Episode 191: Guru Mastermind Horror Story, Squats and Knee Pain, Overcoming Burnout, Favorite Ab Exercises, And More…

0:00:12.3 Mike Vacanti: Hello, Jordan.

0:00:12.7 Jordan Syatt: What’s up Michael?

0:00:13.0 Mike Vacanti: Just about to drink this bottle of xenoestrogen hormone disruptor.

0:00:18.3 Jordan Syatt: Well, after the… I think the Muscle Milk you had before, like coats your stomach and that prevents any of that stuff from absorbing all the protein, the amino acids. It’s like a buffer, you know?

0:00:31.2 Mike Vacanti: That’s some good bro-science. Thank you. That makes me feel better.

0:00:32.5 Jordan Syatt: I just made it up. Made it up right there. But I think it’s true.

0:00:35.9 Mike Vacanti: Guess how much these cost?

0:00:38.0 Jordan Syatt: And for anyone who’s not watching, it’s a Kirkland water bottle. Like just how much does a single one cost?

0:00:46.4 Mike Vacanti: Price per unit when you purchase these.

0:00:48.6 Jordan Syatt: Seven cents?

0:00:49.5 Mike Vacanti: 10 cents.

0:00:50.2 Jordan Syatt: Oh, I was so close, man. Come on. That was good. You looked disappointed that I was pretty close. Oh. ‘Cause I did thing where I under-guessed it…

0:00:56.6 Mike Vacanti: I’m very disappointed. Yeah.

0:00:58.8 Jordan Syatt: That’s, yeah, that’s fine, so I could have over-hit it.

0:01:00.1 Mike Vacanti: You’re under-slept, so you’re a J. No, I wanted an accurate guess. That was pretty good. But a 40 pack for $4, that just seems outrageous.

0:01:08.3 Jordan Syatt: Is that too much? Do you think it’s too much for that water? Or it’s not enough?

0:01:14.0 Mike Vacanti: $4 for 40 bottles of water.

0:01:15.8 Jordan Syatt: It seems like it’s such a great deal.

0:01:17.8 Mike Vacanti: A bottle of water at the airport is $5 for one.

0:01:21.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, that’s what I’m saying. That’s incredible.

0:01:22.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. But you thought seven cents, you thought it should have been priced at like 2.90 per instead of $4 per.

0:01:28.9 Jordan Syatt: Well you made it sound like it was super, super inexpensive, so I was like, “All right, well.” And you know I’m not thinking that far out with the math, I just was like, “I don’t know,” just I didn’t think like, “Okay, 40 bottles.” I don’t even think you said that, I was just like, I just guessed. Sort of just threw it out there.

0:01:45.8 Mike Vacanti: How excited are you for the start of the NFL season?

0:01:49.4 Jordan Syatt: Bro, I don’t think I’ve ever been less excited for the start of the NFL.

0:01:52.2 Mike Vacanti: [laughter] Tonight, tonight is the first game of the NFL season.

0:01:55.5 Jordan Syatt: Oh, is the pre-season over?

0:01:57.2 Mike Vacanti: Yep. The pre-season’s over.

0:01:58.2 Jordan Syatt: Oh wow. Interesting. That’s awesome. My feed gets zero football. Like I have… I don’t even know pre-season was going on. I have no clue when the season starts. It’s news to me. You must be stoked though. That’s exciting.

0:02:14.1 Mike Vacanti: We’re all stoked, Jordan. We’re all stoked. It’s time to make you an… It’s time to get you on board with the Patriots this year. They’re gonna have their worst team in decades. And I think this is where you need to come in as a Patriots fan.

0:02:26.6 Jordan Syatt: Even if I wanted to, I don’t think I could.

0:02:28.7 Mike Vacanti: I think you could.

0:02:29.0 Jordan Syatt: I don’t know. I mean, how do you think the Vikings are gonna do this year?

0:02:34.0 Mike Vacanti: Not good. Not good, unfortunately. But the NFL is such a good product that even when your team is bad, it’s still very entertaining with you know.

0:02:42.1 Jordan Syatt: So you like it even when you’re mad about your team.

0:02:45.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. You got a fantasy league, you got a text thread going, you got… They’re increasing the number of nationally-televised games per week, like slowly year over year. And just taking over other sports. If you look at from… It was either 2022 or 2023 National most-watched events and like 91 of the top 100 for the year were from the NFL.

0:03:15.5 Jordan Syatt: Really?

0:03:15.6 Mike Vacanti: Mm-hmm.

0:03:17.2 Jordan Syatt: Man, I’m really in the minority on this one. That’s crazy.

0:03:18.7 Mike Vacanti: It was like State of the Union… There was like one or two other sporting events… And then it was just like random NFL game, NFL playoff game, Super Bowl, random NFL playoff game, random Monday Night Football game, Random…

0:03:33.6 Jordan Syatt: Just random games, not even like huge games, that’s crazy.

0:03:36.9 Mike Vacanti: Well…

0:03:37.5 Jordan Syatt: Do you… When you go to a game, not necessarily at the game, but when you’re watching a game, do you like to… Do you get pissed when people talk to you? Like, “Hey, I’m watching the game, don’t talk to me.” Or are you more like… So is it a mix of the two? What kind of viewer are you?

0:03:51.6 Mike Vacanti: I don’t go to a lot of football games.

0:03:54.6 Jordan Syatt: No. Even when you’re watching on TV with your family and stuff.

0:03:57.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. If I’m watching on TV and the Vikings are playing, I’m not trying to have conversations. No.

0:04:05.4 Jordan Syatt: Got it. Got it, got it, got it. Okay.

0:04:07.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. I wanna watch the game.

0:04:08.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. What if it’s another team?

0:04:09.7 Mike Vacanti: I don’t care. Then I’m just hanging out.

0:04:11.5 Jordan Syatt: Unless it’s like Super Bowl or something, then you really wanna watch the game.

0:04:14.3 Mike Vacanti: No, I’m still just hanging out.

0:04:15.6 Jordan Syatt: Got it. Got it. Okay.

