How to Do Pull Ups in 30 Days (The Exact Method That Actually Works) | Mind Pump 2898

Key Takeaway

Want to master pull-ups in 30 days? Practice them daily at low intensity—way less than you think. If you can do 5 pull-ups max, do just 1-2 reps, 3-5 times throughout the day. Never go to failure. It's about skill practice, not muscle fatigue. Avoid all other back work during this period. The Soviets proved this works: frequent, low-intensity practice beats traditional high-volume training every time.

Episode Overview

This episode breaks down a proven 30-day formula for achieving pull-ups, based on Soviet training methods and the hosts' personal experiences. The key insight: treat pull-ups as a skill to practice daily at very low intensity, rather than a muscle group to exhaust. The hosts emphasize frequent practice (3-5 times daily), staying far from failure, eliminating other back work, eating at maintenance or surplus, prioritizing sleep, and scheduling a test day after 4-5 days of rest.

Full Transcript

Transcript of How to Do Pull Ups in 30 Days (The Exact Method That Actually Works) | Mind Pump 2898 from Mind Pump Show. Auto-generated from episode audio; may contain minor errors.

Being able to do a pull-up or pull-ups, it's a great accomplishment, but you struggle. You've been trying for a long time. You can't do it. We're going to give you the formula. Be able to do pull-ups in 30 days. Let's get to it. Justin's been trying for 45 years. You still can't do it. So close. So close. So close. It's a heavy cakes. He's got my bottom. It keeps it up. This was a uh Did you guys get this often with your clients, especially female clients, where they're like, I want to be able to do a pull-up.

Yeah. It was a big goal. Yeah, I think it's a it's a it's a fun goal. It's a great exercise, but it's, you know, high resistance, right? You're lifting your body weight. Um, but being able to do it is it's fun. It's a great back exercise, very functional. Um, and a lot of people of people of people who want to do more pull-ups go about it the wrong way. I think that they believe if they just train their back more or add in more pull pull downs and just increase the volume that that's going to do it.

um not realizing that there is a way to get better at a skill, which is all all exercises are skills. There's a much faster way to get good at this. It's actually interesting how little getting really strong on your back actually plays a role. Yes, you can get really strong on your back and see a minimal difference. Now, if you take somebody who's never lifted and you get a strong back, uh you let's say you test them the first day and they can't do a single pull-up or maybe they can do one and then you get them a strong back.

They they could probably do a couple, but there's not a lot of carryover. Not like you would think there would be. Well, again, people strength to weight ratio. It's like you'd probably do better just getting leaner there. Well, so the strength to weight ratio, but also this is a big one is that people, you know, when they look at exercises, exercises, exercises, they look at exercises as it relates to body parts. So it's like those are chest exercises, those are shoulder exercises, those are leg exercises.

And that's true, but exercises are skills. Uh, and so if for example, if your goal was to throw a baseball twice as far as you currently can and you wanted to get really good at throwing a baseball really far, there's two approaches you could take. The approach uh that would be wrong would be let me strengthen all the muscles involved in throwing a baseball. So I got my lats involved. There's some forearm, you know, flexors involved. I got the, you know, infraspanatus and okay, I got to strengthen my hips a little bit.

So, I can go to the gym and just work on those muscles or I could practice throwing a baseball. Which one is going to get uh accomplish the goal faster? Practicing throwing a baseball because it's a skill. When we look at exercises, we just don't look at them that way. We just look at the muscles involved and think, well, let's just get those muscles stronger. Uh, which is part of it, but the other part of it is this is a skill. So, the number one with being able to do pull-ups, if you really want to be able to do pull-ups in 30 days, cut your legs off.

You You You don't cut your legs off. that'll do it. Uh is you practice them daily. Every day you practice them. Now, this is different than training them every single day. single day. single day. So, the mistake someone would make with this is they go and do, you know, a a pull-up workout pull-up workout pull-up workout every single day. That is a a great way to get yourself to do less than you currently can do. That's how you overtrain yourself. What you do is you go and you practice and there's a variety of different ways to do this, but you practice them at a low to moderate intensity moderate intensity moderate intensity uh every day, you know, maybe a couple times a day uh without pushing the intensity.

Uh and what you'll find is strength gains uh in this specific movement increase dramatically and rapidly. Yeah, it's uh I know the audience is probably tired of hearing the story that I think we've all shared because I think we all have a personal story related to this and I mine is so vivid because it's still I don't think I ever have exceeded uh this this pull-up feat for me and uh it was so unintentional. It wasn't even like a big workout. I was into I was working out in high school but like very minimal and not appropriately not doing a lot.

I was doing a lot of things wrong you know nutritionally programwise everything. But when I worked at the dairy which I worked at five sometimes six seven days a week um and I milk cows there was the where you came in to uh where the stalls were. There were these bars that were just uh these big thick bars above me um that were just a just a little bit above. I just had to hop up for a second and just as tradition I would walk in and I'd jump on it real quick and I'd swing up and I I literally only do like three to five.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was not like a workout. Yeah. I wasn't I wasn't like doing it to work out. I like did it just like I did mess around. I was messing around and I did it every every day. Every day I would jump up there and do that and you know that was I worked there for years and before I knew it it was just like it felt like no it actually felt like it was so easy for me to pull my body weight up.

I felt like I could just do as many as I wanted. And it was so wild to to see that. And then years later getting in the gym and lifting weights and trying to build my back and build muscle like I was never that I could never get that good and but I never had applied it to that to that level where I just every day dedicated doing a handful of them and it's wild what a difference. The key to what you're saying is frequency of practice in low intensity.

Yeah. I wasn't going and never went to you could have probably repped out 15. Yeah, but you're doing three. Yeah. Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, just so that people get an idea of what that intensity looks like. I had a similar experience. It wasn't with pull-ups, it was with bench press. I had a this I've told this story before. I had this trainer that worked for me for me for me that uh he could bench press uh four plates. Okay. So, he was just really really strong at the bench press.

And I never really saw him work out. And it wasn't cuz he didn't work out. I just don't think I was there paying attention to the times. But what I did notice was that in between his clients, he'd load up the bench. So, remember this guy who could bench press 400 lb. He would load up like 275 or 315. He'd get under the he would mess around basically. He'd get under the bar. He'd do like a couple reps and rack it up. And I always thought I actually didn't think anything of it.

I thought he was just playing around. And one day, you know, I I had a chance to hang out with him and at this time, you know, I'm a young kid. And then, you know, in the '9s, bench press was like the lift. That's how you talked about how strong you were. And I'm like, dude, how did you get so strong at bench press? Cuz he wasn't a huge I was a big guy, but not big enough to where you could think you bench at 405.

And he goes, "Oh, I I don't even train it." I'm like, "What?" Like, "So, you're just naturally strong at bench press?" He goes, "No." He goes, "All day throughout the day." He goes, "I just go onto the bench and I fool around and mess around throughout the day. Like, that's all you do?" He said, "Yeah, practice it." practice it." practice it." And then I read Soviet era studies on strength training and how they train some of their athletes and they had similar approaches to getting their athletes to increase their strength.

any specific lift dramatically. dramatically. dramatically. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so this is what it looks like for for someone listening, right? So let's say you can't do any pull-ups because maybe you can't do any at all and you're like, I want to be able to do at least one or two. You'd set up a pull-up bar in a doorway somewhere in your house. Set it up with a with assistance with a band so you could hook your knee or your leg underneath it and you would, you know, two or three times a day you go up there and do like one or two easy pull-ups and you would just practice them every single day.

It's just pattern recognition. Yes. At the end of the day, it's just like learning a language. Like you're going to get more um knowledgeable about the sequencing of that and your your body's going to respond so much better the more that you um you know expose it to it. So, it's it's it really is that and it's like, you know, maybe we, you know, we add a little bit more stress to that. And, you know, there's certain techniques you can do like if you can't do a pull-up right away, uh, you know, you might want to just hold, you might want to have isometric, you might want to work on the eentric part, but it's really the exposure of like going through that entire range of motion, maybe assisted, but uh, the more frequently you can do that with, you know, less stress and more skill, the better.

better. better. So, years ago, I had a female client that I did exactly that. So, she t came to me. I really wanted to, we had been training her for a while. So, she already been working out, but she's like, I really want to do pull-ups. So, I said, and I did all the stuff we're going to talk about on top of this, but one thing that I said was I said, set up a pull-up bar, and you can't do a pull-up. So, what I want you to do is get a step so you could get up to the pull-up bar so that you're already, it's like you already finished a pull-up, let then bend your knees and slowly lower yourself, and that's it.

