Episode 194: Staying Motivated When You Want to Give Up, Tips for Avoiding Excessive Soreness, Running vs Walking for Cardio, & More…

0:00:12.0 Mike Vacanti: Hello, Jordan.

0:00:12.5 Jordan Syatt: What’s up, Michael?

0:00:15.1 Mike Vacanti: Bro. How many times a year do we run a sale for the mentorship?

0:00:18.8 Jordan Syatt: Once, maybe twice. Maybe.

0:00:20.4 Mike Vacanti: Correct. I don’t think we’ve ever done it more than twice in a year, usually…

0:00:23.9 Jordan Syatt: Never.

0:00:24.6 Mike Vacanti: Once per year. Sometimes twice per year. We had one back in the spring that went really well. We are likely going to do a Black Friday mentorship launch. Now we know that’s a ways away, many weeks away, but we’ve gotten feedback in the past that it’d be nice to give a little bit of a heads up, so we’re not gonna beat a dead horse here, but if you might be interested in joining the Fitness Business Mentorship for a pretty significant discount here in the next several weeks, jump on our email list, it’s in the YouTube description, it’s in the show notes, and you’ll get a heads up when that’s coming.

0:01:00.5 Jordan Syatt: And just so you know, if we do two sales in a year, one sale is a discount and the next sale is the last time you’ll get it at that price.

0:01:14.6 Mike Vacanti: That’s how we’ve done it. Yes.

0:01:15.4 Jordan Syatt: That’s historically how we’ve done it. So if you want to get in at the lowest price it’s going to be ever, this is when you do it, right? So at this time, we’re actually gonna have a sale, I think we’re gonna have a percentage off the joining price, but this is one of two times in which this will be the lowest price you’ll ever be able to get it.

0:01:40.3 Mike Vacanti: Correct.

0:01:41.3 Jordan Syatt: Like this is it, so save up some money if you wanna join and that’s it. Just keep that in mind.

0:01:50.8 Mike Vacanti: Jordan, I actually don’t have much. We have our questions that we pre-announced that we’re going to get to.

0:02:00.6 Jordan Syatt: Oh, I forgot about those.

0:02:01.6 Mike Vacanti: Well, I did not.

[chuckle]

0:02:08.9 Mike Vacanti: I don’t have a lot prepped, and I think it’s mostly uninteresting to the audience.

0:02:11.7 Jordan Syatt: I doubt it. Let’s hear it.

0:02:13.7 Mike Vacanti: If anyone’s looking for an amazing Spotify channel for their workouts… Do you use Spotify?

0:02:20.4 Jordan Syatt: I did when I had the Samsung, and now that I have my iPhone, I don’t, no. And I don’t really listen to music very much, it’s usually either podcasts or audiobooks.

0:02:30.8 Mike Vacanti: The Foo Fighters’ Best of Me or Foo Fighters’ Everlong “Radio” on Spotify. So you can pick a song and then click the song and say, Go to radio, and it gives you based on your preferences as well as similar songs, gives you a whole playlist related to that song, are amazing. You would actually really like it.

0:02:57.1 Jordan Syatt: I would?

0:02:58.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:02:58.9 Jordan Syatt: Why? Because we have similar taste in music?

0:03:01.3 Mike Vacanti: I think we overlap, I think younger Jordan and younger Mike both overlap on a lot of these songs that are angry/stimulating for heavy lifting.

0:03:14.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is there like Breaking Benjamin on there?

0:03:16.4 Mike Vacanti: Breaking Benjamin, Puddle of Mudd Blurry.

0:03:18.4 Jordan Syatt: Nice.

0:03:21.0 Mike Vacanti: I Hate Everything About You. Basically, if you were born between ’85 and ’95 and you wanna have a really good lift, give it a roll.

0:03:27.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I like that. People ask me for my list all the time, I just… I don’t have one, so I think people will like that one.

0:03:32.9 Mike Vacanti: Good. The other minor announcement I have is just an interesting data point. Over the last eight years since 2016, I’ve primarily been on an upper/lower split for really the better part of those eight years, and only recently was I like, what am I doing? Why am I training upper and lower body 50-50? I don’t care about those body parts equally, I don’t enjoy the movement patterns equally, I need to get back on a more bro-ey upper body, not even focused, but just a more reasonable ratio of upper to lower training, so I went to three days a week, two uppers and one lower over the… And it’s gone famously. I’m continuing to make strength gains on every single exercise on my lower body days, training once a week. I was feeling run down over the past week and took an extra rest day between each workout, so instead of one day between, I took two days between. So basically, instead of seven days between leg days, we’re pushing 10 days between leg days.

0:04:35.1 Jordan Syatt: Oh wow, nice.

0:04:36.2 Mike Vacanti: And I could have jumped out of the gym today, went up on everything in weights, went up on reps, everything felt amazing. I don’t wanna give too much of a head nod to the… I guess that Mike Mentzer movement is starting to cool down with the super low volume, super high intensity, but reducing frequency while keeping volume the same has started to feel really good for me and possibly because it was a change. It was different than how I had been training. But I think there’s something there.

0:05:14.4 Jordan Syatt: I think there’s a lot there, especially the higher level you get. I think high intermediate to advanced trainee, you have the capacity to put so much intensity into your lower body days that a longer rest can really do incredible things, especially I would say, if you’re trying to optimize growth, then that’s probably not the best choice, but if you’re trying to optimize… I wouldn’t say… If you’re trying to be able to get stronger with minimal fatigue, once every 10 days a really heavy lower body lift, I think is a really good strategy.

0:06:03.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. And one of the reasons I historically avoided it was because I like the movement associated with lower body training, and you could just do some easy, whether it’s light training or mobility work twice in between those 10 days. But I never did that. If I was in the gym doing legs, I wasn’t gonna do a light leg day, I would just go hard, but yeah, you’re absolutely right. In terms of, if you wanna build muscle, getting more volume into a shorter period of time is going to be beneficial. Hey man, feeling really good.

