Well, hello ladies and gents, Robert Sykes, Keto savage.com.
Today I've got special guest Mauro Stara on the line.
He is the founder and CEO of Six Pack CEO.
He is a coach and we dive into all things coaching related.
We talk about nutrition, we talk about macros, micros, we talk
about blood work, we talk about training modalities, talk about
all kinds of things. Talk about some of the the
common denominators we see in different client pools that we
work with. He talks about some of the
pitfalls, some of the the pros, the cons, the things that he's
found to work exceedingly well and things that have not worked
well amongst his client pool. And I thoroughly enjoy the
conversation. I always like bringing on other
coaches to the podcast, picking their brain, figuring out what
works, what doesn't work, and just finding common ground.
So thoroughly enjoy the conversation.
I've got no doubt that you will take something from this.
Stop further, delay, sit back, relax.
Enjoy the podcast with Mauro and we are live tomorrow.
How are you, brother? Very good.
Thank you. How about yourself, Robert?
I'm good, man. I'm excited to be chatting with
you. I always like talking with
coaches, other coaches kind of see what their, their
methodologies are, what their, you know, hiccups are what's
working for them, what's not working for them.
So you've been coaching people for for how long now?
I started in August 2015, so you could say in two months it's
gonna be nine years. Very cool, man, Very cool.
And what got you into coaching to begin with?
Like, do you kind of fall into it by accident like a lot of
coaches do, or is that something you knew you always wanted to
do? It was a mix.
So I, I started lifting at like 17 and once I had my personal
transformation, I had people reach out like friends and you
know, they brought their brother and sister.
I'm pretty sure you and many people were coaches know how
that works. And then that's kind of how it
took off the, the them asking me for advice and training programs
and nutrition programs or, you know, macros, whatever that was.
And I was doing that on the side for a very long time or for a
while and I was working in banking full time in
Switzerland. And as I had that on the side
and the banking and building out another online business, I
pretty much put myself out in the process.
And as I fixed it and I saw the opportunity to work with man
just like me. And that's how we got a little
bit more centered into not just what I was doing, but who I was
helping. And here's where we are today.
I love it, man. I love it.
When you said that you had a transformation yourself at 17,
what did that consist of? Like were you overweight to
begin with or what did that look like?
No, I was actually very, very skinny.
So spaghetti arms and super, super weak skinny.
Like on windy days, you know, you would feel it.
And I I put on a lot of weight. It wasn't all muscle.
Some of it was fat, but I just noticed, hey, I'm bigger, I get
respected more, people treat me differently, and overall I just
felt better by myself. And that's where I really saw
the power of you, your own physical transformation and how
it impacts your you, you, how it impacts really how you perceive
yourself, but also how you are perceived in the world.
No, totally, man. It, it's funny 'cause when
people talk about transformations or, you know,
getting healthy, they're usually referring to people that are
overweight, obese, that they need to lose a lot of weight in
order to get to healthy body fat.
But like, I'm, I'm the same as you, man.
I was 115 lbs when I started working out and I was super
self-conscious, just really scrawny, had no, no confidence
at all. Like my last two years of high
school, I literally never wore a short sleeve shirt because I
didn't want anybody to see how scrawny my arms were.
Like it was kind of pathetic. So there's like a whole other
side of the equation there that most people don't even talk
about. Oh, absolutely.
And I think the the people are very skinny or even skinny fat.
They sometimes are underserved and get left behind in the sense
of, well, everyone is so focused on weight loss and that part,
that part of the equation that people who are skinny and
they're like, well, you're fine anyways.
Like, no, I'm also like, I'm on the other end of the spectrum
that's ignored and underserved where I also want to be, yeah,
I, I don't want to put on fat, but I, I want to put on size and
get stronger. Totally, totally.
So you, you were doing that at 17.
What, what was your like nutrition like when you were
trying to put on weight? Like were you just eating
everything inside or did you fall like a specific type of
nutritional format? Like how did that look?
Yeah, well, I I wish we had or I had the the knowledge and the
scientific tools and research rules that we have today.
Like I saw on one of your other podcast you had Eric Helms on.
So with the stuff he put out the the mass, excuse me, the mass,
how you call it the mass subscription that he and I think
it's Trexler and two other guys, I can't remember the name.
They have X of mine, DNA, blood work.
Like there's so much more. I wish I had that back then, but
no, when I started out was just say eat a lot of protein and eat
anything you can. Like even if you're not hungry,
eat, eat, eat and just stop your face until you're full.
And that got me gaining really. Really.
Quick Yeah, yeah, it's interesting, man.
Like, I've, I've talked, I I love all of Eric's work.
He's he's brilliant, Very, very monumental in the natural
bodybuilding space for sure. But there's like just as there's
so much information out there about how to lose weight, how to
cut calories. As you said there, there's an
underserved market when it comes to gaining weight and a lot of
people just simply don't eat enough.
Obviously you want to eat enough of the right foods 'cause you're
like your, your health depends on eating the right foods as
well. But so many people struggle with
just simply not eating enough, having a down regulated
metabolism. And there is some truth to the
whole, you know, you have to almost force feed in an in an
instant, you know, to kind of up regulate about pathways and to
kind of breakthrough that plateau to gain weight because
when you're 115 pounds, 120 lbs scrawny, like you just simply
have to eat more food. No, I, I, I agree.
It's and you know, I don't know if you felt the same, but for
me, I can't remember what weight exactly was, but I think it was
like 1/1/18 1:20. So pretty similar to you.
And I felt better when I was, I think I once, once I first
arrived at like 151 sixty, even though my body composition was
an ideal, like just being heavier, filling out shirts, it
felt a lot better even though I had a little bit of fat versus
being that skinny. Yeah, there's, there's like a, a
benefit to having a healthy amount of body fat.
And you know, as, as a bodybuilder for me, like
everybody glorifies being super, super lean and there's
definitely a place for that. But like there's a, a yin Yang
to the equation. Like you have to have a period
where you're at a healthy body fat because there's so much
benefit to be had in that too. Like you don't want to be overly
fat obviously, but there should not be a negative connotation
around gaining a healthy amount of body fat.