And usually that one time, and do that like three times a day. And, uh, but it wasn't very long at all. She was able to do uh more than one. She was able to do full like two or three full pull-ups. full pull-ups. full pull-ups. I mean, we all have these crazy stories, right? When I was uh Hillsdale, so I'm 25, 25, 25, I had this guy Raphael from New York who was in his mid4s at the time. And of course, this is my 20 20ome year old brain brain brain defaulted to, oh, he takes all kinds of steroids, that's why he looks like he's probably really good with size.

Yeah. Yeah. And he never worked out. He never had a half hour hour block of training. Never on one. And he worked for me for years and he was absolutely jacked and claimed he was natural and I didn't believe it. Especially because the way I saw he worked out and the way he worked out was you we all know who Sal tells the story of how he used to stuff food down between the five to 10 clients. Five 10 minutes, right? Everyone has about five to 10 minutes between clients.

What he did was walk over to the dumbbell rack and did two sets of curls or walk over to the bench press and just do two sets of bench press just between clients all day long. All day long. And I actually interpreted it too is like one I thought he was on steroids or two this guy's so insecure. He has to keep lifting. He has to keep lifting to keep a pump all the time and that's his thing. But he was like that's how I work out.

I just just just I don't ever do a full hour workout. I don't have time to do that and it's easier for me just to do this all day. And I just didn't believe him. I I didn't believe him whatsoever. And I'm so inspired by uh that way of training that, you know, part of the motivation I've talked off air, I think, to you guys. I don't know if I've publicly talked about this, but you know, I'm working on building an outdoor gym at my house, and I'm outside a lot, especially with Max and the pool and stuff like that.

And I'm just going to make it a goal. I'm gonna log it, too. So, I'm not gonna just willy-nilly do it. I'm gonna try and kind of track it to get an idea of what I'm doing and just kind of keep a little notebook there and just like, oh, did two sets of this, do this, and just kind of see where everything lands. But I'm I'm inspired to not do any traditional kind of lifting and just make an effort every, you know, every time I walk outside or I go for a swim or I lay out or I go in my sauna, all those things are outside or I'm barbecuing out there.

just gonna walk over to the dumbbell or the pull-up or the squat, right? And just do a set or two and then walk away and just see if I can tally up what would be a general workout in a in a day or two and just see what happens. And and that's that's the the Soviets wrote a lot about that style of training for building. building. building. And I know it's not realistic for the average listener, right? Like not everybody has that luxury. So, I get why we've all kind of as a society conformed to this 1h hour blocks 3 days a week or whatever like that, but you know, from everything that I've seen, what I've experienced personally from the stories you guys have shared, it almost seems like this would be ideal if you had that luxury.

I think so. And again, for someone listening who wants to do this with pull-ups, this is actually this is easy with pull-ups cuz pull-up bars are really inexpensive, really inexpensive, really inexpensive, right? put them in a doorway in your house house house and and you just you just practice this like literally two or three times a day and just and it has to feel like practice. Don't make it a workout which takes us to the second uh point here which is avoid any other back work.

So this will not work if you also once or twice a week have a long intense back workout. workout. workout. Yeah, you fatigue. You got to avoid all other back work for 30 days. And all your back work is going to be this, you know, daily two or three times a day. I go up and I hop up and I practice. Which, by the way, don't all because that might uh, you know, discourage somebody because like, oh my god, I don't want to lose my like you will develop pull-ups are such a great exercise for developing the back.

And so if you if you go from not being good at pull-ups to being great at pull-ups in 30 days, but you missed you skip deadlifting for a while or you skip doing rows for a while, trust me, you're going to have a good back. I mean, this is how you get good at any lift. You have to kind of trade it out like and focus on that and get rid of the junk volume. And that's kind of like, you know, that's the recipe. If you really, if this is a goal of yours to get better at it, you know, you just have to, you know, get rid of some of the other exercises that are kind of deterring you from just all your focus on this.

That's right. Well, you just recently learned that lesson again, right? Going through your whole journey with the push press and you were trying to complement it with all these auxiliary things and you're Yeah. it it like logically you think it makes sense to kind of build up from uh you know the whole like so I'm I need to like get all these other ranges of motion to kind of you know make sure like the joints stable and this and that and the other but really it was taking away from you know the the bucket of of what I could really output and so if like you know if you just emphasize that more and you just focus completely on that you're going to get really good fast fast fast no real good that's and again this is 30 days so if you're like okay I'll give this a shot just give it a shot for 30 days and watch what happens.

Now, the next thing is you're trying to get stronger. Don't do this in a deficit. So, uh, and I don't mean you need to be in a crazy bulk, but feed your body cuz we're trying to get you stronger. Uh, there is, of course, there can be an argument for losing weight to be able to do a pull-up. Totally get that. So, for some people who have a lot of weight to lose, it might be better to strategize to lose some weight to be able to do a pull-up.

But for most people, don't do don't undereat to try to get stronger. It's typically a terrible No. I mean, if you want a crazy recipe for getting bad acid pull-ups is you follow what you're saying in a surplus for 30 days and then you go on a 30-day cut and keep it going. Watch what happens. Watch. Yeah. Drop an extra 5, 10 lbs or 15 lbs and keep doing the pull-up thing and all of a sudden you'll see your pull-ups go double triple what you were doing after you did the 30 days of bulking.

Uh here's the other thing. You're doing this for 30 days. For 30 days, also get really good sleep. So, prioritize your sleep. Nothing kills strength gains like poor sleep. Nothing increases risk of injury like poor sleep. Nothing will hammer your hormones as terribly as poor sleep. So, you're doing a 30-day challenge. So, for the next 30 days, just sign up for I'm going to bed at the same time every night and I'm waking up at the same time every morning. Um, and you add this to what we said and you know, watch what happens.

And then lastly, set up your test day. So, you're going to have a day where you're like, "Okay, this is the day [clears throat] 30 days from now or 40 days from now. This is the day I'm going to see if I can hit a new PR and pull-ups or if I can do a pull-up." Here's what you're going to do to set yourself up. Take four to 5 days off before that. You want to give yourself enough time to be totally fresh. Set yourself up.

Film yourself. Send it to us. I'd love to see people be able to do pull-ups. Now, would you not recommend during this 30 days uh once a week having a day where you kind of rep out? No. No. Still no. No. Just just literally it's this is a third. So if it was a longer ch if we're doing this for 90 days, if we're doing this for then yes, but when you're doing it for a short period of time, you want low-level frequent stimulus daily and that's it.

And you will shock yourself. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. At how strong you are when you finally go test yourself, it's pretty wild. So again, the Soviets did this with certain lifts. Like they do do this with squats. They would take a lift like let's say you had a let's say you had an athlete who uh you know could do 500 lb uh for five reps in a barbell squat. squat. squat. They would go 315 and they would do five reps every day. That's it. Three and they no matter what it was always the same.

315 rep and it would feel easy. 315 like and what would end up happening over 30 days it kind of felt easier and easier and easier. Then they would give them some time off test it and then they'd hit 10 reps with 500 lb. 500 lb. 500 lb. It's like your new floor. This is like the new baseline. So, let's let's imagine I'm somebody who can only get about five pull-ups in right now. Y and I'm going to do this for the next 30 days. And I'm going to practice this throughout the day.

So, I have I go in and invest in I don't even think those pull-up bars are very expensive. 20 40 bucks at most for those ones that go in your door frame, which I would put it in my bedroom door frame that I walk in and out of the most out of anything. And I'm only I'm guessing I would only do two pull-ups. One or two? Yeah. One or two pull-ups uh five times plus a day. Yeah. If you're doing it that much, I do one.

If it's five times, you're just doing one. You're hopping up. One pull-up come. That's it. Oh, yeah. No, no, no. Oh, yeah. No, no, no, no. If my If I can do five, you're saying do singles all day. Five is failure. That would be three reps short of failure to do two. I Yeah. Three set three reps short of of of failure. of failure. of failure. If you're going to practice it that often, it's got to be much lower. But I mean, I'm I've tested this so many times.

