206 - Q&A: Tapering Stimulants, Reducing Joint Stress, Bodybuilding, Low Back Tightness, Imbalances +More

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What's going on guys? Welcome to another episode of the Terminator Training Show. I'm Kevin Smith. Today is going to be a q and a from this week's Instagram. Ask me anything or I go through and answer some of the better questions or the questions that I haven't answered in a long time or the questions maybe I've never answered before from my Instagram followers. If you want your question answered in the future, that's the best way to do it. Give me a follow on Instagram at terminator training and look out for my, typically, I've been doing them weekly As, and sometimes I answer questions [00:00:30] on there in story format and then I'll also answer 'em on here. Some of the questions I answer on here, I don't answer on there and vice versa. So a good solid mixed blend of everything. Nutrition questions, fitness questions, lifestyle questions, SF questions, personal development questions, anything goes.

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Even people ask me finance questions, which I think I answered one recently and I'm not a finance expert, but do appreciate your guys' trust in my wide variety of expertise, even though I'm [00:01:00] not really an expert at a lot of things. But anyway, exciting news before we get into the questions. I am officially now working with Pride Foods, so I talk about rice and grinds all the time. They are basically an oatmeal alternative that's way easier on the gut than oatmeal. They digest like nothing even easier than white rice in my opinion, in a lot of my clients' opinions, and they're delicious. They have a lot of really, really good flavors. I will probably talk about the flavor I have [00:01:30] in the past, but I'll probably talk about 'em a little more often as I go through my episodes in the future. But anyway, they also have not just rice and grinds, they've got other products as well.

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They're pride stacks or pancakes. They're basically sweet potato based pancakes are also really, really delicious and they're just clean ingredients, not a bunch of random fillers and like I said, they're just rice-based, so if you struggle digesting oats or if you struggle digesting wheat or if you just want something really, really fast digesting, they're great around [00:02:00] training, whereas oats take a little longer to digest. They're a great alternative for that. Typically what I do is mix a couple scoops. I have a bunch of different flavors that I go through. My go-tos are chocolate mixed with waffle, maple, waffle, that's a really good combo or maple waffle mixed with brown sugar cinnamon. I also have been doing some brown sugar cinnamon mixed with apple pie lately, and that's also really good too. So you can't really go wrong. I haven't tried, the [00:02:30] only flavor I haven't tried is taco, which that might be good with meat or something like that, but I am more into the sweeter versions of things.

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I don't eat a lot of sweets, if any. I really don't eat any sweets, so this kind of sells my sweet tooth. I do have a sweet tooth and I mix some berries in there and some banana, and then sometimes I will do some maple syrup if I need more carbs or I'll do some sugar-free maple syrup if I just want that syrup flavor, but don't want carbs, but it's honestly really good plain. The main reason I [00:03:00] put frozen berries in it is just to cool it down so I don't have to wait as long because it's super hot when it comes out of the pan. But anyway, there will be links to that in every show from here on out to my discount page, if you just go there organically, just use the code, t, TM, nothing else, just t, TM and you'll get 10% off.

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So really looking forward to that and pumped to continue working with them. So anyway, let's hop into today's, oh, and the other news, I don't [00:03:30] think I've mentioned this on the podcast before, but my wife is pregnant, so we are expecting a baby in August, baby boy. So we made an Instagram posts a few weeks ago, but not everyone sees those figured I would just make that announcement here. Super duper pumped our first baby and it's going to be an adventure, but we are over the moon and very, very excited. So more to follow on upcoming dad life as well as dad life. That'll be kind of integrated into some of these episodes. I know [00:04:00] probably a lot of people listening to this probably aren't dads, but maybe you will be someday, but I'm sure plenty of guys listening to this are dads or moms, maybe a lady or two out there listening to the show too.

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Who knows? But anyway, let's get into today's episode. First question, I have a broken hand that sucks. I can't press or pull for six weeks. My goal is to gain muscle mass. What are some strategies? Yeah, so unfortunately the side that is messed up, you might not [00:04:30] be able to gain a ton of muscle on that side, but the good thing is if you train the other side, honestly, of course train your legs, train other parts of your body that you don't need your hands for. But the good thing is if you train the other side, even though it seems counterintuitive like you're just going to gain a ton of muscle on the other side and kind of leave your injured side lagging, that's not actually how it works. There's a systemic nervous system crossover effect where you could still gain some muscle or at least maybe not gain muscle, [00:05:00] but reduce how much you atrophy in the injured side.

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So if you didn't train your other side, you wouldn't gain muscle on that side of course, but also you would atrophy more on your injured side, so single arm stuff on the other side, absolutely, you can probably do some stuff with wrist cuffs on your injured side, so maybe lateral raises. You might be able to do something where you put a wrist cuff. It depends on what you have for a broken hand. If you can get a wrist cuff on that side, things [00:05:30] like push downs, maybe you can finagle some sort of curl, but I'm not sure how that would work. If you have access to a Nautilus pullover machine, you can do some pullovers for your lats, but either way, I would just focus mostly on training your legs, getting jacked legs, hamstring squads, et cetera, and I would focus on training your other side, training your core.

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Anything you can do that does not involve that, of course injured hand and then maybe some be a little bit creative with some exercises with wrist cuffs. [00:06:00] On the injured side, luckily it's only six weeks, so once you get back into training, you're going to regain, especially if you train other parts of your body, you're going to regain that muscle very, very quickly. I would probably for a little while when you come back, of course I'm guessing you probably are going to have some sort of physical therapy or rehab plan or something like that, so follow that, but I would probably favor unilateral exercises mostly. You don't have to only do unilateral when you come back, but for the most part, first few weeks do a lot of unilateral [00:06:30] stuff or you start with the weak side and kind of match reps with a strong side just while that catches up.

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But you really shouldn't notice much after a few weeks, man, probably a couple months most likely to regain at least the aesthetic size of that hand or that arm that the hand is attached to. So kind of a pain in the butt, but good on you for looking for ways around it. A lot of people will say, I have a broken hand I can't train, which is just absolutely ridiculous. [00:07:00] May as well get the most out of the other parts of your body and do your best to limit the atrophy of the injured side by training the other side, the uninjured side, and you're going to be good to go. Next question, I'm 205 pounds, 13% body fat. What forms of cardio would you recommend to lighten the load for less joint stress than running? Honestly, unless you have goals to get good at some other form of cardio, something specific.

