, as well as a ton of other things someone my size has no business doing. I loved CrossFit and my life was all about it. I coached through my 2 years of grad school at The Arsenal (Muncie CrossFit) which is where I learned a ton about about exercise, coaching, mobility, SMR, and how to break the "rules" that exercise science tells us that are necessary for people. Once I moved up to Appleton, Wisconsin, I began helping out and coaching occasionally at CrossFit Appleton. I continued competing for a few months up there until I backed off to compete in a Weightlifting competition. After I won my weigh class for that, I hopped right back in to compete in the 2016 Open. I only trained for about 4 weeks or so but got back to a pretty competitive level. This is about the same time I start working as a trainer again too.

After the Open is over, every year I would take a little while to back off and work on some nagging injuries or imbalances that accumulate during the intensity of training competitively. It just so happened that this year I was working at Xperience Fitness where I had the option to work on powerlifting and bodybuilding outside of a CrossFit gym. This gave me access to different equipment that I didn't really train with for a couple years including dumbbells, machines, and the ability to do curls without judgement. As I began to back off on my programming to recover a bit, I also realized that working out at work was not only convenient but good for business as well. As a personal trainer there, it helped me get to know more members and make more connections that led to more clients. More clients is always better.

This also gave me a chance to reflect and figure out what my real goals were. Honestly, I knew for a long time that my height and size was going to limit me from every getting to where I wanted to go in CrossFit. CrossFit is definitely not a tall man's game and obviously I couldn't get shorter. I also was not willing to lose the weight that I would have needed to to be at a high level in bodyweight and gymnastics movements. I knew that I had to look and think about what I really wanted to work on.

After bouncing between programs and goals and not really knowing what I wanted, I got an opportunity that I hadn't really thought about in years; I started playing volleyball again. Finally! I had something to train for. I focused my program on the goals or getting strong, getting bigger, and being able to play again (basically getting my vertical up again). This worked out well with the program I wrote which already involved a lot of speed work anyway.

During this time I also learned a lot and realized a lot of things that were missing from typical CrossFit programming. There were multiple movement patterns, muscle groups and equipment that could help prevent injury and increase gains for people who are still doing it. The biggest things that I found missing where; horizontal pulling and pushing exercises, anything with a supinated grip, enough single arm/leg exercises, knee flexion, dumbbells, and any rotation or side-to-side movements. Lacking these things can have a pretty big impact on the health and longevity of competitors and adding in just a couple exercises for each can make a huge difference. Missing these elements leads to a lot off underdeveloped lats, pecs, biceps, and glutes (yeah I said it), hamstrings, and obliques. I think going into the details of all of these things would be an entire post in itself which I might need to do. For now, just know that CrossFit coaches really need to expand the movements they are using if they really want to do the most for their members as they can. What I do like recently is the use of the term "functional bodybuilding" (which I have been using for years) and seeing that grow into something that is more popular in the sports. From what I've seen, it address a lot of the issues I mentioned above.

So all in all, the biggest reason I took a step back is because it just didn't fit with my goals anymore. I knew that my success in CrossFit was most likely limited and I needed to figure out what I really wanted to do. Although I still love it and use it with my weight loss clients, CrossFit just no longer fit with the goals that I wanted. But even so, coaching for all of those years led me to where I am today and I would not be the trainer I am without it.

Running a Successful Cutting Phase Part 1 48/84

Now that I've finished with the post on how to bulk, it's time to get after what it takes to cut successfully.  I think this one will definitely speak to more people than the bulking posts especially since the majority of people want to lose fat. Just like I did earlier, I'll start with nutrition first and then go on into the workouts tomorrow.

I've posted this time after time and I'm going to keep posting it forever because it's really important; nutrition is the single most important factor in weight loss. If you try to eat like crap and just change up your workouts or add some more cardio then you're going to fail. You need to make changes in what you eat each day if you ever actually want to make progress. Here are the biggest things I coach people through

- Just like when bulking, you need to find a baseline first but then eat a little less. You can do this by tracking calories or just base it off of what your body has been doing recently. If your weight have stayed the same then just eat a little less, if you've been gaining weight slowely then you need to eat a lot less

- Still hit 1 gram of protein per pound or body weight. As weird as it might sound, it might actually be MORE important to eat protein when cutting because you want to preserve muscle mass on a calorie deficit.

- Prioritize protein and veggies each meal. Try and get 1-2 palm sized servings on protein and 1-2 fist size servings of veggies per meal and eat them first.

- Pick either low carb or low fat but don't try and do both at the same time. You have to reduce calories some how and it shouldn't be from protein.

- Reduce calories slightly and stay there until weight loss stops, then reduce again until you plateau again. This is how my nutrition programs are set up for you.