No, not at all. So I'm, I'm absolutely on the
same page with you. And I think, you know, speaking
like of Eric, without wanting to deviate too much here, but he, I
listened to a lot of his stuff when he talked about people who
came off prep, post prep and how there's that fear because you
have that image that you're so shredded.
And that post prep time is mentally so battling for a lot
of people where they go, let's say from 6% body fat to 10,
which is still fantastic and they feel fat.
Mm hmm. Yeah, it's a psychological.
It's a psychological ordeal, man.
Like when you were lean and you put on body fat, you see your
composition changing you. You get so excited about seeing
the scale weight drop and the body fat fall off.
But then when the inverse happens, it's like you have to
totally switch your frame of thinking to embrace that and
view it as a positive as well when that time comes.
But it's interesting because the same thing at one phase is
considered a negative and then now you have to re vamp your
thinking to embrace it as a positive.
And there's definitely like a a shift that has to occur
psychologically before it can healthfully happen
physiologically. But it's so important that it
does, in fact, happen. Absolutely agree, it's I would
say it's much much more mental than it is physical depending on
someone's starting point. Like especially the the the more
far off they are from their goal, the more it is mental than
it is physical a lot of times. Yeah, no, I totally agree,
Totally agree. So talk to me a little bit about
your coaching practice. So what?
What is the typical demographic of people you're working with?
Most people we work with are men, typically 3555.
They're they have anywhere from 20 to 50 lbs to lose.
They're already like eating healthy, meaning making overall
better food choices. They're working out just often
overtraining. They work with trainers before,
So they had like a personal trainer at the gym, maybe a
nutritionist. Some of them even had like a
functional medicine doctor or practitioner and they, they saw
good results, but, and some of them even got down to that six
pack. That is like the number one
outcome that the man we work with come to us about.
But a lot of times they, they couldn't sustain it.
And it's because it was never, they never really had a system
or a way to integrate it into their future life.
So it's like, well, I can do this if I'm very aggressive with
dieting and doing cardio every day.
But they were never really in a spot where they said, hey, this
is something I can sustain and I look forward to enjoy doing for
the rest of my life. Gotcha.
So kind of like the the quintessential dad bod who
individual that was maybe athletic throughout high school,
potentially even college. Then life happens to them, their
career gets the best of them, they've got kids potentially now
they're just busy and taking, you know, efforts towards
physical well-being aren't top of priority.
Let themselves go just a bit and lose the the physical prowess
that they had when they were younger.
Absolutely yeah, this is spot on.
A lot of them are ex athletes, high achievers, go gatherers,
CEOs and they they many of them not all but many of them used to
be in shape. So they know what it looks like
and what it feels like. But as they got older, as you
touched on business, family and just work life responsibilities
took over or put high demands on their schedule.
What percentage of that demographic has stopped training
altogether and they're basically coming to you with the hopes of
starting that backup versus have maintained some form of physical
training, like via resistance training that entire time?
Like is there a, you know, one percentage higher than the
other? Are you asking from the guys we
work with or in general? Yeah, like the guys who y'all
work with are, are most of them, Like have they gone a period of
time without any training whatsoever?
They maintained some level of physical activity via resistance
training throughout that span. I would say it's 3030 thirty.
So 1/3 hasn't worked out in a very long time.
Let's say very long time. 6 plus months to 12 months they haven't
worked out, haven't lifted. The other third is regular.
Like this week they went once, then last week 02 weeks before 2
times. I'd say like one day one, one
day a week, two days a week, one day a week, two weeks off.
So they're like they have a gym membership, they go there or
they work out at home, but it's not like very consistent for
them to get the results they want.
And the other third is consistent.
And a lot of times with the guys that are consistent, because
they're so high achievers and so driven, they're over trained.
So they're in the gym 5-6 days a week, brutal workouts, keto,
fasting, CrossFit. Like they're just beating their
body down and not recovering from it.
And you can just see it in the blood work.
Their testosterone is very low, cortisol is through the roof.
They're under eating carbohydrates and that will be
that loss through there. Of those 3 demographics, which
is generally the easier to get back on course?
Well, the last one, right, because that the, I mean, I
enjoy working with all of them, but for the last part, like the
guys that they're over training, it's such an epiphany for them
when. And then sometimes there's a
fear when I say, hey, we're going to cut back and I can
share more why I believe that's necessary.
But we're going to cut back to like 3 workouts a week, maybe a
fourth one. And like you sure, like I'm
going to lose all my muscles and all the progress.
No, like trust the process. Here's why it works.
And we'll go to three days a week and suddenly they feel
better, they recover better, they start setting new PRS
again. So the for those guys, the ROI
is the biggest because they know exactly, OK, I'm saving 234
hours a week every single week and I'm getting better results
in terms of how I look, how I feel, how I perform.
So it's, it's a no brainer and an immediate ROI there were for
the others, the results obviously happen as well, but
they will take longer to see. And sometimes I think if you
haven't worked out five days a week and going down the tree and
seeing better results, you don't appreciate the three day a week
until you've seen the five or six day a week.
Yeah, no, totally. That makes total sense to me.
I feel like, you know, if you've got object in motion, tend to
stay in motion philosophy here, like if you are putting forth
the effort on a consistent basis and you care about it, you know,
with a few tweaks you can capitalize on that effort pretty
easily. Whereas if you don't have a
consistent routine in motion at all, like your body would be
very responsive to any new stimulus you provide it with,
like resistance training, but you just got to build that
habitual routine into place and that that oftentimes just takes
more mental work than not. Yeah, as as the saying goes,
it's easier to get someone from 1:00 to 10:00 than from zero to
1. So someone that is already
working out, making some tweaking adjustments, as you
said, will be much more immediate than someone who
hasn't been working out. Well.
They have to learn, depending on their level of skill set, they
have to learn a lot of new exercises and work on the mind
muscle connection, their form, the optimal recovery, and you
know, many other things there. Plus the whole habit of showing
up, like showing up regularly at the gym versus the other guys
already showing up, like, hey, let's just switch the routine
that you're doing or adjust that routine that you're doing and
watch what happens. Totally.