It has to be like you're playing like one and done, walk away. If you're doing it five times in a day, yeah, it's literally just one and that's if you're doing it twice in a day, maybe. maybe. maybe. But if you're going to practice that often, it literally needs to feel like you're just you're just you're just because I feel like you need to do at least the amount of volume that you could already do, right? So, it makes sense that you wouldn't go uh you wouldn't go less than five total.

I'm glad you asked this. It's remarkably less intense than you think to practice something like this. It's way less. In fact, that's where everybody messes up is they push it a little bit, a little bit, and then they don't see the progress. progress. progress. Cuz I feel like if I was going to do single, so my we're just going to stick with this number. Five is like five is your max. your max. your max. Yeah, five is my max. If I was going to do singles and I'd want to try and do it like eight times or more a day.

That way I'm still I'm still guilt getting more total volume than what I could do in a single set almost, but not at a high intensity. intensity. intensity. I mean, you could practice it that way. I think five is a lot. uh for every single day for 30 days. But, you know, experiment with it. Uh but I'm gonna say this. I'm gonna hammer this home. Way less than you think. I guess you to your point, what I wouldn't want to see, so let's say I do go about it because I'm pretty confident that if I could do five in a row and I do singles for five times in a day, I'm never going to feel like I can't get that one.

That'll feel easy. It'll feel easy every time. But I could see if I did that eight times, maybe by time seven or eight, like it's kind of a little little little Well, let me ask you this. When you were doing this as a kid, Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. when you were practicing, how many pull-ups do you think you could do max at that time before you got Oh, you're Well, I mean, I guess you're a good point. I could probably do 15 and I was doing like three.

That's right. That's right. That's right. It's It's literally It needs to feel like easy. like easy. like easy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you're doing it so far with a ton of space in between. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah. A lot of time in between. That's how this works. If it starts to feel like I'm getting a little bit of a workout, you probably went too hard. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Which is which is really hard to do. It was me like just doing two or three and it was uh throughout like every every hour for the 5 hour work the 5 hour 6 hour shift I would do.

Yep. Yep. Yep. Yeah. Okay. I mean that's fair. No, it's wild. Uh we talked about eating more um which made me think about this. So, you know, a lot of times people increase their protein intake through protein powder, which is totally fine, very convenient, easy, but um you know, I think a good strategy for some people, a better strategy might be just to eat like three or four of the Paleo Valley meat sticks throughout the day. H H H like it's meat, it's minimally processed. processed.

processed. Yeah. Uh, it's got more nutrients, tastes good, it's got long shelf life, so it's just as it's actually more convenient. You don't have to put it in a shaker cup. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm. Take them with you, eat one in between your meals. You know, three of those is going to give you what is that going to give you? 28 g, 26 g of protein. Yeah. Bumping your protein. Totally. Totally. Totally. Now, does that you you said it has more nutrients. Is it have more natural nutri nutrients and not fortified?

Cuz supplements are are fortified with a lot of nutrients. of nutrients. of nutrients. It's just it's meat. It's it's grass-fed meat. Yeah. you know, and so you're source. Yeah, dude. So, you're just And it's again, it's closer to whole natural and comparing that is is is what we're comparing when we compare to something that is fortified in nutrients and and heavily processed versus something that's minimally processed and more natural nutrients. Is it just the bioavailability? Usually is that usually and look there's companies out there really good protein powder companies that will put like good nutrients in there but sometimes they put put put nutrients that don't have good bio bioavailability like versions of certain nutrients just to show on the label and some protein powders don't add any because people aren't looking for [clears throat] [clears throat] [clears throat] uh you know vitamins and minerals and take a protein powder like I don't care if I take a protein I just want the protein.

protein. protein. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So with the meat stick with the pale meat stick meat stick meat stick it's I mean it comes along with it. Yeah. Um, Yeah. Um, Yeah. Um, it's just closer to a whole food and I, you know, it is it's super close. I still I still believe, you know, uh, I know you've experimented with this. Yeah, I still believe we're so arrogant with our science sometimes, you know, that we know everything, you know, and and there's there's studies to show if you do this that these a lot of things are very very similar in comparison.

So, we just make this leap of it's exactly the same. And it's like I just don't believe that. I don't believe that if all things are controlled, carbohydrates, fats, calories, and you take it one of them in a processed protein bar versus something that you measured out to be just the right amount of rice, you know, vegetables and and chicken and it's the same. It's not the something else is not the same. the same. the same. You know what's crazy about what you're saying? We lie to ourselves with our arrogance.

Put protein powder on the table and put some food on the table. Are they the same? No. Obviously, they're not the same thing, but they have the same stuff in them. That's not the same, though. I know. I know. I know. It's wild. It's wild. It's wild. And and we and we do these studies where we measure like certain important markers, protein synthesis, and like total calories and what like thermogenesis, like there's some things that we and then we we and and those things are really important when it comes to fat loss or building muscle.

And so, we just jump to this like they're the same and it's like they're not. No, we negate the experience also. Like, are they do they feel like they're the same? same? same? That's like that means I going to use it the same way. And then also behaviorally, which we always talk like that that's clear to me. Like I mean cuz you can you can argue the science part uh that I can't beat you on to figure out cuz I don't know what else is going on in the gut that I can't prove that that so many so we again also act like we know everything about which we know very little about.

I mean the gut, the ocean, and the universe are like three of the most comp and the brain, right? the four most complex things that we act as if we know everything about yet we've really explored explored explored new discoveries every day. We just discovered this new thing that we know we know everything about it. It's like, man, it's it's clear that they they they affect you differently. And I know for sure they affect you differently behaviorally because, you know, I eat a protein bar and 15 know, I eat a protein bar and 15 minutes later I want another one or I'm craving something where I eat an egg, a whole boiled egg or something like that.

And And And it's a different experience. And I mean, even the fermenting process that they would use to make this like is more friendly for the gut for me. So I'm sure Yeah, that plays a factor. It is. I want to ask you guys because we hadn't seen each other for a while because we're on vacation and stuff. I want to ask you guys about your father's day because we didn't see each others after Father's Day, did we? No. No. No. No. We We did that and then we all went on vacation.

on vacation. on vacation. Oh, mine was all weird cuz it like it was before. So, I did like the weekend before. before. before. Oh, did you? Yeah. Because we were all split up, you know, the next weekend. Everybody's I got to tell you guys about one of the presents that my my 5-year-old gave me, my, you know, Relius. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, so she So, Jessica took them to the store, the kids, and had them pick whatever they wanted to get me, which I think is so fun.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You want my son coffee? What? What? What? A trophy? A trophy? A trophy? What? What? What? It was a plastic trophy at Target. Or what did he say? It's like a blank trophy. You're supposed to write on it. You know what he say was for? He just number one dad. Yeah. He just like He's just like, "You're the best." You know, he gave me a trophy. I'm like, "This is the coolest gift I think I've ever gotten, dude." So, I have like this blank, you know, trophy sitting on my desk that my son gave me for Father's Day.

Isn't that so awesome that he thought to give his dad a trophy? Those are those things that you got to make sure you put away and you remember keep that stuff. You know what I'm saying? Like that's a I actually don't know what we did for Father's Day. What'd you get for Father? Did you get anything? anything? anything? I don't I'm going to My wife's going to roast me if I did and I didn't. I can't think of what uh She has a thought out. I was like, "Oh [ __ ] this is not going to go well right now." Uh I mean I I know what my son did.

My son My son's school is really good. I mean they they they always have him create something and he created a a a drawing of you know what he what he wanted to be. He he if you ask my son what he wants to be he wants to be a father. That's what he says when he grows up which and so he drew this picture of him uh as a as a father and then also running Mind Pump. What just so you said that? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So my my son wants to work at Mind Pump too. too. too. Yeah. Yeah. So I hope that stays. You know what I'm saying? I hope I hope that continues on. And I I always tell Katrina, too, like I tell you what, that's why I don't trip about the sports thing because I know that's like a a soft spot for me is I I want him to want to want to really be into that and it's just not his jam. But if he likes business as much or more than sports, like I'll I'll be as excited or more excited.

Probably more. I'm sure more excited. I think I would be more excited. So, I'm just like then there's there's still a lot of hope for that because I feel like he's he's interested and he and he's into all that stuff. So, but yeah, I don't know uh what what day cuz that was right that was before we left on vacation, right? vacation, right? vacation, right? And so I don't know what we uh what we did. I know Justin had to celebrate his father's day like a week early.