- Try super low carb if you need to, but only for a short time. This can work well for a big time hormonal reset and help get some insulin sensitivity back, similarly to intermittent fasting.

- Base carbs off of workout volume for the day. If your workout has more volume than eat more carbs. Less volume equals less carbs, and non workout days should be low carb.

- Aim to lose 1-2 pounds per week. .5 isn't bad either but you don't want to lose any more than that consistently.

- Only cut for 3 months at a time then maintain. I wrote a whole post on this so I don't need to go into detail.

- Maintain for as long as you cut then cut again if needed.

- Have protein or BCAAs during workout and protein before bed. I prefer protein over BCAAs but if you're super calorie restricted the they can be ok to help maintain muscle.

- Try intermittent fasting. Again, whole post on this. Actually 3, so not a lot of detail here.

All in all it comes down to finding what works for you and sticking too it. Consistency is going to be the most important and without it the details don't matter. As long as you are consistently eating less calories than you're burning, being active, and taking maintenance lanes then you will be successful!

Running A Successful Bulking Phase Part 1 46/84

I'm not going to lie, bulking is way more fun than cutting. I don't think this would be news to anyone, especially because of the look on their face when I tell my weight loss clients that I'm trying to gain weight. With that being said, it's not the free-for-all that people think it is, and so many people do it way wrong. Bulking is not about eating all the food and getting as big as possible as fast as possible. That mentality is a really good way to get fat. Bulking is about gaining quality muscle mass while maintaining as much of the leanness you worked so hard for on your cut. The process should be slow, just like weight loss, and it needs to be just as well planned. In this post, I'll go over the nutrition points you need to focus on when bulking and in Part 2 I'll go over the workouts.

During a bulk, your goal should be to gain about 1 pound per week for men and closer to .5 for women. Any more than that and you are probably not gaining quite as much lean muscle as you can. Obviously, you're going to get a little bit of body fat while you're bulking but the goal is to try and keep it to a minimum while still gaining a good amount of muscle. There are a few main points that you should spend most of your time focusing on. I'll go through those as bullet points to make it easy.

Nutrition

Whether you're bulking or cutting, nutrition is going to be super important to making sure you actually make progress. Here are some basic recommendations that I live by when bulking

- Find your baseline then eat a little more. If your weight is stable right now then all you need to do is add a little more food and you'll start gaining weight. If you want to get more precise there are some macronutrient recommendations you can use.

- Aim for .8-1.0 grams of protein per pound that you weigh. Most people don't get enough protein each day and this might be all the extra calories you need to hit point 1. This mean a guy weighing 180 pound would need between 145 and 180 grams per day.

- Aim for .5-2.0 grams of carbs per pound that you weigh. Yes, I know this is a broad range but it depends on the volume and intensity of your workout for the day. On days you do workouts that are higher volume, you should eat more carbs and days you do less you should eat less cars. most workout days will be closer to .8-1.5 grams per pound. Conditioning days will be on the lower end, even if the "feel harder".

- Fill in the rest of your calories with healthy fats. If you are tracking calories and macros this will just make up the remainder if you daily calories.

- As you progress through your bulk, carbs and protein stay about the same but fat increases. There is a number of reasons for this; protein and carbs have optimal ranges that they should be consumed in but fat doesn't, and fat has the most calories per gram meaning you need to eat less to get more. Want to make this simple? Add a scoop of peanut butter to the end of each meal.

- Still focus on getting protein and veggies with each meal and spread you carbs and fats pretty evenly across your day. Make sure you still eat about 1 cup of veggies per meal, you're going to want the fiber with all the food you'll be eating.

- Make sure you're getting you intra-workout shake each workout. Not only will this help you get more calories in each day but it'll help prevent any potential muscle loss from workouts

- Get protein and fat right before bed. This will help you recover faster and prevent muscle loss when sleeping, I like to blend 2 scoops on whey with peanut butter but if you can get casein protein that will be much better.

- Once you stop gaining weight, increase fat by a couple servings a day and maintain that until you stop gaining again.

- Just like cutting, you'll need to take a maintenance phase about every 3 months to get your body used to your new weight. If you don't you'll quickly lose the weight you worked so hard to put on.

If you can get good at these things and combine them with the workout blueprint I'll be posting tomorrow then you're definitely going to have a successful bulk. Remember to take is slow and enjoy the process, don't just try to rush to the end. Finally, if you want to see what it's like to work with me for totally free then subscribe here and you can join the group of workout testers that I'll be starting with this Monday. You can read about the workout HERE and see the post I but up about it on Facebook HERE. Anyone is free to join so let me know!

See you tomorrow!