0:06:39.3 Jordan Syatt: When I was near my peak strength, I was deadlifting heavy once every 10 days, and I would have like a speed and accessory day in between that, but it wasn’t heavy. I had a one heavy lower body day every 10 days, and that’s when I would deadlift. Otherwise, it was like one more speed accessory based day. I think there’s a lot to be said for that, and for a beginner, I think it makes sense to have it more frequently as well because of the technique improvements, because just the greater exposures, all of that, they can generally handle more volume, they’re also probably not lifting…

0:07:16.8 Mike Vacanti: Unable to push intensity.

0:07:18.0 Jordan Syatt: Exactly, but as you reach a higher level of strength and proficiency, sometimes you need it, sometimes a week isn’t enough for me to… It’s just not enough.

0:07:32.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. And it depends on your ability to recover, which is driven in large part by lifestyle. How much are you sleeping? How stressed are you? How much is training a priority relative to work or relative to family, or relative to… Are you trying to add muscle and strength and you don’t care as much about body comp, and so you can have more calories to play with? Or are you trying to stay lean in the process, which is gonna make it harder to recover from those workouts. All of these are factors that determine how ready you’ll be and when you’ll be ready for your next heavy training session.

0:08:09.2 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yep. I’ll keep you updated on that, yeah.

0:08:12.7 Mike Vacanti: How’s your training going? Little barbell, barbell upper body work lately, you’ve gotten into?

0:08:19.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I’m sore. I’m sore. I’ve been doing the Inner Circle workouts for a long time now. I’ve been doing the three-day week push-pull legs, and I really like it. Lately, by lately I mean for the past year, any time there’s been barbell work, I’ve just subbed it for dumbbell work, only just because I wasn’t really interested in doing the barbell stuff. I was like, ah, I don’t really wanna do the barbell stuff, I just… I have this rack of dumbbells and I was just more interested in doing dumbbell stuff. And then yesterday I started the new program, and it was like barbell, bench press and overhead press, and I was like, you know what, I feel like doing some barbell work, so I got some barbell in there, woke up today super freaking sore, like super freaking sore. So yeah.

0:09:06.9 Mike Vacanti: A barbell upper body push day? Have you any other barbell work?

0:09:12.9 Jordan Syatt: Deadlifts. Yeah, deadlifts, Romanian deadlifts. I would do barbell stuff for my lower body.

0:09:17.9 Mike Vacanti: Sorry. I just mean this week, are you sore just from the push day or have you done a pull day too?

0:09:22.2 Jordan Syatt: Oh no, just from the push day, just from the push day. A pull would be… I’m trying to decide when I’m gonna do the pull.

0:09:26.4 Mike Vacanti: Friday?

0:09:28.3 Jordan Syatt: No. Yeah, Friday is probably gonna be my side split Day. So either… Wow, today’s Thursday.

0:09:34.2 Mike Vacanti: Did you lift upper Monday or Tuesday?

0:09:36.0 Jordan Syatt: Yesterday. Wasn’t it yesterday that I did that?

0:09:38.1 Mike Vacanti: Got it. Yeah, then it does make sense to wait till Saturday or Sunday to hit upper pull.

0:09:42.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. So I’ll probably just do cardio today, splits tomorrow, and then upper pull on Saturday.

0:09:47.9 Mike Vacanti: I like it. It’s fun to mix it up.

0:09:50.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. No, it feels really good. The barbell stuff… And it’s funny, it’s a whole different skill. It really is a whole different skill that when you’re doing it, you don’t even think about it. But then, like, man, barbell, it’s, there’s so much that goes into it. The grip on it, the range of motion changes relative to dumbbells. It’s, even the unrack, like barbell bench press unrack plays a huge role in how you’re going to do, especially on that first rep, which sets the tone for the rest. It’s fun. It really is fun. And I haven’t really done it much for the last year.

0:10:25.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, dumbbells are, I don’t wanna say easier, but more comfortable. I think for most people especially who have a lot of training experience, end up prefer training… Not everyone, but the majority end up prefer training more with dumbbells than barbells.

0:10:44.5 Jordan Syatt: You know what it was for me? You know why I didn’t wanna do the barbells for like the last year? Is just because I didn’t wanna have to load the bar and unload the bar.

0:10:53.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. You hate that. Which is…

0:10:54.9 Jordan Syatt: It’s just annoying. And it’s like, it was like eh, I’ll just get the dumbbells, just have to pick them up and put them back, that’s it. And yesterday I ended up having more time than I expected. So I was like, you know what? I’m feeling loading this bar up. You know, you gotta change the height on the rack and then you gotta get the bar, then you’ve gotta load all the weights and it’s just dumbbells are so much more convenient from that perspective. It’s like, and I get to… The other thing I like about dumbbells is I can really play with my positioning. Like I can rotate my wrists wherever I want them to go, and I can… And not even just like within the range that we’re used to, but like, I’m really playing with this mobility stuff full body.

0:11:36.2 Jordan Syatt: And so like, I’m playing with different ranges and elbows out here and going really deep down and rotating my wrists out. It’s just fun to take my joints to these different ranges where with a barbell, you’re really locked in, which I think is really great from a maximal strength perspective. And when you’re really in a power lifting mode, it’s fun. Like, I really enjoyed it, but for the last year I was like, I just don’t wanna fucking load that bar and unload the bar. It just takes time away from that I could just be doing other stuff.

0:12:03.4 Mike Vacanti: I actually find it more annoying doing… For upper body, I find it more annoying with dumbbells, like racking and unracking.

0:12:11.1 Jordan Syatt: Oh, really?

0:12:12.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, it’s…

0:12:13.1 Jordan Syatt: Oh, interesting.

0:12:14.2 Mike Vacanti: Loading a 45 onto a barbell for a barbell bench press is a very easy movement compared to unracking heavy dumbbells and then walking them to the bench and then sitting on the bench. And then, I basically assaulted you with Instagram Reels yesterday. And I’m trying to remember if I sent this…

0:12:33.0 Jordan Syatt: My wife was like, what is he sending? I was like, Mike has sent me like 12 reels. When Mike is on Instagram, he’ll send me a lot. [laughter] I did watch them all, though.

0:12:42.3 Mike Vacanti: You watched it? I don’t think I sent this one, but there was one of a guy and he looked, he was unracking 90s, and he was wearing these weird clothes and he was walking very like, wobbly to the bench with a 90-pound dumbbell in each hand.

