Episode 235: Make Bro Science Great Again, High Reps vs Low Reps, “Blinded” Cardio, and More…

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

0:00:12.3 Jordan Syatt: What’s up, Michael?

0:00:13.0 Mike Vacanti: Pick a number, 1 through 10.

0:00:14.7 Jordan Syatt: Four.

0:00:15.4 Mike Vacanti: Okay, first of all, do you have your three things today?

0:00:17.6 Jordan Syatt: First of all, I spilled all over my shirt.

0:00:20.5 Mike Vacanti: He goes with the redirect.  

0:00:23.3 Jordan Syatt: First of all… 

0:00:23.5 Mike Vacanti: The redirect is such a classic move.

0:00:25.8 Jordan Syatt: No, I don’t have my three things today, but you’ve got 10 things, so that’s perfect.

0:00:30.4 Mike Vacanti: You don’t even have one thing that came to mind that you can build on to get to three?

0:00:35.2 Jordan Syatt: Not in this moment, bro.

0:00:36.6 Mike Vacanti: No. Wow. Okay. All right. Well, hey, I didn’t… I came underprepared last week, so it’s only right. One, two, three, four. I started a new pre-workout. For some reason, I decided to buy Ghost just impulsively. Didn’t really check, I mean, I looked at the label and monitoring caffeine. And I heard and saw that there’s less nootropic, less brain stuff in it relative to energy drinks, which interested me. And some of the flavors just look good. So I impulse bought that. And the difference between that and anything I’ve taken over the last several years is kind of incredible. And not sponsored, not affiliated whatsoever, but there isn’t much mood boosting or cognitive enhancement to it, but there’s the physiological upside of muscular endurance, wanting to lift, desire to lift without the positive mood, which I thought was interesting. I’m enjoying so far. Two workouts in.

0:01:46.8 Jordan Syatt: Do you know what’s in it that you really like about it?

0:01:51.5 Mike Vacanti: No, no, I don’t. I think it’s more about what’s not in it that I like about it, which is probably Alpha-GPC. There is choline in it, but I think Alpha-GPC is in, the euphoria product is in the Ghost energy drink, is in a bunch of pre-workouts, that’s like, people would just take it to do computer work. It has that kind of effect. Whereas this doesn’t have that. I would imagine that has something to do with it. It also has artificial sweetener. I’m like 99% sure. I didn’t actually look, but it’s delicious. And every pre I’ve taken for years is naturally sweetened. So that’s probably part of why it is more enjoyable.

0:02:36.7 Jordan Syatt: Is there beta-alanine?

0:02:37.9 Mike Vacanti: A little bit. I should actually look at that.

0:02:40.0 Jordan Syatt: But not like a clinically effective dose.

0:02:42.4 Mike Vacanti: I mean, 3.2 g of beta-alanine, I guess that… But I’m only having half a scoop, so 1.6 g is not a ton. L-citrulline 6000 mg, so half of that. L-tyrosine 2000, taurine 1000. Between natural caffeine and this neuro factor, coffee, fruit extract, there’s 300 mg plus 100 mg, so 400. Half of that is 200. No, I don’t actually know, but I just know that it doesn’t give me this like euphoric mood boost, but does give great energy for working out.

0:03:26.5 Jordan Syatt: Nice. I like it.

0:03:27.6 Mike Vacanti: You’re not a big pre-workout guy.

0:03:29.3 Jordan Syatt: No. You know who really turned me off of pre-workout? It was Louis. Louis turned me off. He was always like, I don’t want you getting jacked up for your lifts. I want you pretty low-key in here. So then when you go out to compete, then you use it. So then you get the maximal, maximum, maximum. He wanted training sessions to be more Zen, which…  

0:03:51.0 Mike Vacanti: That makes sense when you’re competing.

0:03:52.2 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. When you’re a competitor, it’s like you want to keep your training sessions as low-key as possible. So when you do get jacked up, you save it. Because that’s where I think a lot of this over-training nonsense comes in. People, most people who say they’re overtraining are not actually overtraining, number one. And number two is, I think a very heavy lift isn’t stressful in and of itself as much as how much you hype yourself up for that lift. The hype up for that lift. The smacking yourself, freaking out, da, da, da, da. Even the stress you put on yourself if you’re not doing that, that’s what’s stressful about it far more than the actual lift itself.

0:04:33.6 Mike Vacanti: A lot of psychological stimulation, stress coming that way. That makes sense. For someone whose main vice at the moment is the caffeine I consume during my workout. I’m not letting go of my pre-workout.

0:04:47.3 Jordan Syatt: And you’re not a competitor, you’re not competing in anything right now.

0:04:49.9 Mike Vacanti: I’m competing versus myself.  

0:04:52.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. 

0:04:53.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. But that makes a lot of sense. And yeah, for competitors/people who are athletes in general, I think using pre-workout or anything sparingly to peak when they really need it is a really good idea.

0:05:10.9 Jordan Syatt: It also, I was literally just thinking about this last night. I feel like when people rely on something like pre-workout, for example, they often end up thinking that, not logically but emotionally and subconsciously, it’s like if they don’t feel really good or hyped up, then they just can’t work out. Right? And it’s like, you don’t have to feel good to work out. You know what I mean? You don’t have to… 

0:05:41.3 Mike Vacanti: Absolutely. 

0:05:42.3 Jordan Syatt: You don’t have to fucking…

0:05:42.0 Mike Vacanti: You work out to feel good.

0:05:43.6 Jordan Syatt: Yes, yes.

0:05:45.2 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, that’s whatever… Yep. That’s a great, great point. Imagine if everyone only worked out when they felt super motivated and super hyped. There wouldn’t be a lot of workouts going on.

0:05:58.6 Jordan Syatt: It’s a real crutch to be like, I need this to work out. That’s actually what drove me away. One of the things that drove me away from the geared powerlifting world. It was like, man, I need to have this whole bag with all this fucking equipment in my bag in order to get a lift in. And I got to fucking squeeze myself into these briefs or this bench shirt and get like… It’s just, I just want to walk in, in shorts and a T-shirt or whatever and just lift. I don’t want to have to rely on something.

0:06:26.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, couldn’t agree more. Pick another number. We got 10 things. So we’re gonna be moving this episode.  

0:06:32.7 Jordan Syatt: Eight. 

0:06:33.4 Mike Vacanti: I can’t prove this, but perfect temperature regulation, so keeping every space between 68 and 72 degrees. Working in office settings, having homes, great temperatures. If it’s a little too cold, you don’t go outside; you go on the treadmill in the commercial gym. If it’s too hot outside, you like to be in air-conditioned settings. Perfectly regulated temperature is making us soft and weak as a species.

0:07:01.4 Jordan Syatt: Dude, preach.

0:07:03.0 Mike Vacanti: We need more exposure to the elements, to the cold, to the hot, definitely for the psychological/mental toughness component of it. But I would imagine, and this is where I can’t prove this, but there is physiological benefit to it as well. And we see this on the more extremes with heat exposure and sauna, and the cardiac upside of that. If we look at the countries who are using sauna four or five times a week. But I’m not even talking about that amount of heat. I just mean, oh, it’s 95 and sunny. Like, don’t do your cardio on your incline treadmill at 70 degrees. Go outside and get a little sweat and be a little uncomfortable. It’s good for you.

0:07:47.9 Jordan Syatt: It’s good to get a little sweaty, maybe be a little sticky, not be in this air-conditioned environment all the time. If nothing else, it really makes you appreciate the air conditioning that you do have, and it makes you appreciate the luxuries that we do have. Where, man, I know if… So I’ll get in my car, and it’s fucking hot. And I remember being a kid going to my… I remember. I haven’t thought about this in years. I remember going to my aunt’s house in Florida and not like, we didn’t have much money, and they. They really didn’t have much money. It was really difficult. And they… She had a car without AC in Florida. And, dude, it was brutal. It was absolutely… Getting out of that car, sweating, just crazy. I remember going back home being like, “Oh, it’s really nice to have a car with AC again.” It’s, even just having those moments where you’re like, you know what? I’m deliberately gonna be uncomfortable right now… 

0:08:49.5 Mike Vacanti: Makes you appreciate. 