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If you want to get really good at swimming or rowing, [00:07:30] most of your cardio should be those things, but if you just want to get the general benefits of overall cardio without the stress of running totally fine. Honestly, that's a really good idea for a lot of people that have no interest in getting better at running running's just a little more stressful. That doesn't mean if you don't have running goals like you shouldn't ever run, but generally speaking, you're better off doing some form of other cardio if you want the longevity benefits of it, the mental health benefits, the physical health [00:08:00] benefits, because to be honest, most people don't have the best running form or the best technique. They're not great at managing their intensity and so on and so forth. So choosing some other option would be a great idea. I personally really like things that involve a little more skill.

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They're just a little more engaging, so you could try and get really good at rowing. Rowing, believe it or not, is a high skill activity and most people are absolutely terrible at it. They just don't treat it like a skill. They just sit on a rower and put it on damper 10 and [00:08:30] row away, which is fine. I mean, you're not going to hurt yourself most likely you could hurt yourself, but it's harder than running with poor form. The cost, the potential cost of poor rowing form is lower than poor running form, but you could do that. You could get really good at swimming or you could get really good at biking or if you just want to be healthy, then do a mix of a bunch of different things. I really like, especially for longer stuff, choosing a couple of different modalities. [00:09:00] For example, maybe you choose a rower and a bike and a StairMaster and you go, say you're doing a 90 minute session, you do two sets of 15 minutes on each one, 15 minutes on the rower, 15 minutes on the bike, 15 minutes on the StairMaster continuous.

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It's a great way to make it less boring and also sitting on a rower for 90 minutes straight will really bang your butt up if you're not used to it, just especially if you have a bony butt, if you're skinnier. So for me, if I sat on a rower for that long, it would really mess me up. Bike [00:09:30] to your taint just kind of destroys your taint. You get used to it over time, of course, and you can get certain types of seats, but for most people just mixing a nice medley, that would be awesome. You can also do less conventional stuff like sled dragging or really, really light sled if you have a big space for it, or maybe you could do it out on a trail your house or something like that. That's what I do sometimes. I haven't done it in a while, but once in a while I'll go out into my trail, attach a sled to my waist around like using a dip belt, just walk down, walk back.

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[00:10:00] It's like a 0.75 mile trail, so down and back is about a mile and a half, but that's just one option. If you have a turf field or a turf strip inside your gym, you can just go back and forth. StairMaster elliptical, Jacob's ladder ski erg, really whatever you want, whatever you feel is best, it doesn't really matter all that much. There's no specific cardio that's extra good versus other cardios that are not as good. Whatever gets you to the intensity that you want that you can stick to that you enjoy [00:10:30] is what I would go with. Next question. How far out from SFAS start date should you come off all stimulants, vitamins and supplements? So stimulants are in a different category than vitamins and supplements. Most if not all vitamins and supplements that I can think of don't really have a withdrawal effect, so like creatine or multivitamins or fish oil, I would just take those until you go creatine, yes, I mean technically you're going to feel [00:11:00] or the effects of creatine coming off creatine, you're going to eventually probably notice them in perfect conditions.

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You're not going to notice 'em at selection because it takes a few weeks, three to four weeks in fact for creatine to completely desaturate from your muscle cells, just like it takes a while for them to saturate, like you don't start feeling the effects or noticing the effects of creatine, right when you start taking it. Some guys will do the loading phase where they take twice the dose for a shorter period of time and then they go down [00:11:30] to five, 10 grams a day. But even if you don't do that, which honestly it's not all that necessary unless you really want an extra week of creatine, it's really the big difference it makes, but it takes a while to build up in your cells to actually really feel the effects of craz and notice the effects. Same thing coming off, it just takes a while for it to completely desaturate and by the time it's completely out of your body, you're going to be on team week and you're not going to notice that you're going [00:12:00] to be smoked for other reasons, not because it's like this really, really tiny minimal effect.

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You barely feel it. I personally don't even take creatine half the year, and I don't notice really any difference other than I'm two pounds bigger if I take creatine two pounds heavier because I'm holding more water in the muscle cells, not bloated or anything like that. A lot of people think creatine makes you. Same thing with vitamins, same thing with really most supplements that you can take stimulants however are different because they do have withdrawals and they're different for everyone and it depends on [00:12:30] how much you're taking. If you have coffee a few days a week, maybe a cup or two probably won't notice anything because you have several days per week where you don't use it. Most people aren't like that. Most people either drink coffee pretty much daily or drink energy drinks or whatever caffeine is your go-to, and so if you are like that, then I would highly recommend coming off.

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The thing is it takes about 12 days to completely resensitize yourself to caffeine. So [00:13:00] you come off say 12 ish days out from SFAS, you want to be at caffeine zero. The good thing about doing that is A, you won't feel the withdrawals while you're during gate week. That would be not a great week to be withdrawing from caffeine, especially if you're a high caffeine content user, and B, you get little coffee packets in the MREs and if you are fully sensitive to caffeine because you came off enough time before going back into it, you're going to actually feel it. You're going to really feel the effects. You're [00:13:30] going to notice the benefits. The caffeine content in those is so minuscule though that if you don't come off, they're not really going to be enough to support your high caffeine addiction. Most people probably, it depends.

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Some people take one cup of coffee a day. If you take one cup of coffee a day, you probably are totally fine managing your withdraws with a coffee packet from the res, maybe give or take, if you're having two or three or if you have coffee plus energy drinks or coffee plus pre-workout, you're up in the 400, 500, 600 [00:14:00] plus milligrams a day, that is definitely a good idea to come off and those little coffee packets are not going to really help you get through those withdrawals. So everyone's a little different too with withdrawals. Some people don't really feel that bad. Other people, it's absolutely brutal. Caffeine is a drug. I mean other stimulants or a drug too, I'm assuming by stimulants you mean caffeine, but that's really the one that I would recommend coming off and the ways to come off, there's a couple different ways.