0:04:17.3 Mike Vacanti: Enjoying the company. Yeah. I can’t even tell you, this chair that I’m sitting in broke, I was doing T-spine extensions over it and apparently it can’t handle that, and I’m gonna have to kneel for this podcast, it’s unbelievably…

0:04:29.6 Jordan Syatt: You broke it doing the T-spine extensions.

0:04:32.3 Mike Vacanti: Apparently. It’s not very…

0:04:33.1 Jordan Syatt: Did you fall out?

0:04:34.1 Mike Vacanti: No. It just… I don’t even know what happened. But the back support now isn’t there and it just, when I lean back, the whole chair leans back.

0:04:41.6 Jordan Syatt: [laughter] Did it make a noise when you broke it? It was like…

[vocalization]

0:04:47.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, it made a little crack, like something cracked in there. I don’t even know what it’s made out of, but, yeah, these Wayfair chairs, it’s a negative advertisement.

0:04:57.5 Jordan Syatt: That’s not good.

0:04:58.5 Mike Vacanti: All right Jordan’s not excited for the start of the NFL season. Are you excited for…

0:05:01.8 Jordan Syatt: I mean that’s not news, you knew I wasn’t gonna be excited for that. That’s like the least surprising thing in your life.

0:05:04.8 Mike Vacanti: Jordan Ryan… Gordon Ryan… Jordan Ryan…

0:05:08.1 Jordan Syatt: Gordon Ryan.

0:05:09.5 Mike Vacanti: Gordon Ryan vs. Craig Jones. That’ll be sweet.

0:05:11.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. If that happens…

0:05:14.5 Mike Vacanti: I just made it up. I don’t… [laughter] I don’t know.

0:05:20.4 Jordan Syatt: And way fewer people are excited about that. Guarantee, like 99% of the people listening are like, “I don’t know who either of those people are,” but the very small percentage of the viewer are gonna be like, “Oh, that’s a real head nod.” They like that.

0:05:31.2 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, hey Craig Jones’ leg locks. I mean, leg locks might not be the best in a street fight, but in a jiu-jitsu match. Impressive.

0:05:40.0 Jordan Syatt: Super impressive.

0:05:43.5 Mike Vacanti: This is the equivalent of Jordan being like, “a punt return touchdown is really cool when it happens.”

0:05:47.3 Jordan Syatt: Bro. It is super impressive when that… I think that’s super fun to watch. You know what I think is really fun to watch? Is an onside kick recovery. But I think they changed the rules in the last year or two to make it more difficult. Is that correct? Or easier to make that happen? Which one was it?

0:06:02.5 Mike Vacanti: More difficult.

0:06:03.7 Jordan Syatt: Which is annoying ’cause it’s already difficult enough.

0:06:06.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, you’re absolutely right. A few years ago they changed the rule so that you had to have like a certain number of players on both sides of the ball. ‘Cause I’m pretty sure you used to be able to put all 10 guys on one side of the ball, or maybe nine on one side and only one on the other, then you have the kicker. But they made it so you limited the number of people on each side of the ball. And now… That was a few years back. Now I’m pretty sure, I don’t know, but I think in this past off season, so implemented for this year, there’s a new rule, like you can only do an onside kick in certain situations. You can’t…

0:06:41.0 Jordan Syatt: It’s so annoying.

0:06:41.1 Mike Vacanti: Can’t do it anytime during the game. Yeah.

0:06:44.7 Jordan Syatt: It’s a dumb rule from someone who doesn’t really understand football that well, but understands it enough.

0:06:48.2 Mike Vacanti: The NFL’s been taking measures over the last, at least, 10 years, if not longer, to improve player safety, with all…

0:06:57.5 Jordan Syatt: The NFL’s corrupt.

[laughter]

0:07:02.7 Mike Vacanti: I mean…

0:07:03.4 Jordan Syatt: They’re bought and paid for. Come on.

0:07:07.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Hey, look with all the CTE stuff and like these running backs who are in their 50s and 60s and their brains are just mush, I understand the effort to make the game safer while keeping it entertaining and keeping the spirit of the game.

0:07:23.8 Jordan Syatt: Completely agree. Player safety, I think is of paramount importance.

0:07:27.9 Mike Vacanti: [laughter] Okay, now you’re just saying things. I get it now.

0:07:31.1 Jordan Syatt: No. [laughter] I agree with that. There’s… I don’t think anyone can… I actually do see people in comments who are like against that. They’re like, “They get to decide if they wanna play or not.” It’s like, yeah, but if that’s like their main thing and they’re being offered millions and millions of dollars and it could set their family up forever, like they’re going to… And often when you’re in your 20s and 30s, like you don’t understand what that means that by the time you’re 50s you’ve got this mental degeneration and cognitive degeneration, like you don’t fully understand it. So yeah, they have the freedom to choose not to do it, but it’s like, if we can make them safer, why not?

0:08:02.2 Mike Vacanti: I agree with you. Although even like Brady has come out and been like, some of these rules protecting the quarterback especially are… Or even like protecting receivers are taking away from the game.

0:08:18.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I believe it. I mean, anytime there’s another rule in place, it takes away some aspect. And that’s just not even football, that’s in life. When there’s another rule, another law, there’s a certain level of freedom that’s taken away.

0:08:33.7 Mike Vacanti: It’s a good high level meta point you’re drawing out of this. I like that.

0:08:38.3 Jordan Syatt: It’s just life but sometimes… We’re not like truly, truly free, you know? ‘Cause sometimes we have to give up freedom in order for some level of safety or civil…

0:08:52.3 Mike Vacanti: There are…

0:08:52.4 Jordan Syatt: Civil obedience.

0:08:53.9 Mike Vacanti: There are consequences to actions.

0:08:56.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Correct. Yeah.

0:08:58.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah. Like you can do pretty much whatever you want, but there may be consequences.

0:09:00.7 Jordan Syatt: Correct. Correct. Yeah. Yeah.

0:09:04.2 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Whereas other people would make a real argument that we don’t have any freedom whatsoever. Like that free will doesn’t exist. Which I disagree.

0:09:06.8 Jordan Syatt: That one doesn’t make sense to me.

