Fitness Toolkit: Protocol & Tools to Optimize Physical Health

00:00:00.000 | - Welcome to the Huberman Lab Podcast,

00:00:02.280 | where we discuss science and science-based tools

00:00:04.880 | for everyday life.

00:00:05.900 | I'm Andrew Huberman,

00:00:10.120 | and I'm a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology

00:00:13.080 | at Stanford School of Medicine.

00:00:14.800 | Today, we are discussing fitness.

00:00:17.000 | Fitness, of course, is vitally important

00:00:19.000 | for cardiovascular health, for strength, for endurance,

00:00:21.840 | for lifespan, for healthspan.

00:00:23.720 | I can't think of anyone out there

00:00:24.940 | that wouldn't want to have healthy hormonal function,

00:00:27.840 | healthy cardiovascular function, to live a long time

00:00:30.880 | and to feel vital, that is to have a long healthspan

00:00:34.340 | as well as a long lifespan.

00:00:36.480 | Fitness and fitness protocols are tremendously powerful

00:00:39.760 | for developing all of that.

00:00:41.200 | However, despite there being an enormous amount

00:00:44.120 | of information out there on the internet

00:00:46.140 | and in books and elsewhere, it can be a bit overwhelming.

00:00:49.040 | So today's episode is really designed

00:00:50.780 | to synthesize science-based tools

00:00:53.280 | that we've covered on the podcast,

00:00:55.280 | some with expert guests like Dr. Andy Galpin

00:00:57.760 | or Dr. Peter Attia or world renowned movement specialist,

00:01:01.360 | Ido Portal or physiotherapist

00:01:03.720 | and strength and conditioning coach, Jeff Cavaliere.

00:01:06.400 | We've had all of them as guests on the podcast

00:01:08.960 | and each and every one of them provided a wealth of knowledge

00:01:12.080 | in terms of the various things that you can do

00:01:13.940 | to optimize very specific or multiple aspects of fitness.

00:01:17.800 | Today, we're going to do something

00:01:18.920 | a little bit different than usual.

00:01:20.440 | Typically on the Huberman Lab Podcast,

00:01:22.400 | I offer mechanism upfront or first,

00:01:25.080 | and then we talk about protocols that you can use

00:01:28.160 | that really lean on those science

00:01:29.760 | and science-based mechanisms.

00:01:31.780 | Today, I'm going to describe a specific protocol

00:01:34.500 | that serves as a general template that anyone,

00:01:37.200 | in fact, everyone can use

00:01:38.860 | in order to maximize all aspects of fitness.

00:01:41.520 | So that includes endurance, strength, flexibility,

00:01:43.700 | hypertrophy, aesthetic changes, et cetera.

00:01:47.080 | However, this general framework can also be modified

00:01:50.600 | that is customized to your particular needs.

00:01:53.080 | So if you're somebody who really wants to build more strength

00:01:55.140 | or bigger muscles, you can change the protocol

00:01:58.080 | and the overall program according to that.

00:02:00.480 | And I'll talk about very specific ways to do that.

00:02:02.360 | Or if you're somebody who really just wants

00:02:03.800 | to maintain strength, but you want to build endurance,

00:02:06.160 | we'll talk about that.

00:02:07.620 | And of course, we will cover real life issues such as,

00:02:10.840 | should you train if you are sleep deprived?

00:02:12.920 | What about food?

00:02:13.960 | When should you eat?

00:02:14.800 | What if you haven't eaten and you're hungry?

00:02:16.500 | Should you still train, et cetera, et cetera?

00:02:18.800 | We're going to cover all of that again

00:02:20.240 | in the context of this,

00:02:21.800 | what I would call foundational template of fitness.

00:02:24.400 | And this foundational template of fitness

00:02:26.320 | is something that I personally use.

00:02:28.460 | In fact, I've used it for over three decades.

00:02:30.680 | Hard to believe that I'm that old,

00:02:31.840 | but I just recently turned 47

00:02:33.480 | and I still use this basic protocol

00:02:35.840 | or template across the week and modify it

00:02:38.780 | according to what my particular goals are that year,

00:02:41.960 | that month, even that day,

00:02:43.800 | because I, like you, live in the real world.

00:02:45.960 | And sometimes I've been traveling or I miss a workout.

00:02:49.600 | Yes, it does happen.

00:02:50.880 | Or life isn't organized in exactly the way that I need to

00:02:54.160 | in order to have everything go

00:02:55.980 | according to the protocol that's on paper.

00:02:57.940 | So we're going to discuss real world issues

00:02:59.720 | and how to work with the real world issues

00:03:01.760 | in order to get the most out of your fitness program.

00:03:04.060 | And again, by the end of today's program,

00:03:05.720 | I can assure you,

00:03:06.840 | you will have a template protocol

00:03:09.360 | that you can build up from, build out, change and modify,

00:03:13.280 | and that will really serve your fitness goals

00:03:15.760 | according to the science and what peer reviewed studies

00:03:18.700 | and the experts that appeared on this podcast

00:03:20.780 | and other podcasts really tell us

00:03:22.480 | is best and optimal for our fitness.

00:03:24.900 | I'm pleased to announce that the Huberman Lab Podcast

00:03:26.880 | has now launched a premium channel.

00:03:28.700 | I want to be very clear that the Huberman Lab Podcast

00:03:30.940 | will continue to be released every Monday

00:03:33.280 | at zero cost to consumer,

00:03:35.120 | and there will be no change in the format of these podcasts.

00:03:38.400 | The premium channel is a response

00:03:40.000 | to the many questions we get about specific topics,

00:03:43.160 | and it will allow me to really drill deep

00:03:45.160 | into specific answers related to those topics.

00:03:47.480 | So once a month, I'm going to host an Ask Me Anything,

00:03:49.800 | so-called AMA, where you can ask me anything

00:03:52.520 | about specific topics covered on the Huberman Lab Podcast,

00:03:54.880 | and I will answer those questions.

00:03:56.700 | Those of course will be recorded.

00:03:57.980 | There will also be other premium content

00:03:59.980 | available to premium subscribers,

00:04:01.800 | such as transcripts and short videos of new tools

00:04:04.400 | and unique tools for mental health,

00:04:06.700 | physical health, and performance.

00:04:08.600 | If you want to check out the premium channel,

00:04:10.180 | you can go to HubermanLab.com/premium.

00:04:12.800 | There's a $10 a month charge or $100 per year,

00:04:15.300 | and I should mention that a large portion of the proceeds

00:04:17.820 | from the Huberman Lab premium channel

00:04:19.500 | will go to support scientific research

00:04:21.700 | that develops the very sorts of tools

00:04:24.120 | that we talk about on the Huberman Lab Podcast.

00:04:27.100 | The rest of the support

00:04:28.040 | for the Huberman Lab Podcast premium channel

00:04:29.860 | will go to supporting the regular Huberman Lab Podcast.

00:04:32.420 | Again, that's HubermanLab.com/premium.

00:04:35.140 | Before we dive into today's content

00:04:36.740 | about fitness and fitness protocols,

00:04:38.820 | I want to tell you about a brand new study

00:04:41.000 | that is very exciting and frankly, very unusual.

00:04:44.840 | This is a study that was published

00:04:46.460 | out of the University of Houston

00:04:48.260 | examining what I would call a micro exercise

00:04:51.700 | or a micro movement.

00:04:52.820 | It's a very small movement

00:04:54.220 | of a very small portion of your body.

00:04:57.500 | In fact, just 1% of your musculature

00:05:00.280 | that when it's performed continuously while seated has,

00:05:04.340 | at least what they report,

00:05:05.220 | are very dramatic positive changes

00:05:07.920 | in terms of blood sugar utilization and metabolism.

00:05:11.780 | So the title of this study is a potent physiological method

00:05:15.640 | to magnify and sustain soleus oxidative metabolism

00:05:19.420 | improves glucose and lipid regulation.

00:05:22.780 | This study was published in Eye Science

00:05:24.740 | and as I mentioned earlier,

00:05:26.380 | it is getting a lot of attention and it's very unusual.

00:05:30.180 | Without going into all the details of this study,

00:05:32.540 | let me just briefly give you

00:05:33.660 | a little bit of the background.

00:05:34.620 | First of all, you have a muscle called the soleus.

00:05:37.060 | The soleus muscle is a more or less wide flat muscle

00:05:40.660 | that sits beneath what most people think of as their calf,

00:05:43.180 | although it's part of the calf muscle.

00:05:44.860 | The other portion of the calf is called the gastrocnemius.

00:05:47.260 | The soleus sits below that.

00:05:48.760 | Now the soleus muscle is a unique muscle

00:05:51.060 | because it's largely slow twitch muscle fibers.

00:05:54.320 | It's designed to be used continuously over and over again

00:05:57.620 | for stabilizing your body

00:05:59.160 | when you're standing upright, for walking.

00:06:02.120 | This is a muscle that's designed to contract

00:06:03.880 | over and over and over again.

00:06:05.760 | In fact, you could walk all day on this muscle

00:06:08.200 | and most likely it would not get sore.

00:06:11.000 | You've probably done that and it did not get sore.

00:06:13.720 | In contrast, a muscle like your bicep or your tricep,

00:06:16.420 | if I were to have you perform hundreds

00:06:18.920 | or thousands of repetitions, even with a very lightweight,

00:06:22.000 | you know, one pound weight or a two pound weight,

00:06:24.140 | eventually it would fatigue.

00:06:26.140 | You would feel a sort of a burn there.

00:06:27.940 | It's a very unusual set of muscles to use repeatedly,

00:06:30.820 | but the soleus is an unusual muscle

00:06:32.460 | in that it really is designed to be used continuously.

00:06:35.540 | Now this study was focused on how people

00:06:37.680 | who sit a lot of the day and don't have the opportunity

00:06:40.720 | for a lot of physical movement,

00:06:41.800 | or maybe who don't even exercise at all,

00:06:44.600 | can improve their metabolism and glucose utilization.

00:06:48.560 | Without going into a deep dive about glucose utilization,

00:06:51.560 | because we've done the deep dive on this podcast,

00:06:53.800 | episodes such as metabolism, et cetera,

00:06:55.680 | you can look those up at Hubermanlab.com.

00:06:57.760 | They're all timestamped and available there.

00:06:59.880 | Anytime you eat, your blood sugar goes up to some extent.

00:07:02.840 | So your blood glucose, as it's called,

00:07:04.280 | goes up to some extent.

00:07:05.120 | And then insulin is a hormone

00:07:06.840 | that's used to essentially chaperone and sequester

00:07:11.160 | and use that blood glucose.

00:07:13.080 | Or basically the idea is you don't want blood glucose

00:07:15.360 | to go too high.

00:07:16.200 | Hyperinsulinemia is something associated

00:07:18.480 | with blood glucose that's too high,

00:07:19.680 | because insulin goes up to essentially match

00:07:21.600 | the level of blood glucose.

00:07:22.720 | You also don't want to be hypoglycemic.

00:07:24.640 | You don't want to have blood sugar that's too low.

00:07:27.240 | And insulin is involved in both regulating peaks

00:07:30.800 | and troughs in blood sugar, blood glucose.

00:07:33.840 | So we can basically say, and this is very simple,

00:07:36.280 | but we can basically say that you don't want blood glucose

00:07:39.080 | to be elevated too much or for too long.

00:07:41.520 | That's not good.

00:07:42.560 | In fact, people who have diabetes,

00:07:43.920 | because they don't make insulin,

00:07:45.560 | people who have type 1 diabetes do not make insulin at all,

00:07:48.500 | their blood glucose is so high

00:07:50.200 | that they actually have to take insulin

00:07:52.280 | in order to regulate it.

00:07:53.200 | Otherwise their blood glucose can go so high

00:07:54.900 | that it can damage cells and damage organs.

00:07:57.400 | It can even kill people.

00:07:58.600 | People who have type 2 diabetes

00:08:01.280 | are so-called insulin insensitive.

00:08:03.000 | They make insulin, but the receptors to insulin

00:08:05.000 | are not sensitive to it.

00:08:06.160 | And so they make more insulin than normally would be made

00:08:09.480 | and blood glucose isn't regulated properly,

00:08:11.320 | et cetera, et cetera.

00:08:12.680 | The take-home message about blood glucose

00:08:14.900 | is that you want your blood glucose levels

00:08:16.480 | to go up when you eat, but not too high,

00:08:18.040 | and you don't want them to stay elevated for too long.

00:08:20.900 | This study looked at how people who are largely sedentary

00:08:23.760 | or at least sitting can increase the utilization,

00:08:27.920 | the clearance of glucose from the bloodstream after eating.

00:08:31.640 | And they also looked at overall metabolism for people,

00:08:34.860 | get this, that we're using just that 1% of muscle,

00:08:38.160 | the soleus, by doing what they call a soleus push-up.

00:08:41.480 | So the soleus push-up can be described very simply

00:08:43.580 | as if you're sitting down with your knee bent

00:08:46.080 | at an approximately right angle, like a square corner,

00:08:50.040 | and pushing up, or I should say lifting your heel

00:08:53.080 | while pushing down on your toe

00:08:55.140 | and contracting the calf muscle as it were,

00:08:58.600 | and then lowering the heel

00:09:00.520 | and then lifting that heel again,

00:09:02.880 | lowering the heel, lifting the heel again,

00:09:04.500 | each one of those is what they call a soleus push-up.

00:09:08.260 | This study had people continuously do soleus push-ups,

00:09:12.440 | and they looked at things like blood glucose utilization,

00:09:16.040 | they looked at metabolism, and so on.

00:09:17.860 | Now, a couple of important things about this study

00:09:19.640 | before I tell you what they discovered,

00:09:20.880 | which was frankly pretty miraculous,

00:09:23.120 | almost hard to believe, and yet I believe the data,

00:09:26.400 | the data looked to be collected quite well,

00:09:30.000 | and there are a lot of statistics,

00:09:31.300 | and the study looks to be quite thorough.

00:09:33.460 | First of all, they used an equal number

00:09:34.700 | of male and female subjects.

00:09:36.680 | There were a wide range of body mass indices, okay?

00:09:40.400 | So this wasn't just super fit people

00:09:42.120 | or people that were purely sedentary and not fit.

00:09:44.280 | They used a wide variety of ages, time of day,

00:09:47.440 | people who tended to walk a lot or not walk a lot.

00:09:50.480 | They measured changes in metabolism

00:09:52.840 | and blood glucose utilization

00:09:54.420 | in people that had done these soleus push-ups

00:09:57.080 | while seated in the laboratory,

00:09:58.560 | and I must say they had them do these soleus push-ups

00:10:00.400 | for quite a long while continuously.

00:10:03.040 | So they had them do it for as long as 270 minutes total

00:10:08.040 | throughout the day.

00:10:09.280 | So if you divide that that's four and a half hours,

00:10:11.480 | you might say, well, four and a half hours

00:10:12.900 | of lifting the heel and putting the heel down,

00:10:14.340 | lifting the heel, putting the heel down, that's a lot,

00:10:16.020 | but they didn't always do it continuously.

00:10:17.700 | They had some breaks in there.

00:10:19.000 | So this is the sort of thing that you could imagine

00:10:21.700 | you or other people could do while seated,

00:10:23.440 | while doing zooms or while on calls,

00:10:26.960 | or maybe even while eating, doing that sort of thing.

00:10:29.280 | Although I'm not suggesting that you constantly be focusing

00:10:31.760 | on soleus push-ups throughout your life,

00:10:34.000 | the point is that people who did these soleus push-ups

00:10:37.560 | experienced dramatic improvements in blood sugar regulation

00:10:41.800 | and in metabolism,

00:10:42.800 | despite the fact that the soleus is just 1%

00:10:45.680 | of the total musculature.

00:10:47.000 | So here I'm going to read from the abstract

00:10:48.360 | about what they found.

00:10:49.180 | People who did these soleus push-ups,

00:10:51.080 | despite being a tiny muscle

00:10:55.320 | and using very little local energy,

00:10:58.320 | in fact, they measured muscle glycogen,

00:11:00.440 | the burn or essentially the utilization of fuel

00:11:03.480 | within the muscle.

00:11:04.320 | And there was very little utilization of fuel

00:11:07.000 | within the soleus itself.

00:11:08.400 | And that's because the soleus has this unique property

00:11:10.680 | of needing to basically keep you going all day,

00:11:13.160 | walking all day or moving all day.

00:11:15.640 | What they saw was a large magnitude, for example,

00:11:19.720 | 52% less postprandial, that's after a meal,

00:11:24.120 | glucose excursion.

00:11:25.200 | So 52% less increase in blood glucose.

00:11:29.980 | And 60%, 6-0 less hyperinsulinemia,

00:11:33.520 | so reduced levels of insulin.

00:11:35.260 | They also miraculously observed that despite this being,

00:11:39.680 | again, a small muscle, 1% of the total muscle mass,

00:11:44.400 | so very small oxidative use,

00:11:46.520 | they saw big improvements in systemic metabolic regulation.

00:11:50.440 | So this is interesting.

00:11:51.600 | And I think something that we should at least know about,

00:11:54.080 | I'm not aware that anyone's replicated this study yet.

00:11:56.500 | I know there's a ton of excitement about this study

00:11:58.460 | in the popular press.

00:11:59.780 | And if the data turn out to hold up,

00:12:02.080 | which I like to imagine they will,

00:12:04.560 | I can understand why there's so much excitement.

00:12:06.400 | What this means is that if you're somebody who cares

00:12:08.400 | about blood glucose regulation,

00:12:09.780 | you want to keep your metabolism running,

00:12:12.080 | please don't stop exercising the other ways

00:12:14.000 | that you exercise.

00:12:15.000 | But if you're somebody who wants to maximize your health,

00:12:18.500 | doing these soleus pushups fairly continuously while seated

00:12:22.860 | is going to be beneficial.

00:12:24.840 | And in addition to that,

00:12:25.880 | I know that there are going to be people out there who,

00:12:27.800 | for instance, might be injured,

00:12:28.960 | or you're traveling and you're stuck on a plane,

00:12:31.040 | or you're in the classroom and you're forced

00:12:34.000 | to study all day or take notes all day,

00:12:36.120 | you're just not getting enough opportunity

00:12:37.800 | to get those steps that you want to take,

00:12:40.100 | whether or not it's 10,000 or fewer or more,

00:12:41.820 | getting enough steps or movement.

00:12:43.400 | Maybe you don't have time to get out and do your run,

00:12:45.080 | or maybe you're also running weightlifting

00:12:47.240 | and doing yoga classes and things of that sort,

00:12:49.760 | but you want to further improve your fitness,

00:12:52.780 | at least in terms of your metabolic health.

00:12:54.920 | This seems like a terrific, very low investment way

00:12:57.840 | to do it, certainly zero cost.

00:12:59.620 | It does take a little bit of attention,

00:13:01.200 | so you have to divert your attention

00:13:02.660 | from other things you're doing

00:13:03.560 | to make sure that you're still doing these soleus pushups.

00:13:05.900 | I'm sure that many of you are going to have

00:13:07.040 | a lot of detailed questions,

00:13:08.120 | such as how high did they lift the heel,

00:13:10.280 | and did they contract the muscle very hard or not?

00:13:13.240 | Couple of things about that,

00:13:14.080 | they did not have subjects really contract the muscle hard.

00:13:16.980 | They did measure the angle of heel raise,

00:13:19.620 | and it was anywhere from 10 to 15 degrees,

00:13:21.580 | so they didn't have to go way, way up on their tippy toes

00:13:23.800 | or things of that sort.

00:13:25.360 | In any event, 270 minutes, four and a half hours

00:13:28.880 | of doing these soleus pushups is a lot,

00:13:31.740 | but by my read of the data and the rather significant,

00:13:35.400 | or I should say very significant effects

00:13:37.360 | that they observed on blood glucose regulation

00:13:39.160 | and metabolism, et cetera,

00:13:41.000 | seems to me that doing less would still be beneficial

00:13:44.320 | and that you don't necessarily have to do the full 270

00:13:47.240 | minutes in order to get the benefits that they observed.

00:13:50.080 | More about this study includes the fact

00:13:52.800 | that the benefits they observed were very long lasting,

00:13:55.320 | as long as two hours after a meal,

00:13:57.040 | they could still see this improved blood glucose utilization.

