2846: Why People Quit Personal Trainers (And Whether AI Can Replace Them)

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The most effective thing you could do for your health and fitness, if you have goals, if you wanna lose body fat and you wanna get stronger, or if you just want to make fitness, something that you do for the rest of your life is hire a good personal trainer. But people, sometimes, often times, stop working with their trainers. We're gonna give you the six reasons why they stopped doing it. In fact, I'm gonna ask my co-host here about that. And if AI is a good substitute. So what we did is we looked up, our team looked up the top six reasons why people stopped working with a trainer. And the AI angle is coming up more and more now. I think it's coming up more and more for a lot of different places, different occupations. And so the question is coming up now, even for fitness with AI, and if it's gonna play a role in any of this stuff. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna go through some of these reasons. We could talk about it a little bit, and then see, will AI actually be a solution to some of these reasons? So the first one is, and this definitely, I would say, has gotta be the top reason why someone doesn't work with a trainer or stops working with a trainer. They say it's too expensive. Yeah, costs too much money. Yeah, this is most common objection and reason, I think, that has always been this. And I also think that the people that don't even end up getting a personal trainer that are using AI, this would be their reason too. When I look at my family, who I am aware of that uses AI to help coach them through their workouts, ironically. Your family? Yeah. That's the best I've ever heard. Hard to be a profit in your hometown. We do have a free podcast. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, and they do, they use, but I have some interesting cool stories about that because several of them have, and then eventually came back to asking help for me about that. And so it does kind of solve that, right? I mean, it's not expensive to use AI, but the question becomes, is it, how comparable is it as far as, sure it's inexpensive, it's free. Yeah, it's effective. But I would argue that that's not the main value of a coach. No, exactly. So I think to start out, working with a trainer is expensive in the context of all the things you can pay for in the fitness space, right? What can you pay for? Gym membership, supplements, maybe someone to help you with your diet or whatever. The most expensive is to have somebody there worth you in person a couple days a week. On average, depending on where you live, you're gonna pay anywhere between on the low end, $50 a session, to on the high end, it could be as expensive in some areas over $100. Sometimes $120, $130 a session. And so it isn't inexpensive, especially when you compare it to how cheap gym memberships have gotten and how free information is. But I think the real question, you kind of said this a little bit, Adam, is what am I getting for the money? Cause if I know I'm gonna get the results I'm looking for, if I know I'm gonna get sustainable results, if I know it's gonna change my life in that way, then I think for a lot of people, the money becomes, it's worth the money, right? This is a problem, if this is gonna solve this issue, which is a big issue, it's a hard one for a lot of people, people struggle with this for a long time. If it's gonna solve this issue, if working with a trainer for six months, which let's say it costs you, how much would six months of personal training cost you? What could that possibly, is that $3,000 let's say? Yeah, so. With $3,000, if I knew $3,000 of working with someone would significantly impact me or solve this challenge that I've been dealing with, I think a lot of people wouldn't think it was expensive. I think they would see the value in it. I think the problem is they compare it to other aspects of fitness, in which case it's way more expensive. There's a lot of watered down versions. If you go back, even when we were trainers, this was always like the big challenge to overcome. And so you'd kind of go through the thought process of like, well, do I wanna do the buddy up kind of approach? Do I wanna do the group sessions? Do I wanna just coach them from afar and give them written out workout plans? And now we have the virtual versions of that and there's lots of different variations of it. The ideal though being this personalized one-on-one attention like somebody that's professional has predictive knowledge, has very specific knowledge of how to steer you behaviorally. I just don't feel like the rest of it really compares to that. I think it's a really good point you're bringing up, Justin, like this isn't actually a new problem or challenge that we've tried to overcome. Like too expensive has been the number one objection forever. And to Justin's point, we've tried a lot of things. Group coaching, small group coaching, virtual coaching. Free workouts online, free workouts in magazines, gym membership. So we've done a lot of things to address the too expensive, yet personal training has remained around and thriving and well needed for a lot of people. And so I don't think the AI brings something for that objection, right? So I'm curious to hear the other ones because for that one it's like, it's a bit moot. It is because if you think that you're hiring a trainer for information, we're starting out with the wrong assumption right out the gates. Cause that's not what you're getting. That's not the value of a good coach. So a trainer should know exercises and proper technique and form and how to individualize it. That's actually the lowest bar right there by the way. Like that's the bottom. Like if you don't know that, you have no, you shouldn't even apply to be a trainer. So we need to assume that when we're working with, like that's the bottom, that's the bottom rung. In free information has been available for a long time. AI is new, but Google is not. What is not, fitness magazines are not. So it's not the information, I can tell you 100% and you can talk to any good coach or trainer that the one, and what I mean by good is the ones that were successful in the sense that their clients were able to develop these, this relationship with fitness that they were able to maintain it longterm, that it really changed their life. Not just lose 30 pounds, but lose it and then keep it off forever. Was it the information that you gave your clients? Was that what did it? And they're all gonna say no. No, no, no. It was the guidance, it was the coaching, it was the being through this, going through this process. It'd be like comparing reading Jordan Peterson's book or getting one-on-one counseling with him for three months. I can obviously read his book and understand his philosophy and his belief and his 12 rules on life, but to sit in a one-on-one session with him every hour and let him dig into me and ask me questions of where I mean, I think the value and what I get from that is completely different than what I get from picking that book up. No different than somebody who can go online, prompt, chat, GBT to spit out a bunch of great information related to diet and exercise and all the stuff. It's like versus a coach who's meeting with you on a regular basis, who is then going, taking all that knowledge that maybe all that information that the AI could spit out and then customizing it and applying it to, and also disregarding things that are irrelevant to that person based on the phase or where they're at. So let me hear the other ones. Is someone curious what the... I'm gonna add one more thing, I think, until AI can become human and you can develop a human relationship with them, it's just not gonna... And by the way, there are people right now who develop relationships with AI and it's very problematic because AI is a validating machine. A good trainer is not a validating machine. They'll validate when appropriate and other times they won't and they're also real, they're human and so you have a real relationship. If you're just looking for information, that's already been there. The next one is it's not personalized. This is interesting to me. That's kind of what trainers do, so this must be a bad experience. Well, I think that's a fair... I think this goes back to what I've definitely tried to argue or say many times when we bring up personal training is that there still is a smaller percentage of great coaches. I think at least half or more than half are entry level, non-experienced, fresh out of school, fresh off the certification and I think what makes a really good coach and trainer is somebody who's worked with people for years and so otherwise, and I know I'm guilty of this, I know I'm guilty at least the first couple of years of all my clients were doing the same workouts. Like for sure was... Then they ask each other, they find out. Yeah, this still persists, like the chalkboard kind of workout. I think the limitation of the coach's knowledge, but then also too, I think that influencers fall in this category of really showing and portraying this healthy image, but then they go into the coaching space without really the knowledge of personal training and they give everybody kind of this same carbon copy experience. Yeah, but let me add a little bit to that because personalization isn't just a unique workout. I had a lot of clients whose workouts looked very similar. That's not the personalization that I think is important. Yeah, definitely you adjust exercises and technique, but what AI will do is analyze data. Data is important. Personal trainer takes into account things like effort, mood, attitude, stress. Sometimes the data says one thing, but when you're with your client, you know it's still not the right thing. Sure. So there are many times when the data would have said, my client needs to have a hard workout, but I know them, because I've been working with them for months or years, we're talking. I'm like, no, no, what do you need right now? Is something totally different. I know he's got good sleep, but I could tell he's off a bit, and it's probably not a good idea. And a good coach will do this whereas AI is not gonna be able to do this. It won't be able to do this for two reasons. One, it will only be able to work with the information you give. Many times clients don't even give that information. Yeah. They coach's job is to prod. Or read. Yeah, exactly, to observe. And you know when you can press a little more, you have to pull back a bit more. And the individual is just gonna kind of look at it as like, this is my plan, I have to stick with this, hell or high water. You as a coach are like, this isn't benefiting. I have to like, we have to bring the intensity level down. And they're not really aware of that. There are times when I've pushed clients who said that they needed an easier workout, and they probably would have benefited physiologically, maybe like physically from an easier workout, but they were afraid of the intensity. And so I was trying to help them get over the fear. And I didn't overdo it, but as a health, it become more comfortable. I've also had the reverse. I've also had the fanatic who's doing everything perfect. And I'm trying to get them to be okay with having the occasional easy workout. And so my job is to convince them and coach them through that process. In other words, they're not coming in, giving me the data. This is what I'm reading as a good coach, and AI won't be able to do that. AI will read your data. So it might be able to read your heart rate variability at some point. It's gonna read your sleep score, maybe a grip strength test. And then you're gonna say, tell me what to do. And then you're gonna follow it, and it's not gonna be able to read what's going on. So metrics is not gonna be a health and biometrics, but not like a lot of psychology, which is pretty much the majority of coaching. Yeah, I would make the case that one of the most valuable things aside from what you guys already touched on, with modifying the workout, is actually the in-between sets, talking about my client and managing stress, getting better sleep, educating. Yeah, prepping meals, good choices. You know, like that happens during that hour, is a lot of conversation of, you know, I had a really hard time hitting my protein intake yesterday. Oh, well, tell me what you ate. Oh, I ate this. Oh, you know what, try this. This has worked really well for a lot of my clients. You know, or, I mean, that's just on the fly while you're working out. There's no metric, there's no data you're gonna plug in to spit off something like that. Like it's just, so there's other things outside of the workout to your point that the trainer is gonna be able to do. And again, AI is not going to be able to, or it won't look the same, I should say. Yeah, I think for the extremely dedicated, consistent, I'm never missing a workout no matter what. I'm a high level athlete. I'm already working with a coach. AI data can be great. Yeah. You know, you plug in the data, this is what it says, I'm already training. You're like Strava. Well, I was gonna say, do you think it's much? It's just Strava client. Is it much different than Strava or Fitbit or Woo? I mean, it's very similar, right? Like an assistant to the coach. It just interprets it. Yeah, like, I mean, I find my war ring to be extremely beneficial for me. You know, because it's just another data point that I can look at. For example, I've been talking about my sleep for quite some time. And so I'm constantly tweaking these things and then referring to that and going like, okay, that's working or that's not working. And so, but it's not the end all be all for sure. Sometimes there's trust too. Like a client could come in with all the right measurements. I never use these things, by the way, for this particular reason, but there were a couple of times that clients that