Yeah, I did that. I went to uh Carmel. We went hiking and stuff and then had to hit up the cheese shop. So, I like I ended up finding about that place. Dude, it's like my jam. It's amazing. It's amazing. It's amazing. I wish there was more of them like location. There's nothing like that. There's nothing like that place. That place I tell everybody European. In Europe, you find places like Yeah, it's totally European. Does European have stuff? Like I mean, I know in Italy. Well, like Yeah.

Italy. The place that Justin is talking about has cheese from all over the world. Every kind of cheese you can think of all over the world. And then they and then they have all these wines. And then the guy behind the counter pairs them. Oh, yeah. Well, and two, it gets your pallet for like what types of you know, hard, soft, you know, the cheeses or like uh you know, what what kind of like um whatever direction you get to try them all first. And so I brought the kid the kids had never been there and so they were kind of tripping out cuz there was just so many options, you know, and you're like trying out and they're doing the truffle this with it's like they do combos of some of them and so anyway, yeah, we we were in there a really long time.

Do you like um like blue cheeses? Strong Gucci. I do too. Yeah. Love them. Yeah. Not like you're hit with people. Yeah. Cuz it's, you know, some people are like associate the whole mold thing and and and and all that. Some of the stinky ones, you know, you're kind of like yikes. I haven't found a stinky cheese that I didn't like. I like the really strong cheeses. cheeses. cheeses. It has to go with something for me. I don't I don't Well, you got to put it on a cracker.

Yeah. So, you got to put it You got to put it with There's a cheese I want to say it's an Italian cheese. Italian cheese. Italian cheese. The maggot one. Yep. Yeah, Yep. Yeah, Yep. Yeah, it's got they leave the maggots in there and like they flick them off before they give you the cheese. It's not mimlet, is it? I don't know, but I would not. That's one cheese I would know. I've seen I've seen seen seen I'm not cool. That's one of my favorites. favorites.

favorites. But that place that Justin's talking about, I don't Did you guys go Did you guys stay at a hotel, too, or No, you just just just No, it was just a day thing. Yeah. And we went to Oh, I know what we did. That's what we did. We did a drive. That's what we did. Katrina and I did a did a Katrina and I did a did a drive and did a did our spotlight. That's kind of our thing where we'll go take off for the day and and and do a nice nice do a nice It's a Sardinian cheese.

Kasu Marsu. Oh, okay. okay. okay. Yeah. Sheep milk cheese for being infested with live maggots which ferment the cheese giving you a very soft cream pungent smell. It's probably delicious. It's funny though. It's like you got to be the first one to try it. There's like like maggots on there. You're like, "Oh man, this is delicious." I don't think you eat the maggot. I think they get the maggots off before they give it to you. I would think so. They look really tiny though. Like you could easily miss some of them.

It's like and and it blends in with the cheese pretty good. I'm like, "Look at that. Look at how they look." Tell me you would not miss some of those. I wouldn't even trust someone be like, "Oh, yeah. We cleaned them all off." Oh, sure you did, buddy. [clears throat] Sure. They're high in protein. Yeah. Doug. Doug, what did you Did you do anything for Well, you see, Father's Day was almost as same day as my birthday this year. Oh, so they got combined. So, I ended up having dinner with Briana and she was going to pay for dinner, but I chose a an expensive Japanese restaurant.

So, I ended up paying for it. Do you have saved I'm sure you do. You're such a sentimental guy. I bet you have a bunch of Father's Day cards and stuff you've saved. Yeah, I save all that stuff. I'm I am very sentimental, actually. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's so great. Do you plan to do anything with it or do you just keep it? Like, I keep that. I mean, I have a lot of video and stuff like that. That's just the things I do more with photos and video.

But the cards, you know, just every once in a while you you run into them, you pull something out and go, "Oh, I remember that." Yeah. Katrina saves all hers. I Yeah, I'm kind of a packr rat that way, which is not very positive because generally speaking, you may look at it one once every 10 years. But uh but when you do see it, it's does something for you. It does. You bring it up, especially when your kids grow up. Well, I think the key is to make something out of it that's like a like a book or something like that because because what happens it ends up turning into because Katrina does this and she keeps all of it and that it drives me crazy and I'm just like, like, like, you know, would be a good gift for her at some point would be for you to organize them like maybe like when Matt Oh, yeah.

No, no, you're right. No, that's her I when I told you guys when the first five years we were together, I made books of every our first five years. So that was me who did the photos and then I put together. So there we have a chronological order of these photo books of our first five years together. Haven't done it since then, but I'm sure she would love that with you know what Jessica organized for us cuz we're up at Yellowstone and we went up there with her mom and her brother and her sister-in-law there and the kids and all that.

She organized a day uh with a photographer. photographer. photographer. So, we drove uh not to Yellowstone, but kind of like almost like off the grid a little bit because there was a spot and this photographer met us out there and I can't wait to see how the photos turned out because it was like the the background was incredible with the mountains. We were like in this meadow. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And we were just we at like dusk. So, but I got to tell you this.

You know what I got to tell you guys? So, I rented a I had uh because we had all so many people, I had to rent a minivan and I got to drove it. Minivans are pretty amazing. amazing. amazing. Are you trying to sell some? He's been trying to sell something. Listen, the amount of people and the cargo and then I went offroad with that thing cuz she took us off road and it had rain the day before and I was a little bit like are we going to make it?

Let me tell you, bro. That minivan made it. made it. made it. I just rewatched. I was going offro friends trying to sell me on minivan. You guys remember John Travolta and Get Shorty? I just rewatched a great movie. Great movie. I just rewatched. I never watched that. What? Oh, what a great film. I just rewatched it the other day and there's a scene where scene where scene where he's, you know, he's a he's [clears throat] like a a debt collector, right? whatever like muscle guy or whatever and he's he's getting off his plane to get his rented car that he had ordered and he I think he ordered like a nice Cadillac or like that and he pulls up and it's like a minivan and looks at the lady he's like what is this she's like it's the Cadillac of minivans and so like there's like a whole scene of him like driving around the minivan and then he sees Danny DeVito and Danny Devito's like hey is that that new minivan he's like yeah it's a Cadillac he's can I take it for a spin you go that's so funny you remember that commercial.

They even tried to have like a a puma in the back of it like wow like this is the manliest mini ever seen. I love those old Do you guys Okay, so since you brought up Father's Day and stuff like that and um um um do you have in mind what a perfect Father's Day looks like for you? Like what like is there like did you want something in particular? You're so easy. I bet you have nothing to say, but I bet I bet I'm sure you're very specific.

I'm sure you know exactly. Yeah. Uh I feel like Justin and I will be Doug might be too. I'm curious like what like a like a a good Father's Day kind of looks like. What does that What does that look like for you? Do you know? Do you have an idea? For me? Oh, I just want to feel I just want to be around my kids, dude. My kids and my wife. And I want to feel There's not a thing that you want to do specifically with them.

There's not like a a a uh I I I just want to feel loved by them. I want to feel I want them to to hug me. I want to be around them. I want to have dinner with them. Um, it would be awesome if everybody said something they liked, you know, about their dad or told some story. That'd be crazy. Amazing. But just I want to be around I just want to be around. Did you see that the viral memes of the like the the mother's day versus the father's day?

father's day? father's day? The mother's day it's like so accurate. Like you margaritas, girls day, there's like a party, something like that. The dad's barbecuing on Father's Day. On Father's Day, doing all the stuff anyways. Yeah. What about What about you, John? Do you have like do you think like that's a that's a perfect father's day? Yeah, I I'm like I love going on like nature hikes and stuff with the kids and and like getting away from the house and tech and I don't know. I like it.

I like when everybody's like on the same page and we're all doing one thing together and it's like something active. But um and then obviously like the for me the perfect scenario would be for me to like you know do that and then I'd like go and get a massage or something like just you know relax and chill and then Oh you are a massage guy for that. I'm totally a massage. I know you did that for your yours and I actually I I heard about it and I was just like I wonder if that was like Justin's idea.

Justin's idea. Justin's idea. You let them touch your feet or you No. No feet guy. I would have I actually totally called that that was not your thing. That's hilarious. Yeah. No, I like I uh it's that's the thing like it's Dude, I'm I'm so wound up all the time. Like that's like a one I I kind of do it more like on plan if it's like a vacation or something. Like I want to at least get one day like that where I'm just like, you know, you work all the knots out and then I can just like decompress.