I, I want to pick your brain on the concept of overtraining
because I get asked this a lot as well.
And I'm of the opinion that it's honestly relatively hard to
overtrain. Like it's not as easy as people.
It's, it's pretty easy for people to undertrain.
Like you often times go to the gym and you don't see people
operating with enough intensity. They're taking, you know, 10
minutes between sets, they're on their phone between sets.
That's it's much easier to under train than it is to over train.
However, in the context of people that are those type A
personalities, you know, really driven, very busy, have a
business, have family, whatever the case may be, they're often
times not eating enough food and not sleeping enough.
And in that context, in that context, it can be much easier
to over train. But if someone is consuming
adequate nutrition and getting adequate rest, it's it's
relatively hard to over train if those criteria are met.
The problem is most people aren't meeting that criteria.
Yeah, I agree with what you said.
Like we there's this study that was published a while ago.
I can't remember from where and from when I can look it up after
the call, but they, these were elite athletes, a group of
trained men and they put them on, they, they were lifting five
days a week. I can't remember what the
routine was. And they were in a deficit.
And they're pretty high volume, high intensity workouts.
And their testosterone dropped. I think it was 4550%.
I I have to look up the exact numbers, but those are guys in
their 20s with good recovery, no kids, no stress from work, and
the only thing they do is train and eat and recover right where
you have a guy that's 4550, sleeps 5 hours a night, and
granted those five hours are not great.
His testosterone is already lower, part of it from aging,
part of it from poor lifestyle choices over the last one to
maybe 3 decades. And you add on top of that that
his nutrition is not optimal. So pre workout, inter workout,
post workout, overall nutrition throughout the day,
micronutrient status. And what do most people do?
Like a lot of people are not a fan of tracking their food or
tracking calories and macros. So.
They will go. It's much easier for them to
think like oh keto good. I can eat protein and carbs.
I don't have to add protein and fats.
I don't have to eat carbs and count carbs so to say.
So it just makes it easier for them or fasting like OK cool,
I'm going to skip breakfast. So they do keto or fasting or a
mix of the two together and they're just not fueling their
body properly to the degree they they should for the amount of
exercise or activity they do and maybe even a different
nutritional model or diet that they follow.
And that's where they will be under recovered.
And as a consequence of that overtraining, plus as we touched
on, most people want to lose weight.
If we look at the demographic in the US, but also the guys that I
work with, most people are not like you and IA 115 lbs to begin
with, rather on the other side of the spectrum.
And what I found is when you earn a caloric deficit and
you're training even four days a week, some, some guys do well
with that, but others not so well.
It just jacks up your appetite so hard.
So, yeah, so, so hard and so high that it's very, very easy
to then also agreed. And this will lead us to the
problem that you were moving in circles all the time and not
progressing. And So what a lot of high, high
achievers then do is they will train even more.
And so, OK, let me start doing card in the morning because I'm
not dropping that way. And they just add more and more
and more and more where they don't realize, hey, I'm not
recovering from these sessions there.
Yeah, no, I I totally agree, man.
I think I think a lot of people are under consuming nutrition
like that's honestly probably the majority of my client pool
like they have been chronically under fed.
You see this a lot in females as well, but but men too they they
under eat, therefore their metabolisms down regulated.
Their performance in the gym starts to suffer or hasn't
suffered for a while. And then they don't really have
much caloric one way left to taper from because they've been
eating far too little for far too long.
And they honestly people just don't have any.
They don't have any truth to what their actual consumption
is. Like you touched on tracking
intake and a lot of people are hesitant to do that.
And I'm not suggesting people become a slave to tracking their
food, but I think anybody would benefit from having periods of
time in which they do so they can just have that that tool at
their disposal. Because I mean, people easily
overeat assuming they're not eating as much as they are.
And the same is true in the opposite in the spectrum.
They easily under eat assuming they're eating more than they
are. And the only way to really know
with any degree of certainty is to actually track it for a time
and see how their body responds in at a given intake.
Absolutely, and the time people spend on toilet, they could just
track their food there. Plus one really big value that
tracking gives us is once you track you, you see the direct
impact of that food. And if you track it before you
eat it, you insert future based logic, which means it will have
you reconsider if you want to spend so many calories for that
particular food where if you just eat it, you never know what
was in there and what was the impact of that.
And the tracking just brings much more awareness.
And a lot of the guys in our program when they first started,
they initially don't really enjoy doing it, but after a
while they say, man, thank you so much.
Like I'm, I'm so happy that I'm now seeing and I have the
awareness and I was massively overeating prior to that or
massively under eating on protein or carbs, whatever that
was. And now I see the impact that
was having on my body. Yeah, totally agree.
And I mean I'm sure you see this a lot too.
I mean, I'm in the the keto, low carb carnivore space.
So I'm an advocate for removing the carbohydrates.
But my frustration with a lot of people in that space is that
they lean into this intuitive eating so much so that they
throw all caution to the wind with consumption entirely.
And they assume that you can consume proteins and fats at
libitum and never track it and you'll reach your desired body
composition effortlessly. And that may be some the the
case for some, but I mean, I can assure you that people in the
low carb carnivore keto space can most definitely put on body
fat by eating no carbohydrates. And I think the only way to be
honest with oneself is to track that intake.
Like when I'm in a prep, I mean, I'm, I'm eating the same foods
whether I'm in prep or out of prep.
I'm just simply manipulating the quantities of those foods.
But I would not know that to the degree that I do had I not
tracked that. And I think tracking proactively
instead of reactively like you mentioned is also key because
people like, if they consume a meal and then retroactively try
to track it afterwards and they're, they're giving a poor
estimation at best. Like you, you ideally need to
weigh out that food so that you can actually know what the true
quantity is. And there's, there's always
going to be some variability there.