were really into data with their Fitbit and all that stuff. I even had a client that would measure heart rate variability before it was even a thing. And they could come in and all the measurements could look good. Everything says that they're great, but then they tell me, listen, man, I'm not feeling too great. You know what? I'm gonna listen to you, John, at this moment. You know best. You need to know that you can trust me. You know, and this is just kind of, again, one of those relationship things. Here's another one. This one's one of my favorites. People cancel because of boring workouts. So here's what I'm gonna say. I made this mistake as a trainer. I thought the excitement of the workout. You got to cater to that, yeah. Was what made things effective. Like the workout is different and razzle-dazzle and we're hyped and I'm like, ah, you're having fun and we're doing all this new stuff. And today we're gonna try something crazy that you've never done before. We're gonna restrict your breathing today with a mask. I'm gonna tell you something right now. The workouts that I did with my clients in the back half of my career, if you looked at the workouts themselves, Very boring. You'd be like, that's the most boring workout I've ever seen in my life. And yet my clients never missed, showed up all the time. I mean, that's a lack of education on the trainer right there, right? So that's, because I agree. I was 100% the same way, fell into the trap of trying to dazzle my clients with unique exercises every time they came in. Versus these are the five most effective things we can do and we're gonna do a lot of it and get really good at it. A good, like a veteran coach, like what you would communicate that right now though. Like versus the mistake that the young trainer makes is maybe they program something with that in there and then the client goes, hey, this is boring. Can we do something else? And then the trainer, okay. Versus me the very first time I meet with you, this is obviously veteran, older version, right? So it's like, hey, we're gonna do a handful of things and it's gonna get boring. It's gonna feel like this is redundant, this and that. But trust me, this is the most effective way to get to the place that you wanna get to if you just trust me. So like learning to communicate that early on that you're gonna feel bored sometimes with these workouts because they're gonna seem like, oh, it's the same stuff all the time. But that's how you get good at those things. And getting good at those things is what's gonna render the most results. But you're saying this on a podcast, but I mean, when you're with a, here's the deal, if a client thinks a workout is boring because the trainer's boring. Yeah, you're a boring person. It's not because the workout's boring. We're gonna be a personality. Listen, I had clients who were me for 12 years. I know, dude. Never missed. Do you think that they needed me to take them through? Some of these people were like really old so they couldn't do too many exercises. Do you think that they were showing up not knowing what's the new surprise work? You've been with me for 12 years. You know what we're probably gonna do, but you love being with me. That's totally true. I mean, there was like some overcoming that in the beginning though, for sure. Because like people come in with expectations, they see all the fancy, you know, P90X workouts and things on TV and they're like, where's all this? And it's like, no, this is what works. And then you literally have to just have conversations with them and be entertaining. And that's the job. That's like we have to do. You know what it is, if you're a trainer and you don't wanna be there, they're not gonna be there. Wanna be there. If you love what you're doing, I guarantee they won't feel bored. And you know, as far as the workouts concern, like do what's right and the person will be engaged with you. That's the most important thing. Next up is scheduling issues. I guess this is a real concern. I guess AI is always available. So at any moment or time, I don't know how you would overcome this with a trainer. I guess if you like your trainer, you can't meet with you anymore then. I guess that's a thing. I don't know. Yeah. No, I mean, this is a common. I mean, when you survey a bunch of people and say what are the reasons why you quit, this would obviously come up there. I think we've all seen scheduling conflicts with clients before and it's part of the business. I don't know how much AI, like you said, AI is available 24 seven. But I don't know if that's like if. I don't know if it solves the problem because I hate saying this. This just sounds very invalidating. But oftentimes not having enough time isn't really the issue. Now I know some people have more time than others, obviously, but regardless of what your schedule looks like, in my experience, the people that are successful carve out however much time they can and stay consistent. Yeah, even if it's just like a brief, like one or two days a week, we have like that one little chunk. I've never had anybody. Even the busiest clients I've ever had that actually figured this piece out would tell you they gained all that time back and so. Totally. So the hurdle is when you are that person, kids, work, you got a ton of stuff on your plate that it doesn't seem feasible to me. I know what that, I understand that feeling. Totally. But the reality is if you find a way to make two to three hours out of the week where that's broken up or one or two days or whatever, find that time to carve that out for yourself and then you become consistent with that, what you'll find is you'll get every bit of that time. And I think, I don't know. In productivity. I think there's studies say like four times that back, something ridiculous. In productivity. Oh yeah. And so what you thought you lost, you actually gained because of productivity. And so, but you first have to take that leap of figuring that. I'll also say this when it comes to scheduling and time. The least successful strategy with, not saying that you can't be successful this way, it's just really rare. The least successful strategy with schedule is to do this. I'll work out whenever I find time and then you just go about your week. That almost never works. I've seen it work, I think once. With people have a home gym. It's always behind. We're very dedicated. That doesn't work. Typically it works as you carve out a little bit of time. Whatever that looks like, 20 minutes once a week. I don't care. And then you make it happen. So that's what I think the solution is with that one. And then lastly, this one's crazy to me. And this is definitely falls on the trainer. But the last reason, you guys want to know what the last reason is? Let's see here, we got two. This is the last number six. The trainer doesn't practice what they preach. Ooh. Ooh. Yes. Now this is the trainer's fault. And I don't mean it's because the trainer isn't perfect, but the trainer presented themselves as perfect. That's your fault, dude. You need to tell- Thizing them and then they see them at Burger King. Yeah, dude, you got to be real. First of all, it'll make you a more effective trainer. Like the least, most, the most effective trainers, the ones that clients think are like real people. That also struggle with diet sometimes. That also, you know, are challenged with it. That's the most effective. But if you present yourself as like this perfect fitness God, and then you hammer your client for every little mistake, there's no grace, which is a terrible strategy. The second they see you slip up, they're like, screw you, I'm out of here. Do you think it's more of that? Or do you think these are people that are judging the trainer because the trainer is not as fit as they would want? This is people canceling their training. So they hired them in the first place for a reason. So I don't think it's that, but I mean, if we go on that path, yeah, if you look really at it- Because maybe that's how, because imagine you hire somebody, and maybe they're not the most jacked Greek God looking trainer, but they're like, they look like they're semi-fit, but then you start training with them and you realize, oh my God, they eat like crap and then it's like, and then you're like, okay, I'm not. So you think it's more the trainer presenting themselves? Yeah, I think that's only a problem if the trainer, hammers the client for every little mistake they make, hides the fact that they struggle, and then the client finds out. I think if you're honest, especially if you struggle, look, there's people who really struggle with weight, and if they hire a trainer who also struggled with weight, who now maybe has lost a lot of weight, but tells them, I still struggle with this, man, this is just like, hey, I know you screwed up last night. Listen, I screwed up last week. I know this was really hard. That is a very powerful and effective relationship building strategy, it works, builds trust. You sell yourself as something you're not, and then your client kind of finds out, and you shame them on top of it, they're not gonna wanna work with you. It's just not gonna happen. And AI, I don't know how AI works around that. I guess what? AI is, what do they look like? I don't know. I don't know. Yeah, I'm saying too. How do we fix that? Yeah, I think we're finding more and more. I mean, AI is gonna be this incredible tool for a lot of reasons, but there's a lot of things that I don't think it's gonna replace. I mean, we all agree. No professions that require human connection. It won't, it won't. No, no. No, it'll be a poor substitute. Poor. It'll be a really poor substitute. The day that AI replaces humans for human connection, we have way bigger problems than not having jobs. Sure. Way bigger problems at that point. You referenced P90X. Yeah. Did you see? Uh-uh. They're reviving that. No, they're not. Yes, they are. Doug, Google P90X. I hear like big health problems, right? They're for many. So I don't know who they're using a different model. Man guy? Yeah, and I just saw this, that P90X revival. Wow. See what it comes up. Beach Bistram, we can come back. Yeah, wow. You get marketed by a mind pump. Yeah, I know. I like that. You're the first thing that came up. I like that. We already bought everything though. So it's called P90X Generation Next. Oh, so it launched on February 3rd. I didn't even know that. Oh man. See, show me the image. Wait, hold on. Oh god. There we go. There we are. Just. Interesting they brought it. They're gonna be able to revive this, huh? Well, I mean, it sold a lot. Yeah. It's a household name because of all the money they put in there. I mean, is that true that maybe they sold so many millions of copies that even the, you know, hundreds of thousands of people that have moved on and like this beach body is whack is going, there's still hundreds. I wonder what they're doing. There's still hundreds of thousands more that will be like, I've been waiting for the new generation of P90X. Oh my god. They still got the flag in that garage. Listen, I'm gonna just read, I'm just gonna read some of their training pillars. You'll see. I want you guys just to be okay. Yes. I'm already reading it right now. Inside my body. I feel, I feel bristling. Yeah. So there's, there's three core modalities training pillars. There's metabolic overload. Yeah. Metabolic overload. Strength and power moves with minimal rest to build muscle. Cardio. You won't build muscle doing that. Yeah. There's neuro performance. Neuro. Neuro. Drills for coordination, reaction, time and speed. More cardio. Yeah. Keep going, keep going. Active recovery, purposeful mobility and flexibility. Purposeful. Moving while you're supposed to be resting. Yeah. More cardio. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Got it. So our three boards. Where's the muscle confusion? That was like their whole thing. I want to be confused. You know what it is, is it's three modes of different cardio. It's a confusion muscle. Yeah. Yeah. 30 to 45 minutes a day for seven days a week. Oh my god. Of an intense training. Whoa. 35, okay. Yeah, you guys. What are they selling it for? Can we look up how, what's the pitch? Let's see here. You guys, I started this new program. I'm losing weight. It's crazy. Really? What are you doing? Going crazy seven days a week. Seven days a week. I just knew. Only 10 bucks a month. 9.99. Oh, it's monthly. You got to pay monthly. 