00:13:59.680 | I don't know because I wasn't able to find it

00:14:01.600 | in the methods, whether or not they were doing

00:14:03.080 | the soleus pushups while they were consuming blood sugar

00:14:07.360 | in this study.

00:14:08.200 | The point being that if you're somebody who cares

00:14:10.800 | about their fitness, this study is interesting

00:14:13.320 | because what it means is that, again,

00:14:15.080 | if you are forced to be immobile

00:14:16.760 | or sitting longer than you would like,

00:14:18.840 | I feel stuck in a meeting or zooms or class

00:14:20.960 | or on a plane, et cetera,

00:14:22.820 | or if you're simply trying to add a bit more fitness

00:14:25.940 | and metabolic health to your overall regimen,

00:14:29.400 | soleus pushups, at least to me,

00:14:31.260 | seem like a very low investment, simple zero cost tool

00:14:34.760 | to improve your metabolic health.

00:14:36.260 | For those of you that want to peruse the study

00:14:37.700 | in more detail, we will provide a link to this paper

00:14:40.260 | published in iScience in the show note caption.

00:14:42.860 | Before we begin, I'd like to emphasize that this podcast

00:14:45.480 | is separate from my teaching and research roles at Stanford.

00:14:48.280 | It is, however, part of my desire and effort

00:14:50.460 | to bring zero cost to consumer information about science

00:14:53.060 | and science-related tools to the general public.

00:14:55.680 | In keeping with that theme,

00:14:56.800 | I'd like to thank the sponsors of today's podcast.

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00:16:26.680 | Now, I wear eyeglasses at night when I work or when I drive,

00:16:30.360 | and I wear sunglasses during the day.

00:16:31.880 | I don't wear sunglasses

00:16:32.760 | when I get my morning sunlight viewing,

00:16:34.280 | a practice that I'm absolutely religious about

00:16:36.540 | every single morning,

00:16:37.560 | but throughout the day, I'll wear sunglasses when I drive

00:16:39.700 | or if I'm headed into bright sunlight to protect my eyes.

00:16:42.760 | Roca eyeglasses and sunglasses are terrific

00:16:45.160 | because they were designed for performance,

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00:16:54.120 | I can't even remember that they're on my face.

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00:17:15.080 | If you'd like to try Roca eyeglasses and sunglasses,

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00:18:35.000 | The Huberman Lab podcast

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00:18:45.480 | And I should just mention

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00:18:49.260 | Again, that's livemomentus.com/huberman.

00:18:52.340 | Let's talk about fitness,

00:18:53.800 | and let's talk about how you can develop

00:18:55.400 | the optimal fitness protocols for you.

00:18:57.620 | So that includes what to do each day of the week

00:19:00.340 | and your fitness protocol across the week

00:19:02.560 | and indeed across the month and the year

00:19:04.640 | and even year to year.

00:19:06.600 | When we had Dr. Andy Galpin on the podcast,

00:19:09.080 | he said something very important

00:19:10.440 | that we want to keep in mind today,

00:19:12.360 | which is concepts are few, methods are many.

00:19:15.600 | That is, there are an infinite number

00:19:18.120 | of different programs and exercises

00:19:20.160 | and set and rep schemes and different runs

00:19:22.160 | and burpees and pushups, et cetera, et cetera,

00:19:24.920 | that one can follow.

00:19:26.020 | However, there are really just a few basic concepts

00:19:30.080 | or principles of muscle physiology,

00:19:33.280 | of cardiovascular function, of connective tissue function,

00:19:36.720 | that provide or set the basis for the adaptations

00:19:40.340 | that we call fitness or that lead to fitness.

00:19:43.120 | So I'm going to list those off now.

00:19:45.100 | We can talk about a fitness protocol

00:19:47.320 | that's really aimed mainly toward developing skill.

00:19:50.560 | That's one.

00:19:51.440 | Or speed, that's another.

00:19:53.840 | Or power, which is speed times strength.

00:19:57.080 | Or specifically strength.

00:19:59.200 | Or hypertrophy, growth of muscles.

00:20:02.220 | Or endurance, such as muscular endurance.

00:20:04.760 | Muscular endurance is, for instance,

00:20:06.440 | your ability to stay in a plank position

00:20:09.220 | or to do a wall sit,

00:20:11.120 | you know, to sit on an invisible chair against a wall.

00:20:14.600 | Or other forms of endurance,

00:20:16.120 | like near pure anaerobic endurance.

00:20:19.000 | So a one-minute sprint or less,

00:20:22.200 | or a one-minute all-out cycling on a stationary bike,

00:20:25.880 | this sort of thing.

00:20:26.960 | Or endurance that occurs in the kind of

00:20:29.560 | three to 12-minute total duration range.

00:20:33.120 | So that might be sprints

00:20:35.740 | or high-intensity interval type training.

00:20:37.800 | It could be a all-out swim.

00:20:39.860 | It could be all-out row.

00:20:41.800 | That's another form of endurance,

00:20:43.040 | taps into different fuel systems,

00:20:44.800 | different aspects of muscle physiology, et cetera.

00:20:47.840 | And then endurance that lasts 30 minutes or more,

00:20:50.720 | which is typically what people think about

00:20:52.280 | when they think about endurance.

00:20:53.740 | But of course the other forms of endurance matter.

00:20:55.620 | So we've got skill, speed, power, strength, hypertrophy,

00:20:59.600 | muscular endurance, anaerobic endurance,

00:21:02.280 | what I would call three to 12-minute endurance,

00:21:05.560 | although it goes by other names as well.

00:21:07.520 | And 30 minutes or more endurance type

00:21:10.080 | exercise and adaptations.

00:21:12.480 | Each and every one of these

00:21:14.560 | requires different principles, different concepts,

00:21:17.720 | in order to improve, say your muscular strength

00:21:21.280 | or your hypertrophy or both.

00:21:23.320 | However, there's a general theme

00:21:25.640 | that sits beneath all adaptations leading to fitness.

00:21:29.240 | And that's what we're really going to set down

00:21:30.960 | as the base layer,

00:21:32.160 | the foundation of everything we talk about today.

00:21:34.520 | And that's that we need to think about

00:21:37.800 | what are the modifiable variables?

00:21:39.740 | Again, I'm borrowing directly

00:21:41.400 | from the episode with Dr. Andy Galpin.

00:21:43.040 | He was the one that said modifiable variables

00:21:45.280 | are the key thing to think about.

00:21:46.280 | What are you going to modify?

00:21:47.520 | What are you going to change

00:21:49.000 | in order to increase one or some

00:21:52.240 | of the various things I listed off before?

00:21:55.800 | Skill, speed, power, strength, hypertrophy,

00:21:57.480 | endurance, et cetera, et cetera.

00:21:59.280 | And some of the key concepts

00:22:01.520 | that emerge from that discussion

00:22:03.160 | are that we need to think about progressive overload.

00:22:05.440 | Normally, when people hear about progressive overload,

00:22:07.280 | they think about adding more weight to a bar

00:22:09.160 | or picking up heavier dumbbells,

00:22:10.620 | but that could also be progressive overload

00:22:13.180 | in the context of running up a hill of steeper incline

00:22:16.160 | or running a little bit faster or a little bit further

00:22:18.280 | and so on and so forth.

00:22:19.800 | Now, as I promised earlier today,

00:22:21.280 | we are not going to drill

00:22:22.460 | into each and every one of the mechanisms

00:22:24.380 | that underlie the different adaptations

00:22:26.700 | that are going to develop speed

00:22:28.120 | and strength and endurance, et cetera,

00:22:30.040 | because that was covered in the podcast

00:22:31.520 | with Dr. Andy Galpin and the other podcasts

00:22:33.680 | with experts that I mentioned earlier.

00:22:35.320 | And we, again, we'll provide links to those podcasts

00:22:37.360 | if you want to drill into those mechanisms.

00:22:39.700 | Instead, what we're going to do is we're going to start

00:22:42.280 | with a program that essentially is designed

00:22:45.840 | for you to maximize all aspects of fitness

00:22:49.700 | to the extent that you can simultaneously

00:22:52.200 | maximize all aspects of fitness,

00:22:54.280 | but then to change or modify that protocol

00:22:57.920 | so that if you want to build up more, for instance, strength

00:23:01.080 | and you want to just hold on to the endurance you have,

00:23:04.280 | you don't want to build endurance,

00:23:05.600 | at least not in that week or that month, you can do that.

00:23:08.720 | Or if you want to improve your endurance

00:23:09.980 | while maintaining your strength, you can do that,

00:23:12.720 | and so on and so forth.

00:23:14.680 | Most people, I do believe, would like a combination

00:23:17.720 | of strength and endurance and flexibility

00:23:21.160 | and maybe even hypertrophy,

00:23:22.460 | particularly for certain muscle groups

00:23:24.520 | that maybe are not as well developed

00:23:26.520 | as other muscle groups.

00:23:27.360 | They want to bring balance to their physique,

00:23:29.060 | both for sake of aesthetics and for sake of health

00:23:31.560 | and for sake of general functioning,

00:23:34.540 | maybe even to eliminate pain.

00:23:36.360 | The protocol that I'm going to describe

00:23:38.160 | really works as a foundational template for that as well.

00:23:41.400 | So let's drill into that foundational protocol,

00:23:43.900 | and I'll keep referring to it as the foundational protocol,

00:23:47.220 | not because it's the one that I use,

00:23:48.540 | although it is the one that I use,

00:23:50.000 | and not because it's the one that we're talking about today,

00:23:51.980 | although it's the one we're talking about today,

00:23:53.540 | but because we need some general framework

00:23:55.620 | from which to build out the more specific protocols

00:23:58.180 | that we'll get into in a bit more detail later.

00:24:00.680 | So in this foundational protocol for fitness,

00:24:02.840 | what you'll notice is that on any one given day,

00:24:06.200 | you're going to focus on one particular aspect of fitness.

00:24:09.300 | Maybe it's endurance, maybe it's strength,

00:24:11.080 | maybe it's hypertrophy.

00:24:12.800 | In particular, it might be hypertrophy

00:24:14.520 | for a particular muscle group or muscle groups.

00:24:17.400 | That said, across the entire week,

00:24:20.060 | it's designed to bring fitness

00:24:21.980 | and different forms of fitness to all aspects of your body.

00:24:26.440 | So this particular protocol begins on Sunday,

00:24:29.780 | although that's simply the day

00:24:31.740 | that I happen to begin the protocol.

00:24:33.680 | And again, this protocol is not important

00:24:36.080 | because it's the one that I follow.

00:24:37.660 | I follow it because it is important.

00:24:39.780 | In other words, it's a protocol that's really gleaned

00:24:42.100 | from the scientific literature

00:24:43.260 | and the experts that is for you.

00:24:45.080 | So this fitness protocol is really about you.

00:24:47.120 | I just may refer to it as the one that I follow

00:24:49.740 | simply for ease of communication.

00:24:51.340 | And for me, my week begins on Sunday.

00:24:53.780 | So I do my very best to get a workout in on Sunday.

00:24:58.060 | And for me, that workout is that of a endurance workout.

00:25:02.680 | It's designed to either maintain or increase my endurance.

00:25:07.440 | And the endurance type that I'm referring to

00:25:09.720 | is endurance of 30 minutes or more.

00:25:11.780 | In fact, for me, the goal is always to get

00:25:15.680 | either 60 to 75 minutes of jogging.

00:25:18.860 | So this would be so-called zone two cardio.

00:25:21.640 | People probably have heard of zone two cardio,

00:25:23.660 | but if you haven't, that's okay.

00:25:24.700 | Zone two cardio is something that you could measure

00:25:27.320 | with a heart rate monitor or other device,

00:25:29.320 | but you don't need to.

00:25:31.020 | Zone two cardio is the kind of cardiovascular exercise

00:25:33.900 | in which you're pushing yourself to move

00:25:38.180 | such that you're breathing faster than normal.

00:25:41.380 | Your heart is beating faster than normal.

00:25:43.380 | However, you are still able to sustain a conversation.

00:25:46.540 | But if you were to push yourself any harder,

00:25:49.960 | that is move faster or go up a steeper incline

00:25:52.860 | at the same rate you happen to be at any one moment,

00:25:55.220 | you would lose that ability to speak.

00:25:57.620 | You wouldn't be able to complete sentences.

00:25:59.020 | You would be out of breath

00:25:59.980 | or you'd have to pause mid-sentence.

00:26:01.800 | Now it's near impossible, even with a heart rate monitor,

00:26:04.580 | to stay exactly in zone two

00:26:07.260 | unless you're very, very skilled at that.

00:26:08.720 | So I don't obsess over that.

00:26:10.320 | And in fact, I don't wear a heart rate monitor

00:26:11.940 | when I do this exercise.

00:26:12.980 | But for me, the goal is to head out on Sunday

00:26:15.580 | and get 60 to 75 minutes of jogging in zone two.

00:26:19.780 | Now, of course, I like to jog,

00:26:21.380 | but that doesn't mean that you have to jog.

00:26:22.720 | You could replace jogging with rowing on a rowing machine

00:26:26.980 | or maybe even rowing an actual boat

00:26:28.660 | if you have access to that or cycling or swimming,

00:26:32.060 | something that allows you continuous movement

00:26:34.340 | for 60 to 75 minutes at that zone two threshold

00:26:38.660 | we talked about earlier.

00:26:40.620 | For me, that can include some hills.

00:26:42.920 | And when I say hills, they could be very steep hills,

00:26:44.920 | but I'll simply slow my pace down

00:26:47.600 | in order to stay in that roughly zone two range.

00:26:51.340 | Or it could be that they are more low grade hills

00:26:55.100 | and I might just slow down a little bit,

00:26:57.040 | or I might even push myself a tiny bit that day,

00:26:59.440 | but really I'm just trying to build that long endurance.

00:27:01.780 | I'm trying to build up my capacity or maintain my capacity

00:27:04.860 | to go a long distance without fatiguing.

00:27:07.460 | Now, some days, meaning some Sundays,

00:27:10.300 | since I tend to do this almost always on Sunday,

00:27:12.580 | although there are exceptions,

00:27:14.100 | instead of doing the 60 to 75 minute jog,

00:27:16.820 | what I'll do is I will head out for a long hike

00:27:20.140 | that could be two and a half hours or three hours,

00:27:22.660 | or maybe even a four or five hour hike.

00:27:24.260 | Sometimes it's very long.

00:27:25.900 | And I'll do that sometimes simply to mix up the routine

00:27:30.620 | because sometimes jogging and jogging the same routes

00:27:33.540 | gets boring to me.

00:27:34.700 | I do enjoy running.

00:27:35.980 | That's something I've been doing for a very long time,

00:27:38.060 | but sometimes it just gets a little bit tedious

00:27:41.940 | and I want to do something different.

00:27:43.580 | Also, sometimes I want to be social on Sundays.

00:27:45.800 | I want to head out on a hike with my partner,

00:27:47.820 | or I want to meet up with friends

00:27:49.940 | and hike with them.

00:27:50.780 | And so taking a long hike on Sunday

00:27:52.600 | is something that also could be quite social.

00:27:54.340 | And then I don't have to worry

00:27:55.260 | about also getting in my workout

00:27:56.980 | when heading out on a hike with my partner

00:27:59.380 | or going out to meet with friends or things of that sort.

00:28:03.000 | I will say that there's a specific tool

00:28:07.420 | or a specific change that you can make

00:28:09.680 | to this Sunday long endurance,

00:28:11.820 | or at least what I consider long for me.

00:28:13.560 | I mean, it's by no means a marathon or an Ironman,

00:28:15.460 | but this long endurance training.

00:28:18.500 | And that's the use of a weight vest.

00:28:20.620 | So something that I've really started utilizing

00:28:23.020 | more recently, and by more recently,

00:28:25.260 | I really mean within the last year or so,

00:28:27.420 | is I purchased one of these weight vests

00:28:29.460 | that can be anywhere from 10 to 50 pounds.

00:28:33.020 | What I use in the weight vest is irrelevant,

00:28:35.400 | but it certainly changes the level of effort required

00:28:39.280 | when taking a hike or even a walk.

00:28:40.940 | Now there's an additional benefit of the weight vest,

00:28:42.780 | which is that if you are going out for a hike

00:28:45.620 | or even for a walk for social reasons,

00:28:47.460 | and you're with somebody that's not quite

00:28:48.660 | at the same fitness level that you are,

00:28:50.660 | frankly, it's a little bit rude

00:28:52.000 | to just keep walking ahead of them and running back

00:28:54.660 | or running ahead and running back.

00:28:56.200 | You know, oftentimes you really want to spend time

00:28:57.660 | with the person and you don't want them to feel

00:28:59.240 | as if they're holding you up.

00:29:00.740 | And so the weight vest is a terrific way

00:29:02.800 | to get some additional work.

00:29:04.300 | Then as you'll find, if you wear a weight vest,

00:29:07.100 | it is additional work on say a shorter hike.

00:29:10.460 | So maybe the person you're with

00:29:12.220 | only has time for an hour long hike,

00:29:13.980 | or maybe they just don't have the fitness

00:29:15.380 | to do a two hour or three hour hike.

00:29:17.920 | So I'll throw on the weight vest

00:29:19.540 | and I'll head out for a walk with them or a hike with them.

00:29:21.940 | Or sometimes I'll go out on a long hike

00:29:23.620 | with the weight vest myself.

00:29:25.340 | So again, the point of this for me Sunday,

00:29:28.380 | although it could fall on any day for you,

00:29:30.180 | workout is really to build up that long form endurance.

00:29:33.140 | And this fits well with what Dr. Andy Galpin

00:29:35.940 | and Dr. Peter Attia referred to as the real need

00:29:39.140 | to get in some long endurance type work at some point

00:29:42.680 | or even multiple points throughout the week.

00:29:44.980 | For me, this long Sunday jog of 60 to 75 minutes

00:29:48.920 | or long Sunday hike or weighted walk or weighted hike

00:29:52.840 | really accomplishes that goal.

00:29:54.660 | Sometimes leads to a little bit of soreness,

00:29:57.140 | particularly in my calves,

00:29:59.540 | or if I'm wearing the weight vest,

00:30:01.100 | sometimes my midsection will get sore

00:30:04.100 | because I'm trying to remain upright.

00:30:05.780 | So I think it also builds up some muscular endurance,

00:30:08.960 | not just cardiovascular endurance.

00:30:10.860 | But again, throughout the entire time

00:30:12.620 | that I'm jogging or hiking,

00:30:14.320 | what I'm trying to get to is a place where I can feel

00:30:16.940 | that my pulse rate is definitely elevated,

00:30:19.580 | but it's not so elevated that I have to stop

00:30:21.760 | because I'm out of breath.

00:30:23.120 | And because I know some people out there

00:30:24.900 | might be really neurotic about this sort of thing.

00:30:27.060 | If you have to stop because you're out of breath,

00:30:29.040 | that doesn't mean that you blew the workout

00:30:30.480 | that you know you aren't getting endurance.

00:30:31.900 | Of course, you're getting benefits from it.

00:30:34.300 | So I'm not absolutely neurotic about always staying exactly

00:30:37.360 | in that heart rate zone.

00:30:38.700 | I might stop and have a conversation for a moment

00:30:40.880 | if it's a longer hike,

00:30:42.040 | although I really try and keep moving

00:30:43.380 | and I try and push myself just a little bit further

00:30:45.920 | than where I'm exceedingly comfortable.

00:30:48.660 | And so for me, doing this long Sunday hike or jog

00:30:52.660 | really provides a foundation, a base for endurance

00:30:55.880 | that then the other endurance workouts

00:30:57.860 | that I'll describe later

00:30:58.800 | and that take place later in the week can build on.

00:31:01.740 | Now, as I mentioned earlier,

00:31:02.880 | we will get back to the mechanisms that this taps into

00:31:05.440 | and why this is so useful.

00:31:07.580 | There are multiple benefits to doing these kinds

00:31:09.620 | of endurance type workouts and zone two cardio,

00:31:13.020 | but by putting it at the start of my week,

00:31:15.800 | again, my week starts on Sunday,

00:31:18.040 | I'm sure that regardless of how the rest of the week goes,

00:31:21.760 | that I got my endurance training in.