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You can either go cold Turkey, just suck it up for a couple days, how long it's going to take for [00:14:30] you to start feeling normal again, is again, just depends on the person, depends on how much caffeine you normally take in and some other factors or you can taper down. What I like to do, generally what I have my guys do is cut a hundred milligrams of caffeine off their current intake every three to four days. So if you're taking 400 milligrams of caffeine per day, generally once you get down to a hundred ish, you can just go off it, you probably won't feel all that bad. So 400 milligrams, three to four days [00:15:00] down to 300 milligrams, three to four days down to 200 milligrams, three to four days down to 100, and then three to four days at 100 you can just come off and you shouldn't feel all that much.

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You can get down to 50 if you want, but kind of splitting hairs at that point. So that is the one that I would definitely focus on. I wouldn't worry too much about supplements and vitamins. Next question. I'm one year into running and did not do a base building phase. Is a good idea to still do one now? Absolutely. I think a lot of people think [00:15:30] that they have a misconception about base phases. It's not like you just build a base one time and then you set it and forget it and the rest of the running you ever do is all speed building phases like speed work and tempo work every single week and long runs with quality and so on and so forth. High level runners every single year they go through a base phase every single season I should say. They go through a base phase and they have really, really good robust bases because they've been running for years and years and years, super high mileage.

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[00:16:00] So they could get into their speed work and their specific race prep work without doing a base phase, but also they're just, they'd be selling themselves short on performance because that base phase is really, really important to build that really robust engine. So just because you missed your original base phase doesn't mean you can't go back, not just this time but continuously throughout your entire running career and go through base phases. It is a much more longevity friendly way to run [00:16:30] because if you're just doing speed and tempo every week on end and you're never taking any breaks from that, A, you're going to hit points of diminishing return like several times and it's going to be really frustrating. B, you're just increasing your risk of injury. It's going to be a very fatiguing way to train and it's not really sustainable. So in your case, I think it would be very beneficial.

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It would help you not just reduce your injury risk in the future running, but it would also just give you that wider foundation, that bigger, more robust foundation [00:17:00] from which to build speed on in the future. It'll give you some time to practice running your mechanics, your skill. You can definitely throughout that time do strides and you should do strides. You should also do some pickups. You should also do some short hill sprints, but take six weeks, eight weeks, 10 weeks where you don't do any 400 meter repeats or specific threshold work and you just focus mostly on easy running strides, pickups and short sprints. It would be a really, really [00:17:30] good idea. And that goes for really anyone like, hey, originally, even if you just started running perfectly, which is very, very uncommon, but if you started running perfectly and the first thing you did was build a base for a long time and then you got into your faster stuff and whatnot, even if you did that, still going back periodically after you've been doing specific stuff, it's a lot easier if you're actually training for certain events or certain races or selection processes, but if you're just running because you want to be good at running and you enjoy it, which is totally fine, going [00:18:00] back and restarting base phases is a really good thing.

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But when I say restart, I don't mean starting from as if you've never built a base before. You can start with higher volume, especially for the person asking this question, I'm sure you've been running a decent amount, so you don't have to start with three 15 minute runs a week or anything like that. So you can kind of apply it to what you're doing for running volume and kind of go from there. But I would say very good idea, make or break, probably not, but still a good idea. Next question. If I'm managing running and lifting [00:18:30] properly, volume and intensity, do you still need a deload for lifting?

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Deloads are very, very nuanced. It really depends. I would've to see your program, to answer this specific question for you, I would have to know a lot more about your lifestyle, how you're feeling, what your goals are and so on and so forth. You'll see in most of my programs, and I put deloads in based on when I predict most people would need one based on the intensity, the progression, how [00:19:00] long we've been doing higher intensity stuff, and just my experience coaching people and seeing when most people need deloads. That being said, just because there's a deload in week eight of one of my programs doesn't mean that's a perfect time for every single person following the program to take a deload. Usually it's a pretty good idea. Most of my programs are performance biased, and taking a deload is usually just going to be a net positive regardless, even if you don't necessarily need it at that exact time.

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Oftentimes, I think [00:19:30] in one of my programs, I can't remember which one I want to say, it's either Jack is L three or two, I have a deload that you can plug and play so you can take the deload whenever you feel like you need it, and I personally am a big fan of reactive deloads or more intuitive deloads for certain people. For some people saying, Hey, take a deload whenever you need it is a fool's errand because they're just never going to take it. That was me for a decade in my twenties. But [00:20:00] for other people who are, they really want to, they understand the benefits of rest and recovery and taking not just a physical break, but a mental break from hard training. They understand that they will typically be able to listen to their body better and actually throw their ego out the window and take a deload when they feel like they need it.

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So I like to do that with my one-on-one clients. I don't plan deloads ahead. I plan tapers ahead based on when they're starting selection or when they're going to SFRE [00:20:30] or something like that. Or I have one client right now who's prepping for a ultra marathon, so I'll have his taper planned, but generally for those guys, I don't actually plan out specific deloads. We communicate back and forth and I also can see their training logs, and so I am more in tune with how they're feeling, how they're recovering, whether they're mentally in it or not. Maybe they need a mental break, maybe they're feeling good physically, but they've been going hard for a really long time and the mental strain of that, [00:21:00] which is a massive factor, it just requires them to kind of dial it back a little bit for a little while. So my deload strategy for myself as well as one-on-one clients is usually not still training just lower volume.

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Sometimes it is, especially with conditioning, but oftentimes it's like, Hey, don't think about training for the next four days or five days. Just don't go to the gym, don't run, don't think about training, do your best not to think about training and then we'll just hop right back into it. That is not necessarily [00:21:30] a deload, it's more like a hiatus, but it's a perfectly viable way to do it. It's totally, totally fine to do it that way. That is more of a mental relief because when you're doing a deload, you're still going to go train like a classic deload where you do typically less volume, sometimes less intensity, or maybe both or the other way around, depending on what you're deloading from, you're still going and you're still going through the motions, which for some people they need that because they freak freak out when they can't [00:22:00] train, which I think is kind of an issue that should be addressed, but either way, you're still going and doing it so you don't get quite as much of a mental relief.

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You still get that physical relief and you're still kind of going through the motions, you're going through the movement patterns and it's totally fine, but I really like just complete hiatus because they just help you mentally reset when you come off one. I usually do this twice a year, sometimes three years, three times a year. When you come off it, you just feel way more into it and way more motivated and ready to go, hit it hard [00:22:30] again for several weeks to several months. So deload for lifting, do you need one? I mean, if your goal is maximum performance and your program is set up appropriately for maximum performance, which if you created it yourself, I mean, I don't know, maybe not, but either way, most guys typically overdo their training in general, and in that case I would probably consider taking some deloads, but you could either do it reactively or you could plan it in.