0:08:49.9 Jordan Syatt: Just so that I can appreciate what I really do have, I think is an exercise in gratitude that is super helpful to keep you positive. Even last night, I went on a run around the neighborhood, and it was so buggy, and I’m getting bit up. And so now it makes me appreciate when I am gonna be inside more, and I’m not getting all these bugs all over the place. But like, yeah, man. When you put yourself in those situations that are really uncomfortable. Yeah, I think it’s good mental toughness and all that, but also it’s like, dude, it’s just… It makes you realize how good you have it.

0:09:25.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah. Well, there’s hedonic adaptation to your environment, too. So if you’re only in 68 all the time, that’s your new baseline. And then it’s not like you appreciate it when you get it as a reward. It’s that you absolutely hate any time when you aren’t in perfect conditions.

0:09:43.1 Jordan Syatt: You know, I, similar, but adjacent to this topic. I don’t want to say his name. He made a post about it, so I’m sure he’d be fine. But I don’t want to say his name because I don’t want to call him out. It’s not anything bad that he did, but… So all this talk around cold plunges and all that. I’ve seen a number of people having cardiac issues from getting into cold plunges, and someone, one of our colleagues, recently went into a cold plunge just because it was a social thing, and he had to go to the hospital. He almost died.

0:10:19.0 Mike Vacanti: No way.

0:10:20.2 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. And I’ve seen a number of these stories.

0:10:22.5 Mike Vacanti: We can bleep the name, but you got to tell me who this is.

0:10:26.3 Jordan Syatt: [REDACTED].

0:10:26.7 Mike Vacanti: Really?

0:10:27.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, dude.

0:10:27.8 Mike Vacanti: Oh, no.

0:10:28.4 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, he’s fine now. He’s fine now. And he’s, yeah, he’s fine now, but he posted about it on Facebook, and…

0:10:36.8 Mike Vacanti: I’m glad he’s okay.

0:10:39.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, me as well.

0:10:40.4 Mike Vacanti: I like that guy.

0:10:41.6 Jordan Syatt: Me as well. And we can… This can all be in there. We’re just gonna bleep his name out. But, yeah, I think he’s great. And he probably would be fine if we said his name here. But, he posted about it on his Facebook. But, yeah, it was… I’ve seen a number of these stories more, and I’ve seen cardiologists even talking about it. Or it’s like, just so you know, a lot of people don’t know they have underlying heart conditions. And you just put yourself in this really, really, really cold environment, all of a sudden, it could lead to something really bad happening. And it happened to him.

0:11:13.0 Mike Vacanti: I don’t know anything. I’d never heard of cold exposure leading to potential for acute heart issues. I’m really glad he’s okay. I don’t have much to add. I know you’re anti-cold in general, so I feel like… 

0:11:30.8 Jordan Syatt: I have a huge bias against it. I have a huge bias against it, but I’ve also done it. I did it with you, and I hated every second of it, and…

0:11:38.9 Mike Vacanti: I hate every second of sauna, but I also know that there are benefits.

0:11:42.5 Jordan Syatt: I’d say there are more benefits to sauna than cold exposure, but that’s also my bias, but I also believe.

0:11:47.5 Mike Vacanti: Definitely cardiac. Definitely cardiac. More brain benefits to cold in the short term.  

0:11:54.7 Jordan Syatt: Oh, really?  

0:11:55.7 Mike Vacanti: Of course, it’s dopaminergic.

0:11:57.3 Jordan Syatt: Oh, you mean from a dopamine perspective. Got it, got it. Okay. I thought you meant from like…

0:12:02.3 Mike Vacanti: Like a stroke or…

0:12:04.5 Jordan Syatt: No, no, I thought you meant from an intelligence perspective or something.

0:12:08.0 Mike Vacanti: That too, man. That too. Takes your IQ to the moon. 150 like that.

0:12:13.9 Jordan Syatt: IQ to the moon.

0:12:15.5 Mike Vacanti: That’s right. Man. Well, I’m glad he’s okay. Do you have anything that… Or do you want to keep picking numbers? We got eight more, so you can keep picking.  

0:12:25.3 Jordan Syatt: One.  

0:12:25.7 Mike Vacanti: Speaking of heart stuff, I have an n equals 1 for everybody here. I stopped taking stevia. So several years ago, I started putting stevia in my morning coffee. And the amount of stevia necessary to equal Splenda or Sweet’N Low in terms of taste of the coffee is probably like 2 to 1, if not 3 to 1. And so I was putting two stevia packets, sometimes three stevia packets in a cup of coffee. And for years, I was having heart palpitations.

0:13:05.5 Jordan Syatt: Shut up. I didn’t know that.

0:13:07.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah, Randomly. And I attributed it to, like, okay, maybe this… Maybe I’m having too much caffeine. I was monitoring caffeine closely. Maybe this pre-workout I’m taking is doing something weird. I don’t know. I did get a checkup at one point, and everything was good. My heart was perfect. And she said sometimes these palpitations just happen. Could be stress, could be whatever… 

0:13:28.8 Jordan Syatt: They are scary.  

0:13:29.7 Mike Vacanti: I wasn’t that stressed at the time. Yeah, they definitely are. And once I got the check mark from the cardiologist, I wasn’t worried, but it was still uncomfortable. And didn’t happen often, but uncomfortable. And I don’t remember where I saw. Maybe it was an erythritol to heart issue, random Cleveland Clinic study that I saw that I was like, oh, I wonder, is there something there? And I don’t think there actually is, by the way, but in terms of erythritol potentially causing cardiac arrest or something serious.

0:14:13.6 Jordan Syatt: Shut the fuck up.

0:14:14.9 Mike Vacanti: No, no, I’m saying I don’t think that. I don’t think that that… I don’t think there’s a link there. Sorry.  

0:14:20.9 Jordan Syatt: Okay. 

0:14:24.4 Mike Vacanti: But I do believe that there was a direct link between my stevia intake, because stevia… Or, sorry, Truvia is the name of the brand. And Truvia is stevia plus erythritol in a packet. Since I stopped, which was probably six months ago at this point. I haven’t had a single, like, I’m talking… 

0:14:46.8 Jordan Syatt: Wow.  

0:14:47.2 Mike Vacanti: I’m talking zero palpitations. So I don’t…

0:14:48.3 Jordan Syatt: That’s good news.

0:14:49.8 Mike Vacanti: I don’t know that it’s actually bad in any way, given that the palpitations are supposedly completely fine and safe, et cetera, the cardiologist said. But I am almost certain that the Truvia was causing heart palpitations. And so…

0:15:04.7 Jordan Syatt: Interesting.

0:15:05.9 Mike Vacanti: N equals 1. Do what you want with that piece of…

0:15:09.2 Jordan Syatt: But it’s a good piece of data, especially just for you individually. And if anyone else is, like, having Truvia and they’re experiencing that, might be worth trying.

0:15:18.0 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah.

0:15:19.2 Jordan Syatt: That’s really good to know, dude. Those palpitations can be scary. That sucks.

0:15:22.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah, I know.

0:15:24.3 Jordan Syatt: Even when the doctor says, like, oh, it’s okay. It’s like, yeah, but it’s not.

0:15:30.0 Mike Vacanti: That’s where you and I differ.

0:15:31.2 Jordan Syatt: My heart is going on in a weird…

0:15:33.5 Mike Vacanti: You and I differ because when the doctor says, like, gives you the exam, and it’s like, you’re 100, okay. You’re like, what if this… 

0:15:41.0 Jordan Syatt: You just trust the doctor. You just, oh, okay…

0:15:42.8 Mike Vacanti: You’re like, what if this doctor doesn’t like me, what if this doctor…

0:15:46.0 Jordan Syatt: Or like, what if the doctor is hungry and wants to go to lunch and is just like, you’re fine.  

0:15:51.5 Mike Vacanti: You gotta… I would be too anxious of a person if I didn’t put faith in certain parts of the establishment. And here’s my best example of that is flying on an airplane. I remember I was having 500, 600, 700, 800 mg of caffeine a day, coaching Gary in 2014, 2015. And so that was probably part of it, but we were traveling 100 days a year. You did it too. You know what it’s like. And I would get nervous sometimes on takeoff or turbulence or whatever. There was some bad turbulence.

0:16:21.0 Jordan Syatt: Oh, yeah. Totally sucks.