Yeah. But it's really like decompressing so I'm in a better mood. come back, hang out with everybody because I'm like h I'm I'm I'm really tense all the time and like always like trying to, you know, do stuff. So, I don't know. Calm down. I totally did. I did not call that at all cuz I knew you did that and I was totally talking about you on that day and I was just like, I wonder if that was Justin's idea or that was just Courtney thought I would love a massage so I'm going to get him a massage.

massage. massage. I'm not a or go to like a concert. It would be not a massage. a massage. a massage. No. And I always have bad experiences. Did you guys get my text yesterday about the silent massage I had? Yeah, you you definitely don't know how to pick a good massage. Well, so here's the deal. So, here's the deal. deal. deal. Get the mall massage goes to a mall like massage. I've had quote unquote I've had good massages also. I'm just not a it doesn't do a lot for me.

You know, it just it's not a huge thing. And that's okay. You know, you know what I say to that? I say that that you are a person who says, "I feel good. I know. I already feel great. I need you know what great feels like." And until you feel great, you don't realize what you were missing cuz there is there there's there is absolutely absolutely absolutely levels to massage and I have had the whole gamut and spectrum, okay? Being married to one, so I know what it's I've I've had hundreds of massages and everything in between.

And there is a very clear difference between horrible, okay, good, and holy [ __ ] Like, Like, Like, so I've had lots of massages and I've had some that were horrible. I've had some that were good. I just fall asleep. That's all that happens to me. I just fall asleep with the good ones. So, I'm like, I could do that by myself. That's a pretty good if you can if if a massage puts you to sleep and you you feel relaxed and and I see I know the benefit of correctional massage.

I think it's super valuable. Uh but you know, yesterday Jessica and I had some time without the kids. They were at my parents house and and she goes to this place in the mall. It's one of those like Chinese massage places, you know, where where they 20 bucks. 20 bucks. 20 bucks. Yeah. Take 20 bucks, whatever. which was just so funny how they figured out around the laws and they're able to do that anyway and hammer you and they know her by name. She goes there every single week.

It's like her thing. She loves it. She goes there, gets a massage, reads her Bible, does her whole thing. So, I'm like, "Let's go. Let's go do that." So, and she gets excited cuz she loves it. So, I go over there and I don't like foot massages cuz I'm way too ticklish. Like, you touch my feet, I'll kick you. kick you. kick you. Well, I have a scar in the bottom of mine, so it's Yeah, it doesn't feel right. right. right. No, I don't like that.

So, I I'm like, I'll lay on my stomach. You can work on my back. That's totally fine. And I get it's and I get this dude who big Chinese dude like big big old potato head guy like big dude. He's like I'll work on you. Barely speaks English. I'm like cool. It was the most violent massage I've ever had in my life. No, no, it was violent heading. No, listen. Listen. He was It's not just that, Doug. He wasn't just like working on me. There were times and he's like working on my hands.

I'm laying flat and he's like what? And then he like punched my hands a couple times and I'm like my face is down and I'm laughing cuz I'm like what is he doing? Why is he punching my heads? Or he'd hit my back, you know? But like I'm like, is he trying to like fight me? Like what's going on here, dude? He's like overcompensating. It was It was just too It was violent. After we were done, I looked at my wife. I'm like, dude, I was laughing halfway through that cuz it was it was too much.

What about you, Doug? Me? Uh, just quality time with Briana mainly. And the massage sounds great, though. Next year, I'm going to request that. that. that. Yeah, that totally shocked me with Justin. Justin. Justin. Totally shocked me. I did not I would not have guested you as like I'm not like a freed flyer, but I love it. You I'm going to guess you want presents, Adam. Adam. Adam. No, I actually don't. I'm No, I actually don't. I'm a terrible gift receiver. You should know that. You know that.

Not if it's expensive. No, even my wife fails at that. If you got your really expensive present, you know, she hates that. Do you know the last really expensive present I have is is I've never used sitting in my closet. I got to return it. I haven't returned it. Like I just really Yeah. I'm I'm a I'm really difficult to to to purchase for and I know that. And I'm a terrible gift receiver. So, I actually don't like receiving gifts. Uh, Father's Day for me is like uh the the perfect day looks like uh breakfast and coffee.

Like coffee met to me before I get out of my bed. Like that's a that's a big one. Yeah. Yeah. I mean that's when Katrina does that for me on the weekends a lot or like or for Father's Day for sure. Like getting handed a cup of coffee before I even sit up out of bed is like ah Yeah. This is that's that's super super nice. And then uh I spend some time with my son and he normally participates in making breakfast for me with Katrina which is always cute.

We get to do that for a little bit. That's fun. fun. fun. Um and and then my house being cleaned for me for the day before I have to leave the house so I know it's Sounds like Mother's Day. Like it's spotless. And then I want to drive and then I want to and then with my wife I like to go a drive somewhere where we land at a place that we like to eat and go eat some fancy restaurant and have some drinks and then drive back and then and then actually have the so where I might be different where I think a lot of a lot of dads want to spend the time with their their kid.

I spend a lot of time with my kid. So actually that's a that's a day where I'm like I like to see him in the morning and I like to do that with him in the morning. But then I actually like this is we normally have her mom take him or somebody and then it's me and Katrina and so I actually like a night alone with her and day like that and to come home to the house spotless had spent the time with my son started it with coffee a great drive to a great restaurant with good drinks and then come back to our house.

Nice. Nice. Nice. That's like Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't The gifting is not like a That's nice. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not a big gift guy either, but I like sentimental like, you know, like the ones my kids. I love to give gifts. Me, too. Me, too. Me, too. So, so for Mother's Day, I love to surprise Katrina with gifts. And I do get I love to buy gifts, but I'm not I'm horrible at receiving them. Yeah. So, if if one of us was to like show you love, what would we do?

You guys could buy me a gift. Okay. Okay. Okay. Yeah. cuz you guys could afford the gifts THAT you know this is coming out of my account. I don't like this. You know what I'm saying? If I buy your money Yeah. My wife buys me a watch. I'm like I bought that. I would have bought a better one. Yeah. I would I was going to spend that kind of money. I would have bought this model. You know what I'm saying? But you know what I'm saying?

Since it was my But but you guys could buy me that be like damn. Yeah. Yeah. I' been pretty pumped. That's true. That's true. That's true. Even if you missed the little thing. That's true. She buys you a gift. Like I bought that. Yeah. How much did that cost? Yeah. It's Hey, that's such a bad I guess it's so awful to say that, but it's like there's a part of you that goes, goes, goes, of course. of course. of course. You know, oh my god, you spent that much money and it's like if I was going to spend that much money, I probably would have done this thing where if it's coming from you, you guys, it ain't Yeah.

It's free gift. Yeah. And it's nice and it's like, okay, that's cool. I like that. Yeah. So maybe did you guys I'll change the subject. Do you guys see the big skin cancer observational study that people are talking about on social media? Do you guys see this? No. No. No. All right. All right. All right. So, I'm going to pull it up uh because uh it's flying all over social media. It was actually the study itself uh it was an observational analysis from the UK biioank cohort.

So, this was published in cancer epide uh epidemiology biomarkers and prevention. Um, and it had over 440,000 people with controls. Uh, and they found and so they found thousands of skin cancer cases. And they tried to make some associations. Here's what they found. Frequent sunscreen users showed higher observed rates of skin cancers. Wow. compared to people who didn't use it very often, even after they made adjustments for factors like age, sex, skin type, tanning ability, sunburn history, sunlamp use, and time spent outdoors. So, actually, even though it's observational, they did make some corrections for certain things.

And here's what they found. The associations included uh up to 292% higher risk of invasive melanoma, a 140% higher risk of basal cell carcinoma and 126% higher uh rate of squamis cell carcinoma and there was a dose response pattern meaning more frequent sunscreen use was linked to higher cancer skin cancer risks. That's crazy. That's crazy. That's crazy. That does not look good. I'm assuming they're using like chemical based these are chemical based. Right. Right. So if we're using things that are non that you're correct. Okay.

correct. Okay. correct. Okay. These the vast majority of sunscreen uh users use the you know the more popular sunscreens that contain these kind of chemicals uh that uh will absorb and scatter UV rays. um and uh those have hormone-like effects in the body and studies uh consistently show that the that the amount of those chemicals that that they can find in your blood are far higher than what are even FDA would say would be safe. Now is there any uh correlation between when you use all natural stuff or nothing at all you also have to manage your time that you're being exposed to the sun because you're you or is that being controlled in this situation?