0:09:10.6 Mike Vacanti: No, we don’t need to go down that rabbit hole. [laughter]

0:09:15.0 Jordan Syatt: “We’re not talking Sam Harris and we’re not doing that right now.” [laughter]

0:09:19.2 Mike Vacanti: Do you wanna talk about [redacted] and we can bleep his name? [laughter]

0:09:24.8 Jordan Syatt: I did not expect you to go down that route. Yeah, let’s do it. We’ll bleep his name out so no one heard what you just said. But yeah, what do you have to say about that?

0:09:31.9 Mike Vacanti: I don’t have anything. I thought maybe you’d have something to say about that.

0:09:34.6 Jordan Syatt: Oh, I didn’t expect you to talk about that at all. There was a guy in the… Who’s in our mentorship, the fitness business mentorship, who’s fantastic. He’s been for years now.

0:09:49.3 Mike Vacanti: He’s a beast.

0:09:49.4 Jordan Syatt: And he told us, wow, it must have been like a year ago or so that he ended up joining another guru mastermind course for like $10,000. And he was like, “Yeah, I’ve got some friends who are in it. And they said I should try it.” And he just made a post about it yesterday. He didn’t name the guru mastermind course. He didn’t name… Actually, I thought it was really smart. You don’t wanna burn a bridge, you don’t wanna call someone out like that. But basically he was like, “I got got. I went into this program. I paid $10,000 for it. The marketing, the advertising for it sort roped me in.” And he was like, “And it was just an absolute waste of money.” But he did have some good takeaways just basically being like, “Listen, no one has all the answers and no matter what, you’re still gonna have to put in the work. No matter what.” So it’s… Yeah. And I thought he handled it really well. I was actually DMing him about it earlier today and last night just about his post and the feedback to it and all of that. But he’s a great guy and he’s listening, he knows exactly that we’re talking about him right now.

0:10:55.8 Mike Vacanti: Shout out, brother. I thought it was a really good post as well. You sent it to me. Was that yesterday morning, I think?

0:11:02.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Yeah.

0:11:04.1 Mike Vacanti: And just classy not to create drama or negativity or namedrop or anything like that, but really to just extract really making it more fitness-related and bringing it to his audience in a way that could help them, which was cool.

0:11:19.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Agreed.

0:11:21.4 Mike Vacanti: So I think I’ve talked about this a decent amount on the podcast over the years, how infrequently I weigh myself, just…

0:11:32.9 Jordan Syatt: Oh, wow.

0:11:35.2 Mike Vacanti: Out of a lack of necessity, a lack of specific fat loss, or like real intense body comp-related goals. And I just know. If I want to dial in a little bit and lose a little fat, I don’t need to be weighing in regularly, I can look in the mirror and be like, “Okay, I’m heavier than I wanna to be. I have less definition than I want.” And then within a number of weeks of dialing it in, without even looking at the scale, I can tell like, “Okay, I’m visibly leaner.” Number of weeks/months depending on how fast I’m trying to do it. But for whatever reason, over the last few weeks since I’ve started this casual natty aesthetic era, slow fat loss, not really caring that much, but enjoying the process thing that I’m doing, I’m like, bathroom scale is right there, I’ve been stepping on it probably every other day, and it’s been interesting. It’s been interesting, I’m down maybe two pounds in like…

0:12:35.5 Jordan Syatt: Wow.

0:12:38.3 Mike Vacanti: Over three weeks.

0:12:39.2 Jordan Syatt: Couple of weeks? Three weeks?

0:12:41.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. It’s probably been three weeks.

0:12:41.9 Jordan Syatt: Are you hungry?

0:12:43.4 Mike Vacanti: No, not at all.

0:12:44.5 Jordan Syatt: You’re not hungry at all? There’s zero hunger?

0:12:47.4 Mike Vacanti: Well, bro, I mean, yeah, I’m hungry in the same way that I’m hungry during a surplus. When it’s mealtime, I’m hungry. But there’s no deprivation hunger, there’s no like, I’m in a deficit hunger. And it’s not two pounds of fat.

0:13:00.3 Jordan Syatt: Less full.

0:13:01.6 Mike Vacanti: Right. There’s… With total intake down, maybe half of it is temporary weight, maybe I’m down a pound of fat, or like 1.25 pounds of fat or something along those lines.

0:13:09.5 Jordan Syatt: But you’re already pretty lean. I know relatively, like for you it’s not much, but you’re already lean.

0:13:12.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Compared to the general population, yeah. But it’s interesting just jumping on and seeing the number at different times of day and trying to guess it, it’s been fun. It’s been fun because it’s been a long time since I consistently weighed in.

0:13:31.8 Jordan Syatt: Is it like giving you more insight as a coach or more just like it’s fun for you to guess what your weight is gonna be?

0:13:40.5 Mike Vacanti: Fun. It’s solidifying everything that I’ve understood about scale weight since 2000 and…

0:13:46.9 Jordan Syatt: 20 years ago.

[laughter]

0:13:47.1 Mike Vacanti: No, no. But definitely like 10, 11, 12, 13 years ago.

0:13:52.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s similar, I’ve started just tracking my intake, not like… Not being… Did we talk about this in the podcast last week? I know… I think you and I spoke about it.

0:14:03.6 Mike Vacanti: We spoke about it…

0:14:04.9 Jordan Syatt: On the phone.

0:14:05.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. I don’t think it was on the podcast.

0:14:06.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I’m not like deliberately, “Okay, I need to be in a deficit,” I’m more just writing down everything that I eat in my app and just like, “Okay, I had this, I had this.” And it’s just like, “Oh fuck.” [laughter] When you actually write it all down…

0:14:23.4 Mike Vacanti: Well…

0:14:23.4 Jordan Syatt: And you’ve had a period of time where you weren’t being as consistent or you just weren’t paying attention to it, and all of a sudden you’re like, “All right, let’s pay attention to it.” You start realizing, “Oh, I’m reaching for this, and I don’t need to reach for that. And I would have before and wouldn’t have given it a second thought.” It makes you very aware of the habits.

0:14:39.4 Mike Vacanti: And just how much you were underestimating your intake before when…

0:14:45.5 Jordan Syatt: Correct.

0:14:46.2 Mike Vacanti: Not paying attention. Like, “I’m probably around 2,500.” It’s like, “Oh, that’s probably 3,500.”