0:13:00.7 Jordan Syatt: Oh no.

0:13:00.8 Mike Vacanti: And he sits down to dumbbell bench and he like kicks them back into position and couldn’t do one. And I think it was like he uploaded it and I think he uploaded it as comedy. It wasn’t like a mean spirited thing, but the comments were just incredible. But I can relate to that feeling of watching him walk the dumb… Like walking heavy dumbbells to the bench and then getting them in position and then kicking them up and get… Especially on a shoulder press. But even on a bench press, it’s like, that is, that’s more energy expending to me than the, like loading a barbell up for a barbell bench.

0:13:35.2 Mike Vacanti: For deadlifts and for hip thrusts I agree with you because you’re bent over, you gotta like pick the barbell up. It’s more of a process.

0:13:41.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. And more plates.

0:13:45.4 Mike Vacanti: More plates.

0:13:45.5 Jordan Syatt: We’re not bench pressing multiple plates, we’re not benching 405.

0:13:50.8 Mike Vacanti: But even if I was, I’d rather load 495 onto a barbell bench than RDL 225, because the position of loading a bench is so easy compared to loading a bar on the ground.

0:14:08.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Yeah. That makes sense.

0:14:11.4 Mike Vacanti: Dude I actually, I never realized it until this conversation. I don’t like unracking dumbbells for dumbbell bench. Especially if you’re doing a, like an RPT or a pyramid where you’re not doing straight sets with the same weight.

0:14:24.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. ‘Cause you have to go back and forth and back forth, yeah.

0:14:26.6 Mike Vacanti: You gotta go back and forth with three different sets of heavy dumbbells. It’s like, this is brutal.

0:14:30.7 Jordan Syatt: No, whatever my top, whatever my set is, like, whatever weight I get, that’s my weight. And I’ve gotten to a point where I don’t do warmup sets. I’m just like alright…

0:14:43.2 Mike Vacanti: Well, Jordan, that’s…

0:14:43.3 Jordan Syatt: This is…

0:14:43.7 Mike Vacanti: We gotta… That’s not good.

0:14:45.1 Jordan Syatt: I’m tired of walking back and forth and I’m…

0:14:47.4 Mike Vacanti: Oh, with dumbbells. I see. Yeah.

0:14:48.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. With the dumbbells, I just… With barbell I do warmup sets. With the dumbbells, I’m like, all right. Alright, 65s, that’s just, and like, I’ll warm up first, like I’ll do a warmup, but I don’t warm up with dumbbells ’cause I don’t want to have to go back and forth and back and forth with the dumbbells. I’ve become such a lazy lifter. I really am.

0:15:08.4 Mike Vacanti: Can you promise me something? Can you do one set of, can you please do one set of 15 reps with like 30s, like something just below 50% before?

0:15:21.5 Jordan Syatt: No.

0:15:22.9 Mike Vacanti: Not even on every move. Just on your first move of the day, please.

0:15:23.5 Jordan Syatt: With a barbell I’d do it, but with dumbbells, no. But you know what’s interesting? This is actually, so I heard Hunter Cook, @hunterfitness talking about this. Man, and it really resonated with me. I really, I like Hunter a lot.

0:15:39.0 Mike Vacanti: Are you about to make an argument against warming up?

0:15:42.7 Jordan Syatt: No, I’m not gonna make an argument against it. I’m gonna make an argument against, I’m gonna make an argument about how important this type of mobility and joint work is to allow you to handle these things without necessarily warming up. It’s not against warmup. I still think warmup is really important, but what he was saying is he was like, a lot of this end range joint range of motion strength training is so helpful because it allows you to be much more resistant to injury and you’re getting stronger in these, I can see you with that shit-eating grin on your face.

0:16:21.9 Mike Vacanti: I’m not grinning.

0:16:23.4 Jordan Syatt: You are, I see it.

0:16:23.5 Mike Vacanti: If anything, it’s a poop-eating frown if anything, but keep going.

0:16:28.4 Jordan Syatt: But basically it’s like, it gives you an opportunity to be stronger and be more resistant against injury in these… ‘Cause like for example, one of the main reasons we train is not just to be able to lift heavy in the moment, but also like if God forbid you need something, like you don’t have to go through a fricking warmup in a life or death situation, that you just gotta go, you gotta do something, you gotta sprint, you gotta catch whatever, you don’t want your…

0:16:54.7 Mike Vacanti: Adrenaline helps. Adrenaline.

0:16:57.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. But that’s, so basically, and for whatever it’s worth, this was Louie’s argument against a warmup. This was always like Louie Simmons’… He’d always be like, you didn’t get to warm up before the lions started chasing you. [laughter]

0:17:11.9 Mike Vacanti: You had a flood of hormones.

0:17:13.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. You just, all right, you go! So I still warm up and I’ll still do pushups. Like I’ll do pushups before I’m about to go do the dumbbell bench press.

0:17:21.9 Mike Vacanti: Good. I like that. I like that.

0:17:23.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Which is basically the same thing without the… The lack of stabilization.

0:17:30.8 Mike Vacanti: Yes. You’re getting blood.

0:17:33.9 Jordan Syatt: But I’m still getting blood flow to it, lubricating the joints. Like I still do that, but like…

0:17:37.3 Mike Vacanti: Okay. So you do warm up?

0:17:38.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I do warm up, but I’m not going back and forth here. I’m, okay, 20s and then 40s and then 50s, and then it’s like, no, I’m just, I’m not doing that.

0:17:45.9 Mike Vacanti: All right. I’m gonna leave that there. I’m not gonna, I’m not gonna take that bait. I would not recommend that, especially for someone…

0:17:51.7 Jordan Syatt: I don’t recommend it to anybody. I don’t recommend it to anybody.

0:17:54.5 Mike Vacanti: Especially for like any coaching clients, anyone in the inner circle. Like people who aren’t on your level of experience.

0:18:01.8 Jordan Syatt: Exactly.

0:18:05.6 Mike Vacanti: And even if they are, if they wanted to perform optimally, like doing some reps at less than 50% is gonna be better than not doing anything for performance.

0:18:15.0 Jordan Syatt: A hundred percent.