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Some [00:23:00] people take deloads in my opinion way too often, and also some people pre-plan in a way that I don't like. For example, if someone just comes off a great amazing training week, they had the best training week of their life and oh by the way, it happened to be six weeks into the program and oh, by the way, next week's a deload no matter what. I don't like that from a mental standpoint, from a confidence standpoint, generally if you have a really, really good training week, you want to continue with that momentum. I would much rather take a deload when you [00:23:30] have a few bad training days in a row or a bad training week, or maybe not even a bad one, just a mundane one, or if you're just feeling mentally spent when you're normally motivated, by the way, if you're not normally motivated, you probably don't need deloads.

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You're probably not at risk of overtraining, but if you're training for maximum performance, a periodic deload or dial back in volume and intensity or even just a periodic few days off would probably be overall a good idea. Next question. I want to get leaner for the summer. I am 15% body fat right now. [00:24:00] Can I do a mini cut and maintain performance? Absolutely. If you're actually 15%, which I'm not doubting you necessarily, but a lot of people think they're 15% and they're probably closer to 18, 19, 20%. Men especially typically under underestimate, overestimate, underestimate how fat they are, how much body fat they have. So if you hear someone say, I'm 10% body fat, generally in my experience, they're usually closer to 15, they're [00:24:30] probably even closer to 20 than 10. That doesn't mean they're like 19 necessarily, but they're probably closer to 20% body fat than 10.

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That's typically what I see. And also it just depends on the measurement you're using. Are you using a DEXA scan? In which case it's probably pretty accurate. Are you using an InBody, which they have at a lot of gyms and stuff, and those are way, way off. Those are not really reliable. They can be decent for precision if you're doing it at the same time of day in the same state. Generally fasted first thing in the morning is the best time to do it, [00:25:00] but they're going to be off usually by 4%, 5% up or down. For example, I went to do a InBody one time. I was probably, I'm pretty good at predicting or guessing with pretty good accuracy by looking at someone, especially myself because I know where I store fat and whatnot, but I can usually look at a picture of a male and guess what body fat percentage they are by within two or 3%, [00:25:30] and at this time I was pretty lean but not crazy lean and I would guess I was probably about 10, 10 and a half percent body fat and I went and did an InBody.

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It said I was like 6.2, which is insanely lean. A lot of people think 6% is the equivalent of 3%. It's not. Guys on bodybuilding stages are typically around 5%. IF bb, pro high level extreme dieting, bodybuilders five, sometimes even 6%. So I was [00:26:00] not that lean and it said I was, but anyway, I am going off on a tangent. Can you get lean for summer? Can you do a mini cut and maintain performance? Absolutely, and good on you for thinking about it this early. A lot of people will be like, I want to get lean for summer in mid June and they're 18% body fat. They're like, I want to get down to 9% by summer. I'm like, dude, summer's literally a week away by what time during the summer? So get on you for thinking about it late March especially, because if you are at 15, you can easily get down to single [00:26:30] digits if you want.

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It depends on how lean you want to get, but if you want to get to nine, 10%, that's relatively maintainable for an entire summer. For some guys maintaining single digits year round is not really in the cards. They're going to feel terrible. Their face is going to look all skeletor. My face, when I got lean back in November, December of 2025, my face was just like Skeletor and I would not have been doing very well if I had to maintain that for a really long time. I am about to start getting lean [00:27:00] again for the summer, but I feel a lot better around 10%, maybe 11%, which is about where I'm at right now. So I would create a relatively modest calorie deficit. Even if you do that, you're still by mid-June at the very latest 4th of July, you're still going to probably be around 10%, 300 to 500 calorie deficit, eating plenty of protein, making sure you don't cut carbs.

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If you want to maintain performance, you should be trying to eat as many carbs as you possibly [00:27:30] can, but still be in the deficit. So generally a gram per pound of body weight for protein, about 0.3 to 0.4 grams of fat per pound of body weight. I would say for you, if you want to really perform, I would go down to 0.3 because that just makes more room for more carbs and that is plenty of fat to maintain your health, maintain your hormone health and things like that, and then ride it out. Make sure that you're doing other things right, getting enough sleep, you're not doing some crazy [00:28:00] training program. That's way, way, way too much volume. You're going to be in a modest recovery deficit, but if you're reasonable with it shouldn't be too bad and assess from there. As far as a mini cut, I mean it depends on your definition of a mini cut, a mini cut when I think mini cut, I think someone's 12%, they want to get down to 9% and they go on a six week mini cut or a four week mini cut or something like that.

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So it might take a little more than that again, depending on how lean you want to get. So I mean, I would just ride it out, see what happens, but [00:28:30] you're in a great spot cutting for 15% body fat. You can easily be lean by the time summer rolls around, no problem. Next question, I have lower back tightness, not pain after walking and standing for a long period. How to alleviate. Yeah, this is a really, really common thing. This was a huge thing when I was in Afghanistan in my last trip we did some PSD or personal security details for VIPs and pretty much the entire day was standing around in kit, walking around in Kit a little bit, but the rest was [00:29:00] just standing and when you're in kit, you're standing around, it's hot. It's absolutely brutal. I would much rather move in kit than stand around Kit.

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By the way, anyone who doesn't know Kit, it's like your body armor and your helmet basically like you're going into a tactical situation where you might have to get your gun on, but these weren't really tactical situations. They were just personal security and we didn't really get any ticks in these instances. So we were just standing around and it was absolutely the least comfortable thing [00:29:30] ever and I was really pumped when it was over, but it can happen without kit too, and if you're standing around a lot, it's definitely a legit thing and it's really just uncomfortable. What I would do is a lot of couch stretching. Oftentimes people have very tight hip flexors, most specifically the SOAs, which is a really deep hip flexor that kind of runs up into your abdominal inside your hip. So couch stretch is really good. Stretching your glutes, things like pigeon stretch, 90 [00:30:00] nineties also really good.