145 workouts total. Yeah. Holy moly. That's a lot of workouts. Well, they got seven days to fill. So. Yeah. Yeah, they got to be. I mean, a great transition from our conversation. We're just having, you know, talk about, you know, just doing a bunch of creative shit for your clients. You know what I'm saying? Put together 145. I'll tell you this. AI is better than that. Yeah. I think it's on par. AI is better. It's cheaper. AI is free. They might have used AI to build. That's what I mean. You know, she's run by AI. You can go on your AI right now and be like, I want a 30 to 45 minute nonstop moving workout for 145 days. Different workouts every day. Done free. Just say, hey, everybody, I just saved you. Yeah. You know, 50 bucks or whatever. Hardcore yoga. Like just throw that in there. You know, the hardest part about the biggest challenge for the consumer, because I think AI could be a great tool. I use AI all the time. We use it within the business is the prompting piece. Because if you don't know how to prompt it correctly for you as a client. What to ask. Yeah. What to ask it. That that's the part that would be challenging. So both my brother-in-laws were using AI for this stuff. And when they show me what they have, I was like, OK, that's pretty decent. So good generic workout and kind of plan for you. But when I sat down with them, we spent an hour on the phone talking. And it was just like, I'm asking all these questions. And then I go, OK, this is where I want you to start. This is what I want you to do. And here's the things I want you to focus on. And don't do this and don't do that. And he's just like, what? That's all different. It's like, well, yeah, because because you told me this. Yeah. And then you told me that. You know who else to. Right. So I know if I knew all that information about him ahead of time, I could then go to a prompt and go, hey, spit me off a workout based off of somebody who has this issue, has only been training for this long, can only do this, is eating this meat. Like if I knew if I was prompting the AI, I could have gave him a better setup than what he got. But since he as a consumer doesn't know better, he just goes, I want to get in shape. Yeah. If you have a coach brain that can ask you. That's what I mean. So that's the problem here is that like someone's going to make the argument that, oh, you can totally, I mean, I'm sure we have a listener who's a trainer or coach is like, oh, I definitely think you can use it. It's like, yeah, that's your trainer brain. Yeah. That knows how to prompt it. And so that the problem is going to be people won't know. You know, they don't know what they don't know. Yeah. So they don't know what to ask. I have a good example of that, dude. Yeah. It's kind of it's related. But even then they're like, oh, do you feel like you can keep going? Keep going. Yeah. That's AI dude. I had my cousin. This was last. This was months ago. He had these this really weird like back pain. His back was hurting and his shoulder was hurting. He was so he's in so much like like upper, mid back pain, low back pain, shoulder pain. He had to stop training. Jiu Jitsu couldn't figure out what's going on. Went to the doctor like, oh, maybe you got injured while you were training. It was just this was like two months of just so much pain. He had to take like a medication to sleep and was doing massage and went to the chiropractor and the doctors were like, it must be your training. Maybe you need a time off. Maybe you got an injury that did imaging couldn't figure out what's going on. So he came and was telling me about this. And this goes to your point about knowing what to ask. Yeah. So him and I are talking and and I'm just randomly I'm thinking to myself. I'm like, wait, didn't you say a couple months ago your kids had like this random fever and then they had kind of like a little rash. And he goes, yeah. And I'm like, I wonder if any of those childhood diseases, because there's these diseases that kids get that we become immune to when we get them again. Then we're adults want to get any more. But sometimes you don't, you never get it. You never got it. And so you get a box as an example. You get it really bad as an adult. And it's different symptoms. Yeah. So I said, what, what did your kids have? And so we started asking him questions. I'm like, bro, I think, and I said, didn't you get kind of sick? He's like, yeah, it was mild. So I looked it up and I said, I think this is what you got. And I looked up the symptoms of what it is for an adult and it looks like severe arthritis throughout your whole body. And that was what it was. He brought to the doctor and the doctor was like, oh yeah. But had we not know what to add, his poor guy was freaking out. He's like, am I dying? Oh, he's very active, thick guy. But nobody knew what to ask. There was no, he didn't know, he didn't know the two could be connected. It's like he went to the doctor and said, Hey, I've got all this back pain. He does jiu-jitsu and he works out. That's what he thinks is going on. Yeah. He doesn't think, oh yeah, my kids had a fever. Yeah. Do you think there's a connection? Yeah. You know? So it's like, if you don't know what to ask or what to connect, your, your, your information is only going to be as good as what you. That's exactly right. That I think that's going to be the biggest hurdle with people that are trying to use it is that they won't know what to ask it or prompt it. And that's going to be tough. And it's going to require a good coach or to train her to do that. You know, so. I gotta tell you guys about my, my daughter, my three year old. I, I almost filmed that I didn't, uh, because I was like, if she sees me filming this, it won't be good, but she threw this. She's so dramatic, dude. She threw the, just the most. So she's been having these like little tantrums with, uh, with Jessica. And I haven't seen the big ones yet. So, you know, praise God, he's been, you know, saving me from these, but I haven't seen any of them yet, but I've seen some of the, some, I've gotten a little taste of just the drama that happens. And so, uh, with toddlers, they call them terrible twos, threes. You talk to any parent threes and fours can sometimes be worse. And so she's in the stage now where she's like defiant and like, you could try to discipline her and she'll just one up you. Like you could, you could even be like, look, if you don't do that, if you, if you don't stop doing that thing, I'm going to throw away your toy. She'll take the toy and throw it away herself and then continue. Like she'll one up you. And you're like, what do I do? Anyway, we were all hanging out and it was just me and the two little ones. And I'm like, Hey guys, all right, let's clean up the playroom. And then we get to, we'll watch this movie. And so they're all excited. So they all did that. And then there was one, one toy, little toy. It was on the floor in the hallway, 10 feet from her room. And it was her toy. So every, they're all done. Everybody's happy. High fives. I'm like, Oh, hey, Dahlia, one more toy. Get that and put it in your room. Uh, no, I said it's one, it's one toy. Just pick it up. Put it. I said, honey, we're not going to watch. We're not going to do the thing unless you pick that up and bring it to your room. Uh, she gets on the floor. She grabs it and army crawls so slowly to her room while going, Oh, like she's a pain. Bro, it takes her 15 minutes. Goes in a room and then she army crawls back on her back. So she's sliding back on her back, flopping around. I'm like, wow. This is amazing. Like 20 minutes. A lot of effort. Yeah. Without just to let you know, like on a scale of one to 10, what that is rated to what you see. I know that. She's like, honey, that's like a three. Just, you know, she's like, that's a three. You haven't seen a nine or 10 yet. She sees so much like my older daughter. My older daughter was little. She would throw these tantrums. I remember thinking like there was one time I had to get her in her car seat and she wouldn't get in her car seat and she was three maybe. And she would stiffen her body so I couldn't get her in the seat. Yeah. So I had to like physically use my strength to like push her in there and lock it in. And she freaked out so much. She took her shoe off. She threw it at her mom. And I remember thinking to myself, like, if we had a way to capture this energy, this would be like, we could power it. Oh yeah. You could power whole city. Dude, so much. I had that same thing with like Everett. It was totally different because you think like the car is, that's your safe haven. That's like where you drive around the block and you get there to go to sleep and everything's gonna be great. And every time we'd go to put them in, it was like you're putting them in a straight jacket. Dude, some kids are like that. Some kids love it. Some kids hate it. Swinging at me and screaming. I'm like, oh my God, it's just the car seat. It's like he did not like to be confined. I was like, we can't go anywhere. Like we're never going to go anywhere. It's so wild how some kids are so opposite like that. Like some kids are just like resistant to that. And then other kids are like, oh, really? Pass out. Let's go to sleep right away. Yeah, that's Max. Max can be in one of the loud cars, dude. Yeah. See, like I'm like, oh my God, dude, how's that? I've seen it. I've been down. Yes. Yeah, top is down. Engine's roaring. And he's just like this. Oh, yeah. I just cannot figure it out, dude. I do remember though, when he was a baby. So when we lived over by the coast and he, I would take him for nap time. I would just throw him in the car and the car seat and we would just cruise one and just drive along the coast. Yeah, play music and just get to go on a drive. Yeah, yeah, I get to go on a drive and he'd fall asleep. So we've been doing that since he was a baby. So I wonder if it has something to do with that, that from from infancy, you know, I'd put him in that car seat and we would just drive for nap time. I was just talking with Aurelius yesterday. I don't know where this came up. And he goes, is it true that when you were little, you guys didn't have car seats? And I'm so I'm explaining to him. I'm like, no, we didn't have any car seats. He's like, where did you sit? I said, anywhere we wanted. You sat in the front. Right. And I said, yeah, I said, I said, my mom's lap. I said on the dashboard, I was like, we crawl around the back and play. He's like, the police didn't stop you. I'm like, there was no laws. And then he goes, there were no laws. That there were laws. He's like, didn't they care about kids? I said, I mean, they did, but they just. Different energy. Can you try to get so mad? I let Max I let Max ride in the front seat all the time. I'm going to get so mad. You're not supposed to do that. I'm like, dude, he's freaking. He's almost five foot already. We let his legs are dangling off this. He's in a, he's in a booster seat and his legs are still almost touching the ground. I'm like, this is ridiculous. Oh, yeah. I've been sitting in the front seat like years before that. He's fine. He's going to be totally fine. I know. I'm like wearing helmets riding bicycles. You know, it's like, I'm like hammering the kids about just because, you know, Courtney's like freaks out about it. And I'm like thinking like, I never wore helmet. Never, ever, ever. Never. If you were a kid, I never, I never wore helmets. Let's never wear helmets. If you wear a helmet in the 80s or 90s, you were 100% going to get bullied. Yeah. Yes. For sure. Everybody. Why are you wearing a helmet? You rolled up like, cause we all used to meet as kids. We all met after like school, all the bikes from all the neighborhood. They get punked. If you were the kid that rolled up the one kid. I don't even remember. What's up safety? Mushroom head. When I used to go to work with my dad, he, uh, in his work van, he had this old work van and, uh, it was a two-seater cause the back was all open. So they'd fill it up. Just sit on one of those crates. Listen, no bro, they used to fill it with sand or, you know, materials. And he would have his helper and I'd sit in the middle. He made a, a wooden box and that's what I'd sit on. Yeah. I've sat, I've sat on crates before. Did you? Oh, yeah. Yeah. And then I don't know what my dad was thinking. He's like, I'm going to make this more safe. He gave me a little rope that I'll put on. I feel like a bungee cord over your lap. I told him before, but I, I mean, usually, dude, we just sit in the back of my dad's pickup truck. The gas tank was right here. Maybe that's why I'm buffering. I'm sorry. Tripping. It's not all about football trauma. I mean, it's not the football. Well, my dad, it was even worse than his gentle, especially cause he was poor. He was operating a heavy machinery when he was 13. He tells me a story of how he drove a cement truck up into the hills and he'd have to put it in first gear to make it. And he's telling me the story of how the road is so narrow that he had, he had his buddy hanging out the side, looking down to make sure that they didn't fall off the cliff and they're going up and they're going up like five miles an hour, 10 thousand. And as he's, bro, as he's telling me the story, I'm like, that's terrifying. This and that. And then I'm like, I just thought to myself. You should ask him how old he was. I'm like, how old were you when you're doing that? He's like, Oh no, 13, 12. Oh my God. That was what you were doing. That's crazy. That is crazy. That's wild. I know. I know. That's a good time. Anyway, I wanted to ask you about, uh, you were saying off air how you've been using, well, I'll just, I'll, I'll prompt you honey on your ribs. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So what are you doing? Yeah. So I use the monocura on there now. So the monocura, and I say it right. Monocura. Monocura. That's Monocura. Yeah. I use the monocura honey on there now. Is it better than just your regular old? I do like the taste of it. So I've grown to really like it. I've also used it when I, we're, uh, since the last time we talked about them, uh, I had gotten sick and so I was taking like, I'd noticed a difference. I take a, like a table for you. Hot water, lamp, light, or lemon and, yeah. All right. Make a hot toddy and I use it inside there. So that's been like my go-to move. But for my ribs, I'll make my ribs where I do the first three hour smoke. And then after that, in fact, I'm doing it today, right? So I'll do a three hour smoke off Katrina. It's already prepped. So I've already seasoned it and everything. And then I'll tell her around one o'clock, okay. Throw it in at two 20. She'll put it in the smoker. You'll sit there for three hours. And then I already have on the counter right now, I set up. So she, in case I don't make it home in time, she can just throw it on there. My foil. And then I have, uh, brown sugar, the monocura honey and then butter. And then the, the rack of ribs sit in that. And then you wrap it all up and then you put it back in. And then like just the juices and the honey. Well, it's, it's, I mean, it's a, it's a medicinal nutritional. Nutritional kind of based honey. So like there's honey and then there's my monocora. Yeah. Like this is, this stuff is like gold. Well, you got me, you got me using it for the cold. I had, I'd already been using it for things like this, but I didn't think about using it for the cold. What's the ingredient is it is MGO. MGO. Okay. This is a compound in honey that has these incredible medicinal and health benefits. And the amount that's in monocora is significantly higher. That we'll find another time. Do we know what, what the, what the comparison is? I know you've talked about it before. Yes. Doug's going to pull it up right now, but it's significantly higher. You'd have to buy or take a lot more of the, of another brand to get the same amount of the, of the MGO, but MGO is anti-microbial. Yeah. It's got anti-inflammatory benefits. It's pro gut health. And this particular type of honey that they make, that they get, I should say, is the highest percentage of MGO versus the other ones. Oh, it even has, that's what the number 850 means on it. Yeah. I've seen the number on it, 850 plus. And I've seen, there's other ones I've seen before that have number that aren't as high as that. I think other ones are like 60 or something. They vary quite a bit, but this is monocora is definitely some of the highest I've ever seen. It's the highest. Yeah. You know what it's good for that. I think it's really good for. So, and this, we talked about this years ago, but this is important to talk about. When you look at people, when you look at populations with gut health issues, it's really interesting. There's this, there's this really strange, we know why, but when they first discovered this, they were like, this doesn't make any sense. You expect people with poor health, poor health habits who don't exercise to have gut health issues. And that is the case. Yeah. That is the case. They have a higher percentage of gut health issues for people who eat like garbage, who smoke, who don't exercise, right? But then on the other side of the spectrum, people who exercise a lot actually have a higher rate of gut health issues than people in the middle. And they couldn't figure out what was going on. Why, why is that the case? It's like really fit. Athletic people. And it's because when you're training at that level, um, you do cost systemic inflammation and you're encouraged, and this isn't a bad thing, but this does increase the risk. You're encouraged to eat or take a protein shake or something like that right after your workout. Yeah. Yeah. When you're all inflamed at the same time. Yeah. Right. And so a lot of gut health issues can start, many of them can start with inflammation and when your gut is, cause your whole body's inflamed from a hard workout, you're including your gut. And when your gut is inflamed, the junctions, uh, the tight junctions that seal your gut can become spaced out and can cause things to pass through. And so what you'll see is sometimes people develop food intolerances with the foods that they eat post workout. So it's like, I could always have dairy and now I can have dairy. Well, your shake is dairy or I could always eat eggs. Now I can't have eggs. Well, you eat eggs, you know, post workout. So Monocora, uh, cause post workout, it's good to have a little carbohydrates with some protein Monocora is good for your gut, Sanitized inflammatory and could help with the maintaining of the, of the junctions. Oh, interesting. So if you want some carbs post workout, honey, people have been using honey for a long time. Post workout. Honey is a natural post workout carb. Athletes have been using that for a long time. Monocora would have, uh, some protective effects. So you would add that tablespoon or two of that with your shake. Now you've got your carbs and your protein. Oh, smart. And it's got some protect. Oh, interesting. Yeah. That's actually a cool idea. Sweeten it up really nice. Yeah. Yeah. And it tastes, uh, you know, it tastes really good. Yeah. You brought up, uh, talking about my, my ribs and stuff like that. You know, a butcher box has been, I still have yet to find anybody else that does ribs with that. I know Doug has done it. Have either one of you guys ordered their stuff. Have you used their ribs? Have you cooked their ribs? I don't make ribs, but I've had yours and Doug's and I've had other people's ribs and then was it at your house? Yeah. It was someone's house where they had, I know Courtney resell for that recipe because we've been trying to get, get the butcher box version of it. Yeah. Well, it was, I think it was your house. We were all eating over there and you had had, you had the butcher box ribs and then you had to buy extra another brand. Oh, it might have been. Yeah. Cause if I run out, I have to order something else. And if I'm cooking ribs for everybody, I'm like, they don't taste, they taste way better. No, they, yeah, way better. They're nowhere near as tender. It's because it's kind of pig, right? Yeah. I believe it's a heritage pork pig, which is a certain, um, breed. Uh, Oh, I thought it was what they feed on that. Well, it could be that as well. Yeah. Absolutely. And no, I did ribs for a friend of mine and he could not stop eating him because why are these ribs so good? Yeah. And I mean, I told him it's the way I cooked them, but the truth was they were here, the butcher box ribs. I mean, it takes both. I mean, you still gotta be decent. You got to know what you're doing and stuff like that, but it's, they're definitely, there's a huge difference. And we'll, Katrina and I will just, we'll eat a rack each and that's like dinner. Oh, yeah. Just sit down and eat a whole rack. They're so good. They are so good. I also liked their, their ground beef, like, cause I was over in my parents' house this weekend, they were barbecuing. They said, we had like a barbecue site, burgers and, and sausages. That's what Italians do instead of hot dogs. And we were all eating them and my dad bought the Costco burger patties. Yeah. So it's just regular beef. I don't like, I think when it comes to ground beef, I like the grass fed better. They just don't taste as greasy. Oh, I, so with ground beef, I prefer that. I was just going to say, some of my steaks, if I go to like a fancy restaurant, I'm going to like a ribeye and then traditional's got that. Then I'll, I'll, I'll prefer a grain. But ground beef, ground beef, grass, grass, grass, grass. Cause the other one's so oily. Too oily. And it's so like 100% agree. So you see me, I made that taste as good. I have been posting it almost every time I've been prepping the, the, the ground beef and the mushrooms and onions. And I've gotten a bunch of people DM me that have been, that have been doing that same exact recipe. And I prefer the butcher box ground beef when I do that for sure. It's, it's otherwise it just gets too oily. And then it sits at the bottom and it's not as good. So I liked the, the, the, the bread. Breakfast sauce is super convenient. It's like a patty. Um, and here's the thing. We're flying out of the house early in the morning. Now the kids eating a lot more. So like, especially Ethan, he'll eat like two of those patties and then like three eggs and then stuff it into like a sandwich. Oh wow. Every morning. He's an age boy, dude. Dude, he's, he's getting huge. Uh, and so that just comes in the clutch. We've been, I mean, the last, you know, month or so, uh, been using and going through just bags of those things. I was just talking to my brother, so my brother's having a third kid. Did I tell you guys this? Did you know that? Three? I didn't know that. He's got a third one coming. Oh right on. Boy. We just found out. So no, he's got three boys. He's gonna have three boys. Oh yeah. And, and so my brother, when he was in the wild house and he's a, he's a, he was, my brother's great. He's a great, he's a great father. I love seeing him with his kids. It warms my heart cause he's such a good day. He's such a loving, engaged, good dad. But when he was little, uh, my brother was, um, I don't know, nuclear power, I guess he would say he was on fire all the time. Like drove my mom crazy, uh, constantly running, constantly moving, constantly climbing, breaking things. It was just, it was, it was insanity. He has two boys that are just like him right now. So he's got two sons that are just, they're just like him too. They're so, you can't get mad at them cause they're so loving. They'll come up to you and they'll hug you. And if you pick them up, they'll cuddle with you. You're just so loving, but you put them down and they're tearing my, you know, cause I said we were having a barbecue yesterday. They're tearing my dad's tree down. They're throwing lemons. They're fighting, you know, they're wrestling with each other. You know, they're, they're, they're just nuts. They're just nuts. Right. He's got two of them. He's going to have a third one. And so I was just talking with them, dude. I'm like, bro, I'm like, first of all, God bless you. And his wife is so patient too. So I'm like, you guys are the right people to have these kind of kids. I said, but also, whoa, and those are teenage boys cause they're big kids. Fighting. My niece was there and she, she works at the kids club at a gym and she's like, you know, I'm working with a lot of kids now. And I realized kids aren't supposed to be as big as your kid cause they're big old kids or big sons or big, big, like my brother, big, big dudes. So I'm like, man, when you're going to have three teenage boys in your house, eat you at a house, you're, yeah, dude, you're going to have to, you better, is he, you better make a lot of money. Are they, are they shutting it down? Are they going to keep going? Is he trying to get a girl? Do you know? I, okay. So we'll have to wait a few years because you know how it is when you first have a baby, you don't want to have anymore. Yeah, yeah. I would love to have, I would love to see him go for number four. Yeah. I want a little niece so bad, dude. Yeah. So bad, but threes, yeah, especially if the third boys like you are too blessed. Oh my God. Oh my God. I feel like three of any sex is a lot. Three girls, three boys, three of the same sex. I feel like parents just need a little, a little bit of a break up, you know what I'm saying? Like you just need a little, a little change of pace. Three of the same of anything is just every parent I know that has three girls or three boys is just like, that's a lot. It's a lot to have three of the same sex. Well, I could see three teenage girls. Uh, obviously I'm being stereotypical, but I could see three teenage girls making you want to pull your hair out, but three young boys. That's a lot, dude. You know, especially active boys, you know, you've been around little, little active boys. Yes, it's, it's don't buy anything expensive. It's bro. He breaks stuff. All his older one breaks stuff all the time. Yeah. Yeah. Just get real durable furniture. Make sure you get the scratch proof floors and, you know, Hey, speaking of boys, uh, on the side of the road with your boys car. Yes. What happened to that? Did you see that? No, these guys got like, I heard for like three hours. Yes. Three hours. Has the car broke down? Yeah. So we were, that sucks. And we were just taking it because, um, well, it got smogged before and this was on like the seller to smog it, but it just like that window where we were like registering it, it had like expired. And so we're like, oh man. And so we have to go smog it ourselves. We go to smog it and it's like, it was the RPMs were going way too high. And, um, and they were like running it, I think for an hour or so, just like, you know, pressure testing it and whatnot. Uh, and they're like, you're going to have to take this to us, you know, the, the mechanic to, to check it out. And so, uh, I was like, okay, I'll follow you. And I followed Courtney. It was driving it and I was following her like, and we're just taking the side roads and it was just like getting hotter and hotter. And she pulls over. I'm like, oh man, it's like it's heating up on us. And I'm like, well, it's just way to while. And then I'm like, you know, testing the engine blocks, you know, hot as, um, okay, it's not too bad. I'll get some coolant, throw some coolant in there, you know, go a little bit further and we went like maybe another mile. And then like, she started getting a little bit of smoke coming through the vent and like, it was, I'm like, dude, just stop, you know, like, we're just going to park it here. And she, she parked, unfortunately, like right where, like in this neighborhood where you have to like, it's not like there was a side of the road where you park, it was like right in the middle of the road. So everybody's like driving around us and like it was, dude, we were there just kind of sitting on the, on the curb for looking at our phone and we kept looking for updates and it was like, it was an update. It was like maybe 45 minutes. Like, oh man, it's a long time. But yeah, I guess we'll just wait 45 minutes. And you know, somebody would come out of their house, you guys doing all right? We're like, yeah, we're doing okay. Like really nice people, dude. Actually, like made me like somewhat optimistic about people again. I was like, wow, like everybody in this neighborhood was super cool and nice and offering us drinks and things. And we're just like sitting there. And then we go look at the update again. It's like two hours. And we're like, what? No way. It was like 15 minutes to two hours. And it just kept going like back and forth and like changing on us forever. And we're just kind of laughing about it because we were kind of held hostage. But there's really nothing we could do. And, and dude, it was, man, it was brutal. We just kept waiting in people driving by. And this one guy comes out and like was talking to us for a bit. So walk around and then he just like, mind pump. And they're like, walks away. You know, I'm like, cool. In Courtney's like, he just said, I'm like, what? I didn't catch that. And I'm like, why, who does that? Like, who says like, mind pump? Yeah. He's like, I was scared to talk to me or something. I'll get that like in the airport. I'll hear someone and then I'll like turn around and look to have no idea where it came from, but I'll hear it, you know, or someone does