0:18:17.5 Mike Vacanti: But yeah, I think the middle ground we could find is that if you took two people and neither did any warming up and just did working sets, the one who spent time doing more flexibility and mobility training is gonna be more resistant to injury.

0:18:36.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah.

0:18:37.3 Mike Vacanti: For sure.

0:18:38.7 Jordan Syatt: Correct.

0:18:39.1 Mike Vacanti: I would say do both. Do flexibility mobility training and warmup.

0:18:42.0 Jordan Syatt: Correct, that’s like a do what I say, not what I do type thing. And really, it’s, I’m trying to get in and out of the gym as fast as I can. You know, like I’m in the garage, I’m like, I gotta be here for my wife, my kids, like my wife is working out right now. So like, so she gets her time, I get my time and it’s like, we just gotta get in and get out as fast as we possibly can. So I think it would be different if I had a more leisurely approach to my workout.

0:19:08.2 Mike Vacanti: It’s for efficiency.

0:19:09.4 Jordan Syatt: And laziness. There is laziness there.

0:19:10.5 Mike Vacanti: I think it’s more efficiency.

0:19:13.8 Jordan Syatt: I’ll take That.

0:19:13.9 Mike Vacanti: I also think it’s a lack of desire for maximal strength or muscle. Like you…

0:19:21.1 Jordan Syatt: A hundred percent. Yeah.

0:19:23.1 Mike Vacanti: Your working weight probably isn’t your working weight if you had six months to get as strong and add as much muscle as possible. You would probably start at a higher weight than you’re using right now.

0:19:34.9 Jordan Syatt: Yes, for sure. I’m not going super hard. I’m doing 65s for 6-8 on my dumbbell bench press sets, which is great, but it’s nowhere near my max.

0:19:48.5 Mike Vacanti: What you could do in the past or, yeah.

0:19:51.0 Jordan Syatt: Correct. And it’s not my priority. Like, I put so much effort into my splits training right now that by the time I get to my upper body days, I’m just like, all right, this is more just, I wanna maintain my muscle, maintain my strength. It’s not even out of enjoyment. Like, I’m not even like, yeah, this is fun. It’s more of like the, this is like a health thing that I have to do, not like a… My fun workouts are different.

0:20:16.2 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, you’re a hardcore stretcher who lifts sometimes. You’re not a hardcore lifter who will stretch now and again.

0:20:21.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. And that’ll change. I go through phases, but that’s where I am right now.

0:20:24.0 Mike Vacanti: Right now. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That Wasn’t.

0:20:26.9 Jordan Syatt: Eventually, yeah, it was a dig, but it’s okay.

0:20:29.6 Mike Vacanti: No, it wasn’t, because people don’t understand how intensely you stretch. Well, maybe they do because you’re probably posting about it a lot, but some people might not understand.

0:20:42.5 Jordan Syatt: I think some of them see it, but they don’t really understand.

0:20:45.3 Mike Vacanti: How hard it is.

0:20:46.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. That it’s like, my wife didn’t get it until she walked out in the garage one day and she was like, what the fuck? Like, I’ve posted about it on social media and she was always like, you’re just stretching? Like, she was like, what are you doing? And then she walked out one day while I was doing it and she was like, oh my gosh. Like that is actually crazy. Like legit strength training. But for probably the first like six months, she was like, so you just stretch?

[laughter]

0:21:12.7 Mike Vacanti: Was any part of you demotivated to stretch? ‘Cause you’re like, man, my wife thinks I’m just a puss out here, like, stretching.

0:21:18.5 Jordan Syatt: No, I was like, I would get competitive. I’d be like, come out, come out and try it with me.

0:21:22.6 Mike Vacanti: Come out. You try it.

0:21:27.1 Jordan Syatt: There was actually one time where she did. Hold on, let me see if I can find this picture really quick. I think I like took a screenshot of it recently. ‘Cause there was one time where she was like, I could do that.

0:21:34.9 Mike Vacanti: Oh, you showed me her split. I actually thought her splits were pretty good.

0:21:38.1 Jordan Syatt: Her pancake, hold on. No, it wasn’t. And she was like, oh my gosh, I can’t, ’cause she thought that it was really, really good. And I was like, oh, you think that’s good? Let me grab a picture of this really quick.

0:21:49.7 Mike Vacanti: It felt good while she was doing it?

0:21:51.2 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. She was like, I think I’m like, I’m where you are. It was the pancake splits and like, she thought she was reaching really far down. Oh yeah. Here it is. So hold on. So this is what I’m doing. And she’s like, oh, I can do that. And she…

0:22:13.3 Mike Vacanti: I don’t think hers looked that bad. Thatta girl, NeeNee. Yeah. Yours looks better. Yours looks better. But you’ve been training it for quite some time.

0:22:21.1 Jordan Syatt: That’s what I’m saying. People…

0:22:21.4 Mike Vacanti: Wait, hang on, hang on, hang on. Hang on. In fairness, she’s just reaching and you have assistance, right?

0:22:29.1 Jordan Syatt: Correct. Correct. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Correct.

0:22:29.1 Mike Vacanti: All right. Let’s go apples to apples here. I still, I mean, yours looks amazing.

0:22:36.2 Jordan Syatt: Thank you, brother. I appreciate that.

0:22:37.9 Mike Vacanti: I don’t hate hers. I’m like, I had not…

0:22:40.6 Jordan Syatt: Listen, I don’t hate it either. I don’t hate it either.

0:22:43.1 Mike Vacanti: Do you remember…

0:22:43.2 Jordan Syatt: I’m just saying that…

0:22:43.3 Mike Vacanti: Do you remember the time…

0:22:44.1 Mike Vacanti: If I’m gonna get called out, then we’re gonna have a competition.

0:22:46.5 Mike Vacanti: Do you remember the time I was in Florida and sent you a picture? I found a picture of, I didn’t find, like something came across my Twitter feed back when I was into that terrible app that just serves up like death and nudity, someone doing a pancake who somewhat looked like me and you couldn’t see his face and I sent it to you.

0:23:07.2 Jordan Syatt: Oh, yeah.