0:16:21.4 Mike Vacanti: And I came to the conclusion that I’m flying on an airplane. I’m just gonna put faith in this, in the pilots, that they’re qualified and the people know what they’re doing. And the math and the big data, we’re gonna be fine. And I really, knock on wood, I haven’t had any nervousness around flying in eight or nine years.

0:16:41.7 Jordan Syatt: Well, I think that makes more sense because the pilot their life is also at fucking risk on the plane.

0:16:49.1 Mike Vacanti: Okay. Okay, I see.

0:16:51.4 Jordan Syatt: The doctor… You know what’s really interesting? There’s a lot of research on this. And I think one of the most interesting bits of research I read was, I think I studied this in college. This was super interesting. If you look at the people who are gonna, who are in a court case, right? They’re gonna go see a judge, okay? If you are gonna be sentenced by a judge, the time of your sentencing plays a big role in the leniency or the severity of your sentencing. The people who have their sentencing hearings, or like, I don’t even know if I’m using the right terminology, but people who are gonna be, have this hearing either first thing in the morning or first thing after lunch, have much more lenient results. Whereas people who are right before lunch or right before the end of the day have way worse. And the hypothesis is like, the judge is like, “I wanna get out of here. I’m fucking tired.” Da, da. Like, “I don’t wanna hear this anymore. I’m out. I’m done.”  

0:18:03.4 Jordan Syatt: Which is like, there’s a human element of it, which is one of the reasons why I think AI is such a useful tool for diagnoses, and from a doctor perspective, I would trust AI more because AI is not tired. AI is not like, it will just, “Hey, here’s what’s going on.” So if AI is like, “Yeah, palpitations are very common. Definitely, obviously, check with your healthcare professional. But palpitations don’t inherently mean anything bad.” I’d be like, “Yeah, I trust you more.” But for the doctor, there’s a human element that… 

0:18:32.8 Mike Vacanti: Depends on the doctor.  

0:18:33.2 Jordan Syatt: I don’t know if I can trust it.

0:18:33.1 Mike Vacanti: It depends on….

0:18:34.2 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, it depends on the doctor for sure.

0:18:35.3 Mike Vacanti: After having a conversation with it. But that is fascinating, by the way, the research that you referenced there.

0:18:41.1 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. I mean, ideally, it would all be fair and equal and just, but we’re all humans, and who knows? We all have our own biases and hunger.

0:18:51.0 Mike Vacanti: That one is simple enough, though, that I feel like, I don’t know, I’m putting my faith in the establishment.

0:18:58.9 Jordan Syatt: Dude, sort of like when you went to the dermatologist, you didn’t trust the dermatologist.

0:19:02.2 Mike Vacanti: But I experienced both.

0:19:04.7 Jordan Syatt: What does that mean you… When you went to the dermatologist and they were like, “You’re fine.” And you were like, “Hey, I want you to check me for these fucking moles.” And they’re like, “You’re good.” You were like, hey.

0:19:13.6 Mike Vacanti: All right, so we’re gonna back all the way up here. First of all, the cardiologist was unbelievably attentive. She listened, she made eye contact. We had a long conversation. She was receptive. She was like… 

0:19:26.0 Jordan Syatt: Okay. Good, good. Yeah.

0:19:25.9 Mike Vacanti: It was like, I trusted this individual. The dermatologist… I sat and waited for 45 minutes. This girl came in and did this. First of all, she’s like, “Why are you even here?” I was like, “I don’t know.” Honestly, the reason I was there, because my friend Jordan goes to the dermatologist. I’ve never been, but he’s afraid of cancer, and it’s like a pre-screening thing. And so I just want to get checked. I’ve never been. I’m in my 30s, but I was like, you know, just getting a scan. Just making sure I’m okay. She’s like, “You don’t have anything in particular you’re concerned about?” I was like, “No, not really.” And she did this scan. Bro, when I tell you she used this little microscope thing and looked over my body, and it took her 41 seconds to check my entire body. And she’s like, “You’re good.” And walked out of the room in three total minutes. Yeah, I didn’t trust her. I think she’s just trying to make a dollar.

0:20:16.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:20:17.6 Mike Vacanti: So I didn’t go back, but there’s…

0:20:20.8 Jordan Syatt: The experience was different. The cardiologist was attentive. It wasn’t seeming rushed. It was like, what was the time of the dermatologist appointment?

0:20:27.9 Mike Vacanti: She seemed more intelligent. Probably late morning. I don’t know.

0:20:32.5 Jordan Syatt: What was the time of the cardiologist appointment?

0:20:34.4 Mike Vacanti: Same.

0:20:34.8 Jordan Syatt: All right. You just have a good cardiologist. You need a new dermatologist.

0:20:38.9 Mike Vacanti: I’m done with dermatology. That’s a complete scam, by the way. An absolute scam. Oh, no, we talked about this woman. Because the one piece of advice she gave me was buy the bucket hat that has the long thing that goes all the way down your back because you don’t want to get any sun exposure ever in the summer. I’m like, “It’s July, it’s 90 degrees, no sun exposure.” She’s like, long sleeve pants, da, da, da, da.

0:21:06.9 Jordan Syatt: Never get the sun.

0:21:07.8 Mike Vacanti: And then I asked her, and I was like, “Are there any benefits to getting sun exposure?” As if I didn’t know the answer. And she’s like, “Technically, there’s vitamin D, but your hands will be exposed. And that’s more than enough.” I’m like, all right, I’m done with this. Get me out of here.  

0:21:26.0 Jordan Syatt: There are good dermatologists. I’m gonna bring my dermatologist on my podcast because she’s awesome. She wouldn’t say that. She’s great. There are good dermatologists, bad dermatologists. Good doctors, bad doctors. It’s not a scam, dude. It’s super important.  

0:21:38.7 Mike Vacanti: I think there are levels to doctors and…

0:21:40.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Oh, oh, you mean in terms of type of doctor?

0:21:45.0 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, I mean in terms of, like…

0:21:46.9 Jordan Syatt: Dermatologists get the shaft, dude, a lot. People, I think, is there a Seinfeld episode about how dermatologists, they just hate on dermatologists all the time?

0:21:54.2 Mike Vacanti: I think it’s, based on my experience and experience of other, you’re the only person close to me who’s had positive dermatologist experiences.

0:22:01.4 Jordan Syatt: I love dermatologists, dude.

0:22:03.1 Mike Vacanti: My dad, I don’t even remember the joke. I’ve heard it so many times, I should remember it. But it’s something to the effect of, if it’s wet, dry it. If it’s dry, wet it, and if it’s something, cut it off. And that’s all you need to know to be a… His dermatologist friend, I think, tells that joke. But I have to put trust in certain elements of the establishment; otherwise, what are you gonna do? You’re just gonna be overthinking and worrying about everything. That’s no way to live.

0:22:32.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:22:41.1 Mike Vacanti: On a spectrum, you would worry more about things of that nature than I would.

0:22:48.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, for sure. I have more fear than you.

0:22:50.8 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. But I think part of it is a choice. I think part of it, meaning… 

0:22:55.2 Jordan Syatt: It’s not a choice, Michael.

0:22:58.2 Mike Vacanti: I used to have more fear, and I decided I’m just done having that fear. I don’t know if maybe I got lucky. Pick a number. Pick a number. Any number.

0:23:08.9 Jordan Syatt: Two.

0:23:09.4 Mike Vacanti: You know what pisses me off, brother?

0:23:11.9 Jordan Syatt: Dermatologist.

0:23:12.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, dermatologist. You ever driving and you’re in a hurry to get somewhere and you’re on a two-lane, not a two-lane road. You’re on a road with two lanes going in the same direction.

0:23:23.8 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Four-lane road.

0:23:25.5 Mike Vacanti: And someone’s going the exact speed limit, or maybe like two miles an hour over in the left lane. And then they go next to someone in the right lane, so you can’t get around them. And then they don’t move over ever. And they just continue to go like 62 in a 60, or 67 in a… Even five over in the left lane is unacceptable, frankly. And then when they finally do go up and get over, so you can go past, they speed up seven to nine miles an hour. For some reason, as if I don’t know that you were just going the speed limit in the left lane.

0:24:04.0 Jordan Syatt: Do you try and look at them to let them know that you’re angry, or do you just like, eyes on the road?