Facebook: Greg Herceg - Personal Trainer
Instagram: @Greg.the.Trainer
Email: gsherceg@gmail.com

Training Every Day for Gains 41/84

This is an interesting topic that hasn't come into the spotlight until recently. If you have been following along with me for a bit, you'll see that I have posted in the past about how I think some people train way too often and that they think that more is better. I've posted about how training too much can actually hurt progress in the long run and that training less frequently may be a better option. I've even cut my own training down to only 3 or 3.5 days of lifting per week. Although I feel that this has been working really well for me recently, this entire conversation all comes back to the "do what works best for you" principle that I preach more often than anything. This is where training every single day can actually be pretty beneficial for a lot of people. In this post, I want to get into how to train every day, what the benefits can be, and who could really benefit from this. Then, tomorrow, at the half way point of my promised 84 straight days of posting, I'm going to write up a free workout, based on this plan, that you guys will have access to.

So why the change of heart? After talking so much about training less, why am I now saying that it might be better for some people to train even more? Like I said in the intro, you need to find what's going to work best for you and hammer that. I'm not necessarily changing my opinion, just giving you more options. If it is better for you and your schedule to make it a habit of getting to the gym every day, at the same time, and running through a quick workout, then do that! The first time I was ever exposed to a workout like this was from a book called "Easy Strength" co-authored by Dan John and Pavel about 5 years ago. This workout was essentially doing the same 5 exercises every single day with next to no volume and almost no weight. Then slowly, almost immeasurably, increasing the volume each week until the point where you're way stronger than you were at the beginning. It's a super weird concept but apparently it works, especially since those two are two of the more established strength coaches in the world. More recently, one of my favorite coaches, Jason Ferruggia, discussed in a podcast about how he tried this for 3 months with great success. That's really were I got the idea to do this because I started thinking about the clients that I already work with that could benefit from it.


The biggest argument for training less often is that less volume is going to allow you to make sure that you're recovering super well from each workout. So what if you can take a 3 day a week workout, cut each day in half, and make it a 6 day a week workout? What if you take the exact same volume you did in 3 days and just do it over 6 days? Yes, your workouts would be shorter, probably around half the time, but that's really the point. And that's exactly what I plan to do. I started out with a workout that I would normally program for 3 days a week and I cut it in half so that each workout could be done in a short time each day. The total amount of work you do each day will be low, probably way lower than any of you are used to. But if you feel like this is something that can be beneficial for you then I encourage you to try it.

The biggest benefit of a workout like this the ability to build a habit around exercise. If you get used to going to the gym at the same time every day and just make it part of your daily routine, then it will be easier to make it a habit and make going to the gym something that you actually do. Although you're not doing that much each day, during the week you're still getting the same total volume that you would be getting if you were doing 3 longer workouts during the week. This mean that, not only will you not miss out on any strength gains, but you actually may get stronger because of it. And since the volume is so low each day, you don't need to worry about being able to recover from day today. Sure, the first week you may be a little sore, but you'll adjust and be able to make a good habit of it. In the long term, since you'll be able to make it to the gym so regularly, you may actually start to see some progress that you've been missing out on for years.

There are a few different types of people that this can be beneficial for so hopefully you can fit into one of these. A high frequency workout like this is great for people who have a hard time with sticking with the gym. Especially if they are also a person who loves to run their lives off of a routine. Having the same work hours each day and working off of the same schedule each day is going to be the perfect placement to add in a quick 20-30 minute workout each day. Get in, get out, get it done, and go back to work (or go eat). Something like a lunch break is a great place to add a quick workout like this. You can also add it in super quick before or after you go to work. On the other hand, if you're someone who has a different day to day schedule, or doesn't have trouble getting to the gym, you may not need to worry about a workout like this. Although it still can be beneficial if you want to try it.

So I'm going to cut it short there because I'll explain the rest tomorrow when I post the workout. But here's the trick, the only people who will receive the workout of my subscribers. So if you're already subscribed to this blog then great! You'll get a fresh new workout in your email tomorrow. But if you're not yet subscribed then make sure to do that! You can do it via the pop-up window on here. Also, when you subscribe, you'll get a copy of the nutrition plan I use with my clients as well as a couple sweet infographics about my favorite muscle building and fat loss tips (seriously they're super cool). So don't wait! Subscribe now and get a bunch of free stuff, plus a new workout tomorrow and more free stuff in the future.

See you tomorrow!

Facebook: Greg Herceg - Personal Trainer
Instagram: @Greg.the.Trainer
Email: gsherceg@gmail.com

Intermittent Fasting Part 3 39/84

Part 3 has arrived. Sorry to drag this out so long but I really do have a lot that I want to say about this. We've already covered the different types of intermittent fasting, the potential benefits it can proved, and the potential side effects it can have. Today I'm going to get into which people can really benefit from IF and which people should probably stay away from it.