0:23:07.8 Mike Vacanti: And I sent it to you. I was like, bro, ’cause he was in some tropical location. And I was like, bro, down in Florida. Like, check this pancake.

0:23:15.6 Jordan Syatt: What did I say?

0:23:17.2 Mike Vacanti: You said if that was you doing the pancake, I would be so pissed. February 16th, 2024.

[laughter]

0:23:26.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, because at first glance, it did look like you. And I think that was not long after I had seen you squat, ass to grass here on the podcast. And I was like, oh, wow. Like you’ve got legit mobility.

0:23:39.5 Mike Vacanti: It was, because you, for some reason you have it in your mind that, or you did maybe a year ago that my mobility wasn’t that good despite my lateral lunge, despite that squat. Here’s what, I didn’t even say anything. I sent you the picture with like the pancake emoji with the butter and syrup on it.

[laughter]

0:23:58.8 Jordan Syatt: I remember I looked at that. I was like, at first I was like, what the fuck? And I was like, okay. That’s definitely not.

0:24:03.7 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. This is wild, though. This is…

0:24:08.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, it’s an insane mobility. It’s absolutely wild.

0:24:11.8 Mike Vacanti: All right. You ready for some questions?

0:24:13.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, For sure. Let’s do it.

0:24:15.3 Mike Vacanti: First up, what motivates you to prioritize fitness or healthy eating when you want to give up?

0:24:22.3 Jordan Syatt: Do you want me to go first or you wanna go first?

0:24:23.1 Mike Vacanti: You can go first. And do we wanna answer this as it’s asked, which is, you know, this person asking us, or do we wanna answer it like a coach talking to somebody who isn’t us?

0:24:36.2 Jordan Syatt: I think we should answer it as us.

0:24:37.6 Mike Vacanti: Cool.

0:24:37.9 Jordan Syatt: And I’m sure the coach will come out, but like, so what motivates you to prioritize health and fitness?

0:24:44.3 Mike Vacanti: I think the most important part of it is when you want to give up.

0:24:49.2 Jordan Syatt: But I wanted to… Was the question health and fitness?

0:24:51.1 Mike Vacanti: What motivates you to prioritize fitness or healthy eating?

0:24:53.5 Jordan Syatt: Oh, fitness. Okay. So, you know, it’s funny the way that they phrase it this way because I would imagine if you really got down to it, they’re probably saying like, what motivates you to do this stuff specifically for fat loss? Like, I would imagine it’s coming from a fat loss perspective because for me the, when it’s fitness and healthy eating, it’s a no-brainer. It’s like, because I know that prioritizing this is going to help me live a better life. Like, there’s a no-brainer. And from the health perspective and lifelong perspective, it’s so much easier to comprehend and conceptualize that this is a forever thing. It’s just like, this is just, this is forever. Right? And so if you’re looking at it from a health perspective, it’s really a no-brainer. And I think a lot of it comes from fear, right?

0:25:42.9 Jordan Syatt: Not wanting to die early. Comes from the place of not being here for my family, all of that stuff. So it’s just a no-brainer from that perspective. It’s also because even if I am not seeing the progress that I want to see in terms of like, rate of progress, I know that I feel better and I’m a happier, better person when I’m trying to do it versus when I’m not doing it. Right? If we’re looking at, okay, well, you can either keep doing it or you cannot do it, I’m a better individual when I try to do it. Even if I’m not seeing the progress that I want, I’m a better person for it.

0:26:20.5 Jordan Syatt: Going to what I would imagine this person is actually talking about from a fat loss perspective, how do you stay motivated? I go back to what I just said. It’s like you’re a better person. The alternative is just to quit. And then at some point after you quit, you’re gonna want to get back on track anyway. ‘Cause at some point you’re gonna be sick of yourself. At some point you’re gonna be like, all right, well, I gotta do it over again. Might as well just keep fucking going. It’s like, it’s just a no-brainer for me because I know that I’m a better person when I’m trying versus when I’m not trying.

0:26:49.1 Mike Vacanti: I love it. I think you’re getting at something good too when you talk about what’s the alternative to doing it, because there really isn’t an alternative, right? Like, there’s no giving up because we are all active and we all eat food. Like, you can give up playing hockey, right? One day you can be like, I give up hockey and I’m never playing again. You can’t give up eating and movement because as humans, we have to do both, right? So it’s not like you’re either doing it or not doing it. And if you give up, you’re not doing it anymore. It’s completely on a spectrum. Rather than a binary, it’s completely on a spectrum. So it’s not do it or not do it, it’s how well or how poorly, like, do I wanna, you know, maybe if I am extraordinarily adherent at 90-95%, and that’s leading to me feeling really demotivated, maybe I crank it down to 70%.

0:27:45.6 Mike Vacanti: Maybe I take more rest days. Maybe I eat more “unclean foods.” Maybe I go enjoy time with family. Maybe I take a diet break. Maybe I do these things that are less optimal for health and fitness, but because I was feeling demotivated, make my life better, make other parts of my life better. But that’s not giving up, right? It’s not zero to 100. It’s just turning the dial down a little bit and knowing in the future, I’m gonna turn the dial back up when I want to start making progress again, or when I want to start making faster progress or when I am excited about a different goal. But I think conceptualizing it as when I want to give up is not the right way to think about it. Because we’re here, we’re in this life. There’s no, you know, not to be morbid, but like suicide would be the only way you could technically. And that’s not what we’re talking about. We’re not gonna do that. But you can’t, like, literally, you can’t give up. You can turn it down to a one. You can eat 8000 calories per day and take 13 steps, but you’re gonna feel awful. You’re not gonna wanna do that for more than 48 hours.

0:28:57.9 Jordan Syatt: I also think it’s people get so wrapped up in not making progress quickly enough where then they, like, they give up, but they don’t think about…

0:29:04.7 Mike Vacanti: But they can’t give up. They just ratchet way down.

0:29:09.2 Jordan Syatt: They don’t think about how if you stop trying and if you stop, like if you just don’t put in nearly as much effort or any effort at all essentially, as we’re getting older, it’s getting harder and harder and harder. It’s getting more and more difficult, and you’re really fighting against all these natural processes. You’re fighting against age, you’re fighting against everything. And though I think about it as like, imagine you’re trying to climb up a staircase, but as this, as you’re going up the staircase, you’ve got like pretty decently heavy water rushing down the staircase at you. And so it’s making it more and more difficult. So you’re climbing, but you’re climbing slow and you’re holding on. Like, you don’t wanna fall down, you don’t want the water to take you out, take your legs out from underneath you, so you’re climbing, but it’s slow.