0:14:52.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. [laughter]

0:14:57.6 Mike Vacanti: It’s late in the day, you’re like… Or even the afternoon, you’re like, “Oh my gosh, I’m already at 1,800 calories. I would’ve eaten however much more.” Like it just… It gives you perspective no matter how much experience you have.

0:15:08.0 Jordan Syatt: For that, and also it’s just like, “Man, I could really improve food volume.” It’s like it’s so easy to choose that low volume, calorie-dense palatable option. Even if it’s a relatively healthy option, it’s like, “Okay, I still could do a better job of having more vegetables, more water-based fruits.” Like more things that are really gonna fill you up as opposed to, all right, I really don’t need to…

0:15:29.0 Mike Vacanti: Mm-hmm. Fiber.

0:15:33.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

0:15:34.0 Mike Vacanti: Protein. Voluminous protein versus protein shake. Dude, I have a great one that I was gonna bring up to you and forgot, which is those Yasso bars.

0:15:48.4 Jordan Syatt: Oh man, so good.

0:15:48.5 Mike Vacanti: So good. But not good. I stopped buying them.

0:15:53.4 Jordan Syatt: What? Within the last couple of weeks, you were saying the mango is like the greatest thing ever. You love it.

0:15:58.2 Mike Vacanti: Yep, that’s right. And that’s not good when you’re trying to stay like reasonably… I can’t eat one of those. They’re 80 calories.

0:16:02.4 Jordan Syatt: Oh you can’t? Got it. Okay.

0:16:03.4 Mike Vacanti: The texture is… They must have eight figures invested in R&D because the texture of those things, and I haven’t had any flavors besides the Mango Yasso bar, it is out of this world. And they’re 80 calories a piece. They sell ’em in a four-pack. The price per calorie is actually really bad. But bro, I wouldn’t even eat two really.

0:16:25.7 Jordan Syatt: PPC… Price per calorie. [chuckle]

0:16:26.6 Mike Vacanti: ‘Cause you can rationalize, something is 80 calories, you’re like, okay.

0:16:30.4 Jordan Syatt: Oh yeah, easy.

0:16:31.5 Mike Vacanti: But this is 300 for the box. This is nothing. I would just eat a box like it was nothing. Be like, “Okay, that was a 300-calorie dessert. That’s really good.” Whereas these like fudge bars.

0:16:43.8 Jordan Syatt: The Fudgsicles?

0:16:46.7 Mike Vacanti: A Fudgsicle.

0:16:46.8 Jordan Syatt: The 40-calorie ones?

0:16:46.7 Mike Vacanti: No, it’s a 100. It’s from Costco.

0:16:47.0 Jordan Syatt: Oh, okay. Okay.

0:16:49.8 Mike Vacanti: The satiety I get off of 100-calorie Fudgsicle, which is all carb. It’s like a… But almost no fat, there’s zero or one fat, but all sugar. Whereas the Yasso have 4 protein, 14 carb, or something like that. The satiety, I get off of a 100 calories of this, whatever the texture of this cold fudge bar is, is night and day. Like I eat one and I feel great and I don’t even want anymore. Whereas I can eat a box of Yassos and be like, “Should I drive to the store and buy another box? Is that what I’m doing?”

0:17:18.9 Jordan Syatt: It’s only 80 calories a piece.

0:17:21.9 Mike Vacanti: Only 80 calories a piece. It’s not… I got an hour ’till bedtime. Like, am I driving to the store right now? So Yassos are out, but these Costco Fudgsicles are in, in a big way.

0:17:30.5 Jordan Syatt: Dude. Fudgsicles are so good. I haven’t had them in a long time that I… You just reminded me, when I was younger, I used to eat these like 40-calorie ones.

0:17:38.5 Mike Vacanti: Okay.

0:17:38.9 Jordan Syatt: And then I could have two or three of them, and they were, oh my gosh. They were amazing. Yeah. I need to get those today. I’m gonna go out today after the mentorship Q&A. I’m gonna get Fudgsicles.

0:17:46.9 Mike Vacanti: Get Fudgsicles.

0:17:48.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Those are so good.

0:17:51.2 Mike Vacanti: But yeah, man, the slow and casual fat loss where you don’t have a timeline whatsoever. And so if you… If over the course of a month you don’t lose any fat, you don’t really care. But over like a six-month window, you just know directionally, like it’d be nice to lose 10 pounds of fat, is like a fun goal.

0:18:16.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Yeah. It is. It is. It’s nice too, ’cause I feel like that is more sustainable, more enjoyable. It’s not as good from like a, if you’re making content about it on social media. ’cause there’s no clear like direction. It’s very like ambiguous and, “Yeah, we’ll see.” But from, I think from a lifestyle perspective, it’s actually a really… It’s a really great way about it. And it’s hard to get clients on board with that. Especially early on, early-on clients are like, “Hey, I wanna just lose this weight really fast.” But I have found that, whether it’s for myself or for long-term clients who are sort of just like they’re just good and they’re just like, “Yeah. Like I know it’s gonna work. It’s just gonna take longer.” It’s such a better way to go about it, long-term.

0:19:00.0 Mike Vacanti: Long-term clients, you’re a hundred percent right. And people who don’t have a ton of body fat to lose.

0:19:05.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah.

0:19:07.6 Mike Vacanti: If you have to lose 50 pounds of body fat to get in a healthy weight range, then saying 10 pounds per six months is, makes zero sense.

0:19:17.2 Jordan Syatt: Man, I made a post last night, ’cause I’m up late at night, and I’m testing, I’m experimenting with social media right now. I made a post at like 12:31 AM. But basically I’m just experimenting with different types of posts on social media. And I was having, I literally wasn’t going to eat an ice cream sandwich last night, but I thought of a good hook for a social media post. And I was like… Basically the hook was, “Let’s see what happens if dot, dot, dot.” And so basically like that was like the hook that I was going to play with. And so I was like, “All right, let’s see what happens if I eat ice cream sandwiches at midnight.” And so literally I wasn’t going to eat it. I just had no desire to, I was just feeding my daughter, my newborn infant, three weeks old. And I was like, “You know what, put her down, let’s give this a shot.” So I have, I’m like, “All right, let’s eat it.” Well, I film it and I’m filming it as I’m eating it. And I ended up having these two ice cream sandwiches, each one is like 100, so 200 calories, no big deal. And they’re delicious. And I make the post and the reaction to the post is great immediately. Like I have some thoughts on social media right now.