00:31:24.120 | And of course, I'm going to want to

00:31:26.240 | and I will do endurance training other days during the week,

00:31:28.560 | but if something comes up or I happen to get sick

00:31:30.800 | or I'm really behind in terms of work

00:31:33.200 | and I can't get other workouts in,

00:31:34.860 | this Sunday long jog or hike really provides

00:31:38.240 | that fundamental, I can honestly say foundation

00:31:41.960 | for cardiovascular fitness and endurance

00:31:44.380 | that I can hang my hat on and say,

00:31:46.120 | okay, I've got that one in the bag

00:31:47.840 | and I can then look to other days of the week

00:31:50.080 | to focus on other aspects of fitness.

00:31:52.140 | Now, a really important point to make

00:31:53.820 | about this Sunday endurance workout

00:31:55.840 | is that allows you to check off a box

00:31:59.360 | and that box is 75 or so minutes of zone two cardio,

00:32:04.100 | because as you may have heard,

00:32:06.280 | either in this podcast or from others out there

00:32:08.320 | like Dr. Peter Attia,

00:32:09.360 | getting 180 to 200 minutes of zone two cardio per week

00:32:13.800 | has enormous positive effects on longevity

00:32:17.180 | and enormous positive effects on general health.

00:32:20.740 | Again, in terms of cardiovascular function,

00:32:22.760 | but also metabolic fuel utilization,

00:32:25.680 | also in terms of your musculature

00:32:27.640 | and your ability to use your body

00:32:29.520 | over long distances for long periods of time.

00:32:31.960 | So while it doesn't complete all 180 to 200 minutes per week,

00:32:37.160 | it certainly gets you a good distance, pun intended,

00:32:40.000 | toward that goal.

00:32:41.220 | Now, I want to acknowledge that some people

00:32:42.840 | might be starting a fitness program

00:32:44.680 | and so 60 to 75 minutes of jogging might be too long

00:32:47.940 | or a three-hour weighted vested hike,

00:32:50.760 | or some people might even do what's called a ruck,

00:32:52.400 | like you wear a rucksack, that might be too much.

00:32:55.240 | In which case, certainly start with less

00:32:58.520 | and go on flat ground and go at the rate

00:33:00.960 | that allows you to get into zone two,

00:33:02.880 | but that is not excessively difficult for you

00:33:04.800 | and then as you build up fitness,

00:33:05.960 | you can add time or you can add weight through a weight vest

00:33:09.280 | or if you don't want to buy a weight vest

00:33:11.760 | or can't afford one, as a simple solution to that,

00:33:14.480 | I actually have a good anecdote about that.

00:33:16.480 | One time I was heading out for a hike with a friend of mine,

00:33:19.400 | he was a former SEAL team operator,

00:33:21.480 | I'll never forget this and he said,

00:33:22.840 | "Oh yeah, I'll bring you a sack."

00:33:25.540 | And I thought he meant like a sack lunch,

00:33:26.920 | like he was going to bring lunch

00:33:27.760 | and I showed up and he basically gave me a backpack

00:33:29.480 | that was loaded with a bunch of stuff

00:33:30.880 | and the backpack weighed about 40 pounds

00:33:32.560 | and then we took a hike.

00:33:33.560 | So I was thinking lunch, he was thinking weighted backpack

00:33:36.920 | and a weighted backpack or even just any kind of strong sack

00:33:40.200 | that you can put over your shoulders

00:33:41.440 | or even carrying your arms,

00:33:42.720 | it's going to work exceedingly well

00:33:44.440 | to build in some extra requirement for effort.

00:33:46.700 | So you certainly don't have to purchase a weight vest

00:33:49.320 | in order to get the benefits of bringing additional weight

00:33:53.640 | along with you on these long cardiovascular events.

00:33:57.040 | But again, build up over time, you can add time,

00:33:59.760 | you can add weight and that's also a really nice feature

00:34:02.280 | of adding weight, which is at some point

00:34:04.720 | your schedule might be such

00:34:06.240 | or you just don't really want to keep adding

00:34:10.000 | more and more and more time on this long endurance,

00:34:13.600 | Sunday in this case, workout, in that case, add weight.

00:34:18.380 | You can also, as you build up fitness,

00:34:19.840 | you can add speed to it, your zone two

00:34:22.440 | and what zone two is won't shift

00:34:24.000 | but what work is required from you

00:34:26.040 | in order to get into zone two will shift.

00:34:28.400 | That is, as you get more and more fit,

00:34:30.000 | you'll have to move faster and or bring more weight

00:34:32.340 | in order to stay in zone two and that will simply tell you

00:34:35.280 | that you are indeed improving your endurance.

00:34:37.760 | Okay, so then Monday rolls around

00:34:39.400 | and I like most everyone else out there, I work on Monday.

00:34:43.620 | I get right into my emails and preparation for podcasts

00:34:47.220 | and running my laboratory, et cetera.

00:34:49.000 | However, I make sure that at some point on Monday

00:34:53.080 | and for me, that some point is typically

00:34:55.820 | and ideally early in the morning, so 7 a.m. or so,

00:34:59.520 | I train my legs on Monday.

00:35:01.320 | So that includes quadriceps, hamstrings and calves.

00:35:04.240 | Why do I do that workout on Monday

00:35:05.840 | and what is that workout designed to do?

00:35:07.360 | Well, that workout is really designed to make sure

00:35:10.560 | that I'm either maintaining or building strength in my legs

00:35:15.140 | and this is not simply for aesthetic reasons.

00:35:18.120 | This is not simply to grow bigger calves

00:35:20.360 | or grow bigger quadriceps and hamstrings,

00:35:22.320 | although it can accomplish that as well

00:35:24.360 | depending on how you train.

00:35:25.560 | We'll talk about details of training.

00:35:27.080 | The reason for training legs on Monday is several fold.

00:35:29.160 | First of all, they are the largest muscle groups of the body

00:35:32.840 | and by training your legs on Monday,

00:35:35.000 | it sets in motion a large number of metabolic processes

00:35:38.580 | that carry you some distance even through the whole week

00:35:41.520 | in terms of elevating metabolism,

00:35:43.840 | in terms of amplifying certain hormonal events in your body,

00:35:47.760 | et cetera, that are really beneficial.

00:35:50.880 | In addition to that, I'm of the belief

00:35:52.680 | that the legs are the foundation of the body

00:35:55.220 | and provided you can train legs safely,

00:35:58.040 | that training legs is vitally important,

00:36:00.100 | not just for strength of the legs,

00:36:02.440 | but also for strength of your entire body.

00:36:04.720 | Again, some of that is through systemic hormonal effects

00:36:07.020 | because if you're going to train the large muscle groups

00:36:09.280 | of your body under substantial loads,

00:36:11.260 | you will get systemic release of hormones,

00:36:13.240 | not just testosterone, although certainly testosterone,

00:36:15.720 | but also things like growth hormone.

00:36:18.020 | You get increases in all sorts of so-called

00:36:20.400 | anabolic hormones that even if you're somebody

00:36:22.360 | who's not trying to increase muscle size,

00:36:24.200 | because I realize a lot of people are not trying to do that,

00:36:26.880 | these are hormones that shift your metabolism

00:36:29.360 | and your overall tendon strength and ligament strength

00:36:32.280 | and overall musculature

00:36:33.780 | into what I would call a strong foundation.

00:36:36.920 | So for me, Monday is leg workout.

00:36:38.800 | It also just feels good to get the leg workout

00:36:41.320 | out of the way early in the week.

00:36:43.220 | And it accomplishes another goal,

00:36:44.920 | which is that I sometimes will take one or two days

00:36:48.440 | off of a leg workout because they can be very intense

00:36:50.860 | and they are large muscle groups.

00:36:52.520 | And I'll explain what I do on the off days,

00:36:54.200 | they're not pure off days,

00:36:55.440 | they actually include some recovery type training

00:36:57.820 | or even some all out training.

00:36:59.960 | But by training legs on Monday,

00:37:02.920 | I'm able to get what I consider the hardest strength

00:37:06.820 | and hypertrophy workout out of the way.

00:37:09.100 | And again, set all those positive physiological effects

00:37:12.000 | in motion for the entire week.

00:37:13.840 | The other thing is that no workout exists in isolation.

00:37:17.120 | What you do one day is going to be determined

00:37:19.600 | by what you did the previous day.

00:37:20.960 | And even though the previous day

00:37:21.960 | I may have taken a three hour weight vested hike,

00:37:24.680 | never are my legs so sore from that long,

00:37:27.160 | slow endurance work, because it is long and slow,

00:37:30.420 | then I'm unable to train legs.

00:37:32.320 | Contrast that with a say high intensity interval training

00:37:36.200 | workout, which comes later in the week.

00:37:38.480 | And my legs might be sore.

00:37:40.060 | In fact, they might not even be recovered

00:37:41.680 | such that I'm able to do a real leg workout.

00:37:44.360 | And when I say real workout,

00:37:45.480 | I'll describe what that means in a moment.

00:37:47.300 | So legs come on Monday.

00:37:48.440 | And I think that for those of you that are using

00:37:51.000 | or interested in using resistance training,

00:37:54.000 | I suggest getting your leg workout done early in the week.

00:37:57.000 | And for those of you that have heard the phrase,

00:38:00.120 | don't skip leg day,

00:38:01.760 | I will go a step further and say, don't skip leg day.

00:38:04.080 | In fact, make leg day your first day

00:38:06.080 | of strength and hypertrophy training, put it on Monday.

00:38:08.620 | Okay, so now that we're talking about resistance training,

00:38:10.480 | the question is going to come up about sets and reps

00:38:13.040 | and all of that business.

00:38:14.560 | That was covered in a lot of detail

00:38:16.360 | on the podcast with Dr. Andy Galpin.

00:38:18.120 | And I'm going to get into some of that detail now,

00:38:20.720 | but I'm going to wait until I describe

00:38:24.140 | the entire set of workouts for the week

00:38:26.920 | before I go into even more detail,

00:38:29.180 | because there's a way of what's called periodizing,

00:38:32.040 | that is changing the sets and reps, et cetera,

00:38:34.760 | across the week and indeed from month to month,

00:38:38.320 | that's really optimal.

00:38:39.640 | But I don't want to make it seem as if all of that

00:38:42.440 | just pertains to the leg workout.

00:38:44.460 | It actually pertains to all of the resistance training.

00:38:47.180 | So I'll just give you a couple of teasers

00:38:49.760 | about the key principles of resistance training

00:38:52.560 | that I think are almost universally,

00:38:56.040 | if not universally, then generally accepted

00:38:58.300 | in the strength training and physiology community.

00:39:01.400 | And then later,

00:39:03.080 | I'll get back to some of the overarching principles

00:39:05.600 | that apply to all strength and hypertrophy workouts

00:39:10.040 | across the week, including the ones for the torso,

00:39:12.040 | the arms, et cetera.

00:39:13.200 | Okay, so legs fall on Monday.

00:39:15.680 | I should say that leg workouts,

00:39:17.560 | like all resistance training workouts for me,

00:39:21.200 | consist of about, again, I'm not neurotically attached to this

00:39:24.520 | but about 10 minutes of warming up

00:39:26.760 | and then about 50, five, zero to 60 minutes of real work.

00:39:30.960 | Now, of course, some of that is going to be rest

00:39:32.500 | between sets, but by real work, I mean really hard work,

00:39:35.920 | not necessarily to failure,

00:39:37.360 | we'll talk about failure in a little bit,

00:39:38.860 | but hard work where I'm struggling

00:39:41.800 | to complete the final repetitions,

00:39:43.620 | if not going to failure

00:39:45.120 | to continue to move the weight repetitions.

00:39:48.000 | And again, the entire work portion of that workout

00:39:51.200 | is about 50 to 60 minutes.

00:39:53.180 | Why?

00:39:54.020 | Well, past 60 minutes, you start getting increases

00:39:56.220 | in cortisol that really impede recovery.

00:39:58.020 | And I personally am somebody that does not recover very well

00:40:02.600 | from high intensity exercise.

00:40:04.600 | I realized that within the literature,

00:40:07.000 | it is believed and I think generally accepted

00:40:10.860 | that when you stimulate muscle hypertrophy

00:40:13.960 | or strength increases, it impacts the nervous system.

00:40:18.360 | It also causes things like protein synthesis, et cetera.

00:40:21.140 | There are a number of different forms of adaptation

00:40:22.920 | that occur to give you muscle strength and size changes.

00:40:26.020 | And these days, people talk a lot about needing

00:40:29.560 | to stimulate muscle growth or muscle strength

00:40:32.040 | at least every 48 hours.

00:40:33.880 | But I can tell you that I recover rather slowly

00:40:36.560 | and I benefit from working the same muscle group

00:40:39.620 | about twice per week with longer,

00:40:42.880 | or I should say more days of rest in between those workouts.

00:40:47.080 | So if I train legs on Monday, believe it or not,

00:40:49.880 | I'm only training legs on Monday.

00:40:52.040 | I do not have a second leg workout during the week.

00:40:55.040 | However, on Friday,

00:40:57.520 | I do a high intensity interval training session

00:41:00.920 | that serves two purposes.

00:41:02.360 | One is it serves the purpose of triggering

00:41:05.000 | a certain type of endurance

00:41:06.920 | and getting my heart rate very, very high.

00:41:09.680 | And in addition to that,

00:41:10.640 | because of the way I do that workout,

00:41:12.800 | it acts as a sort of supplement

00:41:14.680 | or a more moderate intensity workout

00:41:17.960 | for quadriceps, hamstrings, and calves,

00:41:21.180 | such that I at least never lose strength

00:41:23.960 | and in fact generally build strength from one leg workout

00:41:26.760 | to the next provided I'm doing things correctly.

00:41:29.720 | So what I'm not referring to is the kind of classic,

00:41:33.680 | super high intensity training once per week

00:41:35.880 | and then not actually training that muscle group again.

00:41:38.720 | For me, it's really training each muscle group

00:41:40.840 | twice per week, once directly, and then once indirectly,

00:41:44.920 | either during another weight training workout

00:41:47.000 | or during a cardiovascular,

00:41:49.120 | I should say endurance training workout.

00:41:50.560 | So again, legs on Monday,

00:41:51.880 | the workout is 50 to 60 minutes after a brief warmup.

00:41:55.800 | I generally pick two exercises per muscle group.

00:41:58.920 | So again, I'm doing calves, I'm doing quadriceps,

00:42:01.840 | and I'm doing hamstrings.

00:42:03.280 | You should pick the exercises that work for you.

00:42:06.340 | So that's why I'm actually not going to share

00:42:07.880 | which exercises I use.

00:42:09.020 | I'll give you a couple of suggestions about the ones

00:42:11.200 | I do use, but really exercise selection,

00:42:13.360 | as Dr. Andy Galpin pointed out,

00:42:15.120 | is a very important variable.

00:42:17.320 | And the key thing to emphasize for that variable

00:42:19.580 | is that you need to be able to perform the movement safely.

00:42:22.220 | So I know there's a huge debate out there

00:42:24.180 | and people love to argue about whether or not

00:42:25.920 | one can squat or deadlift for long periods of time

00:42:28.760 | or should or should not.

00:42:29.880 | Some people say you absolutely should.

00:42:31.540 | I personally do not squat and do not deadlift.

00:42:34.860 | I've actually never done much squatting or deadlifting.

00:42:38.300 | And I know some people out there

00:42:39.160 | are probably rolling their eyes

00:42:40.360 | or switching the channel at this point,

00:42:42.320 | but I can say that for me,

00:42:45.840 | I've been able to achieve the strength and hypertrophy goals

00:42:50.040 | that I've been seeking doing things like leg extensions

00:42:53.680 | and hack squats, or for hamstrings,

00:42:55.520 | doing things like leg curls and glute ham raises,

00:42:57.480 | or for calves doing standing and seated calf raises,

00:42:59.920 | and so on.

00:43:00.960 | I think a key principle that everyone should pay attention

00:43:03.480 | to is one that was taught to me

00:43:05.380 | by an excellent strength coach,

00:43:08.240 | years ago, and I still use this,

00:43:09.800 | and at least it works for me.

00:43:11.400 | For each muscle group,

00:43:12.780 | try and find an exercise in which you get that muscle

00:43:16.160 | into a weighted stretch position.

00:43:18.480 | So this would be, for instance, the standing calf raise,

00:43:20.920 | down at the bottom, it's weighted,

00:43:22.540 | and you're in a deep stretch

00:43:23.920 | provided you're doing the movement correctly,

00:43:26.600 | as well as another exercise

00:43:29.000 | where you're getting contraction

00:43:30.820 | in the shortened position of the muscle.

00:43:32.520 | So for the hamstrings, that would be the leg curl.

00:43:34.640 | For the calves, it would be a seated calf raise.

00:43:37.640 | Or for the quadriceps, the leg extension is,

00:43:42.000 | if the machine is designed right

00:43:43.480 | and you're doing it correctly,

00:43:44.760 | the peak contraction is largely going to occur

00:43:46.680 | at the leg's extended position.

00:43:49.120 | But then another exercise for each muscle group

00:43:51.880 | that puts the muscle into more of a stretched

00:43:54.600 | or at least a larger range of motion

00:43:58.120 | or compound-type movement,

00:43:59.660 | but ideally where there's some stretch there.

00:44:01.600 | So I guess I will tell you what exercise I do.

00:44:04.320 | For the quadriceps,

00:44:05.140 | it's going to be leg extensions and hack squats.

00:44:06.840 | I use hack squats because I don't do free bar squats

00:44:09.320 | for safety reasons, and I like the hack squat machine.

00:44:11.800 | I'll do leg curls and glute ham raises for hamstrings,

00:44:15.800 | and I'll do standing calf raises

00:44:17.300 | and seated calf raises for the calves.

00:44:18.720 | Again, those are the movements that I use

00:44:20.500 | because I can perform them safely in the repetition ranges

00:44:23.680 | and with the weights that are required for me

00:44:25.720 | to either maintain or build leg strength and calf strength.

00:44:28.820 | But you might decide that for you,

00:44:30.920 | deadlifts are absolutely essential and terrific,

00:44:33.300 | or squats, free bar squats are absolutely terrific,

00:44:36.480 | or front squats.

00:44:38.560 | I'm not here to tell you which exercises to do or not do.

00:44:41.360 | I am telling you that it's probably wise

00:44:44.160 | to at least consider doing at least two exercises

00:44:48.760 | per muscle group, probably three maximum if you ask me,

00:44:52.160 | if you're doing your entire legs and calves in one day,

00:44:54.560 | but to think about doing one exercise

00:44:56.280 | where the muscle is brought

00:44:57.240 | into that shortened peak contraction position,

00:44:59.600 | like leg curls or leg extensions or seated calf raise,

00:45:01.800 | and then another exercise for each muscle group

00:45:04.000 | where there's more of an elongation

00:45:05.720 | and maybe even a stretch on the muscle group.

00:45:08.000 | In fact, that's a principle

00:45:08.960 | that you'll hear me talk about later

00:45:10.440 | when I talk about training other muscle groups

00:45:12.900 | for strength and hypertrophy.

00:45:14.400 | So now you know approximately how long to train.

00:45:17.340 | You might be somebody who can get away with training

00:45:19.240 | for an hour and a half, and that won't impede your recovery.

00:45:22.600 | For me, that really starts to impede my recovery.

00:45:25.000 | Also, if I'm staying on task,

00:45:27.160 | that 60-minute limit really works well for me.

00:45:29.960 | Do I occasionally train for 75 minutes?

00:45:32.880 | Yes, because if I'm waiting for a piece of equipment,

00:45:35.040 | sometimes I have to just wait longer, so that happens,

00:45:37.760 | but I really try and keep the total duration

00:45:39.820 | of the workout shorter.

00:45:41.600 | How many sets and reps and rest intervals?

00:45:43.440 | Well, that was covered by Dr. Andy Galpin as well.

00:45:45.800 | Without getting into the total science,

00:45:47.760 | here's a brief summary of how to structure that.

00:45:52.400 | It's pretty clear that if you're going

00:45:54.600 | to do lower repetitions and heavier weights,

00:45:59.600 | that you're going to want to do a bit more volume.