0:30:01.4 Jordan Syatt: And this is you trying, you’re trying and your progress is going, but it’s slow. Whereas if you just stop trying altogether and you just lay down and let that water sweep you out, and just, you’re gonna, like, you don’t know how much progress you are saving and how much health you’re saving by just trying. You don’t know like how far, how much further along you are simply because you haven’t given up. But if you decide, you know what, fuck it, I’m done. Well now, whoosh, the legs get out from underneath you, you get thrown way further down that never ending staircase. And then when you decide, okay, well now I’ve gotta try again, you’ve gotta climb all that fucking way back, right? And this isn’t something where it’s like you have one bad meal or you like take a week off training. This is something where it’s like, if you just give up for months and years at a time, you are really setting yourself way further back. It’s like just, it’s just a no-brainer for me. Why would I wanna put myself in that position?

0:31:02.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. And I didn’t answer for me. So I’ll do that now, which is very similar to you, Jordan, what you just said, which is what motivates you to prioritize health, fitness or healthy eating when you want to give up? Because I know I’m going to feel and be a better person when I do prioritize those things. I would go so far as, since I’m talking about me personally, to argue that I have a moral imperative to take care of this body I was given, to the best of my ability, so that I can take care of myself and my loved ones and try and help other people, try to make the world a better place. Like, there’s a responsibility that we all have being humans to take care of ourselves. And that’s not always easy, and it’s gonna ebb and flow over the course of life, right?

0:32:03.0 Mike Vacanti: Like, it’s not a judgment upon people who are struggling with that responsibility, but I believe we have that responsibility. And on to make like another argument. I just know that I’m gonna feel and be better if I do the right thing more often than not. If I’m 80/20 not missing workouts, if I’m 80/20 staying near my calorie range, if I’m 80/20, you know, not going for Oreos versus apple, if I’m for the most part, making the right decision consistently, that’s gonna add up, I’m gonna feel better, I’m gonna move better, I’m gonna be in less pain. I’m gonna have more energy, I’m gonna sleep better, I’m gonna be happier, right? I’m gonna be better over a longer period of time compared to “giving up” or doing worse leads to, oh, I feel pleasure. I feel this like sensation. I feel these brain chemicals that make me feel good in the short term, maybe for an hour, then I feel like crap for many hours. Versus, oh, I feel like I gotta push through this difficulty in the short term, but then I feel better for a longer amount of time.

0:33:04.8 Jordan Syatt: Yep.

0:33:06.5 Mike Vacanti: Tips on getting so sore, I’m unable to work out for multiple days.

0:33:14.3 Jordan Syatt: You know, I’m starting to go the other way with this, like, pushing back against the fitness industry a little bit. So much of the, and I’ve said this many times, but I just see it coming up more and more and more now, people… A lot of people are getting to the point where now they’re not only saying soreness is not indicative of a good workout, which it’s not. Soreness is not indicative of a good workout. You could be sore and have a terrible workout, but I’m seeing people get to a point where basically they’re either saying or insinuating that soreness means nothing. I’m like, okay, well that’s not fucking true. Like, obviously it means something. And I would say that even though soreness is not indicative of a good workout, it’s also not indicative of a bad workout. And I would go so far as to say that if you are never sore, and if you never get sore from your training, then you are not training hard enough.

0:34:12.9 Jordan Syatt: Like if you are never sore, then you’re missing out on good training. ‘Cause good training will often produce soreness. I also think that oftentimes people will use soreness as a justification to not train. It’s like, soreness is not a debilitating illness. It’s not… Like you can go through a warmup and have a good lift. And I’ve found that most of the time, even if I’m really sore, if I just get through my warmup, like, great, I feel good, I’m ready to go. It’s not a problem. Now, if you are so debilitatingly sore that you physically cannot, like no matter what, that you can’t work out, either you’re going way too hard in your training, there’s way too much volume, or you’re being dramatic. It’s one of those. And if you’re going way, way, way, way, way too hard, then that’s dangerous.

0:35:20.4 Jordan Syatt: Rhabdomyolysis is a real freaking problem. People die from that every year, especially in the CrossFit community, when they don’t take it seriously enough and they just, they over-prescribe outrageously high volume and high intensity, and the people die from rhabdomyolysis every year. So, if you legitimately are concerned at your level of soreness, I would go to your doctor and say, Hey, like I’m getting very, very sore. Can we do some blood work? I’m concerned about having rhabdomyolysis. And they can check your kidneys and they can check your blood work to see, like, is something having an issue now based on your level of soreness? And God willing, everything will come back and it’ll be fine, in which case there’s a real chance that you might be being a little bit dramatic with your soreness. And there’s also something to consider where if your own pain tolerance is, let’s say it’s very low, for example. Actually, you know, I wanna say this first. I remember when I first started squatting with a barbell, I’m sure you had the same experience, Mike, when I first started squatting with a barbell, even when the bar was in the right position, it hurt my back even in the right position. Like it took, I don’t know, 4-6 weeks of squatting consistently.

0:36:38.3 Mike Vacanti: How old were you?

0:36:39.5 Jordan Syatt: Fourteen, 15.

0:36:40.0 Mike Vacanti: So when it hurt that first time, did you throw the pad on? Don’t lie.

0:36:45.1 Jordan Syatt: So I tried the pad. No, no. I’m gonna tell you the truth. I tried the pad, but my gym had something called the manta ray. It was this like, light blue thing that…

0:36:55.3 Mike Vacanti: Oh, yeah. Plastic.

0:36:56.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, plastic clipped on. And I started using that. And then one of the teachers in my school, he was like a big powerlifter guy. He was like, don’t use that. He is like, and I was like, okay. And I’m glad that he did. I’m really glad that he did. Because within 4-6 weeks, it no longer hurt my back. Soreness is often the same thing, where it’s like, the first few times you go through it, it’s bad. You’re like, what the fuck? Dude, I remember the first time my glutes got sore. I vividly remember the first time my glutes got really, really sore.