These are the factors they adjusted for again uh age, sex, skin type. So this was one that I would have thought out the gates like okay well maybe people who are dark don't use a lot of sunscreen. sunscreen. sunscreen. They controlled for that tanning ability. So, sunburn history, sunlamp use, and then time spent outdoors. So, uh it's not a perfectly controlled, you know, placeboc controlled study, which I don't know how you'd be able to do that with with with long long long exp. I mean, it's really hard to do that, but so many people in there, over 400,000 people, and you [clears throat] had higher rates, and it was dose response uh connected.

So, the more sunscreen, that's pretty concerning. Yeah. Very concerning, dude. Man, Man, Man, very concerning. Yeah. [clears throat] So, uh you know these I know sunburns aren't good for you and and the chemical based sunscreens will reduce Have you ever seen the sunburns but but are those chemicals causing cancer? causing cancer? causing cancer? Beyond that. Yeah. [clears throat] It was like you know somebody that had a frequent like really bad sunburns or like to the point where it like had blisters and like with that you know over time you know how that affected the skin.

But I mean it sounds like the the chemical exposure like continuous. What does state by state look like for for skin cancer? Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, you would expect skin cancer rates to be higher in sunnier states, right? California and Florida. I bet you they're lower. That's why I want to see. I bet you they're lower. But you could be I could be wrong. That's why I'm curious. I'm curious. Which states Which states in the US have the highest skin cancer rates, Doug? That's what I would look up.

I bet you they're we need to know per capita, not by person, because obviously Florida and California. California. California. It would be it would be rate. It would be skin cancer rates which would be okay. Yeah. Which would interesting. That's why I told you guys. Utah, Vermont, Iowa, Minnesota, and Idaho. Idaho. Idaho. Look at that. Wow. Utah, Vermont, Iowa, Minnesota, and Idaho. The highest incidence rates. Wow. Wow. Wow. And now they're higher elevations. That could be part of it. They're outdoors a lot. Could be part of it.

But people in Florida, California, Hawaii, like you guys are outside a lot, too. Yeah, even also more fairkinned residents in those states. states. states. Okay. I mean, true. I wonder if they control for that what we would see. Scroll down more, Doug, cuz there's a higher higher higher That's fascinating to me. Would you I guarantee you guys wouldn't guess any of those states. those states. those states. No. No. No. Nope. Nope. Nope. No, dude. No, dude. No, dude. Put those on the list. That is wild.

That's crazy. And it is per pack. So, this is controlled for controlled for controlled for Yeah. Yep. So, I I here's the thing like uh because we've we've treated the sun like it's like this really dangerous thing, which is crazy crazy. crazy. crazy. Um I I think you definitely don't want to go and burn yourself. Uh but I think it's a good idea to to to get your body uh condition exposure Yeah. to the sun. Small amounts. Small amounts. Get your body condition to the sun.

Uh you know, vitamin D very good for you. Also anti-cancer or should I say if you have low vitamin D, cancer rates go up. Mhm. And then if you're going to use sunscreen, use the mineral ones. Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, use the mineral ones. You know, the altitude does play a factor. It's so wild. I can tell. So, I just came back right from from Nevada. Look up countries with the highest skin cancer rates. Just look and I'm up in the mountains and uh like Reno area and man laying out in so I and you guys know this summer I've been laying out a lot at our own pool like a ton.

We've been out around the pool and it is I can feel a difference in less than an hour's time of laying out around the pool up in Reno. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Versus Versus Versus Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. hours around my It is intense. And the temperature doesn't even have to be hotter. So, it's not like altitude. Yeah. It it the difference of 80° at my house versus 80° over in Reno and an hour an hour of each in there. Night and day difference.

You know what's crazy? You [clears throat] can feel it. I can feel it. feel it. feel it. You know what I would like to see, Doug? Maybe we don't have this data. So, there's one country in the world that had a national effort, like they funded this nationally to get everybody to wear sunscreen. It was Australia. Uh there was actually Yes, it had high rates of skin cancer. I want to know if did the did Australia's sunscreen efforts reduce skin cancer rates rates rates or did it increase?

Yeah. Um because they actually uh they actually had this whole national campaign campaign campaign Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. for decades uh where they were trying to encourage people and so I want to see and then the other thing is did it reduce skin cancer but increase other cancers because sometimes what you see is a reduction in skin cancer but then vitamin D. vitamin D. vitamin D. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm. Yeah. uh the iconic slip. Oh, slip slop slap. That's what it was. Suns smart program. It it reduced skin cancer rates in younger uh generations.

So, it did in that case. I'd like to see if the other regular cancers went up though. I'd also like to see how much. Yeah. Gener younger younger Australians born are estimated to be four times less likely to develop skin cancer compared to older core. Evidence shows that evidence shows that Australians age 18 to 40 who use sunscreen regularly in childhood reduce their risk by developing melanoma by 40%. Okay. I don't know, man. It's interesting to me. Here's the deal. I don't think sunscreen's bad. I think chemical sunscreen should be avoided.

That's that's the that's the position I would take. take. take. Yeah. Yeah. I don't think I mean, your your skin's a major organ. Well, it's interesting because all the things you guys are reading right now, though, they're just blanket saying sunscreen. sunscreen. sunscreen. They're not like saying natural or what that and and it's reducing. So, it almost seems like even chemical sunscreen is better than no sunscreen. when I looked at this when the study that I just read seems to point in the other direction other direction other direction that it's it's not good and like I said we see uh we see that there are uh we know that there are like hormone-l like effects from these chemicals and they build up in the blood much higher than than uh we think is well I mean it's been an interesting experiment for us and our family with this aazanthin like supplement and it's it's like still get like a little bit bit of a burn, but it doesn't last and it pretty much recovers like a lot faster than it would say, you know, uh without it.

So, I don't know. I'm I'm I'm very curious to see if this is like uh the answer instead of sunscreen anymore. anymore. anymore. Interesting. By the way, it says there that the incidence of melanoma initially rose alongside sunscreen adoption. And then so yeah, you know, I want to look a little deeper into that and to see what what effects were, you know, because I've I've read I've read other studies that have connected people avoiding the sun to higher rates of other types of cancers. Mhm. Mhm.

Mhm. Uh versus people who actually seek out uh going out uh into the sun. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So uh I don't know. Interesting. Anyway, I got to tell you guys, yesterday I was doing social med, you know, you guys know I was out there doing social media clips and stuff. One of you that yesterday, yesterday, yesterday, one of the clips I was doing was with the Chris Power. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Uh which by the way, our social media team has been just crushing. You know what's funny to see comments underneath people saying social media team is kicking butt.

Really, really cool. So anyway, I was doing it like this thing uh with Chris Power where Danny was having me uh say, you know, up to 28 grams of protein per bag. And then I had to do it with different emotions, excited, angry, uh sarcastic. So I had to do like these different Yeah. type emotions. But in between, you know, I'd eat one of the crisper. Those things are so addictive. I know. I know. I know. I'm glad they had those bigger bags. I was like sitting like they are.

But so I mean I I had one last uh yesterday. uh yesterday. uh yesterday. They're like It's like you might as well eat potato chips or something. I I had them on on my drive I mean I have them almost every day, but I was I had them last night on my drive home from here and I'm actually so impressed by how satisfying a bag tastes. So when you're done because of the protein. protein. protein. Yes. I I can't think of a You remember they come in those size?

You remember the We just went up to Trucky and my my friends families bought the Costco size variety pack of Cheetos, Doritos, all the all the You know, you ain't eating one bag of that. You don't? No way. You don't. You not even the kids. No way. way. way. The kid I had to limit the kid. I see I see their kids eating them. I'm like, "Hey, that's already two bags I just saw you eat back toback. You better ask your mom and dad if you're okay." Like, I mean, you could just crush those things.

Totally. I have one little bag of those Chris Power and I am fine. I do I do not have the sensation of like I need another one which but they are so delicious. No, they're they are they're fantastic and I and I enjoy it. But I don't think I've ever had a a a small bag of something like that and feel satisfied after having it. And to know that I just took a took in a 28 g protein snack is Yeah, it's cool. They hit the formula cuz they're crushing right now.