00:46:03.400 | I know that this spits in the face

00:46:05.080 | of what a lot of people think,

00:46:06.380 | but so if you're going to do five sets of five,

00:46:08.840 | I would consider five repetitions low repetition range,

00:46:12.440 | heavier weight, and if you're going to train

00:46:15.200 | with higher repetitions, you can do fewer sets.

00:46:17.560 | That certainly works for me.

00:46:19.660 | I generally follow a program where for about a month,

00:46:23.800 | so three to four weeks, I will do all my resistance training

00:46:27.460 | in the repetition range of about four to eight repetitions,

00:46:31.680 | so that's rather heavy, a few more sets,

00:46:34.800 | so it might be anywhere from three to four sets per exercise,

00:46:39.800 | again, still just two exercises,

00:46:41.360 | and longer rest between sets,

00:46:43.380 | anywhere from two minutes to maybe even four minutes

00:46:46.580 | if it's really heavy legwork,

00:46:48.680 | and then for the next month, switch to repetition range

00:46:52.200 | that's closer to eight to 12,

00:46:55.020 | maybe even 15 repetitions per set,

00:46:57.680 | but do fewer sets overall,

00:46:59.860 | so maybe just two to three sets per exercise,

00:47:01.940 | again, just two exercises per muscle group typically,

00:47:05.240 | and shorten the rest between sets

00:47:08.320 | so that it's more in the 90 second,

00:47:10.540 | maybe even as short as 60 seconds rest between sets,

00:47:13.260 | but typically 90 seconds to about two minutes

00:47:15.900 | or two and a half minutes,

00:47:16.940 | so basically it's one month heavier,

00:47:19.180 | the next month slightly lighter,

00:47:21.040 | although I wouldn't say light,

00:47:22.200 | I would say moderate weight and moderate rep range.

00:47:26.060 | That tends to work well for me.

00:47:28.080 | It also adheres to a principle that came up

00:47:31.000 | during the discussion, again, with Dr. Andy Galpin,

00:47:33.520 | that for hypertrophy,

00:47:34.540 | you really can use repetition ranges

00:47:36.120 | anywhere from five to 30, three zero reps,

00:47:39.760 | but he emphasized changing the repetition ranges

00:47:42.880 | in order to offset boredom.

00:47:44.820 | Frankly, I like to train heavier.

00:47:46.520 | I enjoy training in the four to eight rep range.

00:47:48.540 | However, I noticed that if I do that

00:47:50.360 | for more than four weeks in a row

00:47:51.800 | and I don't switch over to training in the eight to 12,

00:47:54.840 | maybe in 15 repetition range for about a month,

00:47:57.360 | well, then I can't make continuous progress.

00:47:59.240 | I start to actually lose ground,

00:48:00.920 | but by switching back and forth,

00:48:03.120 | I actually can make continuous progress

00:48:05.680 | at least across the year.

00:48:07.540 | So I hope that that principle,

00:48:09.440 | or I should say that protocol was communicated clearly.

00:48:12.520 | It works very well, I assure you.

00:48:15.140 | Does that mean that I never get 10 repetitions on a week

00:48:18.300 | when I'm supposed to train

00:48:20.100 | in the four to eight repetition range?

00:48:21.480 | No, occasionally I'll venture up

00:48:22.840 | into the 10 repetition range,

00:48:24.880 | but I really try and cluster the low repetition work

00:48:28.200 | for about a month, again, across all workouts

00:48:30.440 | and all exercises and the slightly higher,

00:48:33.080 | I would even say moderate repetition work

00:48:34.800 | across to the next month.

00:48:36.600 | One thing that you'll notice

00:48:37.880 | since we are talking about total fitness programming

00:48:40.160 | is that during the month

00:48:41.520 | where you are doing moderate repetitions,

00:48:45.040 | you'll notice that your endurance work

00:48:47.400 | will actually be facilitated.

00:48:49.940 | And I do not think that's a coincidence.

00:48:52.080 | In fact, it's not a coincidence.

00:48:53.440 | It's because when you are training very heavy

00:48:55.900 | or in the heavier range, lower repetitions, et cetera,

00:48:59.180 | you're tapping into different processes in those muscles.

00:49:01.520 | So when you head out for that long Sunday hike,

00:49:03.400 | or as you'll soon hear,

00:49:05.160 | whereas on Friday you're going to do

00:49:06.560 | high-intensity interval training,

00:49:08.500 | what you'll notice is during certain months

00:49:10.860 | of weight training, when you're training more heavy,

00:49:12.820 | those workouts will feel, literally will feel different

00:49:16.880 | than they will during the months

00:49:18.200 | when you're doing moderate repetition work.

00:49:20.360 | I am not a competitive athlete.

00:49:23.200 | I'm not running races or triathlons like some of my friends.

00:49:26.440 | I'm very impressed by them.

00:49:27.660 | I'm really just trying to get

00:49:29.120 | overall cardiovascular fitness, overall strength,

00:49:32.040 | overall hypertrophy where I need it,

00:49:34.400 | maintain muscle size, et cetera,

00:49:36.480 | in muscle groups where I'm just trying to maintain.

00:49:38.320 | That's really my goal.

00:49:39.800 | So I'm not trying to optimize any of these workouts

00:49:42.620 | for any one performance feature,

00:49:44.740 | but in a little bit,

00:49:45.580 | we'll talk about how you can change various aspects,

00:49:50.140 | that is variables of this protocols,

00:49:51.580 | in order to say, for instance, really emphasize hypertrophy

00:49:54.520 | or really emphasize endurance.

00:49:56.640 | Okay, so with what I would call

00:49:57.880 | a standard endurance workout done on Sunday,

00:50:00.260 | and I say standard because most people,

00:50:01.620 | when they hear endurance,

00:50:02.460 | they think of the ability to endure,

00:50:04.240 | to continue in a repeated movement or exercise

00:50:07.860 | over some period of time.

00:50:09.100 | With that workout done on Sunday,

00:50:10.900 | and then with the leg workout done on Monday,

00:50:13.780 | you can feel really good

00:50:14.620 | about how you're heading into the week.

00:50:16.380 | However, after training legs on Monday,

00:50:19.860 | I experienced that doing cardiovascular workouts the next day

00:50:24.300 | is either inefficient or at least doesn't really allow me

00:50:28.580 | to completely recover from my leg workout.

00:50:30.700 | Now I realize that some people

00:50:31.540 | are going to immediately scoff at that.

00:50:33.340 | And in fact, there are really beautiful papers out there

00:50:36.920 | talking about how one can actually do a fair amount

00:50:40.380 | of cardiovascular exercise

00:50:41.620 | without interfering with their strength

00:50:44.180 | and speed and hypertrophy improvements and vice versa.

00:50:49.180 | In fact, there's a terrific review that was mentioned

00:50:51.620 | on the podcast with Dr. Andy Galpin.

00:50:53.680 | This is a review that will provide a citation to,

00:50:56.960 | and a reference and a link to,

00:50:58.800 | which is the review by Murak and Bagley,

00:51:01.360 | which talks about whether or not there's interference

00:51:03.640 | between strength and endurance workouts.

00:51:05.500 | Really interesting review if you want to peruse that.

00:51:08.460 | But with all that said, I like to take Tuesday

00:51:11.100 | as a no endurance, no resistance training day.

00:51:14.200 | But that doesn't mean that I'm not doing anything

00:51:17.620 | for my overall health and fitness.

00:51:20.240 | On Tuesdays, I do a series of heat cold contrast.

00:51:25.240 | In other words, I get really, really warm

00:51:28.180 | and then I get really, really cold.

00:51:29.420 | I get really, really warm

00:51:30.320 | and I get really, really cold repeatedly.

00:51:32.420 | And the way I do that is by getting into a hot sauna.

00:51:36.260 | So for me, that's really hot,

00:51:37.700 | but I've built up my heat conditioning.

00:51:39.260 | So please don't do this unless you've built up your ability

00:51:42.160 | to withstand heat.

00:51:43.340 | And I'll get in for about 20 minutes,

00:51:45.820 | sometimes 15, but usually 20 minutes.

00:51:47.920 | Then I get out and then I will get into an ice bath

00:51:50.740 | or a cold water bath

00:51:52.580 | that's about 45 to 50 degrees Fahrenheit.

00:51:56.320 | Again, don't get into water that's so cold

00:51:59.280 | that you go into shock.

00:52:00.580 | I'll explain what a good cold stimulus could be for you

00:52:04.980 | and how to determine that.

00:52:06.340 | Or if I don't have access to my sauna and my ice bath,

00:52:10.060 | what I can do if I'm traveling is I will take a hot bath

00:52:14.220 | and then alternate with cold shower,

00:52:15.820 | hot bath, cold shower.

00:52:17.580 | It's hard to do hot bath, ice bath,

00:52:19.700 | unless you have two baths.

00:52:20.620 | I don't know any hotel rooms,

00:52:21.780 | at least I've never stayed in one that has two baths,

00:52:23.380 | although I'm sure they're out there.

00:52:25.020 | But for me, this is heat, cold, contrast.

00:52:28.780 | And really what this day is about is two things.

00:52:31.540 | First of all, I'm trying to accelerate recovery

00:52:34.020 | from the leg workout I did previously.

00:52:36.140 | Also, if you listen to our episode

00:52:38.920 | of the Huberman Lab Podcast about deliberate heat exposure,

00:52:41.660 | or you listen to our episode of the Huberman Lab Podcast

00:52:44.180 | about deliberate cold exposure,

00:52:46.580 | I talk about some of the benefits of heat and cold.

00:52:49.940 | And I get into a lot of details about

00:52:51.780 | how you can access heat.

00:52:52.780 | You can do baths, you can do saunas,

00:52:54.540 | you can even take hot showers.

00:52:56.100 | If you don't have access to any of that,

00:52:57.460 | you could even wrap your body from the neck down

00:52:59.860 | in garbage bag, plastic garbage bags.

00:53:02.080 | Believe it or not, wrestlers used to do this.

00:53:03.480 | Put on some sweats and go running, that'll get you warm.

00:53:05.980 | Again, be careful not to overheat.

00:53:08.100 | And then you can get into a cold shower.

00:53:10.120 | So there's a lot of ways depending on your budget

00:53:12.020 | and what you have access to.

00:53:13.860 | I don't use cryo, these cryotherapy chambers.

00:53:16.520 | They're hard to find, they're expensive.

00:53:18.580 | Again, I use sauna and ice bath,

00:53:20.300 | and I will do anywhere from three to five rounds,

00:53:23.420 | which is a lot.

00:53:24.260 | Anywhere from three to five rounds of heat

00:53:26.460 | for about 20 minutes and cold for about five minutes.

00:53:29.740 | How cold should the cold be?

00:53:31.240 | We covered this in the episode on deliberate cold exposure.

00:53:34.180 | Here's a general rule of thumb.

00:53:35.760 | It should be cold enough that you really want to get out,

00:53:39.660 | but not so cold that it's unsafe.

00:53:41.820 | And that will vary from person to person.

00:53:43.660 | So I cannot give you a simple prescriptive there.

00:53:46.220 | Same thing with the heat.

00:53:47.260 | Hot enough that you're sweating and that you want to get out,

00:53:49.900 | but not so hot that you're running the risk

00:53:51.860 | of injuring yourself or killing yourself.

00:53:54.500 | And again, that will vary from person to person.

00:53:56.300 | So you have to build up slowly, be careful,

00:53:58.300 | and build up empirically.

00:53:59.980 | I do that on Tuesdays, again,

00:54:01.500 | as a way to accelerate recovery.

00:54:02.820 | And because it's very clear

00:54:04.180 | that there are cardiovascular benefits,

00:54:05.780 | maybe even benefits for the brain

00:54:08.960 | related to the cardiovascular benefits,

00:54:10.780 | because of course the brain needs a lot of blood flow

00:54:13.180 | and needs a lot of nutrients and other things

00:54:15.940 | flowing into and out of there,

00:54:17.580 | debris out and nutrients and other things into the brain.

00:54:20.420 | Heat can help accelerate that or improve that.

00:54:25.060 | And so I'm doing that to improve cardiovascular function,

00:54:27.140 | improve brain health.

00:54:28.780 | And then the cold contrast provides a sort of accelerator

00:54:32.960 | on that or an amplifier,

00:54:34.300 | I think is the better way to phrase it,

00:54:35.800 | on that process.

00:54:36.860 | Because in the cold, you get vasoconstriction.

00:54:38.980 | And then in the heat, you get vasodilation.

00:54:40.660 | And so you're maximizing that process,

00:54:42.260 | which is actually a neural process.

00:54:44.760 | Nerves actually innervate the blood vessels and capillaries

00:54:47.700 | and even the arteries in order to allow that constriction

00:54:50.380 | and dilation process to occur.

00:54:52.420 | So Tuesday is really about recovery,

00:54:54.480 | but my recovery day isn't necessarily about

00:54:57.920 | just laying around and not doing anything.

00:55:00.160 | I might still also take some walks that day.

00:55:02.260 | Remember, I want to try and get that 200 minutes

00:55:04.120 | of zone two cardio across the week.

00:55:06.000 | And sometimes, not often,

00:55:08.260 | but sometimes I'll get in a few minutes or more

00:55:10.920 | of walking quickly that day.

00:55:12.620 | But generally, I'm working a lot on Tuesday,

00:55:14.580 | as I do on Monday.

00:55:15.940 | And I'm a little bit tired

00:55:17.300 | or maybe even a little bit sore from my leg workout

00:55:19.620 | the previous day, Monday.

00:55:20.680 | So I try and get that hot cold contrast.

00:55:23.180 | There are other benefits to hot and cold contrast.

00:55:25.720 | We have a description of the different protocols for hot

00:55:29.660 | and for cold and their contrast

00:55:31.620 | at our Huberman Lab newsletter.

00:55:33.100 | You can find that by going to hubermanlab.com,

00:55:35.220 | go to the newsletter tab under the menu,

00:55:37.020 | and you can sign up.

00:55:37.860 | You can actually download those protocols very easily

00:55:40.460 | without even signing up

00:55:41.340 | if you just want to access them straight off.

00:55:43.700 | So Tuesday is really about recovery

00:55:45.040 | and about getting some additional cardiovascular benefits

00:55:47.720 | from heat cold contrast.

00:55:49.100 | One other thing that's built into the rationale

00:55:51.100 | for doing a lot of heat and cold on one day

00:55:53.460 | as opposed to doing it every day.

00:55:55.060 | Well, in addition to it being a little bit more convenient,

00:55:57.060 | because certainly some people don't have access

00:55:59.260 | to heat and cold, sauna and cold dunks, et cetera, every day.

00:56:03.580 | So maybe getting to do that one day

00:56:05.660 | is more accessible or feasible.

00:56:07.540 | But in addition to that,

00:56:08.580 | it's very clear that while there are benefits

00:56:12.100 | to doing sauna often,

00:56:14.100 | and we talked about this in the Deliberate Heat episode

00:56:16.000 | and the episode with Dr. Rhonda Patrick

00:56:18.040 | when she was a guest on this podcast,

00:56:20.740 | it's also clear that if you do sauna seldom,

00:56:23.460 | that is once a week, but you do a lot of it on one day.

00:56:26.740 | So in this case, it's an hour.

00:56:28.380 | If it's, remember it's, or more,

00:56:30.540 | it's three to five rounds of 20 minutes of sauna

00:56:32.740 | followed by about five minutes of cold or so.

00:56:36.020 | By doing that all on one day,

00:56:38.100 | the peer reviewed research that's covered

00:56:39.840 | in the episode on Deliberate Heat,

00:56:42.060 | this is a study out of Finland,

00:56:43.740 | showed that you get massive,

00:56:45.220 | even 16 fold increases in growth hormone,

00:56:47.560 | which are extremely beneficial

00:56:48.780 | for metabolism and for recovery.

00:56:50.980 | So these massive increases in growth hormone

00:56:53.000 | are seen when you are doing these sessions of sauna

00:56:56.020 | that are repeated on the same day,

00:56:58.180 | and you're only doing that about once a week.

00:57:00.180 | Whereas if you do sauna more often,

00:57:01.800 | there are certainly benefits to that,

00:57:03.620 | but it's time consuming and you need access to sauna

00:57:07.360 | more often than one day a week,

00:57:08.560 | if you're doing it more than one day a week.

00:57:10.300 | But if you do it one day a week

00:57:11.440 | and you're doing a lot of sessions within that day,

00:57:14.160 | as I've detailed here,

00:57:15.780 | you see these massive increases in growth hormone

00:57:18.180 | that are not observed if you're doing sauna more often

00:57:20.900 | for the other benefits of sauna.

00:57:22.840 | Now, the effects of cold are many,

00:57:24.560 | it's not just vasoconstriction,

00:57:26.700 | but the effects of cold are also counterbalanced

00:57:29.680 | by some of the problems with deliberate cold exposure

00:57:32.880 | that maybe you've heard about on this podcast

00:57:35.200 | and a lot of other podcasts

00:57:36.260 | and seem to be a kind of a buzz theme

00:57:40.140 | on Twitter and elsewhere.

00:57:41.700 | And the point is this,

00:57:42.600 | there are a number of quality studies showing

00:57:44.660 | that if you do deliberate cold exposure,

00:57:46.560 | in particular ice baths or getting into very cold water,

00:57:49.440 | immediately after an endurance training session

00:57:53.100 | or a strength and hypertrophy session,

00:57:56.480 | it can indeed, yes, it can disrupt

00:57:59.980 | or prevent some of the adaptations that you are seeking

00:58:03.180 | with strength and hypertrophy and endurance workouts.

00:58:06.180 | Okay, so you heard that right,

00:58:07.840 | and I believe that to be true

00:58:10.160 | based on now several quality peer reviewed studies.

00:58:13.300 | So by doing your deliberate cold exposure on Tuesday,

00:58:15.660 | you're not going to get those effects

00:58:18.400 | that is the blocking of hypertrophy

00:58:21.560 | or the blocking of strength improvement

00:58:23.320 | or the blocking or prevention of improvements in endurance

00:58:26.600 | that would occur if you immediately got into the ice bath

00:58:29.120 | after a hypertrophy strength or endurance workout.

00:58:32.320 | Now, the caveat to that is if you are somebody

00:58:35.140 | who likes to do cold showers,

00:58:36.940 | I am not aware of any data that says

00:58:39.800 | that cold showers cannot be performed

00:58:42.460 | after a strength hypertrophy or endurance workout.

00:58:45.740 | Cold showers are different than submersion up to the neck

00:58:50.260 | in an ice bath or another cold body of water

00:58:52.860 | for a number of different reasons.

00:58:54.020 | In fact, they tap into different aspects

00:58:56.860 | of the nervous system entirely.

00:58:58.220 | We don't have time to go into that now.

00:58:59.420 | It's covered in the episode on deliberate cold exposure.

00:59:01.940 | But the simple point is by doing your heat

00:59:04.780 | and cold contrast, or, hey, listen,

00:59:07.520 | if you're somebody who doesn't have access to sauna

00:59:09.060 | or you don't like hot baths

00:59:09.900 | and you just do some deliberate cold exposure on Tuesday,

00:59:13.480 | you are doing that separate from your strength

00:59:15.420 | and hypertrophy and endurance workouts

00:59:17.180 | such that it will not impede the benefits of those workouts.

00:59:21.180 | Okay, so long endurance on Sunday,

00:59:23.380 | leg resistance training on Monday,

00:59:25.380 | and on Tuesday, heat cold contrast.

00:59:28.180 | That brings us to Wednesday.

00:59:29.820 | And on Wednesday, we get back

00:59:32.120 | to a resistance training workout.

00:59:34.580 | And the resistance training workout

00:59:36.580 | that I emphasize on Wednesday

00:59:38.940 | is one in which you train your torso.

00:59:41.420 | Yes, literally your torso.

00:59:42.600 | I know this is counter to the so-called bro science

00:59:45.660 | of bro splits.

00:59:46.580 | I don't know who originated that term.

00:59:48.180 | It's a terrible term.

00:59:49.240 | It essentially alienates anyone who's not a bro

00:59:53.260 | or considers themselves a bro.

00:59:55.140 | But in any case, this is not about training chest

00:59:58.480 | or back or shoulders.

00:59:59.620 | In fact, it's really about strengthening

01:00:02.340 | the muscles of the torso.