0:37:29.1 Jordan Syatt: I was limping around. I was limping around. And the coach who did it, his name was Kevin McCarthy, he was like, I bet you’ve never felt that before. I was like, I’ve literally never felt this before. And it was like ridiculously uncomfortable. But I did some mobility work, I did my mobilizations and I was able to continue working out. And it’s like, listen, you don’t wanna push through something if you’re really concerned about it, which is why I’m saying go to your doctor and get tested for rhabdo. Make sure you’re safe.

0:37:56.0 Jordan Syatt: If you’re safe and there’s no issues, then potentially think about reducing the eccentric load maybe a little bit instead of doing as much eccentric work, which will cause you to get more sore. But even then, the soreness will dissipate. You will get sore still, but as you get more and more used to it, the soreness will not affect you as much over time.

0:38:22.4 Mike Vacanti: I think you did a really good job of covering that from all angles because… And giving a lot of good advice. Because specific advice depends on so many factors, right? What is this person’s level of training? Are they really sore because these are the first two weeks they’ve ever lifted a weight in their entire life? Cool. That’s super normal. Keep going. It’ll go away. These are the worst DOMS, the worst delayed-onset muscle soreness you’ll ever experience, and it will get better, I promise. Is this someone who is brand new to weightlifting and the very first thing they decide to do is German Volume Training and they’re doing 10 x 10s and they’re going HAM in the gym, well, you’re experiencing soreness because you’re new to lifting. That being said, your program is sub-optimal in that you’re doing way too much training volume for what is necessary for you to make the kind of progress you wanna make. So let’s do way fewer sets and probably stay further away from failure than your training. Is this someone who is on a specialization program, let’s say they’re doing a hamstring specialization program, so they’re at maintenance volume for pretty much everything, but then they’re doing…

0:39:48.7 Mike Vacanti: I don’t know, 40, 50 working sets of hamstrings a week and their hamstrings are super sore. Well, that makes sense that your hamstrings are sore doing that level of volume. There are so many individual factors. I agree with you at a high level that I guess we could boil it down to just because you’re still a little bit sore from your previous training session doesn’t mean you can’t hit that body part again. Especially if you’re trying to build muscle, I would say. It would really help to be able to see this individual’s program.

0:40:27.8 Jordan Syatt: Correct, yeah.

0:40:30.3 Mike Vacanti: And also know his or her nutrition, right. Are you in a surplus or a deficit? You’re gonna be more sore, all else equal if you’re in a 500-calorie deficit, compared to if you’re in a 300-calorie surplus. What does your recovery look like? What does your sleep look like? What does your stress look like relative to the amount of training volume and intensity you’re doing? Because maybe you can’t recover from… Maybe it’s not that you’re “soft” and that this is a normal level of soreness, maybe you are abnormally sore and it’s because you’re not recovering from the amount of volume and intensity you’re doing. In which case, reduce what you’re doing in some way, bring the frequency down a little bit, more rest days between workouts, fewer working sets per training day, fewer sets to failure or close to failure within each individual workout. You might be doing too much. You might not be consuming enough protein. Maybe you haven’t been tracking your calories, your macronutrients, maybe you’re eating exclusively carbs and fats and not getting enough of those amino acids. There could be so many things causing this level of perceived excess soreness.

0:41:43.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. And just like I say with everything, if you feel like something is wrong with you physiologically, go to the doctor. And specifically from a rhabdo perspective like, “Hey, I’m concerned about having rhabdomyolysis. I’ve been unbelievably sore, can you get my blood work done and check out… Make sure everything is functioning okay.” They have legitimate tests that they can do for that, they can check your creatine kinase, they can check your blood work and make sure you’re okay, and if it comes back that you’re fine, then you’re good. You’re good, keep going.

0:42:17.2 Mike Vacanti: Running versus walking for cardio?

0:42:20.1 Jordan Syatt: Oh, everybody knows what I’m gonna say. Yeah. Actually, no, maybe they don’t. I’ll start by saying this. They’re both great cardio. They’re both great exercise. I think that…

0:42:36.3 Mike Vacanti: Wait. I’m so sorry to interrupt.

0:42:39.1 Jordan Syatt: Go for it.

0:42:39.9 Mike Vacanti: I saw a hilarious meme the other day, or no it was yesterday when I was in my scrolling session. It essentially said, Who’s the guy… Who’s the person who made like… Gosh, I’m completely butchering it, but it was basically like, thank you to the guy who coined the term hybrid athlete, so we no longer have to call ourselves mediocre lifters and shitty runners. And then the caption was like, “I just Googled it. Thank you, Alex Viada.” And then the top comment was Viada being like, “Ha ha ha ha. Happy to be of service.” But…

0:43:19.9 Jordan Syatt: That’s so funny.

0:43:21.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:43:21.7 Jordan Syatt: He’s got a good sense of humor and he’s also… He’s a freak, man. Just absolutely top notch lifter, top notch… It’s incredible.

0:43:27.3 Mike Vacanti: He’s a beast. Really smart, too.

0:43:32.7 Jordan Syatt: So here’s the way I think about it. I think about it from a lot of different perspectives, but generally, if I’m looking at the people who live the longest… If we’re looking at people who live the longest across populations, it’s not the highest intensity athletes, it’s not like the best runners of all time, it’s not the best lifters of all time. It’s the people who generally tend to have the most balanced work-life balance, they have very strong faith. Like we see this statistically all over the world wherever they live, they have the strongest faith, they stay active, oftentimes they drink a fair bit of wine, but the main thing is that they stay active through regular movement, they have strong faith, and they have very, very important, strong communities around them.

0:44:22.0 Jordan Syatt: So for me, walking is just king. Walking is just king from an overall health perspective. Now, that doesn’t mean running doesn’t have benefits, running has amazing benefits, and if you really want to improve your cardiovascular health further, then whether it’s running or elliptical or cycling, or just doing something slightly higher intensity than walking, does have real legitimate benefits that you can’t achieve through strolling, I would say. Right? The benefits that it has on your VO2 max, the benefits that it has on your heart strength, there are clear definitive benefits to it. I would say both is better than either alone. I don’t see how there’s any arguing that. I would say doing a little bit of… I would say more walking and less running, but doing both is very important for an overall healthy, balanced life. And when I say running, this is including any slightly higher intensity cardio, not just pounding the pavement.