I mean, there's going to be some fluctuations in fluid weight,
whether you're cooking it raw or cooked or you know what the
package weight is. But if you're consistently
weighing it and measuring it and tracking it the same way, those
those average out over time. And you can have a much clearer
picture as to what your intake is, what your body responds to
at a given intake, and then whether you need to titrate it
up or down, or distribute the macros differently based off of
how your body's responding. Yeah, that's been my key to
success as well. Like once you once you reach A
level of maintenance, then you can just up or down regulate.
So when I'm cutting, I don't need to track my food anymore.
Granted I don't do a contest prep like you so it's different,
but when otherwise I would but I don't need to track it.
I know OK if I do half of that bowl that I would have in the
morning, or if I have two eggs instead of four eggs, or if I
have one banana instead of 2 bananas, or if I have a filet
mignon instead of or cereal instead of rib eye, then that
can put me in a deficit right away.
So because I've tracked for so long consistently, I've my brain
scanned so many of those foods that they kind of eyeballs them
very quickly and sees where they would fit in in my day based on
my goals. Totally.
What, what I'm always curious is going to be highly
individualized. So nobody listening to this
should take it and try to apply it to themselves.
But like, out of curiosity for you and your stats, what, what
is your like general maintenance caloric intake versus, you know,
when you're trying to be in a building phase versus a cutting
phase? Like what does that look like
for you personally? And how do you kind of
distribute those macros? So maintenance again depends on
the level of activity I do. So right now I'm lifting four
days a week for around 45 minutes and I walk around 8 to
10,000 steps a day and I'm currently maintaining surround
20 seven 2800 calories a day maintenance.
When I'm balking, I usually go up to 3000 sometimes again
depends on the activity. I do 3300 and when I'm cutting
it's going to be around 2 thousand 2200 calories plus
minus deer, whether I want to go aggressive or not and and 2000
will be already aggressive for me in terms of time.
My metabolism is very adaptive. I noticed when I overeat or I'm
balking, then I fidget a lot and I start rocking my chair like
just on this call. I had like a big meal before and
I'm, I'm just bouncing back and forth.
So my, my metabolism is very adaptive.
My tea tree is always very high naturally.
And that's like those are the calories.
As far as the macros go, I'm at again, it's not like 1:00 to
1:00 every single day and locked in, but usually workout days I
like to go a little bit higher on carbs.
So I'm around 303 fifty carbs there depending.
Protein is going to be around 14150.
I don't know. Well with very high protein I
just feel very bloated and my digestion is off.
So sticking to like Max 1 preferably 08/09 grams of
protein per 1 LB of lean mass has been better for me than 1 LB
or anything beyond where research doesn't really.
There's not really a lot of evidence for that.
They are less evidence depending which studies you look at.
And then the rest are is going to be fats on lifting days.
We're not lifting days. I enjoy a keto breakfast.
So maybe a little bit of carbs, but I really enjoy the like a
keto breakfast. So steak and eggs with some ghee
or coconut oil. And the reason why is it keeps
my brain very, yeah, my, my brain very stable.
I'm hyper focused for work and I like to have like Tuesday,
Thursdays, very creative work, very hyper focused.
And the, the, the eggs also have a lot of coline, which helps
with brain function and focus, especially if you have ADHD or
let's say, can't help. Don't want to make specific
claims here. And that's like a perfect
breakfast for me. Some much more higher fat on
those days for lunch as well. And then a little bit of carbs
later in the day on non lifting days because I do lift in the
morning. And so my my dinner will will be
my fuel for those morning workouts a lot of time.
Yeah, I, I definitely agree with you there.
I don't do the carbs obviously, but I think having the, the
prior night's meal basically fuel the next day's morning.
Workout is, is key. I used to try and slam a meal
before working out and I would always train in the morning,
which just didn't make sense. I prefer training fast and now,
but I'll have like a pretty hefty meal the night before.
And a lot of people are advocates for not eating much
prior, you know, several hours prior to bed.
But honestly man, like I feel like I sleep much better if I
have a relatively decent sized meal before, but especially if
there's quite a bit of fat in it because it just puts me into
more of a parasympathetic state and I feel like my sleep quality
is improved. Yeah, I've found for me, if I
stop eating around three to four hours before bed, it's good.
If I eat too close, my heart rate is up.
And I don't feel that well, but if it's too far off, yes, I
agree. Typically also cortisol can be
higher and it will impact sleep quality there.
I I do feel the best when when I have some eggs as well for
dinner. They they do really, really well
for me for the coaline source. And that's, that's a lot of
times like I like to mix it with a little bit of cheese sometimes
if it's like a keto meal or very low carb or sometimes with some
honey and cinnamon. And that's one of the go to
meals there for me as well. Yeah, you can't ever go wrong
with eggs, man. Like eggs are always my staple,
too. I've been doing this dish here
lately where I'll cook some lamb chops in a cast iron skillet and
I'll just crack like a dozen eggs in there with it as it's
getting seared. And then I'll just put a lid on
that cast iron and then the steam kind of finishes cooking
off those eggs. And it's, it's been perfect.
So super, super filling too. Like a lot of people, they'll,
you know, try and incorporate more eggs.
I, I certainly do when I'm in a prep, when I'm in a deficit.
And just simply the volume that you get from the eggs being
cooked and the expanding nature that eggs had.
Like I feel like that does wander from a society
standpoint. Yeah, it's very, very filling
food. A lot of micronutrients in
there. So one of my top three top four
foods in the diet for sure talk. To me about the training man,
what are you doing with regards to structuring your exercise
program? So I know you're not trying to
overdo it with the training frequency, you know, 3-4 days a
week like you mentioned. Are you doing lower volume in
the actual training session as well?
So lower Rep counts, lower set numbers, just more intensity?
Or how do you try and structure that?
Yeah, I'm, I'm a really big fan of lower volume, higher
intensity. I just enjoyed more when I walk
out of the gym and I feel I've done something versus high
volume, low intensity where I know, hey, I could have done
more. So my, the way I have it right
now is I have two upper and two lower body days.
And the way I've structured it is I cycle them every six to
eight weeks and do specialization splits.
So full credit here to Lyle McDonald.