0:24:08.2 Mike Vacanti: Depends how close to God I am at that moment. If I’m like, all right, be a good person. I just keep my eyes on the road. This morning, I looked over and I made eye contact. What you’re doing is not okay, was the message I was trying to send.

0:24:25.1 Jordan Syatt: Would you give an extended eye contact? Did you raise your hand at all, or you just like…

0:24:29.6 Mike Vacanti: I didn’t raise my hand. I’m not gonna…. I’m not… Look, road rage is no joke. But I just gave him enough of a look to be like, come on, man.

0:24:40.2 Jordan Syatt: That was unacceptable.  

0:24:42.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.  

0:24:43.5 Jordan Syatt: That was the look. You’re like, that was unacceptable. Get your shit together, buddy.

0:24:47.1 Mike Vacanti: I would say the look was like, you’re better than that, brother. Let’s do better.

0:24:52.5 Jordan Syatt: What did his eyes say?

0:24:53.8 Mike Vacanti: I’m texting and I have no idea what’s going on.

0:24:56.2 Jordan Syatt: Oh, was he texting?

0:24:57.3 Mike Vacanti: Probably. I don’t know. He was…  

0:24:59.8 Jordan Syatt: Oh, man.

0:25:00.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.  

0:25:01.4 Jordan Syatt: That’ll do it. That’s probably why he was going so slow, because he was like, “Hey, I’m texting. I might as well go slower right now.” And he was completely unaware.

0:25:09.5 Mike Vacanti: What’s your biggest…

0:25:10.0 Jordan Syatt: Because he was texting.

0:25:10.7 Mike Vacanti: What’s your biggest pet peeve, Jordan? And I think I know the answer. 

0:25:14.1 Jordan Syatt: Ever?  

0:25:15.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, just that comes to mind right now. Biggest pet peeve.

0:25:17.2 Jordan Syatt: Oh, geez. When I hold the door open for someone.

0:25:20.0 Mike Vacanti: Yes, yes. And they don’t say thank you.  

0:25:21.8 Jordan Syatt: And it’s so infuriating. Does that not bother you?

0:25:30.9 Mike Vacanti: Not nearly as much as you. Because it feels like a covert contract. It feels like if they don’t say thank you, and I get mad, then I’m like, well, was I just doing it so they would say thank you?

0:25:43.3 Jordan Syatt: No, you’re doing it because you’re being courteous. And the courteous response is, hey, I really appreciate you taking the time out of your day to hold the door. Especially if they’re like, it’s difficult, right? Because you don’t want to hold the door open for them if they’re like 30ft away, because then they feel like, shit, I’ve got to pick up my pace, jog in. That’s not fair. So there’s a distance limit. So I would say anywhere from immediately behind you to like 7 to 10ft is where you’re… Unless the person is disabled, has a walker. Then I’m sitting there. I don’t care if they say thank you at that point. That’s fine. I’m happy to take this responsibility and hold it for you. But if you’re able and you’re there and you’re within that 0 to 10 foot range and you just waltz right in without saying a word. It’s just… I wasn’t doing it for the thank you, but because you didn’t say thank you, that’s fucking obnoxious.

0:26:50.6 Mike Vacanti: My wife is the same way as you on that one. She doesn’t like it.

0:26:53.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Her and I are the same way in many instances. 

0:26:56.4 Mike Vacanti: On a few things. Yeah.

0:26:57.8 Jordan Syatt: And then, you know what would be even worse? If you let them go in, they don’t say thank you. And then let’s say you’re going to a coffee shop, and then they go in front of you.

0:27:07.9 Mike Vacanti: That’s… Is there a Seinfeld about that? There’s gotta be.

0:27:11.1 Jordan Syatt: I don’t know. If they go in front of you after not saying thank you, bro.

0:27:16.5 Mike Vacanti: There might be a Curbed about that, actually.

0:27:18.4 Jordan Syatt: Oh, that would make sense. I love that show.

0:27:21.3 Mike Vacanti: It’s funny.

0:27:22.1 Jordan Syatt: It’s crazy.

0:27:23.1 Mike Vacanti: Pick a number.

0:27:23.9 Jordan Syatt: Have I done… Was that three? Yeah. Three. Four.

0:27:25.8 Mike Vacanti: No. No, that was two.

0:27:27.3 Jordan Syatt: I didn’t do three?

0:27:28.3 Mike Vacanti: No, you’ve done…

0:27:29.0 Jordan Syatt: Let’s do three.

0:27:30.8 Mike Vacanti: Three is shifting gears on the episode. Over the many years we’ve done this podcast, we have gotten, I would say, dozens of emails from men and women who are imprisoned, who usually are having a spouse or a significant other or a friend or a family member write the email on their behalf, which takes work. Who are fans of the podcast, who find value in the fitness stuff we talk about, in the comedic aspect of it, and in the… Many of these individuals want to become or have aspirations to work in fitness upon their release. And I just think that in general, people who are convicted of crimes and serving time are overlooked a bit in our society. And I just want to give a shout-out. And Jordan and I talked about this a little bit. Shout out to anyone who’s doing time right now. And we hope you get out soon and keep grinding and do what you can while you’re in there and keep hitting those weights. And, yeah. 

0:28:37.8 Jordan Syatt: I think it’s cool that they’re in there because this is… It’s been numerous people who have DM’d us, emailed us. They’re doing time, and they’re learning, and they’re working to improve themselves. And they’re like, I found a passion. I want to do this when I’m out.

0:28:53.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:28:53.8 Jordan Syatt: So shout to them. And shout out to the spouses who are relaying their emails to us.  

0:28:59.7 Mike Vacanti: Supporting.  

0:29:00.6 Jordan Syatt: Supporting. I mean, that’s… I can’t even begin to imagine. So shout out all around.

0:29:03.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, yeah, big shout out. Next number.

0:29:06.7 Jordan Syatt: Five.

0:29:07.9 Mike Vacanti: All right. I don’t know. I’ve been very off social media, which I feel great about. But last I checked, in the hypertrophy world, there was a growing contingent of people obsessed with low reps who were borderline anti-high reps. Does that group still exist?

0:29:27.3 Jordan Syatt: Oh, yeah.

0:29:28.1 Mike Vacanti: Okay. 

0:29:29.3 Jordan Syatt: Super.  

0:29:30.5 Mike Vacanti: I’m dropping another n equals 1 in this episode. Over the last couple of months, the overwhelming majority of my training has been in the 5 to 10 rep range. So I actually have way more in common with these people than I disagree with them on. However, I do think there is benefit to variety in training. Variety of exercise selection, variety of rep range, variety of rest time. I think all of these things have their place at the end of today’s leg day. And I don’t think I’ve done a set of lower body in the last three months that was outside of 5 to 10 reps. Maybe a 12 in there, like a hamstring machine movement, but 5 to 10. I decided I’m just gonna hit this cable pull through an exercise that the stability hypertrophy crowd hates, but I like. 

0:30:18.3 Jordan Syatt: I love that exercise.

0:30:19.1 Mike Vacanti: Call it a B-tier exercise. Cool, that’s great. I like a lot of B… 

0:30:22.3 Jordan Syatt: No, S tier. I love… 

0:30:24.9 Mike Vacanti: I don’t even care if it’s B tier. I like some B tier, some B tier I just like. They feel good on my anatomy. I feel like I get good results from them. I’m not waiting for Schoenfeld to do the paper in 2029. I wanna do the movement now. Shout out Brad and all the scientists, great. But before the science, how are we making decisions? Intuition, experience. Good. I throw a 2 by 20 little… My intent to take it close to failure, get a little glute pump, felt like it was a movement my body wanted in that moment. We talked about the Ghost pre-workout. Had energy after all the work that I had done and had time. So I was like, I’m going to hit this. The first set, I was way too aggressive on my weight selection. The first set, I hit failure at 17, and my glutes were cramping so hard and so aggressively and in a way that felt so good and foreign because it had been a while since I did a high rep set close to failure.

0:31:26.6 Mike Vacanti: And then I took a nice long rest, used the same weight and got to 20 on the second one, which felt probably equally, if not more brutal, but n equals 1. Intuition and past experience. Not only the muscular endurance upside of a little bit higher rep training, but also taking a higher rep set close to failure or to failure definitely has its place for many goals, including muscle gain or muscle retention in a deficit.