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I would probably foam roll your quads but do it properly. A lot of people when they take a foam roller, they just roll back and forth like a rolling pin, like they're rolling out a pizza that is really not doing anything. When you're foam rolling, your goal is to force your nervous system or encourage your nervous system to relax. So you might have really tight quads taking a foam roller starting at your hip bone, going really, really slow down your quad, your outer quad, your inner quad. You can do a couple down [00:30:30] and backs and anytime you feel like a really tight spot or kind of a tender sore spot or a hotspot, whatever you want to call it, hang out on that spot for 30 seconds, 45 seconds, 60 seconds. You can make really tiny little fine motor movements but not just going back and forth like 99% of people who foam roll do that's not doing anything.

(30:48):

What that does is kind of encourage your nervous system to relax and stop guarding that area and it can free up temporary range of motion. It's not like a saw wall a complete solution to this, but it can free up temporary ranges of motion and [00:31:00] it can help you feel better and it can let you, it's a good thing to do Before you get into mobility drills like the stretches I kind of just talked about, I would also consider foam rolling your calves and stretching your calves quite a bit. A lot of people have tight calves and it kind of works its way up sometimes in the lower back, but most people's approach to this is just to bend over and touch their toes and stretch their back muscles out, which it may alleviate. It may give you the illusion that you're feeling better, but it's really not doing all that much.

(31:28):

Typically it's something [00:31:30] lower down the chain quads your fastest laterals, the outer quad hamstrings. I mean you can definitely stretch your hamstrings and it could be glutes and it could even be, like I said, calves. That's the way I'd approach it and you can do what I would do probably is in the morning, spend five minutes doing this mobility in the evening, spend five minutes doing this mobility and make sure you're also emphasizing full range of motion when you're lifting strength training. I'm assuming you're strength training some form of it, but really get that full range of motion so [00:32:00] you get the mobility benefits of the strength training. A lot of people forget that strength training is a great, great, great way to build mobility, but only if you lift with full range of motion and honestly in my observation, rarely do people lift with full range of motion.

(32:14):

Next question, is it feasible to drop my mile time down to seven minutes from 8 22 in three to four months? Yes, definitely feasible. It definitely is going to require some good programming and I would probably follow two and five mile, even though it's called two and five mile, it'll definitely [00:32:30] improve your one mile time and also, I mean that's the main thing is going to just require really good programming. If you just go out and run as hard as you can all the time when you're doing repeats or if you're just doing repeats way too much or any number of different ways people mess up their running programming, then it's less feasible. If you've been fast before and you took some time off or whatever, it got slower, you have a higher chance of getting back down to that because you're regaining fitness that you've had in the past.

(33:00):

[00:33:00] But even if not, I mean it's totally doable. I get messages all the time from guys that hit me up and they're like in the two and five mile program, they'll cut three, four minutes off their two mile and 6, 8, 10 minutes off their five mile in 13, 14, I think it's a 14 week program, so the one mile is shorter, so the delta is going to be a little smaller, like cutting 10 minutes off a five mile is not the same as cutting 10 minutes off a two mile. That'd [00:33:30] be insane. But either way, you're going to make smaller progress. The shorter the run is, but still a minute and 22 seconds is doable. It's just going to take a lot of dedication and really good programming and the right stuff outside the gym and not doing a bunch of other crazy stuff that's going to interfere with your running progress.

(33:48):

So I would assume you probably have more goals than just a run, like a faster one mile run, but that should be regardless. Even if you do have other goals, if that's your main goal, [00:34:00] that should be your main meat and potatoes, your main focus, you should still definitely lift. You should still not just do only fast running. You should definitely do some easy running and whatnot, but it's very dual. Next question, pace count for unknown rucks at SFAS. So I don't like using pace count. I would much rather use terrain If you get to where, so first off, if you get really, really fit, you absolutely can just run the entire time of unknown rucks. Plenty of people do that. I mean maybe not plenty of people, but there will be guys in every class, [00:34:30] probably a handful or two guys in every class that can run most if not all of it.

(34:34):

There's no really, really extreme long uphills on Camp McCall basically at all. It's mostly rolling hills, so ideally you get to where you can do that, but if not, no big deal. Most of the guys won't be able to do that. I like to use terrain. So when you are coming up on an uphill walk, when you are on flat, do a nice little trot, nothing crazy, you're not like going sprinting or [00:35:00] anything like that. Nice little trot when you're on a downhill, that's when you want to take advantage of gravity and go faster. Now this will bang your quads up if you're not used to it, but also it is kind of rough on the joints too. So in training you want to limit how much downhill running you do. You still want to do some with a ruck on, you still want to do some because you want to make those adaptations so it doesn't just destroy you during gate week and you have eight up quads the rest of the week because you will if you never do it in training.

(35:29):

But [00:35:30] a lot of people train the same way they test. So when they're going out on their training rucks, they run every downhill and they'll walk every uphill and flats are kind of like hit or miss and that's not the best way to do it. What I would do is for the most part in training, as you get closer to selection, you can trot on the flats. I would probably maybe do a little bit of trotting on minor uphills and then on downhills for the most part, you want to avoid running downhill until [00:36:00] you're about six-ish weeks out, six weeks out or so for say you're doing a weekend long rock, you can run 5, 6, 7 minutes downhill and I wouldn't do it all at once. I would break it up into different parts of the rock, maybe two minutes here, one minute here, 30 seconds here, and so on.

(36:18):

So you accumulate about five, six minutes the following week. I would say no downhill running two weeks later because it just takes longer to recover from that stuff. It's more stressful on especially the connected tissue [00:36:30] and the bone structure, the musculoskeletal system. So like the next week, no more downhill running. You can definitely run other parts of your ruck and then the following week do it again a little bit longer, maybe eight minutes, nine minutes total spread out again. And then when you're about two weeks out ish, maybe you have one other ruck where you do some downhill running and you spend 12, 13 minutes or so running downhill and then you're two weeks out, you start to taper. You have plenty of time to recover and you go in and it does not take [00:37:00] a lot of exposure to make those adaptations. You notice, I didn't say go and do an entire ruck where you're running every downhill like you would when it's actually race day, but you do want those adaptations.