0:20:28.3 Jordan Syatt: But even posting at midnight, 1:00 AM, great reaction to the post, early on and it’s continuing on today. But there was one woman who commented who basically was like, “It’s not about calories, it’s about the blood sugar response.” And so I comment that, I just replied, and I was like… Very nicely, I was like, “This time last year I wore a continuous glucose monitor every day. I deliberately spiked my blood sugar every day. And I lost 14 pounds in 30 days while still eating in a calorie deficit.” That’s how I said it. And then some people came in and they were like, they were being mean to her, they were being rude, and basically just being like, “You’re an idiot.” [laughter] Just like really getting on her for it. But then she was like, “I’m a General Physician,” or like a GP. Like she’s like, “I’m a doctor, and I know what I’m talking about.” And then people really started going after her, basically being like, “God, this is so sad. No wonder people don’t trust their doctors,” da, da, da, da, da. But, and then I saw she unfollowed me and I was like, man, I understand… I understand not wanting to get ganged up on and I get it. But also it’s really sad that… ‘Cause then there were people in there who were providing research and saying, “Listen, don’t pay attention to these people who are being rude, but like, here are some studies that you can look at.”

0:21:50.5 Jordan Syatt: And she just dug her heels in deeper and deeper and deeper and basically just appeal to authority, “I’m a doctor. I know what I’m talking about. I don’t need this.” Da, da, da. And it was actually really sad to see someone who’s a doctor and seeing patients and seeing people on a daily basis basically just completely disregarding the truth and disregarding science and research and just digging her heels into what she has been taught before and probably what she’s been influenced by on social media and not even necessarily in medical school. ‘Cause you don’t really learn that much in medical school about nutrition, and I speak with many doctors about this, like you don’t have a time in medical school to learn about it. But, yeah, it was interesting, and to see the unfollow and rather than… And digging in deeper, it’s just, “Okay, I’m just going to believe this instead.” It was actually, it was very sad.

0:22:34.7 Mike Vacanti: Very sad, but I would argue the norm in today’s discourse, like I think more people than not would dig their heels in and like go to a different echo chamber where what they already believe is being professed rather than be open-minded and willing to have a conversation. Also just to play devil’s advocate as someone who didn’t see this interaction, the way you responded was very reasonable. But if I say something and I’m wrong and people come after me aggressively and are mean and are disparaging, like that’s not going to make me want to change my mind or be open to change my mind, that’s just going to like make me angry and make me want to attack those individuals.

0:23:21.3 Jordan Syatt: Of course. Yeah. I was disappointed to see a number of people in the comments just immediately ad hominem going after her. I was like, “Come on. If we want to help someone change their mind, we can’t attack them. Let’s just be helpful.”

0:23:37.7 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah. But I don’t know. Did you DM her?

0:23:42.6 Jordan Syatt: Not yet. I was thinking about it. I’ll probably send her a voice memo and just let her know. Like I don’t agree with how people reacted to her.

0:23:49.5 Mike Vacanti: Wanna fire up questions?

0:23:51.2 Jordan Syatt: Oh you know what was funny yesterday? [laughter] I was in the gym with my wife in the garage, and she’s already back strength training three weeks after giving birth, which is just…

0:24:08.1 Mike Vacanti: Let’s go, NeeNee.

0:24:09.6 Jordan Syatt: So badass, and every single woman is different. Different births are different. Different recovery times are different. The blanket recommendation that doctors will give a woman after giving birth is you need to wait six weeks. And this birth was way easier on my wife than the first one. And she feels great. So she actually started strength training at the end of week two, and very light, but she’s strength training, like she’s moving, she’s doing squats and RDLs and all of that. And she feels great. And she was doing squats with the barbell yesterday and she’s like, “Ah, my knee is hurting.” And I didn’t say anything. I’m not just going to be like, “Hey, do this.” Like, I know, I’m not just gonna be like, “Hey, change this.” Like, I just heard her say, “Oh, my knee’s hurting.” I just keep working out. She does another set, “Oh, my knee.” And she was like, “What do you think I should do?” And so she finally asked me, I was like, “All right, well, I think you should change the bar position, and I think you should change your stance width.”

0:25:11.9 Jordan Syatt: And she was like, “This is how I always do it.” And I was like, “Okay.” Another set goes by, “Ah, my knee. It just hurts.” Don’t say anything. Another set, “Oh, my knee. Ah. What do you think I should do?” “I think you should change your bar position and change your stance width.” “And this is how I’ve always done it. Okay, I’ll try it. Oh my gosh. There’s literally no more pain anymore.” That’s like, this is a real full-on conversation. And I posted it on social media and people thought it was hilarious and how it’s like, no matter what, like whoever you’re married to… I had a lot of females messaging me being like, “I’m a nurse. Every time my husband is sick, I tell him what he should do and he doesn’t fucking listen.” It’s like, it doesn’t matter. But it was interesting. And then a lot of people were asking me like, “Well, can you give us the advice that you gave her? Because I have knee pain when I squat.” And it was interesting. Like I wanted to post it, but it was… There are so many different reasons why someone could have pain, and when they’re squatting. This was a very technique-specific thing. And it was actually funny because her bar position, I felt like was, she had a super low bar powerlifting-style squat. And her stance was a little bit too wide. And I noticed her knee was caving in.

0:26:37.4 Jordan Syatt: And I also asked her, I said, “Where is the pain?” And she pointed to the inside of her knee. It wasn’t on the front of her knee, it was on the inside of her knee. And so I think a lot of people would assume, okay, maybe the bar was too high and her feet were too close together and it was going to the front of her knee. It was the inside and it was a little bit too much valgus collapse. Which isn’t inherently bad, but when you haven’t strength trained in four or five, six months, and your hips and pelvis went through all this change, like there could be real issues there. So I actually brought her stance further in, brought the bar higher up, get a little bit more quad involvement, and have less valgus collapse, and all of a sudden the knee pain is gone. And I was like, man, it’s… People really want that, what’s the fix to the knee pain? There’s so many different reasons why someone could be having pain.

