10 Most Common Reasons You're Not Making Gains

What's going on, everybody? And welcome back to the Built With Science podcast. You're here with your host, as always, me, Max Coleman. And of course sitting across from me, that's D.P. plotkin, D. Pizzle Plotkin, aka Danny Boy. Today's episode is going to be a little bit different than normal. It's not going to be focused on a single topic, but rather Daniel and I, 10 to 11 topics that we're going to go over and talk about if we think they are either underrated or, or overrated. And just a heads up, given that Daniel and I don't know how to have simple conversations, these are probably going to go on for a very long time and each one's going to have like a billion different caveats to it. So we're probably not going to have a quick answer to any of these. However, Danny Boy and I also picked five topics that we have not shared with one another yet that we're going to send to each other rapid fire at the end of this podcast. So we are forced to not give nuanced answers and instead we only have like 60 seconds on the clock to give a definitive answer for each one. So with that being said, let's jump right into it, bro. So first topic, tracking macros. Overrated or underrated?

So tracking macros, I think is overrated for, you know, well trained and people who are in the evidence based community that know what they're consuming, generally speaking, and aren't bodybuilding. And I think it's underrated, particularly for an individual that has never done it before. So somebody that has no idea how many calories like a brownie has or different types of brownies and so on. So I think typically with your average individual who's consuming this content, it's probably overrated because this, they've probably done a little bit of tracking before and they're probably, you know, generally aware of how many calories something has or different food types have and what their typical day looks like in maintenance, in a deficit, and in a surplus. But there are very, very many people who obsess over hitting their targets super precisely. And not only is that an issue because, because you just don't need to be that precise, but it's also an issue because it assumes precision in the actual tracking itself. So different foods, even the same looking apple, like the composition is going to be, you know, slightly different. There's a plus or minus on every single food item. There's a plus or minus on your scale. There's a plus or minus on tons of inputs that are related to how accurate your actual estimate is. So the goal is just to be in the ballpark, and then it will smooth out over the week. So some days you'll be slightly over, even if you're precisely on, and some days you'll be slightly under, and you'll end up averaging to whatever your target was.

Yeah, I would definitely say overrated. And I think it's overrated almost to a fault in that there are individual like, so some individuals will literally eat the same thing every single day and know exactly how much they're eating of each thing while still tracking it, which, there's nothing wrong with that. But it does perplex me a little bit that you would eat, you know for a fact that you're eating the same breakfast, lunch, and dinner and the snacks in between, and it's always gonna add up to the same 2,500 calories, 160 grams of protein, whatever it may be, and you're still putting it in your phone. Again, there's nothing wrong with it, but it does seem a little bit silly to me. I also think that, to a certain extent, tracking. Relying on tracking can be somewhat detrimental to your understanding of food and your understanding of, like, hunger signalings and stuff like that. So, like, for instance, I track my food intake relatively closely, especially when I'm dieting. I, I, I'm, I'm pretty precise with how I track my macros. However, because of that, because of almost relying on macro counting and, and my fitness pal as, like, a crutch, I am now, again, bad at estimating how many calories are in something because I've relied so heavily on my food scale and my fitness pal that I'm not even good at, like, eyeballing stuff anymore. It was like a, it was like a, an inverted U where I got better and better and better at it as I was, like, learning how to track calories. And then eventually it just kind of fell off because I overcorrected and went too into trying to be as precise as possible. I don't, I don't remember how Eric Helm said it, but it was something like, in this field, we love putting a bunch of stock into imprecise measurements and saying that we're doing something incredibly precisely when the tool that we're using itself is imprecise or being really precise with imprecise tools, I think is what he said. Uh, so, yeah, I would say that tracking your macros is definitely overrated. It can be an incredible tool for people learning how to Go about listening to their hunger signaling and learning about what different foods kind of comprise of. Cause like, you ask like your average non gym goer, how many calories are in like you hold up a Joe's slice of pizza that's like this big and you're like, how many calories in there? I don't know, like 150? I have no idea. Like, so it does. It's definitely something that can be helpful. But it is a tool and it is not the thing that is getting you towards your goals. It is a tool that is helping you get towards your goals. So, tracking macros overrated, except for some populations. Okay, cool. Covered there.

Sweet.

Number two, Forcing progressive overload. What are we thinking?

Yeah, so I think forcing progressive overload is definitely overrated. I think that for pretty much any individual, I don't think we need any caveats here because the word forcing is in there. I think progressive overload should be. Well, first, let's define progressive overload. I think progressive overload is commonly thought of as increasing load, but really what progressive overload is, is are we supplying enough of a stimulus to actually elicit an adaptation? So if you do the same thing for months, for the first few weeks, that same thing is actually enough of a stimulus in order to get an adaptation. So in order to get a little bit more growth, but there will be a certain point where that stimulus is actually just enough to maintain and then you need to increase the stimulus a bit. That doesn't mean that it's the minimum stimulus. It just needs to fall into the range of stimulus that will elicit an adaptation. So when people try to force progressive overload, it's almost like that kind of contradicts itself. Even in the statement where if you're forcing it, a lot of the time you are doing something where you're almost tricking yourself into believing that you're actually getting better at that task, when really you should just take your time and allow the progressive overload to show itself with you pushing yourself with similar parameters. So the same form, the same exercise and so on. So yeah, I think definitely almost squarely overrated to try to really, really force progressive overload.