(37:11):

You just don't want to overdo it. That's the way I like to do it because if you think about it, if you're doing pace count and you finish, say your 250 meter pace count or whatever, and you're at the bottom of an uphill, you just walk this either flat or downhill and then it's like, oh, it's time to run and you're running uphill. You're not really taking advantage [00:37:30] of the terrain. So what I would do is take advantage of the terrain and take advantage of gravity and preserve yourself by walking uphill. Unless of course, like I said, you're a super freak flats, depending on how fit you are, maybe some light trotting on flats and then take off down the downhills, not necessarily a full sprint, but get some good solid speed makeup ground on those downhills. That is generally the best way to approach it.

(37:57):

Next question, if I have significant imbalances side to side, should [00:38:00] I focus on unilateral or bilateral lifts? You should definitely do both, but I would say it depends. I mean is it your lower body, your upper body, is it both? Do these imbalances cause pain because every single human being has imbalances side to side. You said yours are significant, in which case I'll get into kind of how I'd approach it, but everyone's got side to side imbalances no matter what. Even if you can't see them, even if you can't feel them, it's just no one's symmetrical, perfectly symmetrical. If it's not causing you [00:38:30] any issues, like you don't have pain on one side, whether it's the side that's weaker or stronger, sometimes it could be either one, then I wouldn't worry too too much about it. But if it's significant enough to either cause pain or say you want to look better and one side is just clearly bigger and stronger than the other side, then you can definitely address it.

(38:50):

So I would still keep some bilateral lifts in some presses, some pulls, some squats, some hinges, but also do a good amount of unilateral [00:39:00] stuff. So when you're doing unilateral lifts to bring up one side, your weaker side, there's a couple of different ways to approach it. Generally, the most foolproof way to do it is to slow down your strong side a little bit, half step it if you will, to let your weak side catch up. And the best way to do that is to say you're doing a split squat. Say your right leg is your weak side, your left leg is your strong side. Start with your right side, start with your weak leg. Do however many reps. [00:39:30] If you're going to one rep in the tank, whatever that may be, say it's nine reps with one rep in the tank. Then after you rest, by the way, in between legs, you want to rest in between legs when you're doing unilateral stuff.

(39:41):

Talked about this a lot, but it's very important and no one ever does it. And if you don't need rest by the way, it's a very, very clear sign that you're not training that first leg hard enough. You're trying to bring up a weak leg, you need to train this leg really, really hard or arm whatever exercise you're doing, whatever part of your body. So you [00:40:00] do that, nine reps, one rep in the tank no matter what, when you go into your strong leg after resting stop at nine, so it's not like you're completely ignoring it and you're not training it at all. You're still getting a good solid stimulus on it. It's just probably going to be three or four reps in the tank instead of one like that side. Then you do that continuously and you might find that your weak leg is able to lift more or it's able to do more reps at the same load.

(40:25):

And also you're getting closer to failure once you train your strong side [00:40:30] as well. So say a month into it, you're getting 11 reps with the same load that you use week one on your weak side. Say you get 11 reps on your strong side, but you maybe only could have done one or two more reps. You're kind of catching them up, you're catching that weak leg up to the strong leg and you're going to have less of a discrepancy between the two. So that is the way I would do it. Other options, you could train the strong leg first and then you could do a rest pause with the weak leg. So what that would look like is you take the strong leg to [00:41:00] a certain reps and reserve, say it's split squats again, you start with the left leg, say you get 12 reps and then you train after resting.

(41:08):

Definitely huge to rest on this one because you want to be able to put as much effort into the weak leg as you possibly can. So take a good solid rest, make sure you're fresh going into that weak leg, train that weak leg, maybe you only get nine reps. ReRack it, take a breather for 20 seconds, 30 seconds, then go back into it and match the reps. So you get like three more reps. It's [00:41:30] a rest pause or a myo rep. You can call it either one. That's another way it's a little more advanced to do it that way, but it is an option. And then there's a final option, and that is to basically train both legs the same. So one rep in the tank, say you get nine reps, seven reps, six reps on the weak side, and say you get 10 reps, eight reps, eight reps on the strong side, you can take the reps remaining and do another set of just the weak side.

(42:00):

[00:42:00] So say there's a five or six rep discrepancy between the two. After your three sets, we're just saying three sets here you can do another set of five or six reps just using the weak side. That is another option. I don't really like that one all that much, but you can do it if you want. It's just more time consuming and a little bit more systemically fatiguing. But honestly, the best way to do it would be the original one. The first one I talked about. Just let the other weak side catch up while kind of dimming down the strength of the [00:42:30] strong side. Next question, breakfast is 85 grams of carbs, five grams of fat, and 57 grams of protein. That's a solid breakfast. Any recommended changes on ruck run and lift for ranger school? Morning heavy workouts. Now, honestly, I mean the fact that you can get a breakfast in with five grams of fat is pretty impressive.

(42:51):

Make sure you're eating enough fat throughout the day. If every meal you eat is only five grams of fat and you're ending the day with 20 grams of fat, 25, then I would definitely up that just a [00:43:00] little bit. If you're in a calorie surplus, not as important If you're around maintenance, not as important. If you're in a deficit, definitely important to make sure your fat's not too low, but still, I mean generally practicality wise, it's going to be easier to eat a little bit more than five grams of fat per meal. And I'm guessing you're not doing that. I like to start my day with a little bit more fat just to kind of slow the digestive process down of that. But then again, it sounds like you're training in the morning, so you're eating this around training. You want really [00:43:30] fast digestion, generally speaking in the meals that you eat around training, in which case, this would be a really, really good option assuming your carbs aren't really, really high in fiber.

(43:39):

Not saying you shouldn't eat fiber at all. I'm saying keep your fiber and your fat low around your training. You're already keeping the fat low. I don't know what you're eating for carbs, so it's hard to a hundred percent say that this is perfect, but the macros are totally fine. I would say if you're feeling good, you're recovering well and you're able to hit your macros on a day-to-day basis. This is just one meal. [00:44:00] I mean, what you eat around training is definitely important as far as macros and food choices. But the main thing to ask yourself is do I feel like this is sustainable? Do I feel like I'm getting enough calories? Am I getting enough carbs throughout the day? Am I making sure I get enough protein and do I feel good? Do I like the food? And so on and so forth.