0:27:22.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, and this was definitely the lesser common of those two instances, because as you were telling that story, I was like, oh, interesting, like high bar back squat, like pretty narrow stance, like cool, but that’s how she’s always squatted, I didn’t know that. Because that’s the assumption if there’s knee pain…

0:27:39.8 Jordan Syatt: Correct.

0:27:40.7 Mike Vacanti: On a squat, it’s like, “Okay, let’s make this more hip-dominant, less knee-dominant. Let’s go a little bit lower bar position. Let’s widen your stance a little bit. Let’s get a little bit more of the tension on your posterior chain rather than your quads and your knees are going to feel better.” And if you had to give general advice, which, again, obviously like you just said, isn’t going to work for everyone. But if you had to give general advice on knee pain during squatting, that would probably be more useful for more people. But in this instance, it was something different.

0:28:11.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. She’s always done like a very low bar powerlifting-style squat and she’s… Always gets into the hamstrings like…

0:28:17.9 Mike Vacanti: Not before she met you… Or not met you, but not before you…

0:28:22.3 Jordan Syatt: Even before, yeah.

0:28:22.4 Mike Vacanti: Really? Before you guys got together?

0:28:24.8 Jordan Syatt: Yep. Yep. Because we initially got together because she was really into strength training and she had a coach who was like a powerlifting coach, and…

0:28:34.7 Mike Vacanti: Did that make you competitive?

0:28:37.9 Jordan Syatt: With my wife?

0:28:38.0 Mike Vacanti: No, that she…

0:28:39.3 Jordan Syatt: With the coach?

0:28:39.7 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah.

0:28:42.4 Jordan Syatt: Not with that coach, but there have been other coaches where… It was funny, like when we first moved to this new town that we’re in, there’s a powerlifting gym. And I love being at home, but like you, you need to get out of the house, my wife she’s like, she needs to get out of the house. So like up to about like six months pregnant, she was going to this powerlifting gym. And, dude, it’s great, it’s an awesome gym. But the first time she went, I was like, “I’m going to go with you. I’m just wanna… ” ‘Cause you know, you see online power… Like it says like Westside Barbell Equipment, like powerlifting gym, like I’m going to go and make sure. And I’m not going to say who I am. I’m not going to say any of that. I’m not… They’re not going to know anything about me. And they’re definitely not going to know by looking at me ’cause I don’t look like I’m a powerlifter, that’s for sure. And so I go in and I’m asking the guy, “Hey, can you just tell me about your program and how it works?” And he’s explaining how they do a conjugate-style system for like this general population, which I love. I’m like, they take general population, men and women, through conjugate periodization and powerlifting programming. It’s just, I was like, “They do a great job.” Like they do a very, very, very good job. So I got competitive before I knew them. And then once I knew that they were doing a very good job, I wasn’t competitive anymore.

0:30:00.8 Mike Vacanti: And it sounds like more than competitive, you were just looking out for your wife. Make sure of it…

0:30:04.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I want to make sure that they knew what they were doing. Yeah. And that my wife was safe. Yeah.

0:30:09.3 Mike Vacanti: All right. Questions.

0:30:09.4 Jordan Syatt: “What’s the best way to measure body fat?”

0:30:11.8 Mike Vacanti: Autopsy.

0:30:12.6 Jordan Syatt: Correct. What’s the second best way?

0:30:15.2 Mike Vacanti: I think DEXAs. I would have said DEXA by far five to seven years ago, but I feel like DEXA has become overrated as the gold standard in recent years.

0:30:25.5 Jordan Syatt: Oh, really?

0:30:26.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Because hydration status plays a role in lean mass, you could do a DEXA, drink 16 ounces of water, do another DEXA, and you’re going to have an extra pound of “muscle”. It’s really hard to have accurate information that is comparable from scan to scan. So you either, one, need a high frequency of scans so that… So higher sample size means less variance and means you’re going to be able to pull averages in a trend line more easily, or you just need to be knowledgeable when analyzing the data and not freaking out if you have two scans six months apart and you’re not seeing what you expected, but your strength is up, the scale is cooperating, your body measurements are… Your waist measurements are cooperating, your clothing, the way they fit is in line with how you feel and you’re making progress on that front. You look better in the mirror. Like if all signs are, “I’m moving in the direction of my goal,” but then your DEXA scan isn’t exactly what you would have thought. It could just be that when you had your first DEXA scan, you were in a surplus, you were topped off with glycogen, you were super hydrated. Remember, when you’re eating excess carbohydrate, you’re storing three grams of water per gram of carbohydrate that you’re storing mostly in the muscles, but also a little bit liver, a little bit brain. So you have more temporary scale weight that isn’t muscle mass, but is showing up as muscle mass on the DEXA scan.

0:32:01.3 Mike Vacanti: And so if you’re in a surplus for one scan, you’re in a deficit for another scan, even if it’s just one month apart, but you’re dripping with glycogen compared to fully depleted, you’re going to see a big difference in terms of lean tissue on the DEXA scale. Now, I still like it more than a Bod Pod. I still like it more than, I guess, the combination of calipers done by someone who’s proficient in calipers plus looking in the mirror. I would take Borge Fagerli doing calipers combined with looking at a physique.

0:32:38.7 Jordan Syatt: That’s someone’s name, by the way, for anyone who doesn’t know. That’s a very well-known strength nutrition coach from somewhere in Europe.

0:32:45.9 Mike Vacanti: I said it right, right?

0:32:47.8 Jordan Syatt: I don’t think that was anywhere near correct. I might be wrong.

0:32:51.1 Mike Vacanti: Borge is his first name. It’s either Fagerli or Fagerli. It’s F-A…

0:32:55.0 Jordan Syatt: Hang on.

0:32:55.1 Mike Vacanti: Now Jordan’s just…

0:32:56.7 Jordan Syatt: You’re saying it like an American, I don’t know if that’s how the…

0:33:00.5 Mike Vacanti: Oh, yeah. B-O-R-G-E is his first name, Borge, I believe. And then F-A-G-E-R-L-I. So I apologize if I mispronounced it, to Borge. But I would take him doing calipers plus looking at a physique over a DEXA by itself.