01:00:03.980 | And of course includes the chest

01:00:05.660 | and the shoulders and the back.

01:00:07.260 | And I'm sure as I say this,

01:00:08.700 | a number of people out there who are obsessed

01:00:10.180 | with hypertrophy and muscle growth

01:00:11.620 | and filling out their shirts or whatever it may be,

01:00:14.700 | are thinking, oh no,

01:00:15.800 | this is just kind of all around fitness.

01:00:17.820 | But no, the point is on Wednesday,

01:00:20.780 | you train your torso

01:00:22.900 | and that's going to involve some pushing.

01:00:24.780 | So that's good for you.

01:00:26.480 | That might include some training of things like bench presses

01:00:29.740 | or incline presses,

01:00:30.620 | as well as shoulder presses or lateral raises,

01:00:33.140 | things for the shoulders, as well as for the back.

01:00:34.840 | Some pulling exercises.

01:00:36.200 | These could be bent over rows or chin ups or pull ups.

01:00:38.580 | Again, there are enormous number of exercise

01:00:40.780 | for each and every one of these muscle groups.

01:00:43.300 | Now, I believe there's a clear benefit

01:00:45.380 | to training all these muscle groups together

01:00:47.460 | on the same day.

01:00:48.980 | Because much in the same way that training legs

01:00:51.220 | all on one day can lead to these systemic effects

01:00:53.660 | because they're large muscle groups

01:00:55.260 | working both the pushing muscles

01:00:56.460 | and the pulling muscles of the torso on one day,

01:00:58.640 | at least in the context of this program,

01:01:00.160 | is very time efficient

01:01:01.780 | and tends to wick out

01:01:03.740 | into a number of different dimensions of health

01:01:06.180 | that at least I'm interested in

01:01:07.380 | and I think a lot of other people are interested in.

01:01:09.000 | What are those?

01:01:09.840 | Well, let's think again.

01:01:10.660 | I want to be strong in not just my legs, but my upper body.

01:01:14.000 | I also may want to engage some hypertrophy,

01:01:18.540 | to grow certain muscle groups

01:01:19.980 | in order to create a sense of balance.

01:01:21.540 | That could be for aesthetic reasons,

01:01:22.660 | but also for balancing strength and for health

01:01:24.780 | and the integrity of the joints, et cetera.

01:01:26.960 | And in addition to that,

01:01:28.580 | by training a bunch of different muscle groups together,

01:01:31.360 | you have the opportunity

01:01:32.540 | to get the more systemic hormonal effects

01:01:35.360 | and metabolic effects that occur

01:01:37.760 | when you're not just training one muscle group

01:01:39.500 | and isolating that one muscle group,

01:01:40.900 | but rather training a bunch of muscle groups together.

01:01:43.620 | So Wednesday, I train torso

01:01:45.220 | and I do that in push-pull fashion

01:01:46.680 | just for kind of time efficiency.

01:01:50.040 | Sometimes that means doing a pushing exercise

01:01:52.180 | and then a pulling exercise.

01:01:53.600 | Sometimes it might even mean doing a set of pushing

01:01:55.840 | and then a set of pulling and going back and forth.

01:01:57.660 | However, if you're in a gym, in a particular crowded gym,

01:02:01.280 | please don't be one of those people

01:02:02.380 | that colonizes multiple pieces of equipment

01:02:04.580 | and says, "I'm working there, I'm working there."

01:02:06.260 | And that can be quite a dance

01:02:07.580 | and it can be hard to orchestrate a workout like that.

01:02:10.080 | So sometimes it will be starting off

01:02:12.300 | with a set of shoulder presses

01:02:13.760 | and then doing all your sets of those

01:02:16.060 | and then moving to your chin ups

01:02:17.700 | and then moving perhaps back to shoulders

01:02:20.220 | and realizing, ah, oh, someone's on the machine

01:02:22.560 | that I wanted or using the equipment that I wanted,

01:02:24.420 | so I'll just finish up the pulling,

01:02:25.720 | I'll finish up the back work and then going to the push.

01:02:27.900 | I don't obsess over the alternation

01:02:30.220 | in any kind of strict way.

01:02:31.600 | I really just try and get the muscles of the torso trained.

01:02:33.900 | And again, it's two exercises per muscle group.

01:02:36.380 | And one of those exercises is going to be something

01:02:38.980 | where there's, I realize this isn't

01:02:41.280 | physiologically accurate, but a shortening of the muscle

01:02:43.880 | or where they, at the end of the movement,

01:02:47.060 | the muscle is under maximal contraction.

01:02:50.060 | I could throw out some names of exercises

01:02:51.700 | just for purpose of understanding.

01:02:53.460 | So this would be like cable crossovers for the chest,

01:02:57.200 | the peak contraction is at the end.

01:03:00.000 | Whereas something like an incline press,

01:03:01.760 | there's more of a stretch provided it's done

01:03:03.340 | over a full range of motion at the beginning of the movement.

01:03:06.060 | So again, something where there's a stretch

01:03:07.360 | and something where there's a peak contraction.

01:03:08.820 | For the shoulders, it's a little bit harder to do,

01:03:10.640 | although there are ways to do that.

01:03:11.700 | And Jeff Cavaliere has excellent workouts

01:03:14.200 | available at zero cost on YouTube.

01:03:16.300 | He also has excellent programs on his athleanx.com site,

01:03:19.580 | but certainly has a lot of excellent protocols

01:03:22.640 | on his YouTube and Instagram.

01:03:24.200 | But on YouTube, you can put in his name

01:03:27.420 | and any muscle group that you want to train.

01:03:29.800 | He has some terrific videos describing exercise choice

01:03:34.180 | and other features of exercise parameters.

01:03:36.320 | Again, a peak contraction or shortening

01:03:40.320 | of the muscle peak contraction exercise

01:03:42.060 | and a stretching exercise.

01:03:43.260 | And so for the back, one might say, okay,

01:03:46.320 | I seated row or a bent over row or a dumbbell row

01:03:50.420 | where the elbow is brought behind the torso

01:03:52.280 | for a peak contraction movement.

01:03:54.100 | And then for more of a stretching movement,

01:03:56.140 | might be something like a chin up or a pull up.

01:03:58.820 | And as I say this, I understand that stretching

01:04:02.240 | and peak contraction aren't the exact terms

01:04:04.780 | that one would use if they were a physiotherapist

01:04:07.460 | or a strength and conditioning coach.

01:04:08.620 | But I think for the typical person

01:04:10.460 | who's trying to generate strength and hypertrophy

01:04:12.940 | in those muscles or maintain strength and hypertrophy

01:04:15.380 | in those muscles, this kind of nomenclature way

01:04:17.660 | of describing it at least should be clear

01:04:20.500 | and even efficient.

01:04:21.860 | And just to remind you, as with the leg workout,

01:04:25.380 | the total duration of the torso workout

01:04:27.420 | is going to be 50 to 60 minutes after a brief warmup.

01:04:31.420 | The sets and repetitions are going to be dictated

01:04:34.920 | in the same way that I described earlier.

01:04:36.440 | So for about a month, it's going to be more sets.

01:04:40.580 | So anywhere from three to five sets

01:04:42.340 | in the lower repetition range, so four to eight repetitions.

01:04:46.140 | So that's going to be heavier weights and longer rest

01:04:48.580 | as I described earlier, the rest intervals.

01:04:50.500 | And then for the next month,

01:04:51.580 | it's going to be moderate repetitions, fewer sets,

01:04:55.020 | the same way I described earlier.

01:04:56.540 | And if you want more details on all of that,

01:04:58.780 | you can find that in the newsletter related to the optimal

01:05:02.620 | or foundational fitness protocol

01:05:04.460 | that you can access at hubermanlab.com.

01:05:06.380 | One thing I should note about the Wednesday torso workout

01:05:08.860 | is that I am a big believer in training

01:05:11.220 | what I believe is the highly avoided

01:05:15.180 | or at least overlooked, but vitally important aspect

01:05:18.660 | of total body stability, strength, and safety,

01:05:21.700 | really safety, which is the neck.

01:05:23.820 | And I realize a lot of people don't want a large neck

01:05:26.020 | and I totally understand for aesthetic reasons

01:05:27.960 | why they don't want that.

01:05:29.220 | It's kind of interesting actually, if you think about it,

01:05:31.000 | that people who have a large neck

01:05:32.100 | are often told they have no neck.

01:05:34.220 | People will say, "That guy has no neck."

01:05:35.940 | Or they have no neck when in fact they're referring

01:05:38.220 | to the fact that they have a very large neck.

01:05:39.620 | I don't know how that came to be.

01:05:40.460 | Somebody put in the comments why that is.

01:05:42.220 | How come when people have a big neck,

01:05:43.780 | they refer to it as no neck?

01:05:45.560 | So why do I train the neck?

01:05:46.540 | I train the neck for a couple of reasons.

01:05:48.220 | One is years ago I had an accident

01:05:49.780 | where I actually fell off a roof

01:05:51.540 | and I'd been training my neck at that time

01:05:55.020 | for a sport that I was involved in.

01:05:56.600 | And I walked away from it with a sore neck,

01:05:58.440 | but not a broken neck.

01:05:59.320 | And I thought, "Wow, it's really great

01:06:00.580 | that I have been training my neck."

01:06:03.780 | In addition to that, I was once in a car accident

01:06:06.280 | where I was parked.

01:06:08.340 | I just bought the car.

01:06:09.740 | It's my first new car purchase.

01:06:11.440 | Parked in that car with my mother

01:06:13.920 | and my grandfather in the back seat at the red light

01:06:16.820 | and someone rammed into us at full speed.

01:06:18.780 | Now, fortunately, none of us were hurt.

01:06:20.540 | We were all rattled.

01:06:23.380 | And once again, I was very sore in my back and in my neck,

01:06:27.480 | but I think one of the reasons why I was able

01:06:30.180 | to essentially walk away from that,

01:06:31.680 | I didn't have any sustained damage,

01:06:33.980 | was because I trained my neck.

01:06:35.380 | But I started training my neck for sport

01:06:37.500 | and I continued to train my neck

01:06:39.020 | because I noticed when I don't train my neck,

01:06:40.900 | I start getting shoulder issues.

01:06:42.180 | And if you talk to an excellent physiologist

01:06:45.300 | like Dr. Kelly Starrett of The Ready State,

01:06:48.500 | that was an excellent channel.

01:06:49.660 | You can find him on all the social media

01:06:50.900 | and standard channels where you talk

01:06:51.960 | to anyone out there who really understands the strength

01:06:56.480 | of the torso and the upper body and even the back.

01:06:58.980 | What you learn is that, of course,

01:07:01.140 | being the upper portion of the spine,

01:07:03.200 | stabilizing your neck is very important.

01:07:05.340 | Now, training the neck can be a little bit detailed

01:07:07.700 | and specific and even dangerous if you do it wrong.

01:07:10.220 | Again, Jeff Cavaliere has a terrific set of videos

01:07:12.580 | on training the neck properly.

01:07:13.780 | I know a lot of people out there might think neck bridges.

01:07:16.500 | And I used to do neck bridges.

01:07:17.700 | I occasionally still sneak in a neck bridge here or there,

01:07:21.220 | although I don't recommend it

01:07:22.200 | because in discussions with Jeff, he will tell you,

01:07:25.140 | and it's true, that the discs eventually go

01:07:28.700 | and you can run into serious issues from doing bridges.

01:07:31.240 | And it doesn't happen gradually,

01:07:32.740 | so you can't notice it happening.

01:07:33.940 | It just happens suddenly.

01:07:35.180 | So I might occasionally do a neck bridge,

01:07:37.560 | but in general, I'll train neck by wrapping a plate

01:07:40.140 | in a towel so that I don't end up with an imprint

01:07:42.040 | of the weight value on my head or face,

01:07:44.860 | and then moving the neck from side to side

01:07:46.660 | or front or back.

01:07:47.900 | And again, we'll provide a link to those videos.

01:07:50.560 | It's a terrific set of videos that describe

01:07:52.220 | how to train your neck properly and safely.

01:07:54.260 | So even if you're not trying to grow your neck,

01:07:56.540 | you definitely want to make sure

01:07:57.600 | that you use some lightweights to make sure

01:07:58.980 | that your neck is stable and upright.

01:08:01.940 | I say stable and upright because it's very clear

01:08:04.780 | that for reasons related to texting

01:08:07.560 | and staring down at computers

01:08:08.940 | and related to weak neck relative to the rest of the muscles

01:08:12.820 | that stabilize the spine, a lot of people,

01:08:16.100 | their default stance or their default posture

01:08:18.740 | is with chin forward, and that's not good.

01:08:21.480 | Not only is it aesthetically not good,

01:08:24.500 | but it also can create all sorts of issues

01:08:26.360 | related to back pain and headaches and things of that sort.

01:08:28.680 | This is a real thing.

01:08:29.880 | Training your neck allows you to stand upright, sit upright.

01:08:32.640 | I even believe that it allows you to do things

01:08:34.580 | like public speaking or have conversations

01:08:36.240 | with people on the street in a way

01:08:37.640 | where you are front-facing as opposed to looking down.

01:08:40.320 | So Wednesday is torso and neck, and then comes Thursday,

01:08:44.980 | and that means another cardiovascular exercise session,

01:08:49.460 | although it's a brief one.

01:08:52.060 | Unlike the endurance training on Sunday,

01:08:54.620 | the cardiovascular session on Thursday,

01:08:57.620 | and again, for me, it falls on Thursday,

01:08:59.300 | but for you, it could fall on a different day

01:09:00.840 | depending on when you started this protocol,

01:09:03.340 | is going to be about, again,

01:09:06.340 | about 35 minutes of, for me, running,

01:09:10.700 | although it could be rowing or it could be cycling,

01:09:12.700 | it could be something of that sort.

01:09:14.620 | The goal of this workout is what's important.

01:09:16.620 | The goal of this workout is to tap into,

01:09:18.780 | remember that long list that we talked about earlier

01:09:20.440 | where you've got skill and speed and power and strength

01:09:22.380 | and hypertrophy, et cetera, different forms of endurance,

01:09:24.560 | is to get into that range of endurance

01:09:27.240 | where your heart rate is elevated

01:09:29.820 | quite a bit more than zone two,

01:09:32.000 | but you're not really going all out sprint.

01:09:34.900 | So what that means for me is warming up

01:09:36.660 | for about five to 10 minutes.

01:09:38.220 | That could be jogging, a little bit of light calisthenics,

01:09:40.660 | might even be hopping on a stationary bike,

01:09:42.380 | although to be honest, I loathe the stationary bike,

01:09:44.580 | and then setting a timer and doing about 30,

01:09:48.700 | but ideally 35 minutes of what I call 75 to 80% of all out.

01:09:53.700 | Okay, now I realize this spits in the face

01:09:58.620 | of all you heart rate monitor wearing

01:10:01.500 | super techie exercise types,

01:10:04.420 | but when I think of all out sprint,

01:10:07.660 | I think of 100%, and what is that?

01:10:10.300 | In my mind, that's somebody is chasing me

01:10:12.460 | with a needle full of poison,

01:10:14.580 | and I am sprinting away at maximal speed.

01:10:17.760 | That for me is 100%.

01:10:19.500 | So after a brief warmup,

01:10:20.740 | what I'm going to do is go out, typically outside,

01:10:23.540 | although sometimes it has to be on a treadmill

01:10:25.220 | if I'm traveling, and move, run for about 30 to 35 minutes

01:10:30.220 | at about 75 or 80% of that all out.

01:10:34.100 | What that means is that I'm striving to keep a steady pace,

01:10:37.800 | but in reality, I don't.

01:10:40.220 | I sometimes have to stop at a stoplight.

01:10:41.840 | There are cars, please don't run into traffic

01:10:43.740 | just to maintain that speed and that timing.

01:10:45.900 | That would be terribly antagonistic to fitness

01:10:50.580 | in particular lifespan.

01:10:52.020 | That running tends to be running in which I'm breathing hard,

01:10:56.140 | so I'm not able to restrict myself

01:10:57.740 | to purely nasal breathing,

01:10:59.020 | and I should have mentioned earlier,

01:11:00.340 | on the Sunday long rock or weighted hike or jog,

01:11:05.340 | if I'm alone, I try and do pure nasal breathing.

01:11:08.380 | If I'm with other people or I'm talking,

01:11:10.320 | obviously I'm not going to do pure nasal breathing

01:11:12.620 | because I'm talking, although I'm sure that sometimes

01:11:15.260 | they wish I was doing pure nasal breathing.

01:11:16.980 | That Thursday workout accomplishes a number of things.

01:11:19.300 | First of all, it really gets my heart rate up,

01:11:22.520 | and it improves multiple aspects of endurance

01:11:25.260 | because as you recall earlier,

01:11:27.060 | the different bins of endurance

01:11:28.780 | that include muscular endurance, anaerobic,

01:11:30.580 | that three to 12 minute range,

01:11:31.660 | and then 30 minutes or longer,

01:11:33.360 | none of them really precisely match what's accomplished

01:11:36.020 | in this 35 minute or so cardiovascular session

01:11:40.280 | where I'm pushing hard, but not all out.

01:11:43.040 | But that's exactly the reason to do it,

01:11:46.060 | which is that it taps into multiple fuel systems

01:11:49.000 | for the muscle and multiple aspects

01:11:51.340 | of the heart and capillaries and arteries and veins

01:11:54.300 | that are involved in generating that movement.

01:11:56.140 | So it really cuts a broad swath

01:11:57.600 | into multiple categories of endurance.

01:11:59.500 | And also just keep in mind what this foundational

01:12:02.560 | or optimal fitness protocol is really designed to do.

01:12:06.020 | In my mind, a foundational fitness protocol

01:12:09.000 | is one that leaves you or has you in a state

01:12:12.840 | where if you need to walk really far

01:12:14.560 | and carry a bunch of weight, you can do it.

01:12:16.680 | If you need to lift a heavy object with your legs,

01:12:18.840 | you can do it.

01:12:19.840 | If you need to run really fast for two minutes,

01:12:23.940 | you can do it.

01:12:24.980 | And if you need to run a little bit further,

01:12:28.820 | like maybe in 10 minutes,

01:12:30.240 | for whatever reason, you can do that.

01:12:31.880 | So it's a really kind of all around fitness program,

01:12:34.480 | and that 35 minute run, again,

01:12:36.560 | could be swapped with a 35 minute ERGRO,

01:12:39.220 | or sometimes if you only have access to a stationary bike,

01:12:42.280 | you could do that.

01:12:43.360 | I suppose if you didn't have access to any equipment

01:12:45.200 | and running is not your thing,

01:12:47.320 | one thing that I have done,

01:12:48.400 | especially if I've been stuck in a hotel

01:12:49.800 | 'cause I arrived late someplace

01:12:51.000 | and I really want to get this workout in,

01:12:52.860 | you could do the dreaded burpee.

01:12:54.480 | I know there are a lot of opinions out there.

01:12:56.000 | Some people think burpees are downright dangerous.

01:12:57.760 | Other people love burpees.

01:12:59.340 | You could do that.

01:13:00.840 | Or you could do really fast but full jumping jacks.

01:13:04.580 | I know that's a little PE class, right?

01:13:07.460 | Physical education class-ish.

01:13:09.520 | But sometimes if I need to get the workout in,

01:13:11.620 | what I'll do in a hotel if I've arrived late,

01:13:14.040 | a particular day of travel is I will find the stairwell,

01:13:16.960 | the fire stairwell.

01:13:17.880 | I'll make sure, by the way,

01:13:18.720 | that I can get back into the building

01:13:20.200 | 'cause I've been locked in those stairwells before.

01:13:22.280 | And I will simply walk really fast up the stairwell

01:13:25.120 | as many flights of stairs as there are,

01:13:26.840 | or maybe even jog it, not quite sprint,

01:13:29.660 | but maybe run up those stairs over and over and over again

01:13:32.620 | in order to get that 35 minutes of 75 to 80%

01:13:36.100 | of max output cardiovascular work done.

01:13:38.940 | And if I'm really just restricted to my hotel room,

01:13:42.000 | I'll just do jumping jacks for 30, 35 minutes,

01:13:44.160 | sometimes while watching something on TV.