that when you go by. So yeah. Do I tell you guys the, the, the, the, when I got my vasectomy, how the, the, one of the people in there. Shut up. Or, or listen, oh yeah, dude. That's a great place to get wrecked. Oh, it's the worst. It's the worst, dude. Yeah. But yeah, I'm getting set up and they're doing the thing. The cough, please. Hey, every white balls are in head. Hey, you know, I know you, right? Love your show. Hey, love your show. It was after, it was afterward. Everything was done. You know what I mean? I'm all sad. Like you got a lot of protein in my right. There's exactly. Healthy. Healthy. You know, I've listened for a while. It's exactly how I pictured. No, after we were done, after we're done, Colin's healthy. They're giving you all the instructions. They're giving you all the instructions, you know, you got to do this as a, I'm on my way out. Like, oh, by the way, really like your show. Yeah. At the end when I'm leaving, I'm like, I guess it's better. I was going to say, that's probably better. If they tell you to me before, I'm like, oh man, this is awkward now. Can you bring someone else in? You know me too much. Oh my God. That's funny. So did you guys get, so you guys, uh, finally get towed three hours later. Yeah. Finally towed. Yeah. So yeah, we're finding out cause like, you know, it was the weekend. And so it's like, we just had to like drop it off, like right at the place and in the keys. And so, uh, we're going to find out today since it's, you know, it was over the weekend, what was wrong with it. But, uh, yeah, it was just like, Revan, the thing is like, we already drove it from LA all the way up there, no problems. And the thing about old cars, like it just kind of like comes out of nowhere, you know? So I'm just like remembering all these things again, like you kind of forget like how the little nuances and stuff like happens with these old cars. And, um, you know, it, it's so much fun though to drive with the manual stick shift. I forgot like how just involved you are, like in, in just the feel of everything and the sounds and it's like so much of a visceral experiences as opposed. So just downshift. Yeah. And revving. And I just found like a rad parking lot to really have like Ethan trying to open up and, uh, I was waiting for like a good rain so we could go hydroplane and figure that out. My dad did that with me and I was, I wanted to have a great idea. Yeah. Go hit it hard, you know, and, and fishtail a bit, but like be calm and, you know, slowly correct it and kind of slide through it. And yeah, all that stuff. Like I'd rather him learn there than just like, of course. So, of course, I saw your daughter's part job too. But that was for real. She like, did she not say anything and she just came to the house and you just saw that for a walk. You went for a walk. He's obviously she didn't have a passenger. Uh, no, I mean, I'm trying to picture her. I sent, you know, I sent to her. What'd you say? You guys know that, that GIF or Homer Simpson goes in. Yeah. Yes. Like this is you. She was half in the bush. She was half in the bush. What are you doing? Like you can't tell me when she's parking. She doesn't hear. Like, I mean, do you just like hear all that? You just know, I took a picture of it and I sent it in a group text with Jessica and my niece and her. Yeah. And I'm just, we're just teasing her and making fun of her about it. I'm like, dude, you're, you're gonna be that close to the bush. You can get a little space between. I was just picturing like if that was like how she was pulling in, then she just said, epic, get out and just leave it. I feel like you do that. You're like, oh, that's a little close. Yeah. Back it back out. Redo it. She just said, no, I'm committed. I'm committed to parking in the bush. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know what happened. Oh, I would have died if I would have came out and saw that dude. It was hilarious. Element is an electrolyte powder. You add to your water. It tastes great, but there's no artificial sweeteners. There's no sugar and it has a thousand milligrams of sodium per serving. Here's the problem with most, most electrolyte powders. They don't have enough sodium. Just sprinkling enough sodium doesn't make a difference. If you need electrolytes, if you'll benefit from electrolytes, if you sweat a lot when you work out or you work in the sun or you're on a low carb diet, you're going to want sodium, a decent amount in your electrolyte powder. That's what makes the difference. An element has a thousand milligrams and it tastes great. And there's nothing in there that's artificial. Go check them out. Go to drink element.com forward slash mine pump. Now that link is going to get you a free sample pack of their most popular drink mix flavors with any purchase back to the show. Our first caller is Nikki from Georgia. Hi, Nikki. Hi, Nikki. Hey, how are you? Good. How can we help you? Good. So my son is 15 years old. And he's been having knee pain when he does barbell squats, but he does not have that knee pain when he does box squats. So he'll do two 25 for reps with barbell squats, but he can do three 15 with box squats and not have any pain. So I was wondering what could cause that issue. His ankle mobility. Usually it's almost certainly that he. So the reason why it doesn't bother his knees is because he doesn't have to go down very deep with the box squats. And so he's got that support. He can sit back on it where he gets barbell squats. His ankles need the mobility for his knees to travel forward. And because he lacks a little bit of that ankle mobility, he feels a stress in his knees as his knees go to travel forward. Change of direction puts the next, this amount of stress too. So that box really helps to kind of slow that down. Yeah. Let me ask you some more questions. Nikki, is the box squad as deep as his regular squad? Um, not quite now. Okay. Of course not. So, uh, so yet, so a number one, it's deeper. Uh, and then what Justin said, right? When you're going down and then you change directions, there's this fraction of a second in which the weight is actually generating more force increases force than the weight itself because you need to change directions. Cause now you're actually, you're not just lifting the way you're having to change the direction of the momentum. Okay. And in that change of direction, which a box squat stops. So a box squat, as I sit, I don't need to change. I don't need to stop the momentum. The box does that. And then I squat up. So even at the same distance, sometimes a box squat feels better on somebody's knees than a traditional squat because I'm not having to reduce or slow down or reverse change or change the direction of the momentum. So what happens is, uh, either the knees don't want to travel forward, like Adam said, or because there's a little lack of ankle mobility, there's a little torsion on the knee. Yeah. You might not even be able to see it, right? But when there's ankle mobility issues, the feet want to do this. They want to turn out, but let's say his knees come in just a little bit on both. Yeah. So that's, so there it is. So compensation. Yeah. It's a little bit of pain in the meniscus. Now there's something else here that I want to address. If you don't mind, cause I see your question. There's more to your question. You said that his doctor warned him, uh, that lifting too heavy would basically stunt his growth. Yeah. So he had his physical, um, for football and he's six one and he wants to get taller. And so the doctor was like, well, just be mindful that, you know, lifting heavy is going to make your bones grow out and not up. And I was like, really? No, no. I've never heard that before. And she's like, yeah. And so my son was like, mom, do I need it? Cause she's like, so you should do higher reps, lower weight. And I was like, I don't think that's a thing. No. So let me address this. It's not Nikki. So there's some truth to it, but I'll explain what's going on. What's true? Well, there's this one's going on at his age, you, uh, he's not done growing. Right. He's 15 and there are growth plates that if they become damaged, we'll limit the growth of the bone. Yeah. Have you heard some self, right? And so the fear is with too much tension on the growth plates, they'll cause damage and then stop the growth. Now here's why that's almost always not a problem. The amount of tension required to cause damage to a growth plate is incredibly high. So yeah, excessive amount. Okay. Now here's, here's, this is a unique situation though, Nikki, because I'm going to just talk a little bit about your kid. He's 15 and he can squat three 15 on a box and he can rep out to 25. He's strong. Yeah. He's, he's actually one of the strongest 15 year olds in the world. He's a very strong kid. Yeah. Okay. If he's doing legit squats, he's really strong. You said he's six one. How much does he weigh? Uh, 164. He's crazy strong. Yeah, he's strong. So here's the deal. So what I'm going to tell you as his mom, okay? Cause he's still growing. And so what happens when you're still growing is you don't have as much time to acclimate to your body, your body awareness. You ever, you ever own a dog and you see it grow into a large puppy and it's like super awkward. Yeah. They just got to get used to their size. So this is your son right now, uh, at his age, cause he's going to keep growing. And you know, he'll probably grow in spurts, like he'll grow three inches out of nowhere or whatever, or he'll just gain all this muscle out of nowhere. And he's got a new body. And so he has to acclimate to it. And so because your son is so strong at his age, I will encourage you. Now, I don't think he's going to damage growth plates, but I will say this, uh, I would be very mindful of pushing the weight only because your kid is hella strong. He's already there. He doesn't need, what this is what I would do. I'm going to give, I'm going to have Doug give you prime pro and have him do work on his ankle mobility because that is absolutely going to serve him. So have him do ankle mobility stuff all the time. He can do, he can work on it every day, multiple times a day. If he improves his ankle mobility, that's going to help a lot. Then tell him to get on Instagram and follow a page called squat university. Their con, their content is a hundred percent built around improving the squat. And what he should do instead of trying to go get his weight any higher than because he's already really strong would be to perfect his squat is get better at the squat. So his knees aren't caving in his feet. So normally too, if a kid's knees are caving in his feet are probably flattening a little bit or his feet are turning out. So, so in squat university talks all about this, about his foot placement, about where his knees are at, and like just have him really dive into like perfecting the squat. Because if he just moves the weight, he's moving with a beautiful, perfect squat, paying free. He'll, he'll see great gains and improvement just from that. It'll be better gains. In fact, I'm going to send you another program that I think will be very valuable for your kid, which is symmetry. I think because of his tip, here's what'll happen. If I take a 15 year old playing football, I'm going to get him strong at squats and dead lifts and overhead presses. Now, if I run into the 0.001% of 15 year olds who can squat 315 on a box, I'm going split stance. He's already strong. Yeah. Like to get him in a split stance is more applicable to any sport. And so to reinforce that and get stronger there in multiple planes. Uh, it's like he built the foundation. He established that. Like he's, he's rock solid there. So now we got to kind of express it. Yes. We actually want to put some breaks on that kind of load with those exercises and split stance exercises, unilateral exercises. That'll improve his performance as much, if not more at his strength. And it'll reinforce his stability so that when he's 18, 19, 20, he's in college. He starts squatting again. He's squatting 500 pounds and he's got really good technique and no pain. Cause what can happen at this age with that weight? Cause here's what happens. There's always a risk of injury with exercise. The heavier the weight, the greater the risk of injury. When you move outside of perfect. So like one degree outside of perfect with a hundred, you know, if you had 90 pounds on his back and he was one degree outside of perfect risk of injury is not that high, 300 pounds on a 15 year olds back, one degree outside of perfect risk of injury is kind of high. Right. So, uh, because this is such an exceptional case, I'm like, I'm going to go unilateral pretty much all the time. He's going to do split stance exercises. We're going to focus on technique. If a weight feels light, I'm going to make it feel heavier by slowing it down and by perfecting the technique, not by adding weight on the bar. Cause again, he's one of the strongest. If he's doing genuine squats, he's one of the strongest 15 year olds in the nation. And so you want to be really, uh, smart about how he trains. Cause you could develop this kid will develop some incredible strength. Yeah. So long as he's smart, we got to support that now. That's right. Reinforce the joints. Paul, that's quite university page. Yeah. A ton of good information on there. That's completely dedicated to improving. Does he have a strength cream, like a, like a personal trainer or coach? So I was training him and we were working out together. And then it got to the point where it's not real cool to go to the gym with your mom. So then he is actually, and they do, it's like seventh period football. So it's one of the coaches that runs the workouts. So that was what my next question. We, after this, so the workouts aren't the best. And he tells me, you know, what they do every day and there's just, there's not a lot of structure to it. It's kind of random. It's like wherever you can find a safe and go do this. Um, so