0:33:17.4 Jordan Syatt: A hundred percent. I agree. Most people don’t have that. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And if you’re doing the calipers…

0:33:22.2 Mike Vacanti: Well, basically no one.

0:33:24.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. You need the same person doing it and they need to be really, really good at it. And most people are just not good at all.

0:33:30.2 Mike Vacanti: Don’t have that. Yeah.

0:33:31.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. And they have to be honest too. That’s another aspect of it, where it’s like, I don’t think people take that into consideration when someone is doing their calipers. Not only have to be really good, they have to be really blunt and just like, this is it. Not trying to take your feelings into account, not trying to take the cost of their services into account. ‘Cause if they’re also the one doing your programming, they might also be like, “Oh, well, maybe it’s actually less because I want you to think that you’re making progress.” I’ve seen coaches do that, where they say like, “Oh yeah, you’ve lost like eight pounds of fat and built 16 pounds of muscle in the last 16 weeks of working together.” And people believe It.

0:34:09.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. That’s a great point. DEXA is still my number two. I just don’t hold it on the same pedestal. DEXA is, I mean, it’s really number one because autopsy is not realistic.

0:34:21.7 Jordan Syatt: Correct.

0:34:25.3 Mike Vacanti: It’s just not the complete end-all be-all. And I still really like waist measurement and scale weight, both taking averages over time as a way to assess progress.

0:34:42.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I also, do you recommend people, like everyday people, get their body fat taken? Is that something you’re like, “Hey, Sally, John,” who are just everyday people, are you like, “Hey, you need to get your body fat taken?”

0:35:02.9 Mike Vacanti: Definitely not need. I’m not requiring it ever. I’ve had clients express interest in knowing, and I’ve had clients express interest oftentimes when wanting tangible, measurable goals that aren’t just the scale. So they’re over the phase of like the scale is the end-all be-all, and I want to look at something else. Strength is a really good place to go on that. So on lifts that they want to be doing, could be big three, could be any exercises. Are you getting stronger over time? But it could also be something like a DEXA, where we’re measuring body fat and lean tissue over time as well. But no, it’s definitely not a requirement.

0:35:50.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I found getting body fat and lean mass measured can be really great for someone who’s got a lot of weight to lose and like is early on in they’re like newbie gains, like they’re building more muscle more quickly, losing fat more quickly. But as someone approaches more of an intermediate, they don’t have… I don’t know, maybe we’ve got 20 pounds, 30 pounds to lose of fat. And they’ve already been lifting a couple of years. You start measuring body fat and muscle mass, it gets really depressing. It gets… If you’re… And nevermind like the standard of error that’s there. It’s like they could be doing everything right, they could have lost a couple of pounds of fat, but whatever the reading is, it told them that they might’ve actually gained a pound of fat and they lost muscle. Like the readings aren’t 100% accurate. And with the scale, you can say, “Hey, there are many different things going on.” Like there are so many variables that aren’t considered. And so it’s easy for it to not get in your head. If you get a reading that tells you no matter… That you’ve been working super hard the last 12 weeks, and it gives you an incorrect reading, but it tells you that your body fat is up and muscle is down or that your body fat barely went down and your muscle didn’t gain or barely gained. You’re like, “What the fuck? Like, why am I even doing this? I’m going to get on steroids.” [laughter]

0:37:12.6 Mike Vacanti: Or quit. Or quit, or go the opposite, “I’m done lifting. This doesn’t work.”

0:37:15.2 Jordan Syatt: “This is stupid. It’s my genetics. It’s my age. Like it just doesn’t work. This program doesn’t work.” Whatever. Yeah.

0:37:20.5 Mike Vacanti: That’s an amazing point. It can be very discouraging, which is why I’m never the one forcing it upon a client. If a client expresses interest, I will support it, but I’ll support it on the backend of bluntly and objectively laying out expectations properly. Okay. You’ve been training for this long. Here is research that shows that the expected rate of muscle gain per year for someone in, male versus female, how many years of like proper training experience you can expect to gain about this much muscle per year, which is much less than you’re expecting, which is this much per month. Like really setting a proper expectations is necessary if you’re going to do that, because, like you said, it can be extremely discouraging, especially when you factor in the margin of safety or the margin of error.

0:38:14.2 Jordan Syatt: “Just struggling. I’m burnt out for my job and I want a career change. I’m feeling stuck.”

0:38:18.3 Mike Vacanti: I love it. Might be a little too vague, but I love it.

0:38:21.2 Jordan Syatt: “Love it. [laughter] Feeling stuck,” why?

0:38:26.5 Mike Vacanti: It’s an opportunity.

0:38:27.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:38:28.4 Mike Vacanti: It’s an opportunity.

0:38:30.2 Jordan Syatt: That’s all you want to say?

0:38:31.8 Mike Vacanti: I don’t think we can say more without context. How old are you? What are your responsibilities? Do you have a family? What are your financial responsibilities? What is your career? How long have you been doing it? How long have you felt stuck? Like are there other factors that could be contributing to this? I don’t have enough context. I might just end up giving bad advice.

0:38:50.6 Jordan Syatt: No. No. I mean, you know what’s really cool? We live in literally the only time that this has ever happened, and the only time in the history of the entire world in which you could start a business from your phone.

0:39:12.7 Mike Vacanti: True.

0:39:13.4 Jordan Syatt: Like you could start a business without having to leave your job.

0:39:17.1 Mike Vacanti: True.

0:39:18.1 Jordan Syatt: You could start your own business without having to leave your current job. You could start a business without having to even tell anyone that you’re starting a business. There are like faceless, nameless social media accounts, businesses. Now, I’m not saying it’s easy at all. It is insanely difficult, but it has never been easier and more accessible to start something, to start your own business, your own venture, from the palm of your hand, wherever you are, as long as you have internet.

0:39:57.5 Mike Vacanti: True.

0:39:58.0 Jordan Syatt: That’s it. So I very much relate to and understand and empathize with the struggling, burnt out, and like you said, looking at it as an opportunity. The good news is you were born at the right time and you won the lottery in that you’ve got a fucking smartphone, you’re even writing this in a Q&A. You just wrote that. You took the time to write it. You’ve won the lottery in terms of time and place of being born. If you want to make a change, you could. It’s there, and you don’t have to sacrifice, you don’t have to leave your job. You don’t have to. You will have to sacrifice something. Sacrifice time spent with friends or family. Sacrifice time and… Something, you have to… And maybe sacrifice sleep. There will be things you have to sacrifice if you want to make this happen, but it’s doable. It’s there.