0:31:58.7 Jordan Syatt: I think even strength, too. And this is something that, I include this within all my programs. Higher rep sets, whether it’s 12 on the lower end or 20, sometimes 25, occasionally on the higher end. But I think there’s a time and a place for strength as well. And I think when people hear about strength, they often, they just think about muscular strength without also understanding the tendon and ligament side of it as well. And I think tendons and ligaments, they respond well to higher rep training, and they also respond well to isometric style training. But even the isometrics are often for longer durations. So it might be 30 seconds, 40 seconds, 60 seconds, which is essentially, it’s…

0:32:45.6 Mike Vacanti: It’s a long set.

0:32:46.6 Jordan Syatt: That’s a long set, and which is more similar to a higher rep set than it is to a lower rep set. So I’m completely with you, and I’ve stood by that, and I’ll continue to stand by that. That’s something I also learned from Louis as well. Whereas you hear about Westside and power lifters and you think about all the heavy 1 rep, 3 rep, 5 rep maxes they’re doing, you just think that’s all they do. And a huge portion of the accessory work is higher repetition range stuff. I think it’s super helpful and important, and I think it actually allows you… It changes up your training mentally and emotionally as well. It provides a really fun stimulus to add within your training. It’s a different challenge, it’s a different type of pain that you’re working through. And I think it’s also, in my experience, less mentally and emotionally taxing compared to the, I’m gonna go super heavy for six to eight right now. I think it allows for faster recovery time and it really allows you to go super, super, super hard on your wicked heavy stuff. And then for that lighter stuff, it’s almost like a little bit of a reprieve from a physical perspective, but it can also be really challenging for that longer duration set. So I’m with you completely.

0:34:00.6 Mike Vacanti: Good added context.

0:34:02.4 Jordan Syatt: Six.

0:34:03.3 Mike Vacanti: For people who don’t have a business and are just consuming social media for the love of the game/the addiction to the dopamine. Living in a comment section and being a regular commenter on posts has to be one of the most dystopian, awful places to spend your life, literally. And I don’t mean if you’re trying to build a business using $80 strategy. You’re out there trying to be helpful, gain attention to your brand, build your business. That’s obviously not who I’m talking to. I’m talking to the person who is just doom-scrolling away and angrily dropping comments on random posts that they see, and fighting with strangers, and having back-and-forths in the comment section with people. Yeah, I can’t think of… In a developed country where you have an iPhone and you have the luxury of not being in a third world country to spend your time doing that, I can’t think of a worse living.

0:35:09.5 Jordan Syatt: No, I mean, it doesn’t make sense…

0:35:13.0 Mike Vacanti: I can’t think of a worse way to voluntarily spend your time.

0:35:15.7 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, it doesn’t make sense unless you are… Unless you’re trying to build your own platform. It makes sense if you’re trying to get attention to your platform so that you can further educate people on whatever topics. But to just be spending your free time going into comment sections after you’ve been angry about the post, it just, it doesn’t make sense. 

0:35:37.8 Mike Vacanti: In the average comment section… You probably have a great comment section. A lot of people in the fitness space have a great comment section. The average post on the Internet, I don’t think is a great comment section. I think it’s contentious and..

0:35:52.9 Jordan Syatt: I would say the average viral post. The average viral post. 

0:35:56.0 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, yes.  

0:35:56.7 Jordan Syatt: Whereas, like… 

0:35:57.4 Mike Vacanti: Yes. 

0:35:58.3 Jordan Syatt: The vast majority of posts have next to no comments because they’re just not being seen.

0:36:02.2 Mike Vacanti: That’s a good point.

0:36:02.8 Jordan Syatt: But the vast majority of posts that we see in our feed, which are being fed to us on purpose because they are typically more viral, they’re getting more views. Yeah, it’s not good.

0:36:11.2 Mike Vacanti: Not good. Don’t live there. Not good.

0:36:13.6 Jordan Syatt: Seven.

0:36:14.3 Mike Vacanti: Jordan was laying out his split for me the other day because I asked about his current workout split, and he was giving me all of the days and what he likes to do. And…

0:36:24.2 Jordan Syatt: I know exactly where you’re going with this.

0:36:25.8 Mike Vacanti: And he had a grip strength day. You might have…

0:36:32.2 Jordan Syatt: No, not a day.

0:36:32.8 Mike Vacanti: Yes, you did. Because when I clarified, you said that you do it when you do on your zone two cardio day. I don’t remember. You combine it with something. But when you were originally laying it out, you called it grip strength day. I know for a fact, because it stood out in my mind, I was like, Whoa, you got a day for grip strength. Some people have a push day. Chest, shoulders, triceps. You got a grip strength day. And then within moments of that, your brain must have jumped to the purpose of grip strength day, because you were like, yeah, you know when your daughter is gonna be getting picked up for a date and you shake that guy’s hand and you just wanna have like a… Just a strong grip on the handshake. And I was like… 

0:37:14.0 Jordan Syatt: Meaty muscle. You want that meaty muscle hand.

0:37:15.7 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, that meat. That’s what you said.

0:37:16.3 Jordan Syatt: You want them to feel the muscle around your thumb and on the bottom of your hand. You want them to feel it.

0:37:22.0 Mike Vacanti: And I said, “Is that why you have a grip strength day?” And without hesitation, you said, yes.

0:37:26.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. It’s not because grip strength makes you live longer, which it doesn’t. It’s just, that’s an association. It’s, I have plenty of grip strength from a functional and livelihood perspective. I don’t have enough meat on my hand for when my daughters are going on dates. And I want to just let the dude know, like, “Hey, this is my hand.”

0:37:52.1 Mike Vacanti: How many years, and how many years do you have to train for that moment?

0:37:55.3 Jordan Syatt: Dude, I told my daughters they’re not getting, they’re not starting to date until they’re married. So long time. 

0:38:03.1 Mike Vacanti: Makes sense. Yeah. 

0:38:04.4 Jordan Syatt: Long time. Yeah.

0:38:04.8 Mike Vacanti: What if they want to wed young? Like couples from centuries ago. 

0:38:10.0 Jordan Syatt: Like 12?  

0:38:10.7 Mike Vacanti: No, no. That was not where my mind was, but like…

0:38:12.3 Jordan Syatt: Centuries ago. That’s, I mean…

0:38:14.3 Mike Vacanti: All right, decades. Generations ago. Generations ago.

0:38:18.7 Jordan Syatt: Like 18?

0:38:20.0 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:38:22.2 Jordan Syatt: Oh man. 

0:38:23.6 Mike Vacanti: We don’t need to go down…  

0:38:25.4 Jordan Syatt: We could go down this route. Listen, there are many marriages that start at 18 that are wonderful. And I care more about the quality of the person that they’re with. So if it’s a great person… I’ll say this, if my daughters are 18 and it’s like a 45-year-old dude, I’m not gonna be happy about it. And that’s really when I’m gonna be like, I’m gonna fight you.

0:38:49.4 Mike Vacanti: Your meaty muscle is gonna come into play.

0:38:51.1 Jordan Syatt: Dude, no, it’s not even that. It’s like, it’s gonna be… 

0:38:54.2 Mike Vacanti: You are sick.  

0:38:54.4 Jordan Syatt: Why the fuck are you dating? You have nothing in common with an 18. What are you doing?

0:38:57.8 Mike Vacanti: Correct.

0:38:58.8 Jordan Syatt: Nothing in common. What are you doing?

0:39:00.5 Mike Vacanti: I also, these words might haunt me and I pray that they don’t, but I don’t think that will happen because I would imagine for the majority of 18-year-old women who end up wanting to have a long term relationship with a 45 plus year old man, there was dysfunction in their family unit that led to that.

0:39:24.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, I mean, God willing, doesn’t happen, but, yeah. I don’t have anything inherently against a young marriage. In fact, I think in many cases it’s wonderful. I think that ironically, I think our society now demonizes it when I don’t think it’s inherently bad. I care much more about the person that she’s with. And listen, you learn a lot from hopefully every age, but from 18 to 25, you learn and you change a lot. That doesn’t mean a young marriage is bad in any way, shape or form. I have friends who have, got married young and are super happy and all that, but it’d be more about who are you with. I think the cool part about that would be, let’s say, she decides to get married young. My daughter decided to get married young, around 18. And the dude is, I don’t know, somewhere between 18 and 23, 24, which is, that’s fine. Whatever. The cool part about that would be, I feel like in that instance I would be, no matter what, you’d be taking on a son, like that’s your son-in-law.  