how would you, if I give him symmetry, look at it and we do that, how do you do that around these workouts that they're doing? Can you, do you ever bring the, he could bring the blueprints in with them? I was just going to say, do you talk to the coach? Yeah, I can. Yeah. It's a, hey, coach, uh, my son's got a little bit of knee pain is really strong. I talked to some, uh, some, you know, strength and conditioning experts. How much does they suggested? That he do split stance exercises. So, you know, like lunges, Bulgarian split stance squats and that kind of stuff. Lateral, lateral lunges. I think I want him to focus on this during strength training. Um, and the coach, I'm sure was not going to care because he's trained a whole class. I'm sure he's totally fine with it. Perfect. Yeah. Yeah. You got it. Yeah. Thank you so much. All right. Awesome. Keep in touch. Can't wait to hear about this kid. Stud. Yeah. Thanks. All right. You got it. Yeah. 99.999% of the time when someone's like, you're going to stunt your growth at a 15 year old. I'm like, get out of here. Then you get that occasional, listen, a three 15 box squad, a 15 year old kid, 225 for reps. That's a strong ass kid. At a hundred and sixty. He's a tall skinny kid. He's light. He's a tall skinny kid. Yeah. He's not, he's not like, I thought she was going to say like two, one, two, 80, yeah, just one 85 maybe. Yeah. I thought he's going to be a big lineman. Like a big heavy ass kid. Yeah. Those are like lineman numbers in high school. Yeah. And he's a fret like a freshman, right? Yeah. That's a freshman. That's, that's right. Damn. Yeah, dude. So that's a force. So again, typically you take your 15 year olds, I'm like squat, let's get you stronger squats. But dude, you're pushing that much weight at a hundred and you're a tall skinny kid. No, we're going to, yeah, we're going to. I completely agree. Just split stance and like do the, the, the boil method from. Yeah. This preserve. I mean, at this point, right. I mean, he could totally avoid bilateral squatting stuff for a year or two and then come back to avoid it all in high school. I seriously, this is going to be a 600 pound squatting college kid. Is what he's going to be. Yeah. Our next caller is Mike from Ontario. What's up Mike? It's happening. Hey there fellas. Appreciate you taking the time to chat with me today. Much love from up here in Canada. How can we help you? All right. With respect to your time, I've consolidated this down the best way I can to point forms. So a little bit about me. I was an obese child and teenager. I was five foot and 260 at my worst. Um, I got into boxing in high school competitively. I did that. I did that for a couple of years. I got my first membership to a gym at 19 years old. So I just threw obsessive cardio. Like honestly, I didn't really have any knowledge for lifting or I wasn't following any kind of programming, just like a ton of cardio. I got into running as well. I lost a hundred pounds. So went down to 160 ish, but it was really skinny fat. Like I always had like, you know, the ripped fat guy calves, but I just, I was never really a defined muscular dude at all. Uh, my mid twenties, I got my first coach and my first meal plan. He was a friend of mine who did physique competitions and stuff like that. Now his first protocol for me was like, prank my calories up, like get, get me into like a reverse diet. I was really resilient to this. I'm like, no, bro, I need to eat less to get abs and tail as old as time. So I've yo-yo dieted a lot of the last 10 years, but it was never out of control. Like I never got like to a point when it was like, okay, I really got to reign this in. So I got married this past November, uh, I guess coming up on six months ago. And just after the wedding, I weighed in at two 15 and, uh, my, my body wasn't looking good. Like I sent, uh, I sent Doug, uh, some, uh, current and, uh, pictures from around then, so we're, we're moving in the right direction. I started a pretty hard cut around then went to 2000 calories a day that looked like, uh, 160 protein, 65 fat, 180 carbs. I was lifting five days a week, uh, 20 minutes daily of cardio. I've got a husky. So I walk her every day and I work in a very successful high volume cocktail bar. So when I'm at work, I'm, I'm moving a fair bit too. So the weight was dropping, uh, strength was holding. I think my programming's pretty decent. Um, I got down to 195 ish. So I lost about 20 pounds. That held for a couple of weeks. Uh, readjusted, went down to 1900 calories and lost another five to a 190 pounds. And it was a hard stall. Like, and, uh, like I'd have fly. Like, uh, I mean, like my wife and I would order pizza for dinner and I'd go up a couple pounds, I'd hold on to that for three or four days. And, uh, it just felt like a really hard stall. So, uh, I discovered you guys around the time I, uh, started this cut, uh, back in November and I knew the advice would be to reverse diet, but I didn't know what that looked like. Um, so I just cranked it overnight from 1900 to 2500. I went up to 201 protein, 84 that and 239 carbs cut out cardio completely. And my strength completely took off. Like I, I didn't realize how much my, uh, like, the thing is like, if I lift the same amount of reps as the week before, but I'm struggling a little bit more mentally, I'm still like, Oh, I'm moving the same way. And I'm not losing strength, but there's a lot to be said for the amount of effort it takes to do that. So my strength completely took off. Uh, every lift is up in that time. My body feels great. Um, sorry, the cat on the table now. Um, yeah. So my body's tightened up. I went down another pound or two. I've been sitting around there. I'm still in the gym five days a week. Feels like a good number for me. I like the ritual. It's good for me mentally. And, uh, yeah, it's, the weight is about leveled off. I feel like I'm kind of stalling again. Uh, I'll be at eating 600 more calories a day. Um, I'm not hyper focused on the weight. I just track it for a data point. Like it doesn't ruin my day. If I'm a little up or it doesn't, you know, drastically skewer, I'm going to go off on a little bit down. But my question then lies in you, what this actually looks like moving forward sustainably for me. So I want to be able to go off with my wife for a nice dinner, like have a, have a glass of whiskey with dinner or something like that. Like I'm not a, I'm not a party. I'm not a drinker, but I, when I hear like, you know, you guys talk about in the long run, oh, like you'll just, you'll have an easier time getting to, you know, these things won't affect you quite as much because your calories will be higher. I want to know what like the pathway to that looks like, but also, uh, like I'm still, uh, I would guess probably mid to mid to low twenties for body fat right now, I'd like to be low to mid, low to mid teams. So getting to that goal while still looking for the long-term sustainability of, you know, having calories high and, uh, building muscle in the long-term. You're on the path. Yeah, you're doing the right thing. You're, you're on the path, bro. You're, I mean, I just, I'm just looking at your, uh, original pictures in November, where you're at now, uh, you're making. And keep in mind too, you're up 600 calories, right? So you're, so the way you look and up 600 calories is phenomenal. You draw, you draw a body fat and built muscle. Yeah. You're on, you're on, you're on a great path right now. Think of it this way. Uh, this is the mentality that I want you to, to, to adopt. That'll help you right now. Build into a leaner physique. Yeah. Don't cut into a leaner physique. Uh, now five days a week of exercise, uh, the amount of activity that you're doing at your weight, uh, your calories are still low. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. 25 hours still low. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. I'm, uh, I'm going to be 38 in a week and I'm, uh, about five eight now. I, I still figure to be about, uh, you know, the 12 to 14, uh, percent range. And I'm not fixated on that number. I'm just figuring that's like, you know, probably I'd be reasonable goal to shoot for, probably. No, no, no, no, don't cut into that. So just to encourage you, you bumped your calories and got leaner. Yep. That's going to happen for a little while, dude. Yeah. Don't continue to happen. And, and you, you're back to your question about how do I get to a place where I can have a glass of whiskey with dinner with my wife on a Friday night or what I thought and not feel like it's, you know, it affects me that where that is, is, is higher calories. So when you get to a place kind of like where you are now, but you're eating 3000 calories, so you put on even more muscle, you lean out a tiny bit more, but now you're eating 3000. Now you have this metabolic flexibility. Now, if you really wanted to, too, you could, you could cut for a short period of time to get down real fast. But if you just keep going the path you're going, like to Sal's point, you build into a leaner physique, you'll get the thing that you want where you have higher calories, so you have more metabolic flexibility. And then you'll also be at such a high calorie. I mean, a great goal instead of a body, pepper, since goal would be, can I not put any weight on the scale kind of hover around, but get my calories up to 3200, 3,400 calories a day. Cause if you, if you don't move on the scale much and just keep kind of do it, you're kind of in that Goldilocks zone, which by the way, is one of the best places to be, but also one of the most mentally challenging places. Cause sometimes not seeing the scale move also messes with people's heads a little bit, like am I seeing progress? I mean, it's very obvious when you look at the picture from November to now, you're making a great progress. You're up 600 calories and you look radically different. You lost a lot of fun. Like, like go, if you just kept going down this path for six more months, I bet you you'll look back at that picture and go, Oh shit, I'm looking even better than that. And so you're in a great place, but Sal's right. Like try and build into that leanness. Don't try and cut into that leanness. So I'd go up in calories. I also think too, like, uh, I mean, I, I know you like the five days a week. I'd like to give you one of our programs because there's, I mean, there's, there's something about having somebody else program for you and following it. And I don't know if you've been kind of doing similar stuff as far as your training, like how have you changed your training up? Does it look pretty similar? Like what's the split look like? I was originally, I don't know. Is it, is it bad decorum to say if I was using a different program? No, no, it's okay. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry. So like you guys have mentioned Jeff Nipper in the past. He's a local guy to me. So I was following a program of his. Okay. And I've been, um, it's five days full body. That's fine. Oh wow. Five days full body. Yeah. It's like heavy light. You know. Okay. So did you periodize like the, the, the, like how you're, is your lifting intensity change each day or what's it look like with a full body? Well, it's, um, it'll be like, uh, the volume changes week to week. So some days or some weeks, uh, like you'll have one week where, uh, the rapper ranges like four to six and you'll be, uh, like aim to hit, you know, uh, two reps and reserve on that. And then the following week, it'll be like, uh, 14 to 16 reps and hit two. So it's like, uh, you, I'll, I imagine the volume will be fairly similar because when I'm doing 14 to 16, I'm using way lower weights. Of course. But, uh, yeah, it's like one to two big lifts a day and then a lot of auxiliary stuff. And that's every day. Yeah. All right. If you like it, you can keep doing it. I think, uh, if I put you on, uh, maps that have ballock, I think it probably serve you a little better. So I'll send it to you. You could decide to try it or not. Let's do it. Yeah. I would love to. I'm, uh, I'm, uh, I'm down to try something new. And see what you can easily, you could bump your calories 27 right now. You think that's the next day. If I'm at 25, yeah, yeah. More about the 27. Yep. Yep. On us, I look, look, now there's, this is give or take, right? So if I coached you through this process, then we would be able to be much more individualized, but generally speaking with what you're saying, I'd eventually probably get you up to about 3,200 calories. That's right. I think that'd be a dream, dude. That's, uh, that's a pizza without the nightmare. Yeah. By the way, by the way, the two or three pounds you gain from the pizza's water. Yeah. Yeah, exactly that. And like, uh, like I said, too, it's like when I, when I see the scale go up, I'm like, yeah, this is waterway. This is like, you know, excess, whatever. And it goes away after a couple of days. Like I analyze it as a data point. Like I'm not stewing on it. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Go up 300 calories. Keep doing what you're doing or follow our program. You get, if you're getting stronger, you're building into getting leaner. Yeah. And keep moving in that direction. And once you get to a place where like, well, I'm eating a lot of food and I feel good, if you want to pull back and do a cut, you could go back down to 2,500 and that'll be your cut. Yeah. Amazing. That'd be the dream. Yeah. I'm, uh, I'm excited to try it. Some of your programming is going to be killed. Yeah, you got it. Yeah. You'll do great, bro. You're doing, you're already doing great. Stay on this path. Amazing. Well, I appreciate your time guys. And, uh, I just like to say as well, um, like my job is incredibly social. So when I'm, uh, when I'm in the gym on a day off, like just like having you guys in my ears, it's just, it's this weird, like parasocial thing. Like I feel like I'm a fly on the wall for just conversations that are helpful. It's, uh, it does something for me. And I think for a lot of people. So I appreciate that. That's cool, man. Appreciate that, Mike. That's cool. Thank you, brother. Amazing. Take care, guys. Thanks. Yeah. It's what's great about his picture for fall. He lost a lot of body fat. Yeah. He built muscle and he lost a lot of body fat. And going up, I mean, he, and he didn't move and he didn't really move on the scale, which is like the Goldilocks. That's right. Yeah. Like he did perfect. And he could, he could probably just hang around here, but he's got room to go up in calories. I think, I think if he hangs around here, he'll still see some body comp change, but I think he'll see more body comp change with a bump in calories. With that much activity, what he's doing. Agreed. And that's obvious because his body was holding on to body fat because his calories are so low. Yeah. Yeah. And he's seeing strength gains. He'll build, he'll build muscle. He'll continue to go down. And the other part that's important to hear is what he said is just like, you know, the guy wants balance. He wants to build, have a glass of whiskey with it. Of course. And that will serve him going the direction you're saying, because he could cut from here if he really wanted just to lean out a little bit and go down to 2000 calories and he'll lean, he'll lose some, he'll lose some body fat. But then he stuck. Yeah. Then he stuck at a low calorie. He probably won't be happy where he's at physique wise. It's like, no, keep building, keep building to a place like 32, 3400 calories. And then come back down to 27, 28, be eating more than you've ever eight and leaner and stronger than you've ever been. Our next caller is Kayla from South Carolina. Hi, Jayla. Hello. Good morning. Hey guys, how are you? Good. Thanks for having me back on. Um, I will just read my question if that's okay. Yeah, let's go. All right. So hi guys, I'm writing with a question around reverse dieting, building muscle and BMR, a little background for context. I have been on the show before. I'm a full-time working mom of two. I have a nine year old and a one year old. And I also coach fitness, um, on the side. So I've been consistently training myself for about six years. Um, I'm currently still breastfeeding though I am starting to wean. A few years back, it was probably around 2022 before finding you guys, I was definitely under eating and overtraining. So when I came on the show at the end of 2023, I was still in that pattern to a lesser degree, but still there. And you guys had encouraged me to scale back my training and increase my calories, which I did shortly after I got pregnant, which was something that we were working toward for a long time. And I now have a healthy one year old as of March 15th. So since then I have stayed fairly consistent with tracking, of course, not perfectly through pregnancy and everything, but pretty consistent overall. Um, and through pregnancy and breastfeeding, my appetite naturally increased. I've gradually brought my cal calories up to around 2600, 2700 per day. Um, and I consider it somewhat of a controlled reverse or a mini bulk that I've been in really just kind of listening to my body and trying to feel myself has been the goal without putting on too much fat. Postpartum, I've adjusted my training. I feel like I've built a solid amount of muscle. I'm getting stronger. I feel like I look leaner and more toned. Um, and my weight is now around 127, 128. Pre-pregnancy, I was about 131, but of course my body has changed as well. I gained about 25 pounds during pregnancy. I've since lost that weight. Um, and then a few extra pounds, but have continued to rebuild the muscle. So here's where my question comes in. I had done a body scan in August and then again recently. And even though I feel confident that I built muscle and lost body fat, my BMR on those scans really hasn't changed much. I mean, I think it went up maybe 20 some calories. I recently was actually listening to one of your episodes and I think you guys had said something given somebody the advice of trying to increase that BMR. So that's kind of when this question came to mind. Um, so it just kind of seemed confusing to me because my current maintenance is around 26, 2700 calories without weight gain. So my questions are, should BMR increase as you build muscle and improve your metabolism? How accurate are these scans? Um, just for context, my most recent ones that my TDEE was around 20, 2100, I believe it was. Um, and then is real world maintenance intake a better indicator than the scan data? And when you talk about building your metabolism before a cut is maintenance intake, the more meaningful metric that I should be focusing on. This is just, yes. Sorry, go ahead. Yes. No. Yes. Yes. Okay. So BMR increase, it should, yes, it should improve your metabolism. It should. Yes. But how accurate are those BMR things? Terrible. Okay. Terrible. Uh, is real world, is real world maintenance intake a better indicator? Absolutely. I never, I never use any of the aura app, Dexa scan. It's never accurate to myself. It's never been accurate to my clients. And that's why I'm, I'm a big fan of like you telling me, and as a coach, trainer, and you're obviously track, you pay attention, you have a better idea of how many calories you maintain at and how many calories will increase you and how many calories is it cut you, or I can tell already, you know that. Yeah. Well, Kayla, let me ask you that. I think, uh, like, what do you think the answer is word of these? So I think that your real world tracking is definitely the way to go. That's kind of what I've been doing with the clients who I'm working with. Um, I don't, I tell them not to focus too much on what these numbers say, but in the gym setting that I'm working in right now, I don't know if it's the demographic, the age or what it is, but people get so hung up on these numbers where my online clients, I feel like trust me, um, to track, I'll have them track usually for 10 to 14 days. And then that's where I start their maintenance and go from way better way. You have so, so here's the deal. Okay. You're, you're tracking, you're eating 26, 27, her calories. You're not gaining any weight. Correct. The machine says 1300. Yeah. You're going to gain weight at over 2100 calories. Okay. Yes. It's not happening. Right. You see the real evidence in front of you. Yeah. Absolutely. Obviously it's a terrible estimate. Yeah. Also for the people in the gym, you have a wonderful testimony. You could show them, Hey, listen, you don't mind says and you show them your paper, do you want to know what I ate yesterday and then show them your tracking? Yeah. And I'm not gaining any weight. It's, it's so to estimate somebody's metabolic rate off of those machines. It is terrible. There's only one way to accurately do it. And it's in the moment and you got to wear a machine that you breathe into and you move and it's measuring it in that moment. There's really no super accurate way to measure this incredibly complex thing known as metabolism. Not to mention it's, it's, it moves. It's not a, it's not a stationary number. Yeah. You are a bad night arrest, uh, overstressed, uh, you know, there's a whole host of things that will change that in a day. So, and that's why the tracking for a week or two weeks, like you've done, gives you a way better estimate than some sort of algorithm that's based off of your age, your sex, your weight, and your estimated movement. Like that's just so that the, what you're doing with people by having them track for 10 to 14 days is exactly what we do. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. That's how we coach our coaches. That's the only accurate number. There is no more accurate way you'll get there. There's no other way to do it in a more accurate way. And the few people that are listening that go, well, mine matches just right. It's more by luck and chance that, that there's matchup. Perfect. Good for you. Like broken clock. Yeah. Then you're the norm. Yeah. I've, those BMR things are almost always way off for people and I just don't even pay attention to them. And when we reverse diet, someone like you, who's fit, who's strength training, who's doing it right, I'll crush whatever BMR scan will save it. Like what you're saying, that's the norm. I'll get, we'll reverse diet someone and we'll be five, 600, 800, 1,000 calories above what their machine tells them they should be at. That happens all the time. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. We recently got an evil body scanner and I think that because of that, it gives so much good data, but people are getting so hung up on those numbers. Yeah. Yeah. And they find it hard to believe that I eat as much as I do and I'm trying to tell them, Hey, I'm tracking. I track pretty religiously. I mean, I'm pretty disciplined, but I do allow myself some flexibility, but okay. Good to know. Just great to have them. My favorite, so out of the three of us, I'm probably the biggest nut when it comes to tracking data stuff. There's three things I use and I like. Steps. So I like to see. So having some sort of a step count. I like some sort of a sleep monitor to do my sleep score and then a consistent body fat test. That's it. And they're, and again, they're not end all be all. No, you're looking at trends. But they're, but they give me a really good indicator on trends of activity level. How well that person is probably sleeping and probably their stress level is normally connected to that. And then a body fat test that am I in the right heading in the right direction or not? And none of them are end all be all, but they're like the three best data points in my opinion to come together with a conclusion of, are we moving in the right direction? Are we not moving in the right direction? All the other shit that's out there is way too much noise in my opinion. Yeah. Well, what you're trying to do with body fat tests is you're looking at trends. So after three of these measurements, what direction are we moving in? But there's really only a few objective measures that a coach can use. Strength. Strength is one of them. There's no room for error. You did 10 more pounds. That's real. You just lifted 10 more pounds. That's objective. I love strength. That's why I always point to strength. I love that. How do you feel that's subjective, but if the person says they feel better than more energy, well, then it's, then it's true. Body fat percentage. This is more of a trend thing. Don't get, but the way you set this up Kayla is when you do these scans with your clients, you got to let them know ahead of time. Yeah. Because what you don't want to do is come around the back of it and then it sounds like you're trying to comfort them. Exactly. So what you want to, yeah. So, hey, before it's right, before I do the scan, here's what I want you to know. There's a, there's a, there's a margin of error with body fat percentage. That's between four and 6%. So we're just looking at trends here. The, the BMR, we're going to ignore that. That is, that is almost never accurate. The only real accurate way to measure is I'm going to have you track for about 10 days and for, you know, here's an example and then tell them about it yourself. So we're going to ignore that number and we're just going to look at trends. You got to let them know ahead of time. Otherwise what happens as a coach is somebody comes out of it and they're disappointed and then it sounds like you're trying to like, comfort them. Yeah. And then, and then they're like, do I believe you or not? Maybe they're just trying to make me feel better. The best, the best coaches are coaches that do a good job from the jump forecasting. So, and that's, and that's everything. Like letting your clients know, like, Hey, I, I expect that we're going to have some plateau weeks. I expect that we're going to see numbers like this. I, and so the more you can forecast for them of what's normal and that's okay. It's no big deal. Then this stuff has a big deal and it's literally, it's reminding them like, this is for me, just so I know that the adjustments that I'm making are aligning with it. I don't want you to get hung up on the body fat test number. I don't want you to get hung up on the BMR number. This is just data points for me that I, I'm moving you in the right direction. So forecasting that to Sal's point before they go in and do that is so huge versus waiting until they get it and then trying to answer their questions of, but why is this saying this and why did we go up 1% and then they start freaking out. And then you're trying to backpedal and explain yourself versus saying, I don't even give a shit if this says we went up 2%. I just want to see where it's at because that'll give me an indication of where I want to go from there. That's right. And so I use it like when I talk to my clients, that's how I communicate before we do any of this testing. It's like, it's not an end all be all. It's just more data for me to know that I'm doing the right things with you. Okay. That sounds great. Thank you guys so much. That definitely helps. I think forecasting is definitely the way to go now with these new scans because people are getting very hung up on those numbers. So that's super helpful. 