So just to start here, I can never really hurt to experiment with something for a short time just to see how it's going to effect you. Even if you find yourself on the list of contraindications, feel free to experiment with yourself a bit to see how it goes (this really applies to a lot of things in the fitness world). With that said, if you start to notice anything bad happening then pay attention and don't be dumb.

So we'll start with the good list, these are the people what can really benefit from some kind of fasting protocol. There's really a lot of lifestyle factors that need to be in play like; when you workout, when you work, if you have to work with clients, when you sleep, what your fitness goals are, and how stressful your life is already. The people that are going to benefit the most are going to be people who have low-ish stress jobs, work normal hours, and usually work out around lunch time or later. Although it's generally thought to be best for cutting, IF can be beneficial for a bulk too. Personally, I do it to try and stay as lean as I can while I gain weight and I just make my fast slightly shorter. Overall, from what we've seen, IF is much more beneficial for men than it is for women. As I mentioned quickly yesterday, IF can have some pretty big negative side effects for some women including missing periods and symptoms or pre-menopause.  Obviously, this won't apply to all women but it's something to keep an eye out for if you want top try. Let's run down that list again...

-Fat loss
-Normal work hours
-Not high stress job
-Later workouts
-Usually men

Now let's take a look at the flip side and see who might want to think for a while before trying. First, if you workout early in the morning, IF is probably not the best (the 16/8 version at least) because you're going to want to eat before, during, or after your workout at some point. Early people could try the 24 hour version though, When you work can be a factor and is associated with when you sleep because you're going to have to plan your meals around that. Usually, the morning is the best time to fast because that fits the best with social norms like going out for lunch or dinner, but it's not 100% necessary. Also, If you're someone who's going to get irritable from not eating, working a job where you work 1-on-1 with people may not be in your best interest. Obviously, this is how my job is but I've  been doing it long enough that I don't get cranky. Also, black coffee helps keep you nice and peppy. If your job or life is already very stressful, the IF just becomes another stressor. This might be the one to put you over the edge so it's better to take some help from anti-stress protocols before you worry about this. Next, if you are an athlete or have very athletic based goals you may benefit form breakfast depending on when you workout or when you have practices etc. Finally, again, women need to pay close attention. It can still work for you but you're going to want to pay pretty close attention to how your body is feeling.  So this list is basically the opposite of the first

- Athletic or massive weight gain goals
-Odd or unpredictable work hours
-High stress job
-Morning workouts
-Often women

The final thing I want to talk about is some strategies that I use to make it through my fast every day so you guys can have them in your arsenal as well. I think the biggest one is to make sure you stay busy. IF works out really well for me because I just fast while I train my morning clients. Once I'm done in the afternoon, I go home and eat. Pretty simple. I'm busy enough during the day to not even think about food most of the time. The next biggest thing is about understanding hunger. There are two main things here; knowing that the feeling of hunger doesn't last that long, and realizing that you need to accept hunger as part of losing fat. Hunger usually only lasts for about 30 minutes or so on average and, after that, it doesn't come back for a very long time. Having this knowledge in the back of you head makes it easier to push through that feeling because you know there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Related, at some point during a Cut, you're going to get hungry, it's just going to happen. You're eating less food than your body is used to and it doesn't like that. If you can get more comfortable with the feeling on hunger than it's going to make the whole process easier for you. The times you'll feel it the most are when you normally eat a meal, so like when you normally eat breakfast. When I do get hungry, water and black coffee help me curb my apatite enough to get over it. If you doing a 24 hour fast then you can add some BCAAs or a greens supplement to help you make the it whole time. Aside from those, it's just about getting it done. You'll feel the most hungry when you first start but you're body will absolutely get used to it. It also help you from getting hungrier during the day if you do happen to miss a meal. That's one of my favorite things because we don;t live in a perfect world and you're not always going to be able to get you 6 meals a day in every 3 hours.

I think that's just about it for these posts. Hopefully you guys are getting some good information from these posts and we're getting close to the halfway point on my daily posts! If you want to stay up to date on everything, get some free stuff including my Top Fat Loss and Top Muscle Building Tips,  nutrition plan, and access to my private Facebook group, fill out the pop up window on here to become a subscriber. Subscribers will also be the first people I go to for workout testing and free programs so don't wait! As always, if you have any questions at all, or feel like you need some help with this whole fitness thing, reach out to me and I'll do whatever I can to help!

See you tomorrow!

Facebook: Greg Herceg - Personal Trainer
Instagram: @Greg.the.Trainer
Email: gsherceg@gmail.com