0:40:55.1 Mike Vacanti: Chris [redacted] joined the mentorship, working a full-time job, didn’t even really have the desire at the time to leave his full-time job.

0:41:03.8 Jordan Syatt: At all. He explicitly said, he’s like, “I don’t want to leave my full-time job. I just want to do this as a side thing.”

0:41:08.0 Mike Vacanti: Built a full roster of one-on-one online coaching clients. And now, maybe we should bleep his last name. I don’t know if we should say publicly that he’s planning to leave his job, just we’ll bleep his last name.

0:41:22.3 Jordan Syatt: Oh, yeah. We’ll bleep his last name.

0:41:24.0 Mike Vacanti: But, yeah. And he’s moving in that direction.

0:41:27.1 Jordan Syatt: How many years has he been in the mentorship? Is it three years? Four years?

0:41:30.3 Mike Vacanti: I believe it’s four.

0:41:31.7 Jordan Syatt: Four years. I mean that…

0:41:34.8 Mike Vacanti: But he also could have left his job two years ago.

0:41:38.2 Jordan Syatt: Correct. But what I’m saying is it’s like, it takes a long time. And not only is it four years, it’s four years of him working insanely hard. And I think he has three kids. Does he have two or three kids, I think?

0:41:50.7 Mike Vacanti: Just had another one.

0:41:51.9 Jordan Syatt: This one’s third?

0:41:52.8 Mike Vacanti: Uh-huh.

0:41:53.4 Jordan Syatt: He has three kids, and a full-time job, and he’s a huge football fan. Football season, he’s all that stuff. He’s a big sports guy in general.

0:42:08.2 Mike Vacanti: He’s got a lot of things going on. Yeah. But like you said, something was sacrificed…

0:42:12.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, correct.

0:42:13.4 Mike Vacanti: To grow the business, to write the articles, to make all the social media posts, to help serve his clients. It takes time. But I think for the person who asked this question, I think Jordan laid it out perfectly, which is a perspective shift toward the opportunity that you have to grow a business that you would enjoy more than what you’re doing now without leaving your current job from the comfort of your own home with this tiny little supercomputer that we all carry around with us.

0:42:41.1 Jordan Syatt: Bang.

0:42:41.2 Mike Vacanti: One more rapid fire and then we got a mentorship Q&A to jump over to.

0:42:45.0 Jordan Syatt: “Easy, simple, effective, core workout?” I’m reading this as, what’s a great ab exercise? And it’s not easy. I don’t like that they ask what’s an easy workout. You don’t want an easy workout. That’s number one. But what’s one of your favorite ab exercises?

0:43:03.7 Mike Vacanti: Are we saying easy in the sense that you could do it body weight, so you could do it from anywhere?

0:43:08.3 Jordan Syatt: We could reframe that as easy as accessible.

0:43:13.0 Mike Vacanti: Sure. Do you want to start? I can start rattling them off.

0:43:15.9 Jordan Syatt: I would say I’m a big fan of… There are different type of ab movements, so we could do like isometric, whether it’s a single leg plank, or a reaching plank, really big fan of those. If we’re also using that same more isometric anti-rotation, big fan of Pallof presses. I really like those a lot. I would say, from a more movement-based and flexion-based, I love leg raises. L-sits, leg raises, big fan of those, for sure. I really like reverse crunches, huge fan of reverse crunches. I would say cable core rotations are awesome as well. Really big fan of those. Those are a bunch of my favorites.

0:44:07.5 Mike Vacanti: Me too, brother. Me too. What can I add? A Russian Twist is a less equipment-intensive way to get very similar rotation. Yeah. I mean, even like other isometrics are coming to mind, advanced variations of planking, like a long lever plank, or like a body saw plank. Even like a, what do you call it? A pot stir plank. If you have an exercise ball and you want to…

0:44:45.6 Jordan Syatt: Stir-the-pot.

0:44:46.8 Mike Vacanti: Plank on that and stir the pot or draw numbers or draw letters. That’s super challenging trying to do that without letting your hips drop, without getting into lumbar extension, but keeping those abs firing. A cable crunch is a good flexion-based. I actually don’t hate the, depends on the machine, but just a crunch machine, assuming that it allows you to get a big enough stretch at the top of each rep, which isn’t always the case.

0:45:20.7 Jordan Syatt: Bro, you know what crunch machine I love? I want to buy one of these. I’m not going to, ’cause it’s just outrageous, but I love the crunch machine where your upper body is stable, but your lower, it’s basically a leg raise, but it’s sliding. It’s like, it’s on that slider where your knees are on that little pad and it slides up and down you could do it sideways as well. I fucking love that machine ’cause you can get a huge stretch on the way down and it, oh my gosh, yeah. That’s such a good one.

0:45:52.6 Mike Vacanti: That is a good machine. Hanging leg raise, hanging knee raise. I actually like hanging knee raises more than hanging leg raises once you’ve progressed to a certain level, but doing it with straps, it just, and I mean the… What do you even call those? They’re not wrist straps, they’re straps with the carabiners, so you’re not use…

0:46:14.0 Jordan Syatt: Elbow, like they’re elbow… You put your elbows…

0:46:14.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, they come around your tricep. Yeah. Those are great just because they take the grip strength out of it. They take the fatiguing on your shoulder, on your forearms, and so you can really just focus on your abs. Yeah. There’s an incomprehensive but solid list of ab workouts, not easy, but ab workouts that will work. We got to go. We’re out of time. Great episode. We’ll be back next week. Thank you for listening. We appreciate you.

0:46:42.8 Jordan Syatt: Five-star review. Five-star review. Leave on, please.

0:46:43.2 Mike Vacanti: Please, please, please, please, please Spotify, Apple, anywhere where you’re listening to your podcasts, thumbs up, written review, five stars, help us a lot. Thank you so much. Have a great week. 

0:46:53.6 Jordan Syatt: See ya.