I don't know if you know him. And he, he brought that concept
to me a few years ago when I hit a wall and he said, hey, you're
at the level where it will make sense to try specialization
splits. And I have never looked back
since then. So I picked a muscle group for
the upper body and one for the lower body and overload those
usually eight sets is my sweet spot is 7 to 8 sets for those
one to two reps shy to failure, sometimes all the way to failure
and beyond that. So with my reps, drop sets,
rest, pause, single arm negatives, whatever intensity
technique I want to use here and the other muscle groups, I put
them on maintenance. So 3:00 to 4:00, two to four
sets there. And after that, like after six
to eight weeks, I rotate it to the next muscle group that has a
weakness. So I always look what's the
weakest chain and let me overload and train that part
there and then put the rest to maintain.
And so just the past 12 months I've been focusing a lot on back
and shoulders together with quads because I've just
neglected those for too long. I've, you know, when I started
out, I, I was so focused on arms and chest and I was training the
host muscle groups a little bit too much.
But I've overlooked the, the shoulders and the back and I'm
just working on that. So a lot of mid back work,
traps, upper traps, mid traps, shoulders especially like rear
delts, lot of specialization work on that there.
I typically do a warm up set to two warm up sets.
So like leg press, I do 2 squats.
If I do them, I, I don't do a lot of squats, but if I do them
as well to the others, typically one warm up set and like 50% of
the initial weight at about 11:50 reps.
And after that I, if it's a compound movement, I usually do
5 to 8, six to eight reps. And if it's an isolation
movement, I do anywhere from 10:00 to 12:10 to 15.
But it's not black and white. There are certain muscle groups
that I just prefer to go higher in reps, like a leg press
because I had a hernia and it doesn't sit well or doesn't feel
well when I go super heavy there.
And deadlifts, I don't like to go too heavy on those as well.
So it depends on the exercise, but generally that's like the
framework I use for myself. And you said when you're doing a
specialization split and you have a target muscle group that
you're trying to bring up an overload, you're doing eight
sets per exercise session or per week for that given muscle
group. No, that would be per per muscle
group. Gotcha.
OK. So per sorry, per session, so
let's say train delts, it would be eight sets.
So it would be four sets of upright rows, 5 to 8 reps And
well, if I do lateral raises, it's typically very high reps I
found I respond better to those. So like anywhere from 20 to 25
reps. And then the other day I do
lateral raises on the cable single arm and maybe another
four sets of upright rows. So it will be 16 sets a week
Max, typically a little bit lower.
Well, now the question I'm sure that comes is that still low
volume, probably not more moderate volume, but sorry.
Yeah, low, low volume, high intensity, more like moderate.
But some muscle groups I need to pump up the volume more.
For others I can do less. Like for my chest I can do like
6 a week and I will still grow. Where for my doubts they need a
lot of work, a lot of volume till they start growing.
Yeah, that makes sense. Man.
I feel like this concept of junk volume has gained a lot of
popularity. And like people, they'll,
they'll just do like an, an obnoxious amount of volume for a
muscle group past the point at which it would respond well,
Especially if you're doing like a bro split.
In which case they're only targeting a muscle group like
maybe once a week and they should be doing, you know, 6
plus exercises for biceps, for instance.
But then they don't target that muscle group for another week.
And I used to do the same thing. I'm guilty of that as well.
But I feel like if you're, especially if you're natural,
like you're, you reach a point of diminishing returns, in which
case the muscle's just totally incompletely fatigued.
There's no more glycogen in that.
You're not getting a pump anymore.
You're not possibly, you know, pushing your capacity on that
from a weight standpoint. So it's better suited to just
drop that overall total volume and then pick the most effective
of those 6 plus exercises and do like two of them and actually
push the intensity envelope much further.
Yeah, I, I agree. I think the Bros split has
gotten a little bit negative publicity over the years where
it's like everyone is so focused on the frequency.
And yeah, the studies do show that.
But I, I still think there's, for some people, there's the
benefit of simplicity there. And I've, I've used the bro
split for three years and I've seen good progress with that as
well. And what I like is it gives you
the focus on just one thing and then moving on.
But I can obviously have it's it downsides there.
And to, to your point with the the junk volume, I I agree, But
I think there always needs to be a pre frame to that conversation
because some people get into lifting and then they start
listening to people that say like, well, you don't need to do
too much volume. And it always depends on the
person. And that's why customization is
so important because you you only get to the quality through
quantity. So initially, yeah, you can do
very low volume, but I think if you ramp it up a little bit, it
will just give you more practice and more exposure to a lot of
particular exercises. And as you get better and better
and better on those, your mind muscle connection with those is
going to be much at a much higher level.
And therefore, you're going to get better results because your,
your, your movement patterns have improved as well with that
exercise. You know, hey, if I take this
angle with the lap, hold down, so feel it much more than with
this angle. And that can only come from
doing a lot of reps. So as you do more of those in
the beginning, you I think there's a lot of benefit from
it. Yeah, no, I totally, completely
agree with that sentiment. I feel like, I feel like people,
especially as it pertains to training, this is also true in
nutrition. But when it comes to training,
there's so many different exercise programs, so many
different exercise machines, so many different ways to do
things. And people have tendency to
overanalyze the approach. They want to get it perfectly
dialed in and do what's best for them.
And the truth of the matter is like if, especially if they're a
new lifter, there's no way that they could possibly know what's
best for them at the end. So they just simply have to do a
lots of different things and see what resonates, see what works,
see what they recover from, see what you know lends itself to
the most increase in strength and composition.
And that just takes time. So like people just need to not
overthink things, just simply do.
And when you're new into training, like it's all going to
be a new stimulus. So your body's going to respond
favorably to pretty much everything.
It's it's pretty hard to mess up.
Obviously if we're doing something stupid, then your
technique suffers, you're going to risk injury.
But apart from that, like you can pretty much see progress
with a pretty free reign over how you're structuring things in
the beginning. And I just don't want people to
have this paralysis analysis fear that keeps them from doing
anything. Absolutely agree.
Yeah, the also the more variety you have, the more you know,
hey, this this is the exercise that I do really, really well
with and I want to have as a base.