01:13:45.840 | And believe me, if you're doing full jumping jacks,

01:13:47.740 | like really extending your legs,

01:13:49.360 | really getting arms overhead

01:13:50.560 | and really doing the full movement,

01:13:53.120 | by the time you hit five or six minutes,

01:13:54.840 | you are going to be sweating

01:13:56.620 | and your heart rate is really going to be up.

01:13:58.680 | I also sometimes will travel with a jump rope.

01:14:00.420 | I always try and travel with a jump rope and skip rope,

01:14:03.980 | much to the dismay of the people

01:14:05.480 | who are housed below me in the hotel room.

01:14:07.240 | Skipping rope, I should mention,

01:14:08.540 | can be a very effective way

01:14:10.220 | of getting cardiovascular training while you're on the road.

01:14:12.900 | But in all seriousness,

01:14:14.040 | if you're in a hotel room or an apartment

01:14:15.840 | and you can't really jump high

01:14:17.160 | and you're very good at jumping rope,

01:14:18.620 | what you'll find is it's not going to get you

01:14:20.180 | into that higher elevated heart rate zone.

01:14:24.080 | Okay, it can be great for zone two type training,

01:14:25.940 | but if you're really good at skipping rope,

01:14:27.960 | and I wouldn't say I'm really good at it,

01:14:29.400 | but I've done enough skipping rope

01:14:30.540 | that I can just kind of cruise and talk,

01:14:32.260 | and it's more zone two-ish,

01:14:34.080 | even feels like walking at times.

01:14:35.560 | Now you can do double unders

01:14:36.680 | where you're really jumping

01:14:37.920 | and putting the rope under you twice each time

01:14:39.980 | or crossovers, et cetera, depending on your skill level.

01:14:43.100 | But again, if you're in an apartment

01:14:44.340 | and you're in a hotel, that's going to be harder to do.

01:14:46.420 | And because there's some skill involved,

01:14:49.060 | sometimes you're stopping more often than you're continuing.

01:14:52.100 | By the way, and I just have to mention this,

01:14:54.200 | a really terrific Instagram channel is Anna Skips.

01:14:56.920 | This is a teacher, a science teacher,

01:14:58.840 | or I believe it's a math, maths, as they say in the UK,

01:15:02.440 | 'cause she's in the UK, math teacher.

01:15:04.160 | I don't know Anna, but I know she Skips

01:15:06.360 | 'cause she has this amazing Instagram channel

01:15:07.800 | called Anna Skips.

01:15:08.800 | And what's really cool about her Instagram

01:15:10.880 | is she shows you her progression

01:15:12.860 | from not being able to skip rope at all

01:15:14.240 | to the absolutely incredible types of rope skipping

01:15:16.940 | that she's doing each morning while getting sunlight,

01:15:18.740 | which of course is a essential health protocol.

01:15:21.440 | So check out Anna Skips on Instagram,

01:15:23.480 | really inspiring and made me want to get better

01:15:26.440 | at skipping rope, I'm still working at it.

01:15:28.460 | Okay, so with that Thursday cardiovascular,

01:15:30.880 | let's call it endurance,

01:15:31.880 | but cardiovascular training workout done,

01:15:34.520 | around rolls Friday.

01:15:35.840 | And on Friday,

01:15:37.160 | I'm going to do another cardiovascular training session.

01:15:40.560 | And I alluded to this earlier,

01:15:41.640 | but this cardiovascular training session

01:15:43.240 | is also designed to tap into some of the ability

01:15:48.240 | of hard, I should say high-intensity interval training

01:15:53.820 | to tap into strength and hypertrophy increases for the legs.

01:15:58.100 | 'Cause remember, we train legs on Monday.

01:16:01.360 | And what the science tells us is that protein synthesis

01:16:05.160 | in a muscle group can be stimulated

01:16:06.780 | about every 42 to 72 hours.

01:16:09.480 | And so we've had Tuesday off,

01:16:11.860 | Wednesday off and Thursday off.

01:16:14.460 | And you don't want to lose progress that you made

01:16:17.380 | from that terrific Monday leg workout,

01:16:20.660 | but in order to make sure that you can do the other things

01:16:23.620 | that follow in this program and pick back up on Monday

01:16:26.680 | with another leg workout,

01:16:28.340 | at least for me with my recovery abilities

01:16:30.440 | and my work schedule,

01:16:31.780 | I'm not going to do an entire other leg workout

01:16:34.360 | because it's going to set the whole thing out of whack.

01:16:37.160 | That is, I won't be able to consistently do the same workouts

01:16:39.720 | on the same days of each week.

01:16:40.980 | Now, with that said, a little bit later,

01:16:42.520 | I'll explain what happens if you have to miss a workout

01:16:44.600 | and how you can combine days, et cetera.

01:16:46.300 | But I really strive to get certain workouts done

01:16:50.120 | on certain days consistently, at least as best I can.

01:16:52.680 | So Friday is high intensity interval training.

01:16:55.480 | That can take a variety of different forms.

01:16:57.960 | For me, the ideal thing to do for me,

01:17:01.080 | again, you could do something completely different.

01:17:03.720 | Exercise choice, again, should be governed

01:17:05.920 | by what you can do safely so you don't injure yourself

01:17:09.060 | and that you can perform effectively

01:17:10.480 | and that gets you or provides you the stimulus

01:17:13.200 | that you want.

01:17:14.040 | And what I'm trying to do on Friday

01:17:15.480 | is get my heart rate way, way up.

01:17:17.540 | Talked about this in the episode with Dr. Andy Galpin.

01:17:20.040 | In addition to the benefits of getting 180 to 200 minutes

01:17:23.840 | of zone two cardio per week minimum,

01:17:26.960 | it's a really good idea to get up to that max

01:17:29.760 | or near max heart rate at least once a week.

01:17:32.600 | And you're not going to do that

01:17:33.560 | for very long periods of time.

01:17:34.640 | You're not going to do that for 30 minutes.

01:17:35.840 | You can't sprint all out for 30 minutes

01:17:37.760 | unless you're Steve Prefontaine.

01:17:39.600 | If you haven't seen the movies "Without Limits"

01:17:41.240 | or "Prefontaine," you should absolutely see those.

01:17:44.000 | He was able to go out and run 12 laps,

01:17:47.320 | what seemed to be an all out sprint or close to it.

01:17:50.920 | Incredible, but most people are not going to do that

01:17:54.280 | or are going to be carried away on a stretcher if they try.

01:17:57.500 | These high intensity interval training for me,

01:17:59.720 | ideally would be on so-called assault bike or airdyne bike.

01:18:02.800 | So these are bikes that have the fan,

01:18:04.400 | which might seem like, oh, you know, it just cools you off,

01:18:06.920 | but actually there's a lot of resistance there.

01:18:08.840 | So what I will typically do is a 20 to 30 second

01:18:13.000 | all out sprint using arms and legs,

01:18:15.880 | and then 10 seconds rest, and then repeat.

01:18:19.620 | All out sprint for 20 or 30 seconds,

01:18:22.000 | 10 seconds rest, repeat.

01:18:24.100 | And I'll do that for anywhere from eight to 12 rounds,

01:18:28.200 | which trust me, even if you start out a little bit less,

01:18:32.720 | or I should say not all out intensity or effort,

01:18:35.360 | by time you hit the fifth or sixth one,

01:18:37.040 | you will be certainly headed into,

01:18:40.220 | if not near your maximum heart rate.

01:18:42.280 | Now, what is your maximum heart rate?

01:18:43.440 | Do you need a heart rate monitor?

01:18:44.600 | No, if you'd like using that sort of thing, great.

01:18:47.240 | But again, Andy Galpin beautifully supplied us

01:18:50.360 | with the information.

01:18:51.400 | He said, if you take the number 220

01:18:53.320 | and you subtract your age, that for most people,

01:18:56.440 | most is going to be your maximum heart rate.

01:18:58.360 | Although for certain people who are very fit

01:19:00.080 | or certain ages, that's not going to apply.

01:19:02.040 | So it's a little bit too crude a measure,

01:19:04.160 | but it's a good starting place

01:19:05.480 | and you can look up other information

01:19:06.860 | or see that podcast episode.

01:19:08.200 | We probably had a link to it in the show note captions

01:19:10.000 | if you want to get more details on that.

01:19:12.060 | I don't use a heart rate monitor.

01:19:13.320 | What I'm trying to do is get to that point

01:19:15.200 | where I quote unquote, feel like I want to die.

01:19:18.200 | Now I don't want to die and please don't die, right?

01:19:21.320 | If you're not in good cardiovascular health,

01:19:23.020 | do not just jump right into this fitness protocol.

01:19:26.040 | But I want to get to the point where I really feel

01:19:28.060 | like I could not pedal any faster

01:19:30.880 | or pull any faster on the assault bike, the Airdyne bike.

01:19:34.760 | Or if I'm doing this workout in a place or at a time

01:19:38.200 | or because I choose to not use a bike or a rower,

01:19:41.840 | 'cause you could also use a rower,

01:19:43.120 | I will simply do sprint jog intervals.

01:19:46.400 | I will sprint for 20 or 30 seconds,

01:19:48.960 | then jog for 10 seconds.

01:19:50.400 | Sprint for 20 or 30 seconds

01:19:51.680 | and then jog for 10 seconds and just repeat.

01:19:53.960 | I used to have a big field next to my laboratory,

01:19:56.460 | my old laboratory,

01:19:57.440 | and I used to bring my bulldog Costello out there.

01:19:59.220 | He was really good at the first sprint part

01:20:01.180 | and then he would just lie down and watch.

01:20:02.800 | He didn't even do the jog part.

01:20:04.160 | I would just go back and forth,

01:20:05.120 | back and forth, back and forth,

01:20:06.560 | panting like a bulldog nonstop,

01:20:08.860 | barely able to recover before sprinting again.

01:20:11.640 | And the basis of this workout again is several fold.

01:20:14.440 | First of all, it's to get the heart rate really high,

01:20:16.720 | up towards maximum heart rate at least once a week.

01:20:19.920 | So you accomplish that this Friday.

01:20:21.200 | Also, if you are sprinting and then jogging

01:20:24.240 | or you're really pushing hard on an assault bike

01:20:26.600 | or an Airdyne bike, or using a, for instance,

01:20:29.100 | a skier or the skier machine,

01:20:31.300 | or any number of different cardiovascular training tools,

01:20:36.080 | you are going to get activation of the legs.

01:20:40.680 | Of course, not to the same degree as you would with squats

01:20:42.980 | or deadlifts or leg extensions and leg curls.

01:20:44.900 | That's simply not the case,

01:20:46.400 | but you're going to trigger strength and hypertrophy

01:20:50.120 | and other types of adaptations in those muscle groups.

01:20:52.740 | So this for me also represents the second leg workout

01:20:56.200 | of the week where I'm not touching any weights.

01:20:58.800 | One important point that I don't think

01:21:00.160 | I've heard mentioned anywhere else,

01:21:01.740 | but that I hope to have Dr. Kelly Starrett

01:21:04.480 | on the podcast to discuss,

01:21:05.540 | and that I've discussed with him one-on-one,

01:21:08.240 | which is be careful with all out sprints

01:21:11.600 | or all out anything cardiovascular exercise.

01:21:13.960 | You can get injured doing those.

01:21:15.980 | So for instance, if you go out

01:21:17.200 | and you just sprint across a field,

01:21:19.160 | all out 20 or 30 seconds,

01:21:20.600 | and then walk back and can do it again and again,

01:21:23.160 | don't be surprised if the next day you have some sciatica

01:21:26.500 | or even some pelvic floor pain.

01:21:28.640 | I don't recommend going all out on any movement

01:21:32.220 | that you can't perform with perfect form, okay?

01:21:35.720 | So for me, I really try and stay away

01:21:37.960 | from all out sprints.

01:21:39.200 | I'll sprint at about 95% of what I can do

01:21:41.840 | because I find if I go all out sprint,

01:21:44.360 | I don't know what the reason is,

01:21:45.400 | but it might be an overextension of a limb

01:21:47.380 | or something like that.

01:21:48.220 | I'm not a sprinter.

01:21:49.060 | I'm not a sprinting coach.

01:21:50.160 | I do hope to get Stu McMillan on here or Dan Pfaff.

01:21:54.560 | They were excellent sprinting coaches.

01:21:56.080 | At some point, they're world-class sprinting coaches,

01:21:58.880 | but I'm not a pro sprinter.

01:22:01.720 | I'm not even a amateur sprinter.

01:22:03.420 | I'm a fitness sprinter.

01:22:05.160 | So the Airdyne or assault bike or the rower

01:22:07.720 | is really a safer option for me.

01:22:09.340 | And if I'm running or I'm doing some sort of movement

01:22:11.880 | where I'm unconstrained,

01:22:13.500 | really in terms of how far my stride is,

01:22:15.420 | I mean, I'm obviously constrained by the musculature,

01:22:17.560 | I'm really careful to not overextend

01:22:20.120 | or do something like that.

01:22:20.940 | And the only way to do that is to not go all out.

01:22:22.800 | So again, the goal for this Friday workout

01:22:24.600 | is to really get the heart rate high,

01:22:26.120 | do high intensity interval training.

01:22:28.200 | There are a number of different ways you could do that.

01:22:29.420 | You can look up HIIT, hit workouts online,

01:22:32.480 | find the one that's best for you

01:22:33.400 | and really pick something that's safe

01:22:34.800 | that you can do consistently.

01:22:36.420 | And I believe that ideally will also trigger a bit

01:22:39.600 | of either strength and hypertrophy

01:22:41.700 | and speed, power, maintenance,

01:22:44.080 | or even give you a little bit of a stimulus

01:22:46.040 | so that by time you roll around to that leg workout

01:22:48.960 | again on Monday,

01:22:50.240 | you've got a little bit of an additional boost

01:22:52.320 | to your leg strength, hypertrophy, speed and power.

01:22:55.560 | So we've covered Sunday through Friday

01:22:57.480 | and then Saturday rolls around.

01:23:00.400 | And Saturday is when you train arms, calves and neck.

01:23:05.800 | So this may sound as if you're training

01:23:08.260 | a bunch of small muscle groups, biceps, triceps,

01:23:10.380 | necks and calves, and that's true.

01:23:12.860 | But I should mention that you are also training your torso

01:23:16.720 | a second time and you're doing it indirectly

01:23:19.620 | or sometimes not indirectly.

01:23:21.380 | Why do I say this?

01:23:22.220 | Well, keep in mind again that for strength and hypertrophy,

01:23:25.420 | you're going for that once about every 48 to 72 hours,

01:23:29.260 | you want to stimulate that.

01:23:31.280 | On Wednesday is when you trained your torso, right?

01:23:34.060 | Chest, shoulders, back and neck.

01:23:35.900 | You've had Thursday to rest, Friday to rest.

01:23:39.840 | I know a lot of people are going to want to emphasize

01:23:41.720 | those body parts and they're going to think,

01:23:42.700 | oh, you have to train it twice a week.

01:23:44.200 | But if you have modest recovery ability

01:23:48.980 | or low recovery ability, such as I do,

01:23:51.620 | and you're doing these other

01:23:52.640 | cardiovascular training sessions, et cetera,

01:23:55.060 | well then on Saturday is when you will train arms,

01:23:58.360 | calves and neck directly, but included in that,

01:24:01.180 | remember two exercises per muscle group,

01:24:03.040 | one with a peak contraction,

01:24:04.300 | one with somewhat of a stretch in there.

01:24:06.540 | Included in that, I suggest doing some sort of dip movement,

01:24:11.540 | which I think it was Pavel Satsoulin said the dip

01:24:13.840 | is synonymous with or at least similar

01:24:16.140 | to an upper body squat.

01:24:17.660 | Excuse me, Pavel, if I got that wrong,

01:24:19.260 | maybe it wasn't you that said that,

01:24:20.500 | but I'm a big admirer of his work.

01:24:22.820 | And certainly the dip is a great exercise

01:24:25.000 | to hit multiple muscle groups,

01:24:27.260 | chest, shoulders and triceps,

01:24:29.440 | maybe even some back to some extent,

01:24:30.820 | depending on how you do it.

01:24:32.160 | So doing some dipping movement will indirectly

01:24:35.980 | stimulate strength, hypertrophy, et cetera,

01:24:38.540 | in the chest and shoulders,

01:24:40.540 | and including some sort of pulling movement for the bicep,

01:24:43.680 | like a chin up or palms facing movement,

01:24:47.740 | pulling up to the bar,

01:24:49.260 | especially if it's a close grip type movement,

01:24:52.020 | but even if it's a wide grip type movement,

01:24:54.060 | will of course trigger strength and hypertrophy,

01:24:57.100 | maintenance or improvements in the biceps,

01:25:00.020 | but will also trigger strength,

01:25:02.780 | hypertrophy in the lats, in the back, okay?

01:25:06.560 | So Saturday is this arm workout that,

01:25:09.320 | I'll just give an example of a potential workout

01:25:11.640 | where you might do a few more exercises,

01:25:13.560 | and maybe not just two, but maybe three,

01:25:14.820 | to make sure you get the torso indirect stimulation.

01:25:17.500 | So what would this look like?

01:25:18.860 | Well, this might be your sort of classic dumbbell curls

01:25:21.640 | for the bicep and maybe incline curl for the bicep

01:25:25.120 | because it has more of a stretch, so on an incline bench.

01:25:27.680 | And then you might finish with two sets of chin ups,

01:25:31.680 | so palms facing you, chin ups, or three sets of chin ups,

01:25:33.980 | depending on whether or not you're in a heavier load month

01:25:36.440 | or a more moderate weight month.

01:25:38.680 | Again, activating the biceps muscles, 'cause arms day,

01:25:42.420 | but also activating strength and hypertrophy in the lats,

01:25:45.700 | or at least maintaining it so that,

01:25:48.140 | because you're not training those torso muscles again

01:25:50.640 | until Wednesday, you're not allowing the hypertrophy

01:25:54.160 | and strength gains that you generated on Wednesday

01:25:57.300 | to atrophy, to disappear.

01:25:59.740 | Then thinking about triceps,

01:26:02.640 | it might be some sort of triceps isolation

01:26:04.600 | or peak contraction movement,

01:26:05.820 | so that could be tricep kickback or some overhead extension

01:26:09.220 | would be more of a stretch type movement than a kickback,

01:26:11.320 | but then also doing regular old dips.

01:26:13.640 | You might even start with dips, which again,

01:26:15.200 | are going to activate those torso muscles and the triceps.

01:26:18.580 | And then calf work in the same way that you did on Monday,

01:26:22.500 | and neck work, again, I am a believer in training neck

01:26:25.620 | multiple times per week.

01:26:27.280 | And if you are able to finish all of that

01:26:29.840 | in 45 or 50 minutes, great.

01:26:32.080 | Most people will find when you're doing

01:26:33.420 | a lot of small muscle groups, it actually takes longer

01:26:35.520 | because you have to go around to more exercises.

01:26:37.880 | But again, just adhere to the same principles

01:26:39.700 | we talked about before,

01:26:41.000 | about 50 to 60 minutes of real work after a warmup

01:26:45.080 | with an asterisk next to that,

01:26:46.320 | that if someone's on the equipment

01:26:47.560 | or you can't find the dumbbells you need, et cetera,

01:26:50.280 | then maybe 75 minutes max,

01:26:52.240 | but really trying to not extend that workout too long,

01:26:55.400 | making sure that you activate the arms directly,

01:26:58.740 | but also activating the torso muscles indirectly.

01:27:01.780 | And again, I won't repeat it this time again,

01:27:04.900 | but following the same weight and repetition

01:27:07.760 | and rest interval scheme that we talked about earlier,

01:27:10.080 | a bit heavier, lower reps, more sets,

01:27:13.900 | and longer rest for about a month,

01:27:16.020 | and then alternating to more repetitions, yet fewer sets,

01:27:22.620 | shorter rest intervals, and do that for about a month.

01:27:25.540 | This carries through

01:27:26.380 | for all the resistance training workouts,

01:27:28.200 | regardless of the day of the week.

01:27:29.620 | So we've completed the total arc across the week,

01:27:31.840 | and we can summarize it as saying Sunday is,

01:27:34.880 | let's just say long endurance.

01:27:36.320 | Monday is leg resistance training.