(44:20):

So it's kind of asking about, I'm not saying this is wrong or anything, this is honestly totally a fine question and I like nerding out about this stuff, but it's like when people ask me, [00:44:30] is doing this for one workout on one day optimal or not? It depends. What you do on one day doesn't really matter all that much. Just like what you eat in one meal doesn't matter all that much, but the context that you provided around your breakfast does make it a little bit more of a relevant and easier to answer question. So I would say don't change anything unless for whatever reason you don't feel good when you eat it or whatever. I would say it's totally fine to maintain. Next question. In phase one of ruck [00:45:00] run lift, will replacing front squats with zercher squats still be optimal? I mean optimal?

(45:06):

What's your definition of optimal? It really depends. Are you trying to get good at front squats, then it would be really suboptimal to not do front squats. If you're trying to get stronger legs and you like the zercher squat and you don't like the front squat, would it be optimal? I don't know, but would it be acceptable? Totally fine. Yeah, absolutely. I would say a better option would be something like a safety bar squat, maybe a high bar squat, but probably a safety bar [00:45:30] if you have access to one. Zercher, squats are a little bit limited by how much you can hold onto, and they're, for a lot of people really uncomfortable. But that being said, they're totally fine. They're just kind of a different, less of a leg stimulus than a front squat would be. Front squats really, really cross the quads and they're great, great quad exercise, but if for whatever reason they're not comfortable for you or you just don't like them for, it's not like you're going to get tested on your front squats most likely.

(45:57):

I don't know where you're going, but in which case finding [00:46:00] an alternative is fine. Just note that the zercher squats more of like a full body posterior chain involved lift than the front squat is. And if you want to get more quad stimulus, I would consider a safety bar or a, you could even sub in a machine squat if you want a pendulum hack like press whatever you fancy. So optimal, I don't know, but optimal is, I dunno, it's one of the most overused words in fitness these days because optimal, there's no definition [00:46:30] for optimal, optimal for this person, for this goal. Maybe optimal for this, is it optimal for your quad growth? No, but it still could be a good idea in the context of the entire training plan to sub it out with something. Maybe zercher squats, maybe something different. It just depends on what you're going for.

(46:49):

Next question. Is leg drive on bench press cheating? No, not at all. I mean, the proper way to bench is to use leg drive, so definitely not. I mean, you're going to be able to lift way more weight [00:47:00] if you use leg drive. Every single power lifter in the world has really, really big benches, and a lot of it has to do with their leg drive ability. So I mean, if you're just trying to get a bigger chest, I would say bench press wouldn't be the best option for most people, unless you have a very specific build, really short arms, and it's a really big time chest blows up your chest, but you're always limited by range of motion on the bench press because the bench is going to touch your chest. You can't go any deeper, and it's not really full range of motion for the pecs.

(47:29):

That doesn't mean it [00:47:30] won't build any muscle, don't get me wrong. But if you want to just maximize your muscle growth, less leg drive might be a better option, but you're going to just be stronger if you use leg drive in the lift. So if you're going for maximum bench press weight, then I would absolutely use leg drive. That being said, some guys will use leg drive and also what happens is their butt comes way up off the bench. That's really rough on your back, first of all. And also it reduces the range of motion. And also it's cheating. Like [00:48:00] it would not count in a power lifting meet, and you can lift more weight that way, but you're basically making it a decline bench. And I see guys doing this on incline bench two all the time. Basically, they're on an incline bench benching, and because they're probably attached to their incline bench numbers for whatever reason, I mean, I get it, a lot of people are attached to their lift numbers, but they will bring their butt so far off the bench that it just becomes basically a flat bench press.

(48:25):

Why don't you just do a flat bench press if you're going to do that? And also it's way less stressful [00:48:30] on your lower back. But anyway, is it cheating? No. Is it the best option for maximum hypertrophy? Probably not bringing your feet up off the floor or just having them down on the floor but not pushing off. You're going to get just more chest engagement. It's going to be less of a full body core involving lift and leg involving lift, but it's kind of splitting hairs at that point. It's not like you're not going to grow any muscle if you use leg drive. And like I said, if you're trying to get a stronger bench as strong [00:49:00] as possible, definitely use leg drive. Just keep your butt on the bench and don't be one of those archers that says they have a 4 0 5 bench, but their butt comes off the bench by 10 inches.

(49:09):

That's not really, you're kind of missing the point on that point. Next question. In your last post, you said bodybuilding is best for soft if you don't neglect other facets. Is that true? I would say absolutely not. A lot of people share this view that I do, but I would say it is hands down the best way to train. It's the most longevity friendly way to train lifting in [00:49:30] a bodybuilding rep range. Now, I'm not talking about trying to go and step on a bodybuilding stage. There's a bunch of aspects of professional bodybuilding that make it a less healthy thing, taking peds, getting crazy, crazy, crazy lean and so on and so forth. It's very, very extreme. But lifting with the goal of building muscle in a longevity friendly manner, choosing exercises based on your own body proportions, your leverages, what feels the best for you.

(50:00):

[00:50:00] Training in a five to 10 rep most of the time with a goal of building muscle, keeping your joints healthy, that is going to be the best way to lift for longevity. And soft is a very inherently non longevity friendly endeavor. So anything you can do to mitigate the potential longevity effects, the negative longevity effects of just life in soft is a good idea. And most people totally overlook that. They just want to get super strong. They want to get crazy power [00:50:30] cleans and hang cleans and snatches. They want to pull heavy weight off the floor. And believe me, this was me for most of my career. I was the strength guy. You would not catch me, barely catch me doing any sort of bodybuilding. And over time I realized that that is not a great way to lift. If you want to feel good all the time, if you're also doing a bunch of stuff that is inherently going to make you not feel good, jumping out of planes, not sleeping, traveling, wearing kit all the time, doing weird stuff, like most of [00:51:00] the stuff you do on a day-to-day basis and soft is not very great for your joints, not great for your nervous system, it's not great for your overall health and so on and so forth.

(51:09):

So finding a way to train a base of your training that is longevity, in which case bodybuilding would be definitely number one because it's controlled, you are using full range of motion. So there's a mobility component and like I said, you don't necessarily have to do a specific lift. You can choose lifts based on you got to do the movement patterns, [00:51:30] but you can choose lifts based on what you prefer and what equipment you have access to is going to be a really good idea. Now that being said, it can be taken too far and you mentioned it in your question, not neglecting the other stuff. Make sure you're also doing some things to make you more capable, such as strongman work, such as maybe periodically doing strength phases where you try and get a little stronger in the lower rep ranges, plenty of speed, agility and longer conditioning endurance, you still have to include that [00:52:00] stuff too, but as a baseline component of your lifting bodybuilding would be the way to go.