And if we look right at the the people who have the best results
and they're most consistent, they're not doing 50 different
exercises. They have a few key lifts that
they've mustered and practiced so many times and they know,
hey, the, the incline double press is better for me than the
machine or the, you know, the the Barber version.
And I'm going to stick with that.
And that's where I've seen the best Rd.
Not to say you can never change that, but I've I've just seen it
times and times again where very, very experienced lifters,
10 plus years. They have those set of exercises
that they've done so many times. And again, that comes only from
putting in the wraps and not being too shy to do maybe a
little bit more. Especially initially, 100
percent, 100%. I know in looking at your
website, you put a pretty good emphasis on, you know, getting,
getting labs drawn, getting blood work dialed in.
Talk to me a little bit about that.
Like how does that look like for the people you work with?
Are they coming to you and they're noticing that they've
got markers that are way out of whack and they're looking to
improve that? Or are they just noticing that
they're stuck and have plateaued and then we turn to blood work
to try and get things more fine-tuned?
It depends. It's rare that someone sends me
their lab and say hey look at it, what is wrong.
I don't think we're at that level of sophistication yet.
We're usually if someone has labs, they go to the doctor and
or the doc orders labs when they don't feel well.
But if we look at the last 3-4 years, people are more
preventative in terms of their own health and they do get in
more regular, like regular blood work, not in a reactive way in
the sense of hey, I'm sick, what is going on?
Rather, hey, I'm fine. But let me look at my labs to
see what is going on here, where I'm at and what can I optimize.
And we, we get in labs and obviously you, you and I know
that. And you, you don't need blood
work to see results. Like anyone who says, oh,
without blood work you will never see results for body
composition or body recomposition, that's just BS.
But I do believe that with blood work as a foundation, we can
optimize those results and fine tune them and see, hey, what
would make most sense for that person.
And that's why we got in a panel initially, we look at 95
biomarkers, organ function, vitamin status, hormones, and we
see, hey, where's that person at?
And we can look at it from a macro level and not macros, but
macro level, big picture level in the sense of, OK, what
patterns do we have here? Do we have patterns of metabolic
adaptation? So very low testosterone, very
high cortisol, low T3 thyroid hormone, insulin that may be
very low SHPG, very high. That's like classic pattern
there. There's some others.
Or do we have someone, let's say with the fatty liver, not non
alcoholic fatty liver, where we can optimize their diet, let's
say adding more choline to their diet to to reduce a little bit
of that liver fat there, that visceral pad.
So it gives us a big picture status there, but also the, the
on a micro level where we see each individual line like OK,
vitamin D39 out of 10 guys, very low or a lot of guys also when
they come in, they don't know that they're pre diabetic.
They think, oh, everything is fine.
I'm a little bit overweight. And then they, they, the labs
come back and they say, oh, insulin resistance pre diabetic.
And typically again, studies show both work, but from my
experience, the adherence is significantly higher for someone
that's pre diabetic, let alone type 2.
But let's say let's just say high glucose insulin resistance
pre diabetic, their adherence is significantly higher on a lower
carb approach, right? Not always keto, but we've also
used keto as a tool for some guys and they've responded
better to it, or others on the other side of the spectrum
responded better to a limit higher carb intake.
And the labs allow us to see those insights and guide us.
What would make most sense for that person to apply and adjust,
let's say their macros or incorporate a little bit more of
these foods in their diet? What nutrient, nutrient
deficiency deficiencies do they have and can we fix those with
diet only, let's say vitamin A deficiency?
OK, can you eat a little bit more beef liver, a little bit
more eggs? And if that person doesn't want
that, then there's always the option for the supplementation
pack. But I'm, I'm a fan of lifestyle
and diet first. Because if I give you 20 pills
and you stop taking those and never changed your lifestyle,
then what happens? You go back to the old you.
But if you started making those adjustments, then even if you
stop taking supplements, you will still have the results long
term. Yeah, no, I totally, totally
agree with that sentiment for sure.
What are some, I mean, with you having worked with so many guys
over the years and, and getting this routine lab panel work
done, what are some pretty common patterns that you're
seeing with people? Like are, are most people that
you're working with generally, you know, having a elevated
blood glucose at baseline? Like what?
What are just some common common denominators you're
experiencing? Sorry, just to clarify, are you
saying some of the causes for the elevation in glucose or some
of the patterns that I've seen across the board?
More so the patterns across the board, like just based off of
your client pool, what are some of the the general pattern
recognitions that you're seeing? Yeah.
Well, the metabolic adaptation is one, right.
Like to be early in the conversation we talked about the
three categories of people that come to me.
And so that last category a little bit overtrained
metabolically adapted, that would be one pattern there.
The high glucose is definitely very standard, like almost every
single person has a little bit too high glucose there, whether
it's their A1C levels, which or your blood sugar levels over the
last 12 weeks or phosphate glucose, phosphate insulin, we
have that there. Another pattern is a lot of
times that goes untested, the light proteins.
So cholesterol is fatty, it's sticky, it can't really swim
through blood. It has to go in the life of
protein, which is kind of like a tennis ball that swims through
bloodstream. And there's APOB, which is more
lifestyle related risk factor, pretty high on the list there.
But we also have lipoprotein A, which is a genetic risk factor.
And once you see those, you see, hey, where are my genes AT and
where's my lifestyle at? Do I need to pay more attention
to that and how much more attention there?
That's something I've seen doesn't get a lot checked.
Homocysteine, which is an amino acid and the byproduct of
methylation, very rare checked as well and usually very
elevated, can increase the risk of any cardiovascular event,
potentially Alzheimer dementia. Risk of a stroke is higher with
that and a lot of times it's just that people are missing out
on some B vitamins or baking TMG, which again, you can get
from diet like beef liver, some beets you will cover that beer
or it can be supplemented. Low testosterone is a very
common one. But maybe one pattern that you
know, I, I couldn't believe it initially.
Like I was a little bit shocked and perplexed, but I've seen
that over and over again. The guys in the program that are
like 55 to 70 a lot of times have higher levels of
testosterone than many guys in their 30s.