0:40:34.8 Jordan Syatt: But it would almost be like you now have an opportunity to help him become a better man as they progress in their marriage, to help make sure, hey, what are you doing to provide? What are you doing to keep them safe? How are you growing as an individual to be a better husband, be a better father? That I think would be a fun thing for me. So I wouldn’t be against it. But I would want to have a great relationship with him. So I’d be fine with a younger marriage. And I wouldn’t, I don’t think it’s a good idea to say you’re too young. That’s the fastest way to get them to do the exact opposite of what you want. I remember being younger, and when people say you’re too young to do this, it just makes me want to do it even more. It’s a horrible strategy. So there are other ways that I think you could go about it, but the age to me isn’t that big of a deal.

0:41:25.0 Mike Vacanti: Good.

0:41:25.5 Jordan Syatt: What about you?

0:41:26.5 Mike Vacanti: I think you covered that effectively. We have 10 things here. I don’t have strong positions necessarily. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it. But I’m equally against the 45-year-old wanting to get with the 18-year-old. You have at least 15 years of training up those meaty hands, though, so that’s good news.

0:41:50.9 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Also, so my training schedule allows for so much more. I’m doing this 10 to 12-day training schedule. I like it so much more than that 7-day. I can fit so much more in, into a 12-day cycle. 

0:42:06.5 Mike Vacanti: Of course. Yeah. 

0:42:07.5 Jordan Syatt: So I can have that zone two-day and the grip strength day all in one. Yesterday I did zone two plyos and grip strength, which is great. You know what I want to do. So you know how I’ve done experiments with fat loss, where the Big Mac challenge or the blood sugar spikes or whatever it is. I want to do an experiment where I do the exact opposite of what is “optimal”. So all these optimal bros who are like, you can’t do cardio before you lift weights. I want to do an experiment where I sprint, do the highest intensity cardio, before I do max effort training. And I want to do the exact opposite of everything they say is optimal just so I can show, yeah, you can still make great progress. I want to do long-duration static stretching before I do maximal effort lifting. Just to show, so I can be like, you guys suck.

0:43:03.9 Jordan Syatt: All of the stuff that you’re talking about, that you’re fear-mongering about, that you’re making me be like, you should never do cardio before you lift. You should never stretch before you lift. I want to be like, you need to take five-minute rest. I’m gonna take one-minute rest. I don’t care. I want to do an experiment where I do the exact opposite of everything that they say is optimal. Just to show it’s really not that big of a deal. Just fucking do it.

0:43:26.8 Mike Vacanti: I like it. I like it. As an aside, you’re not as agreeable as you think. You got some… You have a nice little Ari Gold bit of like contrarian/disagreeability in you.

0:43:39.7 Jordan Syatt: It just, when it’s something I’m really passionate about and I see people getting so far into the weeds on shit that doesn’t matter, it’s just obnoxious.

0:43:49.7 Mike Vacanti: Especially when it decreases adherence.  

0:43:52.6 Jordan Syatt: Yes.  

0:43:52.9 Mike Vacanti: When you’re overcomplicating something and putting too many hoops to jump through for gen pop, who would just benefit from doing anything, compared to skipping workouts or moving less. Yeah. And that’s unfortunately a lot of what short-form social media is. Especially because it’s new, it’s novel, it’s different, it’s contrarian. Yeah, it’s too bad. Which is why I think a good recommendation is, if you’re gonna consume short-form content, cool. But then when you find a few people who you really like, I would jump on board with their long-form content. I would listen to their podcasts, I would check out their… I would go deep on what they’ve written on their website, on their YouTube channel. And a lot of people naturally do this. People who are genuinely interested information seekers. But yeah, we don’t need to talk about the algorithms in this episode.

0:44:44.6 Jordan Syatt: Are you doing grip strength?

0:44:45.8 Mike Vacanti: No, I’m not. My hands are pretty meaty. Got some meat on these things.

0:44:51.0 Jordan Syatt: Some hockey… Some hockey hands.

0:44:52.8 Mike Vacanti: I don’t know. Just got some meaty hands. Yeah.

0:44:55.2 Jordan Syatt: You ever do dead hangs?

0:44:58.7 Mike Vacanti: Yes.

0:44:59.2 Jordan Syatt: What?

0:45:00.0 Mike Vacanti: I don’t know. The way you said it was like, I thought it was gonna be more foreign of whatever you were gonna throw out there. You ever do…

0:45:08.4 Jordan Syatt: You do plate pinches? No.

0:45:10.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Dead hangs are great. I love the… The spinal decompression of dead hangs.

0:45:16.7 Jordan Syatt: Oh, yeah.

0:45:17.7 Mike Vacanti: Feel good on the shoulders, too. And yeah, grip strength. Taking a dead hang close to failure. It’s no joke.

0:45:24.3 Jordan Syatt: You ever do alternating dead hangs? So you one hand, other hand, other hand. So instead of just holding with both hands, you go back and forth?

0:45:31.3 Mike Vacanti: I don’t know that I’ve done those before, maybe.

0:45:35.5 Jordan Syatt: You ever do cliffhangers? Just one hand, single arm dead hang?

0:45:38.9 Mike Vacanti: I don’t know.

0:45:40.2 Jordan Syatt: That’s a fun way to maximally test your grip strength with less time. So you could hold on with one hand, and then you could even hold on to a dumbbell with one hand down by your side, and see if you can hold on to half your body weight for five seconds. Pretty sick. It’s also a good way to test, God forbid you’re in a situation where you’re hanging from a cliff holding onto a loved one.

0:46:04.1 Mike Vacanti: For sure.

0:46:04.7 Jordan Syatt: You know what I mean?

0:46:06.0 Mike Vacanti: Batman begins in the training scene where Bruce saves Ra’s al Ghul.

0:46:13.9 Jordan Syatt: Yes.

0:46:14.8 Mike Vacanti: Where he is sliding down the edge of the cliff. He goes after him, he throws his hook or whatever it is into the ice with one hand. So he’s completely stretched out across his chest. And in the other hand, they interlock, grab each other’s forearm. So he’s basically hanging onto this cliff with one hand. And then he has a 200-pound… So he has his entire body weight, and he’s holding a 200-pound guy. And then he does like this fly curl that gets him up and throws him onto the… I was like, “That’s impossible.” But impressive. 

0:46:50.5 Jordan Syatt: And with the ice pick, it’s down. It’s not across. Right? You’re holding onto it, just hanging straight down like, yeah, good luck, dude.

0:46:58.3 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, that would be… That’s insane grip strength. That should be your goal.

0:47:01.8 Jordan Syatt: I think it is now.

0:47:03.0 Mike Vacanti: You have 15 years to make that happen.

0:47:06.2 Jordan Syatt: To be able to pull a 200… Throw a 200-pound weight.

0:47:10.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:47:11.2 Jordan Syatt: Over the Smith machine, while I’m hanging from the Smith machine.

0:47:14.3 Mike Vacanti: Yes, yes, yes, yes. Wow. That’d be crazy.

0:47:17.9 Jordan Syatt: I’d have to get on a lot of tests.

0:47:19.9 Mike Vacanti: Hey, that’s… I would love to do that more…

0:47:25.0 Jordan Syatt: Get on a lot of test.

0:47:26.1 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. Yeah, I would. I really would. I’ve been contemplating because I turned 38 a few months ago, trying to get in the best possible shape by 40, and then being like, okay, now I’m gonna try test. But if I get in the best possible shape by then, I’m probably not gonna want/need it at that age. So…

0:47:50.0 Jordan Syatt: I don’t think you’re ever getting on test.

0:47:51.5 Mike Vacanti: I will, I will. In my 60s, for sure.

0:47:55.6 Jordan Syatt: I feel like you used to say 40, and now that… 

0:47:59.0 Mike Vacanti: I know. I did.

0:47:59.1 Jordan Syatt: You used to say, at 40, I’m doing it. I am doing it at 40. And now you’re like, 60s. Absolutely, when you’re 60, you’re gonna be like 80. I need it at 80.