0:45:31.5 Mike Vacanti: Both, meaning you should do both low-intensity and high-intensity forms of cardio…

0:45:36.9 Jordan Syatt: Correct.

0:45:37.8 Mike Vacanti: Is better than either by itself.

0:45:41.5 Jordan Syatt: Yes, correct.

0:45:43.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, yup, yup.

0:45:43.5 Jordan Syatt: Yup. That’s it.

0:45:44.1 Mike Vacanti: Great answer. It’s a great answer right there. I am with you. I’m probably slightly more anti-running than you are, because you’re not anti-running and I’m not either, but I see the… I see slightly more downsides associated with running in terms of… The main one being risk of injury, right? Almost no one hurts themselves walking. People do hurt themselves running and which takes you out of your strength training or can take you out of your strength training. There are many benefits, it can be hard to get into zone two just walking, but technically inclined walking, technically walking with a weighted vest, these all forms of walking that allow you to get in zone two cardio, and there are many safer ways than running to spend time in that higher intensity, if we wanna call it zone five cardio. If you enjoy running, amazing, do it. If you don’t enjoy running, you definitely don’t have to, and there are so many more important things for your health. The ones you just mentioned, the kind of ones that we think about less in the fitness industry, faith, community, family, things of that nature.

0:47:15.7 Mike Vacanti: But even having reasonable body fat, eating a diet mostly with micronutrient dense foods, strength training, maintaining a reasonable level of lean mass, all of those things in addition to zone two cardio are gonna be more important than the higher intensity cardio, which is almost like a cherry on top or if we had to make a pyramid, it ranks not as important as those other things for longevity. Yeah, it comes back to enjoyability in a big way from me here because I have so many… And less now, but over the years, I’ve had so many people say, “I just, I hate running, but I gotta do it.” Or, “Why haven’t you been as consistent?” “I just don’t enjoy running.” It’s like, “Well, why are you running?”

0:48:11.8 Jordan Syatt: Right.

0:48:13.1 Mike Vacanti: I wanna lose 30 pounds, and so my brother-in-law is signing up for this marathon, so I’m going to too, ’cause that’s gonna be the way. It’s like, “No, track your calories, go for walks, do 30-40 minutes of strength training 2-3 days a week.” There are so many easier and more enjoyable ways than being out there pounding the pavement.

0:48:30.9 Jordan Syatt: A hundred percent.

0:48:31.0 Mike Vacanti: And so for all those reasons, I’m a big fan of walking over running.

0:48:37.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I’m with you. And I will say, I also wanna say sprinting over running, just because you could sprint on a bike, you could sprint on a run, you could sprint whatever, but hopefully we’ve clarified enough now that people know we’re not just talking about running, but I would say from… We have to separate health/longevity from athletic performance, right?

0:49:02.1 Mike Vacanti: Performance.

0:49:03.9 Jordan Syatt: It’s like, if you wanna perform at a high level, running, sprinting, high intensity has to be a part of that at a certain point.

0:49:14.5 Mike Vacanti: Yes.

0:49:15.3 Jordan Syatt: But if you’re talking about health, longevity, blah blah blah, it becomes less important for sure.

0:49:22.0 Mike Vacanti: Exactly.

0:49:22.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:49:25.1 Mike Vacanti: Exactly. And I don’t know, maybe I’m showing my age in that I’m more focused on health than performance, and operating under the assumption that like, alright, we’re mostly not athletes anymore. We’re not college athletes, we’re not professional athletes. It’s cool and fun to perform, but I don’t know. I don’t know if I’m right or wrong, in my assumption that the majority of the population cares more about longevity than performance.

0:49:57.0 Jordan Syatt: I would imagine most care more about living longer and having a higher quality of life than trying to improve their 40.

0:50:05.8 Mike Vacanti: That being said, you’re 100% right, that if performance is a goal, then high intensity cardio is important.

0:50:11.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, yeah. Even then, though, that’s important, even when it’s still important, it still takes up a minuscule amount of your overall training percentage.

0:50:19.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:50:20.4 Jordan Syatt: Like a teeny tiny percentage of your total training volume and in training time, it’s minuscule.

0:50:26.9 Mike Vacanti: And if you’re hyper-focused on health and longevity and you do want that cherry on top, we’re still only talking about, I don’t know, 20 minutes of zone five every 7-10 days, something like that.

0:50:38.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, it’s not much.

0:50:40.2 Mike Vacanti: There’s one other point, we’ve talked about this before in the podcast, and this is almost in I can’t prove this but land, but I have found that people who dislike running, who are running for fat loss will use the fact that they’re running as justification to care less about their nutrition. Whereas people who walk more or get a lot of steps are rarely like…

0:51:03.6 Jordan Syatt: So true.

0:51:04.7 Mike Vacanti: Oh, yeah, I got so many steps, I’m gonna eat so much more.

0:51:08.2 Jordan Syatt: So true.

0:51:10.2 Mike Vacanti: And so there’s a psychological benefit to walking over running in that I find supports better nutrition adherence.

0:51:16.7 Jordan Syatt: It’s a really, really good point that I don’t know if I’ve ever heard anyone articulate that before, it’s such a good point.

0:51:23.3 Mike Vacanti: Oh thank you, Jordan. Thank you, bro. What a guy.

0:51:26.2 Jordan Syatt: Of course, brother.

0:51:28.5 Mike Vacanti: We’ll be back next week. Weekly uploads, 194 episodes. We’re cranking these out every Tuesday. We’re not going anywhere.

0:51:37.9 Jordan Syatt: I do wanna apologize to absolutely nobody. [laughter] No, thank you everyone for listening, we appreciate it. Please leave a five-star review, keep an eye out for the sale coming soon to the Online Fitness Business Mentorship. We love you, we appreciate you. Have an amazing week. We’ll talk to you soon.

0:51:56.9 Mike Vacanti: Bye everyone.