100%. I like it. Great job. Yep. Thank you guys. You got it. Yeah. It's, uh, if it, if coaches know ahead of time how to use these tools and then explain how they're going to be used, very valuable. Yeah. If you don't do that well, the tools start to do the coaching, uh, and then everything's reactionary. Exactly. And then it's going to suck. You're in a bad place. Like, Hey, but my body fat went up a percent. Well, it's okay. You're doing, then you sound like you're just trying to make a damage control. By the way, this is the type of stuff. Uh, I didn't mention it to Kayla, but this is the type of stuff that is in our course. We teach, this is what we teach. This is the type of stuff that we teach. And I, and I think this is the stuff that, uh, all the best national certifications out there that go over, you know, human physiology, biomechanics, nutrition, you know, exercise, coaching, this is coaching. This is what will make a really good coach. You can have all those certs, degrees, all this stuff like that. Oh, that's great. But if you don't know how to do things like this with clients, that is the difference between you being a good and a great coach. Our next callers are Hannah and Tyler from Ohio. Hey, what's up guys? What's happening guys? Hi. How you guys doing? Um, I'm going to go ahead and read off here so I don't forget anything. And I hopefully remember how to talk this whole time. I'm so excited to see you guys. Like I kind of can't believe this is real life. So, um, I just wanted to take, uh, to thank you for taking my call and for the information you put out. You have shifted the way that I view health and fitness and I have exclusively been running your program since 2019. Um, and don't see myself changing that anytime soon. I'm a 37 year old female, um, mom of a two and four year old. I've been working with a functional health practitioner for the past year. Due to low testosterone and honestly, this is the best I've felt since before having kids, um, my energy levels are a lot better, um, more constant and consistent. And I don't have the energy crashes and significant fatigue that I was having before. Um, I usually sit around 122 to 124 pounds prior to having kids. Um, and that was what my weight was also prior to working with this functional health practitioner. So I got down to my pre baby weight. Um, and I would estimate I was around 20 to 22% body fat. Um, I'm five four currently 130 to 132 pounds, depending on the day. Um, I just hit a PR deadlifting at 225 and it was one of those ego things where I felt like I could do more, but I didn't want to injure myself. I'm a PT. So I try to like, uh, live the way I teach people. Um, anyway, I just did a body scan at my gym and it estimated that I had 24% body fat, which feels about right to me, um, with how my clothes fit and what I look like. So I know this is still a healthy range, but I'm having a hard time psychologically with this, um, as I work out very consistently, focus on protein and cycle through your programs pretty religiously at this higher weight and body fat. I feel like I look soft in my definition does it show unless I am flexing hard. Um, and I'm a physical therapist and a former D one athlete and have been told a perfectionist at times, but I really want to let go of that mentality and listening to your podcast over the past five to six years has helped me significantly with this to the point where I'm hoping to help coach people through this at some point and potentially even go into training or functional health in the next five years. However, I'm just really struggling to know if this new weight and size is just a healthier place for my body to be at this point in my life, or if I can try to get back to where I was previously, where I felt more athletic and confident and actually fit into my clothes. Um, I know it doesn't seem like a huge difference, but with this size and weight, um, I basically need to buy like all new pants because none of my pre baby stuff fits anymore. Any help or guidance is appreciated. I'm currently running maps performance and prior to that, I ran maps strong, which I loved and that's where I hit my PR, um, deadlifting. Hey, great question. And I love that your husband's here for support because I can see his face while you're talking. Yeah, I heard it. He's waiting for us to say what he's been saying. That's what I'm reading. He's about to happen. I'm reading his mind right now and I'm going to guess what you're thinking, but he's like, you're kicking ass, honey. Yeah. You're doing such a good job. Like you're so hard on yourself. Yeah. So here's a deal. As the athlete and you kick it in, you are, you listen, you're killing it. Yeah. You're doing really well. Your body fat percentage, very healthy. You're super strong. 225 at your size is really, really good. And you probably could have lifted more, but you want to be really good with your technique and you just had two babies. By the way, in your, in your email, both C section and your last pregnancy was rough. It says you had, uh, you were, you were nauseous the entire time. Really, really bad. Okay. Yeah. Okay. And you had two kids within three years. Yeah. And how old is your youngest? Two, he's two and a half. Technically. Um, yeah. Listen, you're doing way, you're being way too hard on yourself. Yeah. Here's my advice for you. Yeah. Buy new clothes. Okay. Stop worrying about it. Buy new clothes. Also, you're going to continue to see your body progress. Yeah. You just got out of your own, you're just now getting in the good spot. Yeah. It takes, so I've trained a lot of women, uh, pre, during and post, uh, baby. Okay. And I really hate the fitness space for how it communicates, uh, to women post partum, they get this idea that eight months post partum, like you're back in shape and I'm, I'm back to my old size, whatever. That's crap. Every woman I've ever trained who was disciplined and you know, even an athlete like you have trained a few that were athletes, uh, in college. Yeah. It takes like two years before you actually start to feel like yourself. You know exactly what I'm talking about. Uh, yeah. So, and you still got a little, you got still little guys at home. So it's still like hectic, uh, sleep can still be a bit off. Like you're, yeah, you're being way harder on yourself on. If you just stay the course, stop judging yourself so harshly, go and buy some new clothes right now. You're going to keep your body's going to keep progressing on its own. But if you, if you beat yourself up, if you let that happen, you're going to set yourself back. I'm going to tell you too, something that I feel like has been the theme of the calls today that we've been telling people too is you're far better off trying to build into the body that you want than thinking about trying to cut into the body you want to, which is a tendency that everybody seems to want to have. Yeah. The fact that you're, you're hitting PRs right now is just like lean into that. Keep getting stronger, keep building muscle and don't try and cut because you feel like, Oh, I'm, I could lose a little bit or I want to lean out a little bit. Like you're just now getting in this good place. Your body is starting to respond where you're hitting PRs, like lean into that and get stronger. And you're going to, you're going to be happy in six, six months from now, you're going to look back and go like, Oh shit. Like build, build what you want. Don't cut into what you want. So if you, if you just kind of like keep building, you know, slow reverse diet, feed the body, feed your hormones, feed the muscle, you're probably going to get down. If you're walking around 24% right now and you've got a two and a four year old and you're lifting weights and everything that I read here, you'll probably settle around 21% just by building into it. Yeah. Without trying to cut. Yeah. Just by being, having fun with your workouts, enjoying yourself, eating, feeding the muscle, you'll probably fall somewhere around 21, 22% with good shape, good muscle, good strength, the whole deal, good hormone profile, the whole deal. Yeah. How long have you been working with the functional medicine practitioner? About a year. And when I started, I had, I think my, what's like mind blowing to me right now is like you always, you want to be lean. I don't, in the fitness world, like I've lifted weights for decades at this point and I feel the best since I started doing your programs. So I just respect you guys so much. And I truly believe what you say. And I will do, I will do what you're saying. I, I, it resonates with me because when I was leaner before working with the functional health practitioner, I felt terrible. Like I've just felt, but I felt like I looked like I wanted to look. So that's, it's so hard. I think, um, and I really, I do want to get over that. And I believe because I'm like, I feel good. I have energy. Hannah, it is a terrible trade. Yeah. 3% body fat is a terrible trade to feel like crap. Yeah. That's not a good trade. And right now in your head, you don't realize that. But if I were to snap my fingers and have you switch back and forth, give you an hour at there and an hour back, you'd be like, no, no, no, no, I'm good. By the way, the, the, I really do think you're going to settle probably around 21, 22% body fat with more muscle and a faster metabolism. Probably going to settle. You'll, you'll look better than what you did when you were leaner and you'll feel better, but you got to build into it. Yeah. Totally. What are your calories at right now? Um, at least 22 to 2400. Oh my God. That's since I started, um, working with the function. I like, I don't track religiously, but when I do, it's pretty easy for me to get about that. If you, yeah, I bet you when you're around 22, you're probably hungry. Yeah. And I felt like it wasn't even the hunger. It was more like the just feeling almost ill because I just felt depleted. Yeah. Yeah. You need to be probably consistently 24, 25, like don't ever go below that is where I would have you. Yeah. And you'll, you'll actually get leaner with that because you're going to build into it. Yeah. Yeah. That's where I keep you. That should be the focus. Yeah. Stop being so hard on yourself. You're doing so great. Yeah. You're doing really, really great. Yeah. You're going to keep, you're going to keep improving, but if you place that hyper focus on yourself, uh, that's going to, that's going to, it's going to set you back for sure. Focus on getting strong on the lifts, feeding the body, uh, reverse diet and continuing to go up. You could easily continue to go up calories too, by the way. You could land, you could end up landing at a place like 27, 2800 calories easily, easily. And, and getting stronger. If you do that, you'll build into the body that you're, you desire right now. Don't think about cutting into it. Like you're, you're as low as I would want you calorie wise. I want to keep reversing you. And the signs of hitting PR is such a good sign. We're moving in the right direction. I think if you consistently stayed about 24, 25 never went below it, you'd see this nice body composition change. Okay. I appreciate that. Yeah. When I first started your programs, I was using straps for 145 and I was like barely doing that. And now I felt like I could definitely just hold onto the bar at 225. Wow. Yeah. It's like crazy how much your programming helps. And, um, what would you suggest? Cause I just came off as strong and then performance. And, um, that's pretty much all I'm doing. I do a little bit of the elliptical, but I mostly just walk into your programs. Yeah. Um, right now I didn't know like what to do next. I guess. Symmetry would be good. I think you would appreciate it too. As a PT. Yeah. That's so hard though. It's not hard because I love the heavy like stuff, but I do, I haven't done that one yet. I do have it. I should clean into that still though. I mean, you still go power lift, go power lift. You could do power lift. Yeah. Cause you did, you've done strong, you've done perform, you've done performance. So always my recommendation is a cycle of performance or symmetry a year. So always cycle one of those in there because that'll keep you balanced really well. So if you're as long as you're cycling performance or symmetry once a year and then go, if you really enjoy the lifting heavy, I'd push you into power lift. Yeah. You want to do power lift, but you got to, you got to eat 2,500 calories a day for that one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I can do that. I, I feel so good lifting that 225. I made him come out and watch me. Good form. Like, you know, witness this. And I was like, why am I out here? I feel like that would feel. Oh yeah. I love to see you do power lift, power lift and feed, power lift and feed. And if you're hungry feed. So even if you're landing at 2,500 calories and you're appetite, eat more. So that's what I really focused on the strength there. We get strong and we can reverse diet right now even more. That would be a huge win in the next three months. Sounds great. All right. Awesome. You guys keep it up. Yeah. Thanks for calling in. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you so much. You got it guys. See you. I can literally hear his thoughts. Oh yeah. Yeah. I feel like that's why he was on here. That was like, you better tell him what was going on. Well, let's see what the guys have to say. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe, maybe I'm wrong. I don't know. Cause I know he's thinking. He's thinking like, honey, you're killing it. Yeah. Like you are really hard on yourself. Of course. But you don't want to hear it from you. I get it. I get it. But man, she is. It's doing really well. Very, very common with ex-athletes. Oh yeah. Very, very common ex-athletes. So when she said that, I was just like. Oh, she's got a two year old at home and her pregnancy is rough. I mean, if you read the people, she didn't read the whole, the whole email. But I mean, she was diagnosed with hyperemesis. I mean, she, that's like where you're vomiting all the time because you're so nauseous, two C sections, remember they cut through your core. Yeah. And so, and she's doing phenomenal. Yeah. And just hit a PR what a couple of days ago. It's just like, no, we're on the right track. You just, you know, it is, it was a theme of the calls today is like, you know, build into the body you want versus trying to cut into the body you want. It will serve you so much more. That's right. That's it. If you like the show, come find us on Instagram, Mindput Media. Thank you for listening to Mind Pump. 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