What do you think the reason for that is?
That's a great question. I've spoken to a lot of experts
in the fields and doctors around that.
There's no like one answer that everyone gives you.
It's more like a series of again, sub patterns and possible
solutions or hypothesis there. But if if you look how our
lifestyle was 50 years ago, we were a lot more outside than
inside. It was a lot more white collar
than sorry, a lot more blue collar than white collar.
And the, the shift here that happened has had an impact on
our overall key levels. Processed foods, all the
additives in foods and any, you know, any environmental toxins,
plastics will have a role there as well.
I don't think they're at the top of the list, but I do think they
belong on the list. Sleep, stress.
So not only one thing, but a accumulation of poor lifestyle
choices, an environment that has impacted those hormones here
from the very, very early age on were guys in their 60s and 70s,
like 40-50 years ago. They didn't have the amount of
exposure to all those negative effects that a lot of us have
today. Gotcha.
So you, I would imagine the 30 year old now versus the 50 to 70
year old now their current lifestyle may look pretty
similar, like probably pretty similar environment.
But since that older gentleman didn't have those confounding
factors, you know, when he was younger, the compounding effect
hasn't had near the time to, you know, manifest itself as it has
in the 30 year old that was pretty much born into it.
Yes, yeah, that's the way I see it.
If we draw it out like let's say the guy that's dirty, he's been
exposed from age 0 or one to 30. So that's just my own
hypothesis. Whether that's true or not, we
will see. But let's say from age 1 to 30,
he's had that exposure and that accumulation.
So his T levels, testosterone levels never rise to let's say
1000 or 1200. They were, they went up to like
maybe 500 and then at 30 started declining and with accumulation
even more where the guy at let's say 60 or let's say 70 from age
1 to 20, he didn't have that. So he rised up let's say to 12
or 1500 naturally in terms of total T.
And again, we can look at 3T and other metrics, but without
getting into the weeds, let's say total T was 12115 hundred.
So his decline is also happening, but he his peak was
higher compared to the generation today.
And I think that's the case. Both are on a decline that's
normal, but one peak much higher than the other.
Gotcha. So what is the?
And I I just think that would make mathematical sense as well.
Were any other theory that I've seen numbers wise, I haven't
seen it really add up. But again, that's just my
hypothesis. It may be completely wrong, or
it may be what's been happening there.
No, that makes that makes intuitive sense to me.
Like if the if the decline rate is similar but the peak is
significantly different than that would make total sense.
So, So what does the 30 year old do that's been inundated with
all the environmental toxins since the inception, basically
conception like what what do they do to to bring that
testosterone level higher? I mean, obviously you can, you
know, improve the environmental factors, you can get more sleep,
you can weight train, you can eat the right foods, you can
remove all the the harmful cosmetics and you know,
xenoestrogens and phytoestrogens and things like that.
But if you and you can't really change your upbringing when your
body is most impacted by that peak level.
So like, they're probably never going to experience that kind of
peak naturally. It it depends on their starting
point. So let's say someone's assassin
levels when they come in a program.
Total T400 free T is A10 and they're 50 lbs overweight, poor
sleep, high stress. Like terrible situation, right?
They drop 50 lbs, sleep is improved, stress management is
improved, diet quality is up, fixed any micronutrient
deficiencies, resistance training, overall recovery is
optimal. And they're using less senior
Astrogans, as you said, or you know, let's say BPA clothes and
so on. They've optimized everything in
their control very, very doable to get to 7-8 hundred, maybe 900
naturally from that starting point.
And 900 or like 7 to 900 is pretty solid in terms of total
key for someone that's natty. And let's say they started at
150 or 200. Well, they may get to like 45600
but there was still be the average below average and don't
feel that great, right? So it depends where someone
starts out and the reversing lifestyle deficiencies and any
environmental causes will get them up to their natural peak.
And then from there someone has to decide, hey, is that enough
for me? Do I feel great or do I still
have low libido, low energy, brain fog, and many other
symptoms that can occur with low testosterone?
And if that's the case, then the conversation needs to be had
with a medical provider around treatments for that, whether
that's TRT or other solutions. Yeah, but all of that coming
after the lifestyle interventions take place.
Of course, Yeah, of course you know that there's.
I don't want to mention names, but there's a few telemedicine
clinics that I've seen and you know, I've I've I've dealt with
as well with clients we work with and day one you get it in
the labs. Testosterone 350.
All right, let's put you in TRT. No comments to sleep workouts,
diet like it's just just insane because that person, they may
end up at 56700 and feel great and don't need it.
And you just put someone on a lifetime medication because it's
not something can take and then you get off.
Usually you take it and you have to stay on forever.
And yeah, it's it's out of integrity there.
So absolutely lifestyle should always come first.
And if all the lifestyle options are maxed out, then the combo
opens up there. Same goes for Thyrid, right?
If someone is hypothyrid so low T4, low T3 hormones and they've
done everything in their power to optimize those and that it's
not working again, then the combo can be had.
But I think a lot of people just see those low numbers and think,
oh that's how I am and now I need a quick fix where it's
normal that. You're on the lower end for a
lot of these things or on the higher end for other things
because of your lifestyle, right?
Yeah, I mean, I think people just don't realize how big an
impact lifestyle and diet has on these numbers.
Like, I feel like so many people just assume that, yeah, it may
have a an incremental benefit, but you you pretty much have to
get on medication to really see any monumental change.
But truth be told, I mean, whether or not you sleep, I mean
you could literally go get a testosterone test, you know, one
day and the next day cut your sleep in half, then get that
same test and you're you'll see a pretty drastic decrease in
testosterone like these. These lifestyle factors have a
massive impact. A. 100% yeah, I remember mine.
I, I did a test like it was one half two years ago it was total
T was 680 and free T was 1718 and 90 days later I did a retest
for full 1011. My sleep was very, very bad
during those last two months prior to the test and my total T
dropped to a was 420 yeah 420 and my free T was 11.
So if, if you just look at that, you would say like, well, based
on your lifestyle and your age, like you're lean and so on,
well, sleep has a massive impact on your T levels.