I'm seeing them in all kinds of big retailers. They're Costco. Costco. Costco. And I knew it when when we first were introduced to them and I tried it. I was like, "Oh, they're gonna If you can make something that's high protein taste really good, like not like it has high protein, because a lot of high protein foods you can taste it's got protein in it." If you can make something palatable that's high protein, you're going to make a lot of money. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm. And and because people are just going to crush it.

crush it. crush it. Well, especially a a a salty carb snack that's traditionally a salty carb snack that doesn't taste far off from the real thing. Cuz that's the other thing too is like you you'll you'll see some of these products products products and they'll be high protein and then it's just like that's what I mean. You could taste there's protein like Yeah. This this is not good. not good. not good. No, they taste like pretzels with the you know nacho cheese on them or pretzels with flaming on.

Yeah. Yeah. No, they did a good job. They they absolutely crushed it. Look, if you've been listening to Mind Pump for any longer than like one episode, you know how important we take gut health. Gut health is very important. It controls your happiness. Anxiety can contribute to depression if it's off. Inflammation. Good gut health makes you recover faster, build more muscle, and burn more body fat. Well, one of the best products we've ever found that helps contribute to good gut health is seed. So, seed has a probiotic.

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get 25% off. Back to the show. First question is from Fit Mechanic King. I do CrossFit four to five times per week for fun and as a sport. I love the community and the com competitions. I want to build strength outside CrossFit classes. What program would you recommend? I'm considering MAPS 15 strong or MAPS 15 performance. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. I recommend nothing on top of your four to Yeah. Listen, if you're going to do CrossFit four to five times a week and you want to add something to it, don't.

Good recipe, get weaker. Yeah, you're not going to There's nothing we could add that'll make you stronger. But there is something we could do that'll make you stronger. Do CrossFit twice a week. Follow Maps 15 performance, Maps 15, Mass 15 Powerlift, and you will get stronger. Yeah, but it ain't going to happen doing this much uh exercise, this much CrossFit. Just do Mass performance and ditch CrossFit. I'm so I want to see this person's profile, too, because it's fit mechanic king. Is this guy also a full-time mechanic?

full-time mechanic? full-time mechanic? Yeah. I don't know. Well, he's the king, so he probably It probably is. I look I tell you what I I mean, talk about I tell you what, if you're doing CrossFit because And he said the right things. It's for fun, sport, love the community. Awesome. community. Awesome. community. Awesome. Yeah, that's that's what everybody says, bro. But then deep down they want to build muscle or they want to look better. I was just going to say, but you also you also said you want to build strength.

It ain't going to happen doing all that. So, you got to pick. You have to pick which one you're going to do. It's a it's a terrible recipe what you're already doing. It's not that's not the recipe to get stronger and to get fitter and to look better. It's like if that if you want that then and you could still listen doing CrossFit two times a week is still fun. Still have some fun doing it. You know what the problem is? or join a so because I do know this cro crossfit has evolved since mind pump has been [ __ ] on it for 10 years and it has turned into there's a lot of good coaches that have modified it or allow people to do their own thing what it's not really crossfit anymore you know it's now it's becoming more like personal training personal training personal training yeah now it's more like functional and so if if you like showing up to the crossfit gym with your community and you can say hey two times a week I'm going to enjoy the class with everybody and then the other three times a week I'm going to do mass 15.

You could totally do that. do that. do that. I'll tell look I'll say this right now. Um uh CrossFit [clears throat] programming programming programming has generally in a lot of gyms gotten better, but it's still CrossFit. It's still wads. It's still combining exercises. It's still move you around a lot. High intensity approach. I get the community aspect. This is what gyms are crap at. Uh and CrossFit's great at y. They did a great job. And I'm going I'm look I'm going to tell you this right now and this is just a big epiphany for me in more recent years.

Now I'm a fanatic. So in other words I'm the rare person who goes to the gym can do it by myself and enjoy it. But for most people community one of the strongest uh coralates to consistency. Like if someone's going to stay consistent for the rest of their life with fitness one of the strongest coralates is community. It just is. It's a fact. Now I didn't get that before because I'm a fanatic. I do it no matter what. But it's so it's very important. So I like that part of it.

But CrossFit uh is it's you're doing CrossFit and it's not the best way to do to accomplish aesthetic goals or strength goals. goals. goals. You'll get good at CrossFit. And I'll tell you this much right now. This is a big problem. People and people do this with all sports. They look at the top competitors and they say, "Well, that's how I need to train to be good at this particular sport." Like if you want to be you want to build muscle, don't train like a pro bodybuilder.

You want to be great at CrossFit, don't train like the CrossFit uh competitors, like the top ones. They're doing way more than you can tolerate. The average person would get better at CrossFit faster if they did it like twice a week. It's the mentality that's wrong. It's it's just if you look at it as a sport, then you're going to treat it differently. Yep. Yep. Yep. And so, you know, knowing that like how often do you compete in a sport? Uh it's like it's you you're going to be limited in the amount of times you compete.

Therefore, the training should supplement that and and build you up towards it. So, the the problem with me is always they've merged the two together and it doesn't work. It's not just that. So, this is a person who's also a fitness coach, a trainer. Uh and a lot of times what happens to people that love fitness is you do what you can handle and tolerate and there therefore you think it's okay. So, it's like just because you can do CrossFit five times a week doesn't make it optimal for results.

And so, and everybody in this room is living proof of this. Also, at one point in our careers, all listen, there was a time when I trained seven days a week, double days. You know what I'm saying? And I could do it. I did it for a long time. And and you know, and I was quote unquote fit. I just would have been way fitter doing a lot less and doing it a lot smarter than the way you did. So, it's like it's like it's like everything you're doing is way too much to garner the results that you want from it.

You want to be strong. You want to be mobile, you want to be fit, you want to look good, you want all to you want to look good, you want all those things. Well, train way different. The training four to five times a day or four or five times a week of CrossFit plus trying to do a MAPS program. If you if you not the if you did CrossFit twice a week and did uh MAPS 15, 15, 15, one of our MAPS 15 programs, do that for 60 days.

If you're listening to this, do this for 60 days. uh you'll get stronger uh at every single lift and you'll probably get better if you're crossfit. crossfit. crossfit. That'll work. That'll work. That'll work. Next question is from Brenda Partika at 63. Is there a limit to how much you can push your progressive overload training? I competed at age 58 and hit PRs I never thought I'd be able to do. Now I train for health and physique but feel overwhelmed not hitting PRs like I did four years ago.

Great question. So, you've obviously been training consistently that whole time and you were training consistently before age 58 because that's when you were hitting PRs. So, here's a deal with getting stronger. It's one of the best things to chase for the first few years. It's the best thing to chase or for the first few years. After that, chasing strength gives you diminishing returns and then eventually becomes a not worth the squeeze. It becomes too much of a risk factor for injury. Okay. So getting stronger is great, but at this point in your lifting career, you what you want to do is you just want to get better at movement.

You want to get better at movements you're not good at. You want to work on mobility. You want to just continue to maintain where you're at. You can't possibly hit PRs 5, 10, 15 years into your lifting career. Unless you start when you're 15 years old and you're obviously growing into your body, it's just not going to happen. And it's not really a good thing to continue chasing because you will hurt yourself. I mean, I'm going to put a little twist on that. Yes, you can hit PRs, but the way that you suggested it, do something you don't do.

Have you ever got really good at Turkish getups? Go start those and watch how weak you are when you first start doing them and watch you PR doing it after you've been doing it for two months. If you ever got good at windmills, go get really good at windmills and watch what happens. You're going to hit PRs in that. When people say things like PRs, they automatically default to the bench, squat, deadlift, overhead press, overhead press, overhead press, which they maxed out, by the way, which they they've they've trained for four years, five years, eight years, and they've reached these epic numbers that they never thought that maybe they could get, and now they're no longer seeing those.

Maybe they even seen a little bit of a regression, and now it discourages them because they're not seeing PRs anymore. Well, like, if you want to see PRs, go practice a lift that you've never done or rarely ever do and go get good at it. And those the some of the ones I just said get go do a circus unconditional unconditional unconditional learn how to do a circus press, learn to do farmer carries. These are all great movements movements movements that they they all have great movements that have great carryover and benefit to your overall health, physique, and strength.

And you can still get that thrill of watching yourself get stronger doing it. But if you're still focused on the four main lifts that we talk about that are so great for you and still trying to hit PRs, the ROI on that at this point in your life is just not there. there. there. Mhm. Mhm. Mhm. Next question is from my best friend Jack. How about a guide on how to build a chest when both shoulders have chronic pain? pain? pain? Okay. So, a lot of this determines on what's causing the issue with your shoulder shoulder shoulder stability.