(52:04):

Again, differentiating the bodybuilding I'm talking about from the bodybuilding that you see guys doing on pro bodybuilding stages, totally different ballgame. Next question, alternatives for posterior chain development other than deadlift, any sort of deadlift variation, Romanian deadlifts are probably my go-to. A lot of people don't perform Romanian deadlifts with very good form, but if you can [00:52:30] lock in an RDL, you're doing really good and you can do it with multiple different pieces of equipment. You can do barbell R dls, you can do dumbbell, you can do single leg R dls, you can do B stance R dls, you can do R DLS on a belt squat and probably other things, I'm not thinking of other things like a stiff legged deadlift, whether you're doing it with dumbbells and you're kind of doing the eccentric focus, stiff legged deadlift, that's definitely really fatiguing and soreness inducing because your hamstrings are really stretched and you're going really slow in the eccentric.

(52:58):

But that can be a great way to build your [00:53:00] hamstrings, your lower back. You can also do if you don't like hinges or if hinges bother you right now for whatever reason, you could either do upper body hinges where you're on a 45 degree back raise machine and you can make that more glute, you can make it more hamstring. It takes some skill for sure. You can make it more lower back. Although most people don't need more lower back training necessarily because they use their lower back on most of their hinges anyway. You could do hip thrust. That's not a hinge at all, all, but it's still really, really good for especially the glutes and it's less fatiguing and you can really [00:53:30] load it. And it's a great exercise and a lot of guys are apprehensive to do it. They think it's a girl exercise, which is kind of mind boggling to me because it's an awesome lift and you're missing out.

(53:39):

It is a pain in the ass, no pun intended to do it with a barbell. Just the setup and breakdown is really annoying. It takes a while, but if you have a machine of some kind, I think it's a Nautilus machine, and I also have an arsenal machine at my gym hip thrust machine. I use the Nautilus more because it's a better machine. But if you do have access to one, [00:54:00] I would strongly recommend at least sometimes rotating hip thrust in. You can do good mornings, you could do glute ham raises, leg curls, any exercise that works either the hamstrings, I mean I guess calves are technically posterior chain, so calf raises, leg curl variations, hinge variations, upper body hinge variations, deadlift variations that aren't the actual deadlift, any of those work. So posterior chain is very, very important to [00:54:30] focus on. A lot of guys have underdeveloped posterior chains, especially upper posterior chains.

(54:34):

Upper back is probably the most universally underdeveloped muscle group in most military age. Males typically because they don't train it properly or their programs just have tons and tons and tons of lat work and maybe one upper back exercise, but sometimes they do have more horizontal poles for the upper back and they just don't train it properly. Their elbows are really close to their sides. The lats are usually [00:55:00] stronger, so you can lift more weights that way and guys don't really understand muscle functions of the traps, the rhomboids, et cetera. So as long as you have a good balance and mix of all those things, and then I didn't even talk about upper back, but definitely make sure you train upper back, your lats, your traps and your ql. Do some one-sided carries some, what are they suitcase carries and you're going to be robust and you don't have deadlift at all if you don't want.

(55:26):

Next question, we'll make this the last one. Taking the long walk from the regular army. Is [00:55:30] this a bad idea? No, I wouldn't consider it a bad idea. If you want to take the long walk and you're serious about it and you go and you're not just taking someone else's spot because you want to just go and see how it is you actually want to go and crush, I think it's a freaking awesome idea. I don't know why you wouldn't. I had a couple of regular Army guys in my class. One guy actually made it. He was an absolute riot. This dude thought it was SFAS until a week and a half in when someone told him it was not SFAS. He thought, [00:56:00] I am training to go to be a Green beret. That is how out of the loop he was at this election and he still made it because guess what?

(56:09):

He prepared for it. He was the toughest dude ever so tough. He would get back at the end of every day just ripped to shreds, thorns sticking all over him. He did not have a lot of land have skill. He basically just kind of followed instructions and dead wrecking and just went absolutely ham. But he was frigging awesome and [00:56:30] a really good dude and he made it and we were super pumped that he made it. Is that a common thing? Not necessarily. I would say most guys who get picked up, I mean most classes are mostly soft guys, either Ranger or Navy Seals or marsoc or SF, some Air Force. Once in a while I had an Air Force guy in my class get picked up. But there definitely are some regular Army guys. Is it common for them to make it? Not necessarily. I would say it's less common just because they don't get a lot of Land N training.

(56:57):

But if you do a bunch of land nap training on your own, [00:57:00] you don't have to have this to get selected, especially you don't have to have any sort of combat experience whatsoever or really anything. You could be a soft skill. MOS, if you're really good at rucking and you're really good at land nav and you're a decent dude and you don't have a crazy psychological profile to say you can't make it, you absolutely can't. Will you struggle a little more in OTC? Most likely, unless you do a lot of shooting on your own, like you're very, very experienced with shooting and you don't have to worry about shooting accuracy. You just have to learn [00:57:30] about getting the CQB down. That's one thing, but for the most part it's going to be kind of drinking from a fire hose if you do get picked up and you go to OTC, but honestly that's down the road.

(57:39):

I would focus on selection. Even just getting selected is pretty cool. Feat, not a lot of people do it. It's very, very low selection rate. Honestly, just getting into that selection is really, really hard. Lots and lots and lots of people apply. Not a lot of people go, most classes are like 90 to 100 guys. I don't know how many guys apply, but it is way, way, way, way more than that. So that's kind of why I said don't [00:58:00] take someone else's slot if you're not serious about it. Some guys do that, so I say send it, man. You only live once. You never know what's going to happen. Do your best to prepare as best you possibly can for it. Ruck run Lift would be a good program to follow if you're interested. And yeah, go see what you're made of. So yeah, that's it guys. Thank you guys very much for tuning in. Next episode to come out will be my interview with Cody McBroom and that was a really good conversation. We talked a lot about performance nutrition [00:58:30] and he's a super smart dude and we got into some really, really good stuff. So stay tuned for that and I'll be back soon with another episode myself. Till then, Terminator out.