I think there's one study that showed just one night of less
than five hours, five hours or less than five hours of sleep
will lower your testosterone levels by 10 or 11% just one
night. Yeah, it's, it's crazy, man.
I, I did, I documented all of my blood work throughout this last
prep that I did. And, and it's, I mean, your
testosterone level is tightly correlated to the amount of body
fat you have as well. Like it all kind of works in
unison. And when I got down to sub 4%
body fat, I was also not sleeping very much.
Like I was probably averaging 4 hours of sleep a night.
I was training every day. Like I was just taxing the
system on all fronts and my total testosterone at that point
at the apex of the cut was 86 man, like crazy low.
But I've tested it, you know, several times since then and
it's all returned. It's pretty much doubled every
time I've tested it since bringing food back in and
putting on a healthy degree of body fat.
But like people that never test, they never track macros and
never test their body composition.
They don't know what their current body fat is.
Like you have no, you're, you're just playing darts in the dark.
Whereas if you actually track these metrics and they can be
objective as to what it's telling you, I mean, you can
fine tune and finesse things. Again, everything truly dialed
in, it just takes a little more effort. 100% I think a lot of
people don't realize like when we we talked before about how
the weight loss can have an impact on testosterone, but only
to certain degree. Like once you typically get into
the single digits of body fat, it twists and it goes down.
And I, I never really understood why, but it makes a lot of sense
because the, the body has like 2, if you want to call it
mechanisms or two ways to look at or, or assess reserves.
And it's like, OK, you have little food coming in because
you're cutting and cutting and cutting to lower body fat.
So there's short term, the, the short term energy, which is your
nutrition. How much food is available right
now from what you're eating on a day-to-day basis is getting
less. So the short term energy is
being compromised and then your body fat is the long term energy
and that is getting less as well.
So obviously your reproductive hormones are are not a priority
for your body at this stage. So it will just lower, lower
lower those T levels. Totally.
This is honestly why I'm such an advocate for people taking ample
time off in between fat loss phases, because everybody talks
about, you know, how great it is to be lean.
And that is true to an extent for sure.
But there's also so much benefit to be had in having a legitimate
building phase, operating in a caloric surplus, putting on a
healthy degree of body fat. And that never really gets
talked about. But if you look at it simply
from a hormonal standpoint, like you have to give your body ample
time to let your hormones recover and stabilize, your
metabolism to recover and stabilize, like everything has
to have that yin Yang to it and you can't just perpetually be in
a cut. No, you, you, I used to make
that mistake years ago where just cutting, cutting, clutting,
clutting. And it can get addictive to some
to some point in some degree. But you're absolutely right.
We want to cycle nutrition and periodize it and not just stay
in one phase. Like if same for balking, right?
If you're balking for too long, like your glucose may be too
high at some point where if you implement mini cuts and
periodize those as well, you'll have to benefit on that side as
well. So having a cyclical approach or
paradise approach to nutrition over the course of, let's say,
12 months makes a lot of sense. Yeah.
No, totally agree, ma'am, Totally agree.
Well, what what's getting excited for the future, man, I
know we're coming up on our hour mark here, but what what's
getting excited for the business, for the coaching?
What what are you working on at the moment?
I'm working on a lot of systems for my team, so leading them,
coaching them on their education on systems and really creating a
team of elite coaches and focusing on making the program
better. So that's, you know, our #1 core
value as a company is client success.
We're the members success. Everything is tailored around
that. And that's where a lot of the
energy and attention goes into like, how can we make this
easier, faster, better, simpler? How can we take off more
decisions and work from the clients and just make the the
product and the coaching better, better, better and better.
And that's been my number one focus.
I love it. I love it.
And you're you're only working with males?
Or is it females too to some extent?
Mainly men, we have a female program that we started just
recently. So yeah, we like the brand and
the marketing is around men. But a lot of the men as they see
success, they want to have their spouse on board as well.
And it makes sense. It's easier to, or it's easier
to make those lifestyle choices when the most important person
in your life is in alignment as well and supports you versus you
have a different lifestyle than she has.
A lot of times that doesn't work out long term.
Yeah, no, I totally agree with you there.
The the more everybody's on the same on the same trajectory, the
better it's going to be for everyone, for sure.
Absolutely, yeah. We, we see a, a lot of guys as
well, like they go for a morning walk or let's say they work out
at home and the, their wife joins them for a walk.
And now instead of in the morning, just striving to
through like a driveway, Starbucks or sitting on the
couch or in the evening, they, they go for a walk together and
their relationship improves, their health improves.
So it can be that simple. Yeah, no, I love it, man.
I love it. I love what you're putting out
there. So where do people go to learn
more about the systems, the program, the coaching?
Where's the? Where's the main page for that?
Well, that would be 6 pack CEO, so six number six and then
packceo.com. Or you can just find me on
social media, Facebook, Instagram, just type in my name
and I'll pop up there. Awesome, man.
Well, I will definitely link out and make it easier for people to
find you. Appreciate what you're doing,
man. Like I said at the very
beginning, I love talking to other coaches.
I think, you know, each coach has their own approach to
things. It's going to resonate
differently with different people.
Rising Tide raises all ships and I just love coaches that are
doing it for the right reasons and trying to bring people to a
healthier, healthier lifestyle, man.
So, so keep fighting the good fight.
Yeah, we, we're, you know, when I started out as a coach, I
thought I had a lot of, or more of a scarcity mindset in the
sense of I cannot chat with the other coaches and maybe they'll
steal my clients. But first of all, not everyone
will vibe with you. And secondly, there's more than
enough for everyone I in the market.
And everyone is unique in their own way, in their own skill
sets. And you know, I, I really
enjoyed this conversation and the, the collaboration here.
No 100% man. I mean at least in this the
states the the obesity epidemic is still trending upwards.
So as far as I'm concerned, we need more and more coaches.
Exactly. Well awesome man, again I will
link you out to everything, make the easy people to find you.
There's everything I can do for you, man, You just let me know.
Likewise, thank you very much for having me on, Robert.
You bet. Take care, brother.
You too.