I think we could have changed like this to like beating the logbook, essentially, like focusing on, Oh, I did 3 by 10 at 115 or 135 last week on the bench press. If I do not do 3 by 11 at 135 on the bench press this week, this whole workout was for nothing. Like, there was no point in me going to the gym at all. Right. So, yeah, I think that that mindset not only probably isn't a good idea for just long term progress in general, because the kind of the psychology of going to the gym and thinking that you have to beat the logbook, but you're not always going to beat the logbook. And having that happen can make you think that you're doing things wrong with your training or. Or something like that, which is just certainly not the case. Right. Uh, so I think that without question, forcing progressive overload is completely overrated. And understanding that you don't have to go to the gym and do more than you did the last time you went to the gym is like, it's a lesson. It's like a sign of a mature lifter, I would say is like someone who, like, knows for a fact, like, okay, I don't have to do more than I did last week. I just need to provide my muscles with a stimulus to cause them to grow. So, yeah, forcing progressive overload, Beating the logbook squarely. Overrated. Like you said, Danny boy. What about exercise selection, huh? What you think about that one?

Am I just fielding all of them? I like this be my guess.

Yeah.

Then.

Then I can tell you what you.

Were wrong or what you did wrong about. Let me just phrase this a little better now that I've had time to think about it. So, all right, let's do this. Exercise selection. We actually didn't talk about this beforehand. I think exercise selection, underrated. So. So I think there's tons of categories where this could fall into. I think that many people miss out on categories of exercise that they should be doing. So, for example, if they're only doing tricep exercises not in the overhead position, they may be missing out on some gains. I think that another category is sort of just listening to your body category. I think people force exercises because they're supposed to be better, but really don't work for them.

Optimal, bro.

Yeah, so it's actually kind of like I sort of named people on opposite sides of the spectrum where one person is gonna do something regardless of how it feels for them, and the other, because it's supposed to be optimal, and the other person is one that, like, essentially doesn't know that certain positions could potentially net them better progress or something to at least experiment with. So I think those two categories are big ones when it comes to exercise selection. But you know, there's gonna be tons of other variables. So muscles with a broad origin can be worked in many different ranges of motion. So for example, the chest has a broad origin, so it can be worked in many ranges of motion and that's gonna hit slightly different regions of the muscle. So just being aware of how you can manipulate exercises to be hard in different positions, to hit different portions, and basically use it as the tool that it is in order to get the stimulus that you're looking for. But on the other side of the coin, you don't want to obsess to the point where you're not listening to what your body's telling you, what your joints are telling you, and so on. So definitely underrated because I think people don't explore or understand the topic well enough to get the most out of it.

Yeah, I was, I was gonna say the same thing. I think that like adequate exercise selection, like what I would say are the good qualifiers for exercise selection, are very underrated. So you have the groups of people that have to do the squat, bench and deadlift for hypertrophy because they, it's, it's what they do, right? It's like, it's. Those are the best. Why would we do anything else? Even though squats tear their hips apart, deadlifts hurt their back more than they feel a hamstring pump and bench press hurts their rotator cuff more than they feel it in their chest. Right? And then the other end of the spectrum, where someone thinks that if they're doing a, a curl, but they're not supinating to the 30 degrees that they should be, there's. That's a wasted exercise too, right? I think that I was just talking to Milo Wolf about this, so. Shout out Wolf, coach. He was talking about how we in the evidence based community are kind of like moving away from exercise selection. Meaning like we start thinking about how there is no best exercise or even better exercise than others. But that is, I think that's a flawed way of moving because there are exercises that are fundamentally better than other exercises for muscle growth, theoretically. Right? So as long as you're doing exercises that feel good, right. You feel them in the muscle that you're trying to work, you don't feel them in, or at least you don't feel them in a painful way in the joints surrounding that muscle. Right. And you are biasing at least the majority of your work in the lengthened position, right. Where you're doing something that puts the muscle into a deep stretch, then as long as you're covering kind of those two bases, your pretty much golden as far as I'm concerned with exercise selection. But those are two Things that people tend not to consider. So for that reason, I would say underrated, I think. Well said. Anything else?

I think that's good.

Cool food composition. I E. Should we care about if we're eating fruits and veggies or can we just I f Y M Can we. If it fits your macros our way to a golden God physique. Is there any reason to care about something being quote unquote healthy?

Yes. So I'm speaking to the wrong person here who doesn't eat any veggies and just straight I I I fyms it.

With Pop Tarts and whey protein, baby.