0:48:08.6 Mike Vacanti: Addictive personality, hedonic adaptation, all of these things scare me into like, oh, just do it. Oh, just, you know, 120 mg a week. Oh, why not 140? Oh, this doctor with this 24-inch neck says I can do 250. Oh, why don’t I… It just, I feel like I’m protecting myself from it, and I feel like I don’t need it. Although, do you know what I’ve thought about dad life and limited sleep life? And this is kind of in number 9 and 10 that we’re still getting to, is, your hormones take a hit, for lack of a better term, from sleep deprivation, and so getting some exogenous input. I would really like, on a day where I’m low energy and I just don’t want to abuse caffeine because of lack of sleep. I really just wish that my test was at like, even 900, I’d be happy with.

0:49:08.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, but 1200.  

0:49:10.6 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, I mean… Yeah, yeah. That is funny that I used to say 40s, and now I just said 60s. 

0:49:19.2 Jordan Syatt: You used to say definitively 40. At 40, 100%. At 40, I will. 

0:49:23.4 Mike Vacanti: Maybe. Never say never. 

0:49:24.4 Jordan Syatt: And you skip 50s.

0:49:25.2 Mike Vacanti: I did. I don’t know, I think I just thought of my 50s and was like, I’ll be fine in my 50s. Well, it’ll be an ongoing discussion. I definitely think that too many people right now, and people are not gonna want to hear this at all. And that’s too bad. Way too many people right now are looking for some kind of whatever-it-is thing to put in their body to optimize performance, optimize recovery, optimize aesthetics, optimize everything. What’s the supplement? What’s the hormone? What’s the this and that? When the answer is right in front of you, take care of the seven basic… 

0:50:09.5 Jordan Syatt: Move. 

0:50:10.3 Mike Vacanti: Move, strength train. People who want to lose 30 pounds. Dial your nutrition, get enough sleep, get enough hydration, do these very basic things that are right in front of you that you can do before you try to find a peptide that’s gonna offset the fact that you’re not in a deficit or the fact that you’re sleeping four hours a night or whatever it is.

0:50:30.3 Jordan Syatt: Yeah.

0:50:31.0 Mike Vacanti: Anyway, 9 or 10?

0:50:32.4 Jordan Syatt: Nine.

0:50:33.4 Mike Vacanti: Nine. I am pushing three and a half years of not being sick, which is… 

0:50:39.7 Jordan Syatt: Geez.  

0:50:40.0 Mike Vacanti: A pretty crazy streak. Yeah.

0:50:40.8 Jordan Syatt: That’s crazy.

0:50:43.2 Mike Vacanti: It’s gonna come to an end.

0:50:44.5 Jordan Syatt: What? Because you’re not getting as much sleep, and you’re stressed.

0:50:47.2 Mike Vacanti: Not even the stress. Just, I’m not getting as much sleep, and I can feel my body trending towards that. And it’s gonna come to an end. Which is partly sad, but partly like, what are you gonna do? Dad life. But it makes me more confident than ever in my anecdotal experience thesis around immunity, and around, like, there’s way more benefit to building up your own immune system if you don’t want to get sick than trying to avoid other people who are sick. Like, oh, no, they’re gonna spread germs on me. So I’m not gonna go to this public thing or do this thing because I want to avoid getting sick, is the wrong mindset. The right mindset is eat healthy, do the right things, rest, recover, manage stress, and then I can be around other people who are sick and I’m not gonna get sick.

0:51:42.2 Jordan Syatt: I have an anecdote that is super bro sciencey, and I have zero legitimate evidence on this.

0:51:48.0 Mike Vacanti: Perfect. We need more of that in the world.

0:51:50.7 Jordan Syatt: All right. So the research around vitamin C potentially reducing the duration and severity of a cold is pretty substantial. And for a long time, as soon as I would start to feel something coming on, I’d start super-dosing vitamin C. I would just be like, I’m like, have the vitamin C packets. And then I would get really, really sick. And in the last year, I’ve stopped taking vitamin C when I start, I’m feeling about to get sick, and my cold duration and severity has improved dramatically. And my bro science thought is, when I decided I’m just gonna start taking vitamin C, my brain has just, it’s just succumbed to the idea of, well, I’m gonna be sick. And so then I end up getting really sick. But when I don’t take vitamin C, I’m like, no, I’m not gonna get sick, and it’s just not gonna happen. And I don’t let it. Again, full bro science, zero evidence to support this.

0:52:53.2 Mike Vacanti: But you still get sick. But you’re saying less duration and less severity.

0:52:56.7 Jordan Syatt: Dude, everyone in my house was just sick. Everyone, both girls, my daughter, everyone was just sick. My wife, every time, she’s like, let’s take vitamin C. And for the last year, I’ve been like, no, not taking it. And so she takes. She got super sick. My daughters got super sick. I had a tickle in my throat for two days. Great now, great. And I think it’s just, I don’t succumb to it. I don’t let myself get to a point where I’m like, I’m gonna be sick. Because if I get there, then something happens where my body’s like, yeah, you’ve just, you believed it, now you’re gonna be sick. And I would get devastatingly ill. And recently, I just don’t take vitamin C. And I’ll still get a little sniffle here and there, but I sleep it off. Sleep it off.

0:53:42.8 Mike Vacanti: I’m happy for you, and I believe it. And I think you should continue doing it. It sounds like you’re not saying that vitamin C is physiologically not beneficial or even detrimental for being sick, but what you’re saying is when you would take vitamin C… 

0:54:02.9 Jordan Syatt: For me. 

0:54:03.8 Mike Vacanti: You would adopt a mindset of, okay, now I’m sick, and then you would be more sick, whereas vitamin C is almost a proxy for your belief that you’re sick.

0:54:13.3 Jordan Syatt: Yes. That’s exactly what I’m saying.

0:54:14.4 Mike Vacanti: And when you don’t take vitamin C, in your mind, you’re not sick, and then you’re not sick. I love it.  

0:54:19.7 Jordan Syatt: That’s it.  

0:54:20.5 Mike Vacanti: I love it.

0:54:20.8 Jordan Syatt: That’s it. Because the research on it is substantial. But for me, once I succumb to believing that I’m sick, I get very sick and I feel it. Whereas when I don’t succumb to the feeling of sickness…

0:54:34.3 Mike Vacanti: Don’t succumb. Don’t ever succumb.

0:54:36.0 Jordan Syatt: I haven’t succumbed.

0:54:36.9 Mike Vacanti: Don’t succumb. Great. I think I’m the opposite, but that’s okay. You’re a little contrarian. You’re contrarian on the science on this one, too, which I…

0:54:46.4 Jordan Syatt: You’re also a contrarian.

0:54:54.8 Mike Vacanti: Am I? Which I love. For me, vitamin C does the opposite. It tells me, you’re not getting sick. Like, oh… 

0:55:06.3 Jordan Syatt: Oh, interesting.  

0:55:06.9 Mike Vacanti: You’re around people who are sick, or you didn’t get a great night of sleep, or you’ve been a little stressed, or pushed your training slightly too hard. I’m taking vitamin C, which is like a shield. It’s not gonna let… I placebo myself into, oh, I took the vitamin C, I can’t get sick. I’m supercharged. It’s all in the brain.

0:55:25.9 Jordan Syatt: It’s the same thing, but the opposite strategy. You take the vitamin C cause it’s your shield, and I don’t take the vitamin C because…  

0:55:33.6 Mike Vacanti: That’s your shield.  

0:55:34.3 Jordan Syatt: Taking it would admit defeat for me. Whereas for you, taking it is like, this is my protective measure. So it’s impossible for them to penetrate.

0:55:40.9 Mike Vacanti: Just a little extra. My protective measure is my brain, too, but it just is like a little extra something. I’m going on three and a half years. I don’t know anyone…  

0:55:49.5 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, and your kids. 

0:55:51.6 Mike Vacanti: I wouldn’t say… All right.  

0:55:53.5 Jordan Syatt: You’re killing all the germs. 

0:55:56.7 Mike Vacanti: Apparently. I like the broscience you pulled out there. Do you think that there is a space in… I think, where is broscience right now as a percentage of the whole fitness space? If fitness space is a pie, broscience is a sliver. Where is it now compared to like five years ago, 10 years ago, and 15 years ago?