Uh, but I would focus on shoulder mobility movements like handcuffs with rotation or wall circles or scapular circles. You can find these all in maps prime pro. And then I'll go light and slow with my chest exercises to make the he the light weight feel heavy. Okay. So, in the meantime, you're doing your normal pressing movements. You're picking a weight that's light and your goal is to make it feel heavy through slowing the movement down, squeezing, and just making it feel more difficult. But the focus is going to be on shoulder mobility.

So the the the key to this is it's not what chest exercises you do to build the chest through this. It's what you need to do to fix the chronic pain in the shoulders. shoulders. shoulders. Chronic pain is movement pattern issues. It's weakness and instability in joints. That's what that is. It's unless you had some acute injury where some your shoulder was torn or you had some rotator cuff something major has happened which is not most people. Most people have like this sharp pain in the front of their shoulder or they have this clicking noise that they notice or they go to lift over their head and they feel grinding of the like that's that chronic pain that's a movement issue and that can be corrected and fixed by putting some effort towards fixing the shoulders.

You fix the shoulders, you build mobility, stability and strength in the shoulders and the chest will come up that you you will just get stronger in all your chest lifts. And lifts. And lifts. And yeah, most of the time it to your point it's it's the rotation because it's not you have to be very intentional to focus on uh introducing that into your everyday training or just like your movement in general. you have to be uh focusing on where do I add rotation? Where do I where do I implement this?

Uh so that way now uh this isn't something that's an instability. My my body will recognize this. It'll add more stability to the joint which then helps you get through the the pain signal and then it helps you actually like produce more force. So a lot of the times like you know you start with the mobility, you start with like your limitations and range of motion. You find out what those limitations are, you work through that, you regain the stability, then we just gradually load that.

It's really amazing when you look at the shoulder joint. Uh not to get too technical, but um I don't know if this is an accurate statement, but I think it is. It's it's one it's it's one of the or if not the most complex joint. It is It is It is in the body. It's floating. It's floating. It's floating. It's uh it's very complex and it has incredible mobility. It's got incredible mobility, rotation. It's uh designed or it evolved, whatever you believe, to be able to throw things with accuracy, to be able to hang, to do incredible things.

But that means it needs to remain balanced and stable with strength that supports all that movement. But when you get there, your shoulders are capable of incredible things. And often times this pain comes from I'm training the same kind of movement over and over again and not working on those other areas. Uh and so that produces this kind of like huge imbalance of strength which is where the instability comes. Well to your point that the shoulder is so complex can do so many amazing things like throw like hang like do move in of this full range and if you stop doing it as we age your body prunes the ability to do it.

Now that doesn't mean you can't get it back. You can absolutely get it back. And there to answer the a guide for that. That is prime bro. That is why we wrote that program. That program is designed to help people address every major joint in their body when they suffer from chronic pain or lack mobility and instability in those joints. And you just need to live in the shoulder and shoulder girdle area. Just those are the movements that you do all the time. You do it every day as many times a day.

Most certainly you always do it before you lift and lift on chest day. day. day. Next question is from the gut check. Are you guys willing to take on an eager, inexperienced, recently certified NASM personal trainer? personal trainer? personal trainer? Look, that's what we look for. We don't hire trainers here. We make them. them. them. We make them. What we look for is character. [snorts] What we're looking for are people who have uh the right passion, dedication, sense of purpose, who understand the culture of Mind Pump.

So, it helps that you listen to the show often and that you have our course uh cuz we coach you through the course. Uh but you got to be willing. You got to be someone who's willing to go through it because it is a privilege to work here. Now, why is it a privilege to work here? Well, number one, our trainers, we we compensate them really well. We provide them with some of the best clients they'll ever get because it comes through the show. Um and they get some of the best training that I've ever seen ever.

I'm I'm jealous and envious of the training that our coaches get. Uh, I wish I had that kind of training and it's just because, you know, we have access to such incredible resources because of the podcast, but I don't care how experienced you are. That's great. That's cool. That's cool. That's cool. But you got to have the right attitude. You got to be the person like I'll talk about one of our top trainers, Marcelo. So, he's been with us. How long's Marcelo been with us? Year and a half.

18. About 18 months. Year and a half. Uh, he now runs he the sales training for our coaches. He's also a coach himself. The guy gets raving like his the reviews he gets are just raving. Phenomenal results with his clients. People are getting great results. Love working with them. Uh he does such phenomenal job. A year and a half ago he was a cop. He had no experience. Do you know how he got a job here? He kept showing up. He kept showing up here at Mine Pump and saying, "I want to work for you guys.

I want to work in fitness." And I think we probably saw him what, three times before we gave him a shot. Was that it? Two or three times? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And and he had the right attitude and now the guy's incredible. And those are the people we look for. I mean, I have a hot take on I mean, I have a hot take on this. I don't like experienced trainers. What comes with that is ego and bad habits. They have an ego. They think they're better than what they they are.

Typically, they have bad habits or way of doing. Just like if you were to ask a golf pro, would you rather take a blank slate, somebody who's never swung a club and teach them how to swing a club great and be a pro, or would you rather have the guy who's been swinging a club like [ __ ] for 5 years and then try and get them to swing a club? You'll take that person who's brand new all day long and you'll make them a better golfer. I feel the same way about personal training.

We've been doing this for so damn long. I feel confident I can take a police officer who's not trained somebody and make them a badass trainer within 6 months to a year. Then I can take a four or five year trainer with five national searchs and train clients and thinks they know everything and thinks they are entitled to all this [ __ ] So I prefer a trainer that is eager to learn that has listened to the podcast that is inexperienced and is hungry. That trainer ends up being a better coach 100%.

And you know you know it's funny that's a that's an old martial arts quote. There's an old martial arts quote which is like it's easier to teach a beginner how to kick effectively than someone who's been kicking wrong for 20 years. So, it's 100% and you get you you're 100% right, Adam. Uh, all the most successful coaches that I ever had working for me were these beginners that learned and through the process and just became super super good. Um, but here's the deal. Like, you got to really show that you want to work here.

here. here. Like, so if you're listening, you want to be a trainer here, like you got to be willing to show you really want to work here. We're not going to come chase you down. We got more applicants than we can uh handle. You got to show it. There's a clip in the movie Fight Club that reminds me of this. You guys remember that clip where where Tyler Duran just turns everybody away. Yeah. And they've got that house that like broken that beat down house and there's a dude that shows up and he's like he wants to be in the club and he's like get out of here.

And he shuts the door. He like sprays him with water and the guy just sits there for days just through the and finally he's like you can come in. You know that's the kind of attitude I want. want. want. You got to be resilient. Did I Did you see the clip Did I Did you see the clip I shared with you guys? What a flop that was. was. was. Oh, they when it first came out. I didn't know that. I know that box office. office. office.

It was a massive fail when it first hit and it turned into like a one of the greatest classics and cult followings down the road, but was a massive flop when it first hit. I did not know that. Crazy. Crazy. Crazy. But yeah, I mean, we love we love trainers. We love hiring trainers. Uh so if you want to work, where's our where where do people apply here? Is it MP? Um mind pump jobs, I believe. Mindpumpjob.com. But I'm going to tell you right now, if you don't have that attitude, don't apply.

I don't want to hire you. Don't want you in my place. Don't want you in the culture. Don't want you train. I'd say the things that I see the the ones that are doing really well are we we've got quite a few coaches and trainers that are new coaches trainers but have been listening to the podcast for long have listened to a lot of the podcast. I mean we teach we teach coaching and philosophy on here. If you've listened to us coach people answer these questions live on air.

I mean, that education, uh, like I said, I'll take that over the trainer who went out and got eight national certifications, worked at some big box gym for six years, and he's listened to 10 episodes and wants a job than the trainer who's listened to most all the episodes, but has never coached anybody because what you've learned listening to us coach people and from our experience, far more valuable. All right, I know you like that episode. If you did, check this one out. Walking. It's one of the best things you could do for your health, bar none.

But there's a better way to approach it. Yes, you can just walk, but if you follow the right protocol, it's far more effective. Let's talk about walking. I can't wait to hear your walking protocol. walking protocol. walking protocol. Well, there is. Well, there is a protocol. So, and I'll start with the first thing, right? Because just first off, uh let me start with this. One of the reasons why walking um is such a great form of just activity is because it's low risk of injury. Now,