01:27:38.780 | Tuesday, heat cold contrast.

01:27:41.020 | Wednesday, torso training plus neck.

01:27:44.800 | Thursday, I would call it

01:27:46.800 | moderate intensity cardiovascular exercise,

01:27:49.880 | so that 35 minute moderate intensity cardiovascular exercise.

01:27:53.240 | Friday, high intensity interval training of sprinting

01:27:56.720 | or some variation thereof.

01:27:58.620 | And Saturday, arms, calves, neck, and torso indirect work.

01:28:01.940 | That's the total structure, but I want to emphasize again,

01:28:05.660 | you do not need to start this on Sunday.

01:28:07.160 | That is, you could make the long endurance work

01:28:10.480 | start on Tuesday and then just fill in the rest

01:28:13.640 | as described before.

01:28:15.460 | It's really up to you.

01:28:17.360 | There's another important point I want to make,

01:28:19.120 | which is that neither I nor anyone is going to be successful

01:28:23.800 | in doing the exact workouts

01:28:26.200 | on the exact same days of every week

01:28:27.960 | because of travel, work, illness, other demands, et cetera.

01:28:31.640 | The thing about the schedule that I like so much

01:28:33.400 | and that I do believe that will benefit you as well

01:28:36.780 | is that you have some flexibility there.

01:28:38.480 | What's the flexibility?

01:28:39.420 | Well, let's say you train

01:28:41.000 | your typical Sunday workout of endurance,

01:28:42.760 | then you train legs on Monday,

01:28:44.800 | and then you don't manage to do your heat-cold contrast

01:28:49.540 | on Tuesday for whatever reason.

01:28:51.080 | Well, you can put it on Wednesday.

01:28:53.900 | Just make sure that if you're going to do the cold stimulus

01:28:56.940 | that you don't do it too close,

01:28:58.680 | not within four, ideally eight hours

01:29:01.560 | after the training of torso, but you could do it before,

01:29:06.280 | or you could do it just heat

01:29:08.240 | and skip the cold that particular week, right?

01:29:11.080 | Not ideal, but better than not doing anything.

01:29:13.800 | Let's say, for instance, the leg workout

01:29:15.240 | was particularly brutal.

01:29:16.160 | You don't sleep that well on Monday night or Tuesday night.

01:29:19.380 | Well, then should you do the torso workout on Wednesday?

01:29:23.100 | Well, I would say,

01:29:24.980 | why not move the heat-cold contrast to Wednesday

01:29:28.160 | and then push that torso workout to Thursday

01:29:32.440 | and maybe also try and do that 35-minute run on Thursday

01:29:35.840 | every once in a while

01:29:36.960 | rather than lose the total control of the program

01:29:40.200 | and let everything shuffle forward.

01:29:41.640 | Here's the basic principle.

01:29:43.440 | I do believe that any one of these workouts,

01:29:46.500 | whether it's for endurance or resistance training,

01:29:48.240 | can be shifted either one day forward or one day back, right?

01:29:52.860 | You could delay it by a day

01:29:53.960 | or you could accelerate it by a day

01:29:56.620 | in order to make sure that you get everything done

01:29:59.040 | across the week.

01:29:59.940 | In fact, I would say the best way to think about this

01:30:03.880 | foundational fitness program is not from the details up,

01:30:08.360 | but from the top down,

01:30:09.880 | from the big picture down to the details,

01:30:12.080 | and say to yourself, once a week,

01:30:13.900 | you're going to get some long endurance in.

01:30:16.320 | Another day during the week,

01:30:17.400 | you're going to make sure that you get a kind of moderate,

01:30:19.680 | faster endurance workout in.

01:30:21.760 | And then one other day during the week,

01:30:23.880 | you're going to get an all-out sprint,

01:30:25.520 | high-intensity cardiovascular exercise workout in.

01:30:29.040 | You're going to get those three workouts in somehow.

01:30:31.920 | And then in addition to that,

01:30:32.920 | you will also do resistance training

01:30:35.280 | for every muscle group in your body.

01:30:37.400 | And that means doing your legs hard at least once a week,

01:30:41.400 | your torso hard at least once a week,

01:30:43.780 | and your arms hard at least once a week.

01:30:46.440 | And of course, you are also paying attention

01:30:48.360 | to train your calves.

01:30:49.980 | And I do, for reasons I described before,

01:30:52.220 | believe that you want to train your neck

01:30:54.000 | at least to keep it strong.

01:30:55.360 | You may not want to generate hypertrophy there.

01:30:58.080 | People vary in terms of how quickly their neck grows.

01:31:00.360 | Some people it grows very, very fast.

01:31:01.600 | Other people, for the life of them,

01:31:02.960 | they can't get much hypertrophy in their neck,

01:31:04.520 | but keeping that neck strong,

01:31:06.080 | at least through some very light work

01:31:08.240 | to moderate weight work, very, very important.

01:31:11.880 | For reasons I stated earlier.

01:31:13.560 | If you set out those goals,

01:31:16.420 | then the specific days that you do each workout

01:31:19.820 | isn't as critical, but the specific spacing is.

01:31:22.800 | So for instance, you're not going to want to do

01:31:24.560 | your high intensity interval training

01:31:26.520 | the day after you train your legs,

01:31:28.560 | because if you're doing

01:31:29.400 | that high intensity interval training correctly,

01:31:31.520 | you're going to be taxing your legs

01:31:34.120 | and eating into their recovery.

01:31:35.920 | And so you want to space them out by two or three days.

01:31:38.280 | So I think you'll notice that the point is really

01:31:40.320 | to optimize everything on the whole

01:31:43.560 | rather than any one specific aspect

01:31:46.220 | of training or adaptation.

01:31:47.840 | Now, that said, I do realize

01:31:50.120 | that some people might be hyper-focused

01:31:52.480 | on things like strength and hypertrophy

01:31:54.280 | and the aesthetics that come with it.

01:31:56.040 | A key point about strength, hypertrophy, and weight training,

01:31:58.900 | and this is something that has been covered

01:32:00.240 | on multiple podcasts,

01:32:01.560 | certainly the one with Jeff Cavaliere

01:32:02.840 | and with Dr. Andy Galpin and the one that I did

01:32:05.620 | on building muscle strength and hypertrophy,

01:32:08.840 | the solo episode, and that is the following.

01:32:12.840 | It is the rare individual

01:32:15.760 | who has perfectly balanced musculature, right?

01:32:18.720 | Most people can be a bit quad dominant

01:32:21.560 | or hamstring dominant,

01:32:22.800 | or they have trouble activating their glutes,

01:32:24.600 | or somebody has a terrible time trying

01:32:26.960 | to activate their chest muscles,

01:32:28.800 | but they're very strong in the back, et cetera.

01:32:31.480 | It's very clear that we can know that not just

01:32:35.440 | based on aesthetics, right, but based on deliberate

01:32:40.160 | contractability of those muscles.

01:32:41.920 | So I don't want to get into this in too much detail

01:32:43.600 | for sake of time, but this is something

01:32:45.280 | that has peer-reviewed research to support it

01:32:47.960 | and was also discussed extensively with Jeff Cavaliere

01:32:50.560 | when he was a guest,

01:32:52.000 | and that actually he's really popularized this notion,

01:32:54.500 | and it's absolutely true,

01:32:55.680 | which is that if you can contract a muscle very hard

01:32:58.320 | to the point where it almost feels like it's cramping,

01:33:00.000 | if you can do that even when there's no weight in your hand

01:33:02.940 | or there's no resistance against it,

01:33:04.840 | so you're just using your mind-muscle connection

01:33:07.000 | to contract that muscle hard and isolate it,

01:33:08.760 | chances are you will be able to generate hypertrophy

01:33:11.600 | and strength gains pretty easily in that muscle

01:33:14.240 | compared to muscles that you have a harder time activating.

01:33:17.860 | So during all resistance training,

01:33:19.400 | that mind-muscle link is really important,

01:33:22.160 | so much so that some people will even try

01:33:24.760 | and emphasize contraction of the muscles

01:33:26.220 | in between sets, et cetera.

01:33:28.020 | I personally, because I'm not somebody

01:33:29.660 | who likes a mirror when I work out,

01:33:32.100 | and I'm not somebody who wants to spend time

01:33:34.360 | in between sets flexing muscles and et cetera,

01:33:37.320 | for whatever reason, I want to actually rest between sets,

01:33:39.720 | and I'm more concerned with performance during those sets

01:33:42.360 | and really putting my mind into the muscle during the set.

01:33:45.240 | I really try and emphasize deep relaxation between sets,

01:33:48.120 | and so here's a tool that, again, is built out of science,

01:33:51.920 | and I should say peer-reviewed studies,

01:33:53.480 | some of which are being done in my lab,

01:33:55.080 | but other labs as well, which is that in between sets,

01:33:58.040 | what I really strive to do is to bring my heart rate down

01:34:00.960 | as much as possible, calm myself down as much as possible,

01:34:03.800 | and I'll do the so-called physiological sigh

01:34:06.100 | in order to do that.

01:34:06.940 | That's two inhales through the nose, back to back,

01:34:09.280 | [inhales and exhales]

01:34:11.920 | and then long, full exhale through the mouth.

01:34:14.320 | I just did it partially there for sake of time again.

01:34:17.100 | So a big, deep inhale through the nose,

01:34:19.160 | and then sneak in a little bit more on a second inhale

01:34:21.280 | to maximally inflate the lungs and the avioli of the lungs,

01:34:23.480 | and then a full exhale of all your air

01:34:26.760 | via the mouth to empty your lungs.

01:34:28.320 | That's the fastest way that we are aware of

01:34:31.320 | to calm your nervous system down,

01:34:33.980 | and really in between sets,

01:34:35.600 | you can use that to calm yourself down and conserve energy,

01:34:38.280 | but then as you move into the weight training set,

01:34:42.160 | you really want to ratchet up your focus and attention

01:34:45.140 | to the muscles that you're going to be using.

01:34:46.720 | Now, I'd like to acknowledge

01:34:47.560 | that there's a huge range of parameters

01:34:49.240 | in terms of how to actually perform during the set.

01:34:51.780 | You can focus on a particular muscle

01:34:53.640 | and try and really isolate

01:34:55.520 | from the beginning of the movement.

01:34:56.720 | Some people will really try and isolate it

01:34:58.400 | only during the peak contraction.

01:34:59.600 | Some people will accentuate the negative.

01:35:01.000 | There's speed and cadence.

01:35:02.480 | There are, again, remember, concepts are few,

01:35:05.880 | methods are many,

01:35:06.720 | and if you're interested in the various methods

01:35:08.440 | of eccentrics and concentrics

01:35:10.120 | and all the different ways of changing up cadence

01:35:14.080 | and so forth during sets,

01:35:15.000 | there's an enormous amount of quality information out there,

01:35:17.520 | far too much for us to get into in detail now,

01:35:20.160 | but what I described the general principles

01:35:21.720 | of how to set your mind, if you will, during the set,

01:35:24.920 | you should be focused on the muscles that you're using

01:35:26.760 | and/or moving the weight.

01:35:27.820 | If movement of the weight is more important,

01:35:29.360 | you can either focus on moving the weight

01:35:31.240 | or challenging muscles, right?

01:35:33.560 | You can either try and isolate muscles

01:35:35.060 | and make specific muscles do the work

01:35:36.640 | or simply moving the weight.

01:35:38.720 | Moving the weight is going to be more geared

01:35:40.880 | towards strength improvements,

01:35:43.320 | but focusing on the muscles,

01:35:45.320 | so-called my muscle link,

01:35:46.200 | is going to shift that very same set

01:35:48.280 | more toward hypertrophy.

01:35:49.560 | I realize I'm painting with a broad brush here,

01:35:51.440 | but nonetheless, this is grounded in the way

01:35:53.640 | that the nervous system governs muscular contraction.

01:35:56.880 | And while I think most people are familiar

01:35:58.800 | with the number of different variables

01:36:00.240 | associated with the resistance training,

01:36:02.080 | you know, sets, reps, rest intervals, cadence, et cetera,

01:36:05.560 | there are also a tremendous number

01:36:07.640 | of very important variables for endurance

01:36:09.660 | and any kind of cardiovascular training.

01:36:11.920 | And there are a lot of excellent resources

01:36:14.040 | out there about that.

01:36:15.560 | I think the most important one,

01:36:17.940 | in fact, I will go on record saying

01:36:19.600 | what I believe to be the most important variable

01:36:23.120 | for any endurance or cardiovascular training

01:36:25.760 | is that because it's a repetitive movement,

01:36:28.500 | that you're able to complete the movement safely,

01:36:31.480 | meaning you're not putting your body

01:36:32.820 | into range of motion or into positions

01:36:35.820 | that can damage joints

01:36:37.780 | or put you in any kind of compromised state.

01:36:40.400 | And some of you might think, well, that seems kind of silly.

01:36:42.400 | But if you've ever set the, for instance,

01:36:44.200 | the seat too high on a stationary bike

01:36:45.860 | and then done, you know,

01:36:46.900 | airdyne or assault bike type interval training sprints,

01:36:50.220 | if it's set too high and you're over striding, as it were,

01:36:53.640 | the next day, you can really pay the price

01:36:55.800 | in terms of some back pain or sciatica.

01:36:57.640 | And sometimes that pain can extend for quite a while.

01:37:00.260 | So of course, you don't want to approach any exercise

01:37:02.160 | with so much caution that it's neurotic and preventive,

01:37:04.540 | and yet you don't want to approach any exercise

01:37:06.940 | in any way that's so cavalier, forgive the pun, Jeff,

01:37:11.540 | that you're also going to compromise

01:37:14.460 | the integrity of your joints

01:37:15.480 | and musculature and connective tissue.

01:37:17.260 | Let's talk about some real world practical variables.

01:37:20.600 | For instance, let's say you get

01:37:23.040 | a poor to terrible night's sleep.

01:37:25.520 | Should you train the next day or not?

01:37:27.680 | Well, that really depends.

01:37:29.120 | I can honestly say I've had some

01:37:30.800 | of the best training sessions, resistance training

01:37:32.960 | or endurance training sessions

01:37:34.120 | after a really poor night's sleep.

01:37:36.240 | But that's the rare event.

01:37:38.280 | More often than not, if I'm not sleeping well,

01:37:42.080 | I've had a terrible night's sleep,

01:37:43.300 | the next day I will just skip training that day.

01:37:46.880 | I know that will shock a number of you out there,

01:37:48.840 | or perhaps you're already calling me names, weak, et cetera.

01:37:52.200 | But I find that if I've slept really poorly

01:37:54.660 | or I've had a very stressful event the day before

01:37:57.840 | and I don't sleep well,

01:37:59.240 | training the next day sets me up for getting ill

01:38:01.440 | and getting ill sets me up

01:38:02.500 | for not being able to train for multiple days.

01:38:04.920 | So it is my preference in that case

01:38:07.620 | to skip a day and really focus on recovery.

01:38:10.780 | And then as I mentioned earlier,

01:38:12.780 | slide that workout to the next day

01:38:15.240 | and rarely double that workout up with another workout,

01:38:19.220 | but then just slide the schedule forward by a day.

01:38:21.660 | But I really try and strive,

01:38:23.440 | that is I really try to double up at least some workouts

01:38:27.280 | later in the week in that case,

01:38:28.760 | so that I can get back on schedule

01:38:31.360 | of starting the seven-day protocol again on the same day.

01:38:34.800 | I don't want to be excessively vague there.

01:38:36.700 | What I'm trying to say is I try and adhere

01:38:38.320 | to the same schedule, but if I get a poor night's sleep,

01:38:40.460 | I'll just simply skip the workout the next day,

01:38:43.360 | slide the workout forward.

01:38:44.840 | There is one exception to that,

01:38:46.120 | and it's an important exception,

01:38:47.360 | which is there are times when I've not slept well

01:38:50.840 | or I've had some particularly stressful event,

01:38:53.320 | the day before and haven't slept well,

01:38:55.480 | but I'm able to do so-called NSDR,

01:38:58.480 | non-sleep deep rest the next day.

01:39:00.240 | So there have been times when I've only got three

01:39:02.680 | or four hours of sleep the night before,

01:39:04.460 | and I'm feeling really behind the ball the next morning.

01:39:07.600 | I really want to get my workout in.

01:39:08.840 | So instead, what I will do is a 10,

01:39:11.280 | but ideally in that case,

01:39:12.480 | a 30 or even 60 minutes non-sleep deep rest.

01:39:15.600 | And there's a 10-minute non-sleep deep rest protocol

01:39:18.360 | read by me,

01:39:21.200 | but it is a non-spiritual, non-mystical,

01:39:24.880 | science-supported, non-sleep deep rest protocol

01:39:27.920 | available on YouTube.

01:39:28.760 | You can simply put my name Huberman,

01:39:30.480 | put N-S-D-R and Virtusan,

01:39:32.920 | V-I-R-T-U-S-A-N into YouTube,

01:39:36.200 | and you'll find that script.

01:39:37.200 | There are other NSDR scripts that you can find now

01:39:39.640 | on Spotify and on YouTube.

01:39:41.600 | And if you fall asleep

01:39:42.600 | during those non-sleep deep rest scripts, that's great.

01:39:45.040 | And if you don't,

01:39:46.020 | you will also find that it will restore your ability

01:39:48.480 | to perform mental and physical work.

01:39:50.680 | So there are times when I haven't gotten as much sleep

01:39:54.040 | as I would like,

01:39:54.880 | or I'm feeling a bit more stressed for whatever reason,

01:39:57.460 | and I'll do NSDR and then I will go train.

01:40:00.800 | And that often works fabulously well for me.

01:40:03.280 | And then I don't have to skip a workout entirely

01:40:05.400 | just because I didn't get a good night's sleep.

01:40:07.080 | A lot of people ask whether or not

01:40:09.160 | you should train fasted or fed.

01:40:10.680 | And this is a very controversial area.

01:40:12.520 | I personally prefer to do my cardiovascular work

01:40:15.400 | not having eaten anything

01:40:18.120 | in the previous three to 10 hours.

01:40:21.160 | And typically that's because I wake up

01:40:23.240 | and I'll do the cardiovascular training

01:40:24.820 | within about an hour of waking up,

01:40:27.500 | sometimes later because my first meal generally falls,

01:40:30.000 | generally not always, falls around 11 a.m.

01:40:32.420 | I don't do any kind of formal intermittent fasting,

01:40:35.000 | but typically my meal schedule is somewhere between 11 a.m.

01:40:38.780 | and my last bite of food is around 8 p.m.,

01:40:40.920 | but I'm not super strict about that.

01:40:42.360 | I might eat in as late as 9 p.m.

01:40:45.160 | and I might eat something at 10 a.m.

01:40:46.840 | If I wake up really hungry, I might have something

01:40:48.620 | before 11 a.m.

01:40:49.460 | I'm not neurotic about it.

01:40:51.080 | But in terms of training, I like to train fasted

01:40:54.320 | and that includes the resistance training workouts

01:40:56.140 | and those come early in the day for me.

01:40:58.100 | And typically if I'm going to train legs on Monday,

01:41:01.020 | for instance, which is when I train legs,

01:41:02.680 | I'll make sure that the night before

01:41:04.160 | I'm ingesting some starch, some carbohydrate,

01:41:06.920 | like rice or pasta or something of that sort

01:41:09.400 | to make sure that when I do that morning leg workout

01:41:12.280 | I have enough glycogen in the muscles, et cetera.

01:41:14.400 | Again, nutrition is a somewhat controversial area.

01:41:16.680 | In fact, it can evoke very strong feelings

01:41:19.720 | 'cause I know we've got vegans and we've got omnivores

01:41:21.880 | and we've got carnivores and people who are keto.

01:41:24.120 | This isn't really the format for us to get into all of that.

01:41:27.680 | I think the rule to follow is figure out

01:41:30.200 | what optimizes your training

01:41:31.800 | for your particular training goals.

01:41:33.840 | For me, that most often means training fasted

01:41:36.720 | and then eating pretty soon after I train.

01:41:38.720 | And if it's a high intensity resistance training workout,

01:41:42.960 | and frankly, all of my resistance training workouts

01:41:44.920 | are pretty high intensity,

01:41:45.860 | I'm not going to failure on every set,

01:41:47.420 | but at least about 30% of those sets, I'm going to failure.