0:56:20.2 Jordan Syatt: It’s getting smaller and smaller.

0:56:21.4 Mike Vacanti: It’s getting smaller. I think…

0:56:22.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, it’s…

0:56:23.1 Mike Vacanti: Should we jump in there? We’ll keep a…

0:56:25.7 Jordan Syatt: Get in the broscience space?

0:56:26.5 Mike Vacanti: We’ll keep a foot out in the other space, but should we make broscience great? 

0:56:32.1 Jordan Syatt: Again? Yes. 

0:56:33.3 Mike Vacanti: Again. Again.

0:56:33.8 Jordan Syatt: Yeah. Because it used to be, the majority of the pie used to be broscience. It used to be like 98% broscience, 2% real science. Now I feel like it’s… 

0:56:43.8 Mike Vacanti: And I like the… It’s not just broscience versus real science. Like the optimal bros are in there too, which is like a toxicity. It’s like they OD’d on science. It’s like they just took too much science and they started doing these crazy optimal exercises. I want a foot in science, but I also want a foot in broscience. I want a foot in art. I want a foot in the golden era of bodybuilding, the 1970s. I want a foot in intuition. I think we don’t take away from science. I think we take away from the optimal bros with just some broscience. Some good old-fashioned, hard, good training.

0:57:16.6 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, agreed.

0:57:17.8 Mike Vacanti: All right, we’ll take it back. 

0:57:20.0 Jordan Syatt: 10.  

0:57:20.3 Mike Vacanti: I’ve been putting a towel over my treadmill when I’ve been doing these morning cardio sessions.

0:57:26.8 Jordan Syatt: Shut up. Wait, you’ve been doing morning cardio again?

0:57:28.5 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, I’ve been, after breakfast, though. After breakfast, just feels better.

0:57:33.5 Jordan Syatt: Is this recent? This has to be recent.

0:57:35.2 Mike Vacanti: Yeah, it’s recent. It’s recent, but a number of sessions.

0:57:40.7 Jordan Syatt: So you can’t see the time.

0:57:41.4 Mike Vacanti: Yeah. And it’s changed my life.

0:57:43.6 Jordan Syatt: Do you have your… Are you watching your phone or TV, or is it… You’re just… Are you listening to anything? 

0:57:48.9 Mike Vacanti: You know what? I have my step count on my phone. So anytime I put something up to watch with my phone, I realize that I actually want my phone in my pocket. So then I’ll put an audiobook or I’ll put music on, or a YouTube video that I can just listen to. So I’m not watching anything. I am listening to something, probably 65% to 70% music, and not seeing the time makes it go so much faster.

0:58:12.7 Jordan Syatt: Interesting.

0:58:13.8 Mike Vacanti: I know you were a big treadmill guy back in the day, or maybe still.

0:58:16.7 Jordan Syatt: I still. I use the treadmill several times a week. Yeah.

0:58:18.1 Mike Vacanti: Well, you got the outdoor, the great outdoors. I don’t know, but I guess it’s pretty hot in Texas. Did you ever cover the numbers?

0:58:27.1 Jordan Syatt: One time, and I hated every minute of it. Alex Viada made me cover it. And not only did he make me cover it, he also said, I don’t want you watching anything, listening to anything. He’s like, I literally just want you to just do nothing. And it was like a, I forget how long. It was either a 45-minute or maybe even a 75 or an 80-minute session. It was the worst experience ever. And I was nasal breathing the whole time.

0:58:54.6 Mike Vacanti: Okay. We’ll set the nasal breathing aside. First of all, I love that he had you do that. Second of all, I feel honored to be in that kind of company. Third and most importantly, good for him because I think that nailed your personality profile in terms of what would be good for you.

0:59:11.0 Jordan Syatt: Yeah, completely agree. I hated it.

0:59:12.9 Mike Vacanti: Yeah.

0:59:13.3 Jordan Syatt: I even told him. I was like, I’m not doing that again.

0:59:17.2 Mike Vacanti: What did he say?

0:59:18.5 Jordan Syatt: I don’t remember. I might have ignored it. Yeah, it was the worst.

0:59:26.1 Mike Vacanti: It would have gotten better if you continued doing it. And it would have made the rest of your life better.

0:59:30.3 Jordan Syatt: I think it would have gotten worse. And it would have made my whole life worse.

0:59:33.5 Mike Vacanti: I promise you, real science, not broscience or optimal bro, real science pie. It would have made your life better.

0:59:41.4 Jordan Syatt: I think it would have made my life worse. 

0:59:43.5 Mike Vacanti: But I know it would have made your life better. It would have sucked in that 75-minute window, but it would have made the other 22 hours and 45 minutes of your day better.

0:59:55.4 Jordan Syatt: Or it would have made… Because I feel like I get productive sometimes, and maybe it would, the whole time it would suck. And then when I’m done, I would have had less done. I mean, there’s so much I can do.

1:00:06.0 Mike Vacanti: No, no, no, no, no. You’re spinning this into like, oh, I have these incredible content-making sessions on the treadmill. You just… No, you listen to an audiobook or you’re watching something.

1:00:14.5 Jordan Syatt: I’m learning. I’m learning. Yeah.

1:00:17.8 Mike Vacanti: Sometimes. Look, I’m not gonna fight you on this. I’ll just…

1:00:22.2 Jordan Syatt: I hated it.

1:00:22.8 Mike Vacanti: I stand with Viad. Yeah, I know… 

1:00:24.8 Jordan Syatt: I know you do.  

1:00:26.5 Mike Vacanti: What we… What did King Arthur say? You got to go to the darkest, the thing you’re most afraid of, or the darkest part of the forest, is where you enter because that’s where the treasure is. There’s mythology going back hundreds, if not thousands of years relating to this. Hard, is good.

1:00:46.3 Jordan Syatt: I’m… That’s what she said. I’m… [laughter] You’re trying so hard not to laugh. When I’m outside, it’s much easier for me just to be like, not listen. Last night I went on a run outside, and I…  

1:01:04.5 Mike Vacanti: I don’t believe… By the way, I don’t believe you. You go, no stim, no… 

1:01:08.9 Jordan Syatt: So I’ll tell you… 

1:01:09.4 Mike Vacanti: Not talking to anyone.

1:01:09.4 Jordan Syatt: I’m not lying. Last night… Oh, actually, okay. So last night I went on a run. I started off listening to this audiobook, The Looming Tower, but it was at night and potentially mountain lions, whatever. I didn’t want to have my headphones on, so at first I just took them halfway off so I could still hear. But then I was like, I’m not, I can’t listen to this. So I stopped. And then I called my wife and I spoke to my wife the rest of the time on the run. But…

1:01:37.2 Mike Vacanti: Okay. So a couple things here. One, you did have an audiobook. And two, it wasn’t like you wanted do something hard that led to you not having it in. It was fear of death that trumped desire to be stimulated. You’re like, my fear of mountain lion is greater than my desire to be stimulated. And third, after a few minutes of running with nothing, you were like, I’m calling my wife.

1:01:57.3 Jordan Syatt: She was like, are you okay? I was like, yeah, just, hey. 

1:02:00.1 Mike Vacanti: What’s up? Yeah, yeah, I’m putting a little time here. Oh, that’s amazing. Hey, your no vitamin C works for you. Vitamin C works for me. Covering the treadmill works for me. You like to see those numbers and know where you’re at. Different strokes for different folks, me boy.  

1:02:24.5 Jordan Syatt: This is a good one. This is a good episode.

1:02:26.2 Mike Vacanti: Great episode. Please leave… Please subscribe on YouTube. Please like this video. I’m pretty sure that the smart marketers would say just like, one CTA here, but I’m actually gonna go for a giant right hook. A massive, could you, if you’re listening still, and if Jordan and I have helped you in any way ever, please help us grow this podcast a little bit. Even though, no, I’m not even gonna qualify it. Like on YouTube, subscribe, and leave a five-star review on either Apple or Spotify, or wherever you’re listening. If you could do each of those things for us, I know that’s a pretty big ask, but that would make me very happy and help us a lot.

1:03:05.4 Jordan Syatt: That would be amazing. It would make me happy as well. So, thank you. We appreciate you. Have an amazing week. Talk to you soon.

1:03:13.0 Mike Vacanti: See you next week.