01:41:51.400 | And the other sets I'm working very hard nonetheless.

01:41:54.200 | Well, then I eat some starches after I train

01:41:55.920 | and I also ingest some protein

01:41:57.220 | in the form of a protein drink or a meal

01:41:59.200 | that includes some protein food.

01:42:01.180 | But I don't like to eat before I do resistance training

01:42:03.720 | or at least not within the hour or two

01:42:06.120 | before I do resistance training.

01:42:08.200 | There are exceptions to that.

01:42:09.440 | And I should say that the same basically applies

01:42:11.440 | to endurance work.

01:42:12.520 | If I'm going to head out for a run,

01:42:14.240 | typically I don't want my belly full of food

01:42:16.780 | or any food at all.

01:42:18.120 | But there are times where I wake up hungry

01:42:21.440 | and I very much need to eat something

01:42:23.220 | or I have something scheduled socially like a breakfast

01:42:25.760 | and I'll have that breakfast.

01:42:27.520 | And then an hour or 90 minutes later, I'll do my workout

01:42:30.980 | because I want to make sure that I finish the workout.

01:42:33.440 | I, again, I'm not neurotically attached

01:42:35.300 | to training fasted or fed.

01:42:37.360 | For me, fasted is preferred, but if I have to train fed,

01:42:40.280 | better to train than to not train at all.

01:42:42.400 | We haven't talked so much about flexibility yet,

01:42:44.520 | but we did an entire episode of the Huberman Lab Podcast

01:42:47.160 | on flexibility.

01:42:48.540 | And I encourage you to check out that episode

01:42:51.040 | if you're interested in increasing your flexibility.

01:42:54.400 | But the basic takeaway from that episode

01:42:56.760 | is that if you look at what I like to call

01:42:58.360 | the center of mass of the research,

01:43:01.140 | that is most of the studies and what the conclusions

01:43:03.380 | of most of the quality studies point to,

01:43:05.200 | so not the exceptions, but the kind of general rules

01:43:08.320 | that have been gleaned over time from multiple labs

01:43:10.640 | over multiple decades, et cetera,

01:43:12.620 | what you find is that static stretching

01:43:15.120 | that is holding a stretch and in fact exhaling

01:43:18.640 | and relaxing the midsection and torso

01:43:21.520 | and relaxing into the stretch

01:43:24.000 | as opposed to staying full of air and tense,

01:43:27.000 | but mentally and physically relaxing into the stretch,

01:43:30.320 | but not stretching maximally,

01:43:33.000 | that is not extending as far as you possibly can go,

01:43:36.040 | but more like 60% or even less.

01:43:38.520 | And then holding those static stretches

01:43:41.580 | for anywhere from 30 to 60 seconds and then repeating,

01:43:45.120 | doing that two or three times throughout the week

01:43:47.160 | for multiple muscle groups.

01:43:48.200 | So it could be for your quadriceps,

01:43:49.560 | could be for hamstrings, for your lats.

01:43:51.760 | There are protocols out there.

01:43:52.720 | In fact, we have a newsletter that is focused entirely

01:43:56.180 | on protocols for flexibility and stretching.

01:43:58.160 | You can find that again by going HubermanLab.com.

01:44:00.660 | You don't even need to sign up for the newsletter,

01:44:02.320 | although we invite you to if you like,

01:44:04.160 | but you can simply go there,

01:44:05.760 | scroll down to the flexibility newsletter

01:44:08.120 | and all the protocols are there

01:44:09.840 | for each of the muscle groups, et cetera.

01:44:11.760 | But what I typically try and do

01:44:13.200 | is some stretching in the evening,

01:44:15.200 | because I train in the morning,

01:44:16.960 | as I'm perhaps getting ready for bed,

01:44:19.720 | or if the TV is on,

01:44:21.880 | which in our house doesn't typically go on

01:44:24.460 | because we don't have a TV,

01:44:25.800 | but of course there are computers

01:44:27.040 | and people are on their computers, et cetera.

01:44:29.720 | Well, I'll try and do some stretching while I do that.

01:44:31.980 | I also have a standing desk.

01:44:33.220 | So during the day at work,

01:44:34.720 | regardless of whether or not I train that morning or not,

01:44:37.120 | or I'm going to train in the afternoon,

01:44:38.300 | I'll try and do some static stretching

01:44:40.160 | for my hamstrings, my quads,

01:44:41.880 | my lats, my shoulders, my back,

01:44:43.860 | really doesn't take much time.

01:44:44.960 | And I really try to space that out throughout the week,

01:44:47.420 | which if you look at the peer-reviewed research,

01:44:50.300 | matches well to what's known to be most effective,

01:44:52.540 | which are going to be short repeated sessions,

01:44:54.560 | ideally every day.

01:44:55.840 | But truth told, I fail.

01:44:58.680 | I categorically fail.

01:45:00.160 | I was about to think of whether or not

01:45:01.200 | I ever stretch every day.

01:45:02.720 | I fail to do it every day,

01:45:03.800 | but I get about three or so stretching sessions

01:45:07.020 | in per week.

01:45:07.860 | And again, it's just static hold,

01:45:09.100 | trying to really relax into the stretch.

01:45:11.580 | Now, the relax into the stretch is something

01:45:14.180 | has been talked about in martial arts circles.

01:45:17.180 | And Pavel Satsoulin has an excellent book on stretching.

01:45:19.640 | We can provide a link to that.

01:45:21.480 | He talks about this.

01:45:22.400 | Has a lot to do with relaxation of the nervous system

01:45:25.320 | and the way that the nerves innervate muscles

01:45:26.940 | and allow for stretch, if you will.

01:45:28.960 | Also the way that the tendons and ligaments

01:45:30.560 | are innervated by nerves.

01:45:33.160 | The converse is also true.

01:45:34.600 | And here, again, this is a principle

01:45:36.320 | that Pavel has put forth.

01:45:38.280 | I believe he calls it irradiation,

01:45:39.900 | meaning irradiating out or emanating out from a source,

01:45:43.520 | which is that while exhaling and relaxing the torso,

01:45:47.540 | the midsection, some people call it the core,

01:45:50.080 | although some people don't like that term,

01:45:53.520 | can facilitate relaxation and stretching

01:45:56.780 | through a larger range of motion.

01:45:58.480 | So too can contracting the core, the midsection,

01:46:02.960 | or gripping very tightly with the fist

01:46:05.880 | can facilitate muscular contraction

01:46:08.000 | because of the way that the nervous system heavily,

01:46:11.160 | we can even say over represents the fists in the brain.

01:46:15.440 | And so how would you apply this

01:46:16.880 | to your overall foundational fitness protocol?

01:46:19.720 | Well, it turns out that let's say you're doing a movement

01:46:23.240 | that involves one limb moving and then the other.

01:46:26.320 | Let's say it's bicep curls, just for sake of example.

01:46:28.880 | It turns out that you will actually be stronger

01:46:31.440 | in moving that dumbbell with the arm

01:46:34.360 | that happens to be moving

01:46:35.980 | if you grip the handle very tightly,

01:46:38.720 | but also grip the handle

01:46:40.280 | of the opposite dumbbell very tightly.

01:46:42.920 | Now that said, in between sets,

01:46:44.620 | I encourage you to do the opposite,

01:46:46.280 | to try and completely relax in between sets,

01:46:48.120 | combine that with a physiological sigh.

01:46:49.800 | And then when the next set commences,

01:46:53.120 | employ that very strong grip,

01:46:54.840 | both again of the weight that's moving

01:46:56.760 | and the weight that at that moment might be stationary

01:46:59.300 | or in isometric position.

01:47:01.160 | So the nervous system, of course,

01:47:03.480 | is what controls muscles,

01:47:04.960 | and that operates in both directions.

01:47:07.280 | If you want to relax, try and use long exhales,

01:47:09.840 | maybe even physiological sighs,

01:47:11.280 | and really concentrate on mentally and physically relaxing,

01:47:13.960 | in particular your core and your fists.

01:47:17.140 | And if you want to generate force, right,

01:47:19.680 | you want to move a heavy barbell or dumbbell,

01:47:22.400 | you want to do a chin up with the maximal force,

01:47:24.680 | that's when you can employ the opposite,

01:47:25.980 | which would be to grip the bar or dumbbell, et cetera,

01:47:28.080 | very tightly, and you want to contract your core

01:47:31.440 | or even fill your body with air as they say,

01:47:33.880 | plug all the leaks, et cetera.

01:47:35.800 | So this gets into kind of form and movement,

01:47:37.920 | which is an extensive near infinite landscape of discussion,

01:47:42.040 | again, that we don't have time to go into.

01:47:43.640 | I just want to mention those two nervous system related tips

01:47:46.360 | because I suppose as a neuroscientist,

01:47:48.280 | they appeal to me because they are grounded

01:47:49.860 | in fundamental principles

01:47:51.040 | of how the nervous system innervates muscle,

01:47:52.760 | and I know that they will benefit you

01:47:54.280 | the first time you use them and every time.

01:47:56.400 | Speaking of grip and nervous system

01:47:57.920 | and fitness and longevity,

01:47:59.160 | Dr. Peter Attia, who is a medical doctor,

01:48:01.480 | was a guest on the Huberman Lab Podcast

01:48:03.160 | and provided an enormous wealth of information

01:48:05.200 | on that podcast episode.

01:48:06.380 | I really encourage you to check it out when you have time.

01:48:09.280 | And of course, has his own spectacular podcast,

01:48:11.560 | The Drive with Peter Attia.

01:48:13.260 | Peter, Dr. Attia, I should say,

01:48:15.680 | often talks about certain movements or exercises

01:48:19.880 | that you should perform, not just to improve your fitness,

01:48:22.080 | but also to touch into or measure how fit you are

01:48:25.520 | and how well you are progressing toward a long lifespan

01:48:28.840 | and health span.

01:48:29.680 | And one of those includes the ability to hang from a bar

01:48:32.560 | for a minute or longer.

01:48:34.040 | And there are a number of different expectations

01:48:37.640 | that one can have of how long they should be able

01:48:40.120 | to hang from a bar, depending on their age

01:48:42.120 | and their fitness level, et cetera.

01:48:43.440 | Please check out Dr. Attia's podcast

01:48:45.920 | and his various social media sites

01:48:47.760 | to get more information on that.

01:48:49.240 | But what I can tell you is that if you're going to hang

01:48:51.320 | from a bar and you want to hang from that bar

01:48:53.760 | as long as possible, which turns out to be a interesting

01:48:56.460 | and important metric of your health,

01:48:58.980 | then gripping the bar very tightly will actually help.

01:49:01.500 | Earlier, we talked about whether or not to train

01:49:03.560 | if you're sleep deprived and how to recover

01:49:06.360 | from what I would say is moderate sleep deprivation

01:49:09.640 | by doing NSDR as opposed to total sleep deprivation,

01:49:12.840 | like being up all night or having a truly miserable night,

01:49:15.720 | which case I think you should just skip training

01:49:18.160 | the next day and slide it forward.

01:49:19.860 | Now, a similar issue comes up from time to time

01:49:22.700 | where people wonder whether or not they should train or not

01:49:26.020 | if they are sick.

01:49:27.200 | And here there's all sorts of crazy gym lore

01:49:31.720 | and sport specific lore.

01:49:34.060 | For instance, I used to hear this.

01:49:36.340 | When I ran cross country, there was this adage

01:49:40.120 | that if the symptoms were from the neck up,

01:49:44.200 | you could still train.

01:49:45.120 | That is, if you were really congested

01:49:46.480 | and you had a headache, you could still run.

01:49:48.640 | Whereas if it was in your chest and in your lungs,

01:49:50.680 | you couldn't run.

01:49:51.720 | I don't think there's any data whatsoever to support

01:49:54.920 | whether or not that's true or whether it's not true

01:49:58.300 | for myself and because my general goal

01:50:02.240 | is to be training and fit over time,

01:50:06.280 | but also to include general health in the fitness equation,

01:50:10.380 | that is to not be sick or chronically sick

01:50:12.640 | and certainly not to get other people sick.

01:50:15.300 | If I have a little tiny sniffle,

01:50:17.940 | like I think I might be getting sick,

01:50:20.060 | even then I'm a little cautious in the sense

01:50:22.580 | that I'm not going to do my typical workout.

01:50:25.740 | I might stop it about 15 minutes earlier

01:50:28.440 | and I would do that not by neglecting any body parts

01:50:31.720 | or anything of that sort.

01:50:32.620 | If it's a weight training workout

01:50:33.620 | by simply reducing the total number of sets,

01:50:36.720 | I probably wouldn't do any sets to failure.

01:50:39.100 | If I did, I might reduce the total number

01:50:41.280 | or percentage of sets to failure from about 30% of sets

01:50:44.220 | to maybe closer to 10% of sets, something like that.

01:50:48.040 | And if it was endurance work,

01:50:49.280 | I might throttle back by 10 or 20%

01:50:51.800 | and I will shorten the total duration of the workout.

01:50:54.300 | And I often find that because of the known,

01:50:58.060 | yes, peer reviewed, known immune system enhancing effects

01:51:01.220 | of exercise, sometimes that alone will allow me

01:51:04.340 | to avoid getting sick.

01:51:06.020 | But of course, I'm also careful to get home,

01:51:08.060 | take a hot shower, not stress myself out if I can,

01:51:11.660 | avoid getting myself stressed out and focus on sleep,

01:51:13.940 | NSDR, other forms of recovery, good nutrition, et cetera.

01:51:17.660 | If however, I have a real sniffle, a cold,

01:51:20.300 | I'm not feeling well,

01:51:21.900 | or I think I might be coming down with a flu,

01:51:23.460 | I absolutely do not train

01:51:24.740 | and I don't get back into training of any kind

01:51:26.920 | until I'm completely recovered.

01:51:29.680 | So what I'm basically saying is that, no,

01:51:31.860 | I don't believe you should train if you're sick.

01:51:34.380 | And perhaps equally importantly,

01:51:37.180 | when you come back from a layoff of any kind,

01:51:39.680 | whether or not because of illness or for whatever reason,

01:51:43.440 | I do believe that because your body is a bit untrained,

01:51:46.520 | it's not ideal to jump right back into maximal training

01:51:49.700 | and to take one, maybe two weeks of ramping up

01:51:53.260 | to the full duration and intensity of workouts

01:51:55.620 | that then I would continue on going

01:51:57.700 | for however many cycles I can complete

01:52:01.080 | before I hit another sickness

01:52:03.940 | or I hit another gap in my schedule

01:52:05.900 | due to family obligations or other obligations, et cetera.

01:52:09.060 | So we've covered a lot of tools and protocols

01:52:11.380 | and variables related to fitness,

01:52:13.620 | but we have by no means covered all the available tools

01:52:16.380 | and protocols and variables.

01:52:18.720 | Before we wrap up, I do want to emphasize one tool.

01:52:21.740 | It's a very easy, in fact, zero cost,

01:52:24.640 | very low time commitment tool.

01:52:27.180 | And this was one that was provided again

01:52:29.100 | by Dr. Andy Galpin when he was on the Huberman Lab Podcast.

01:52:32.580 | And it's a tool that there's excellent research

01:52:35.100 | to support the effectiveness of,

01:52:37.780 | and that I do believe should come

01:52:39.580 | at the end of every training session.

01:52:42.100 | And that's to do three to five minutes

01:52:44.980 | of deliberately slow breathing.

01:52:47.660 | It sounds so simple.

01:52:49.020 | Three to five minutes of deliberately slowed breathing.

01:52:52.280 | So this could be while you're in the shower

01:52:54.280 | or when you arrive at your car,

01:52:56.000 | you might sit in your car quietly and do that

01:52:57.760 | if you have time, or maybe even while you're driving

01:53:00.580 | back to or onto your next destination,

01:53:04.660 | just to really slow down your breathing,

01:53:06.820 | to really look at the recovery period

01:53:09.500 | that has to follow each training session.

01:53:11.680 | And of course, during which the adaptations,

01:53:13.620 | the changes that make you more fit

01:53:15.800 | than you were going into the exercise occur.

01:53:18.940 | And that three to five minutes

01:53:20.340 | of deliberately slowed breathing has been shown

01:53:22.880 | in Andy's group and in related experiments,

01:53:25.980 | not exactly the same, but related experiments

01:53:27.940 | in our laboratory and in other laboratories

01:53:30.100 | to really so-called downshift the nervous system

01:53:32.700 | and really set you up for maximal recovery,

01:53:36.060 | rapid recovery, and allow you to lean

01:53:38.260 | into the next training session with full intensity

01:53:40.540 | when that training session eventually arrives.

01:53:42.460 | So it's a very simple tool, but a very potent tool

01:53:45.880 | for your overall fitness.

01:53:47.360 | So thank you for joining me for this discussion

01:53:49.320 | of what I'm calling a foundational,

01:53:52.320 | I guess we could even get bold

01:53:53.620 | and call it an optimal fitness protocol,

01:53:55.360 | although the word optimal is a tricky one.

01:53:57.820 | There's no real optimal fitness protocol.

01:53:59.960 | And today, what I've really tried to focus on

01:54:01.960 | is this foundational protocol,

01:54:03.880 | because it does allow you to check off

01:54:07.120 | most if not all the boxes related to strength,

01:54:11.240 | endurance, hypertrophy, speed, power, flexibility.

01:54:16.240 | It will also teach you how to regulate your nervous system

01:54:20.000 | up and down, that is to ramp up and focus,

01:54:22.740 | mind muscle link, et cetera,

01:54:24.580 | and then quickly calm down, physiological size,

01:54:27.200 | three to five minute decompressed breathing

01:54:28.740 | at the end of training, et cetera.

01:54:30.500 | Really, even though I talked about the protocol

01:54:32.500 | that I follow, and again, that we will provide

01:54:34.780 | as a newsletter at HubermanLab.com,

01:54:37.300 | if you want to look at it in more detail,

01:54:39.340 | even though we talked about it in the context

01:54:40.860 | of what I do, again, I really want to emphasize

01:54:43.500 | that this protocol and the description of this protocol

01:54:46.960 | and all its variables is really for you

01:54:49.080 | and for you to tailor to your specific needs.

01:54:51.780 | So please take the protocol into consideration,

01:54:55.360 | but do not treat it as wholly.

01:54:56.620 | Treat it as a starting point from which you can adapt it

01:54:59.780 | to your specific fitness needs.

01:55:02.100 | If you're learning from and are enjoying

01:55:03.500 | the Huberman Lab podcast,

01:55:04.900 | please subscribe to our YouTube channel.

01:55:06.620 | That's a terrific zero cost way to support us.

01:55:09.200 | In addition, please subscribe to the Huberman Lab podcast

01:55:12.040 | on Spotify and Apple.

01:55:13.680 | And on both Spotify and Apple,

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01:55:31.260 | That's the best way to support the Huberman Lab podcast.

01:55:34.120 | Not so much today, but in many previous episodes

01:55:36.280 | of the Huberman Lab podcast, we talk about supplements.

01:55:38.680 | While supplements aren't necessary for everybody,

01:55:40.880 | many people derive tremendous benefit from them

01:55:42.900 | for things like enhancing sleep and focus

01:55:44.860 | and hormone optimization.

01:55:46.540 | The Huberman Lab podcast has partnered

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01:55:49.200 | If you'd like to see the supplements

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01:55:57.680 | And there you'll see a number of the supplements

01:55:59.640 | that we talk about regularly on the podcast.

01:56:01.600 | I should just mention that that catalog of supplements

01:56:03.540 | is constantly being updated.

01:56:05.140 | As mentioned at the beginning of today's episode,

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01:57:22.120 | And at all three of those places,

01:57:23.860 | I cover topics and subject matter

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01:57:30.160 | but that's often distinct from information

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01:57:33.620 | Again, it's Huberman Lab on all social media channels.

01:57:36.460 | So thank you for joining me today for our discussion

01:57:38.300 | about building your optimal toolkit for fitness.

01:57:41.060 | And last, but certainly not least,

01:57:43.300 | thank you for your interest in science.

01:57:45.100 | [upbeat music]

01:57:47.680 | (upbeat music)

Fitness Toolkit: Protocol & Tools to Optimize Physical Health | Huberman Lab Podcast #94

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