All kinds of Pop Tarts and whey protein and the occasional chicken and rice to remind himself that he's a bodybuilder. So I do think that there's significant utility in making sure that. So I should start with underrated. So I think there's significant utility in choosing foods that are high in fiber, high in nutrients, higher in, you know, protein for the most part that allow or facilitate you to have a good overall diet where while hitting your macronutrient targets and calorie targets. So I think the vast majority of people in, in our community probably don't focus on it enough early in their careers or early in their fitness journey where they're like, they saw the, I think it was the Twinkie professor and then, you know, maybe early on Lay Norton stuff like that was really pushing for. I think his was Pop Tarts and he was sort of known as the Pop Tart guy. So I think a lot of us early on were squarely in the. Whatever hits your calorie targets is good to go. But you realize fairly early on that that's not gonna work long term. You can, you can smash that for like a month. You could probably last a month. And some people can last for maybe perhaps more than that.

But for the most, yeah, but for.

The, you're just better. You're just on that other side of the bell curve. But for the most part, making sure you're eating a variety of high fiber foods, making sure that when you hit your protein targets, it's not all from liquids. So you're getting actual, you know, physical protein that's a bit more filling and just a nice colorful diet where you don't feel like, like, you know, you're missing out on significant nutrient composition.

So yeah, I would say that this is underrated in general. And, and it would have never been underrated, like, had this conversation been happening 20 years ago. Like it would be ridiculous to say this is underrated. Right. But now because of, you know, more and more people realizing that food composition technically doesn't matter for performance or for body composition, we now have to talk about why it's underrated. Right. So do I think that eating more fruits and veggies is going to make you a more jacked athlete? Probably not, but it is going to make being a jacked athlete better. And what I mean by that is like, let's say cutting, for instance. I think this is the most applicable when we're talking about dieting. When IIF YM really started to take off, you had individuals trying to cram in their protein requirements and then just fill in whatever else they had to fill in to meet their calorie goal. And what they were focusing on was making things taste as delicious as possible and be like, like some balance of satiating and delicious at the same time, which is a good place to be. But I think they overcorrected on average to be like, okay, I know that I, if I just have. I can have half of a pop tart here and then that'll allow me to have three chicken nuggets instead of, you know. Yeah, you know, stuff like that where you're getting almost. You're almost like paralyzing yourself by analyzing how delicious you can make your meal in three bites or less, essentially. And I think that you're going to have so much easier of a time and better of a time focusing on foods that are, you know, you can make fruits and veggies very delicious through a variety of different ways, and some of them are just delicious inherently. Right. But allowing these food composition things to consider are also going to make your diet easier because of like, obviously the satiating capacity of like a head of broccoli versus half of a Pop Tart and a whey protein shake, if that makes sense. So underrated us, generally speaking for health and for longevity in the sport, but definitely underrated in terms of making your cuts easier on yourself by allowing for like more satiating foods throughout the day. Anything else you want to say about food composition?

But yeah, I think two quick points. One is I don't want a strawman Iifym where I think the original iterations of Iifym were sort of a 8020 type deal where they assumed that the majority of your foods were gonna be, you know, nutrient dense, not just straight up junk food. It just sort of allowed for a little bit more leeway with those junkie foods. So I think before people go out and say, ifym is absolute trash and sort of just a straw man. The fact that they're just eating like, you know, 50% pop tart diet, I think we'll just throw that out there real quick. And then the other part is, is that micronutrients matter. Like, because we're in the first world, a lot of us are covering our, our bases, but you could definitely end up in a situation where there's unknown unknowns, where there's tons of, you know, micronutrients and even phytonutrients that we just don't know how good they are for your health long term because we don't have really good data on that. But you probably want to veer in that direction because it just kind of makes sense that if you eat, you know, fruits and veggies over time, you're probably going to be net healthier than if you eat, you know, pop tarts and cornflakes and so on. So I think regardless of it not affecting your physique, your health and wellbeing over time, probably benefit from those little things that you cannot see, but probably help you out in the long run.

Yeah, yeah. I. Iifym is dope. Like, inherently, it is a sick thing that helped people understand that you could be way more flexible with, with your approach to losing weight. Right. And so, unfortunately, being that a pendulum does what a pendulum does, people took it and fucking ran with it in the opposite direction that the people who are originally proselytizing the Iifym meant for it to do. So people. Yeah, I think that's. I think that's a really good point. Okay. Detriments of concurrent training. Right, I'll take this one. Right. And then you can. I think this is incredibly overrated. Right, Right. And we can talk about concurrent training in a couple of different ways. Right. One, concurrent training, the way people typically think about it with cardio. You could also. We could also have phrased this as cardio kills your gains. Right. The notion that doing cardio will inhibit your ability to grow muscle is not completely unfounded. It's not ridiculous. There is a strong mechanistic rationale for why you shouldn't do cardio in close proximity to your, your training. Right. However, the longitudinal data that we have on this just does not support that unless you are doing ridiculously large amounts of cardio. If you're running in close proximity, you're doing a lot of a large amount of volume of cardio work or aerobic work, especially in close proximity to your training. Yes. That might have an impact on your ability to grow maximal amounts of muscle. Right. However, I think it's an insanely overblown issue to the point where now people refuse to do cardio at all, myself included, because they think, I, I don't, I, they think that it's going to preclude their ability to grow as much muscle as possible. But also I think it's a little bit of a. I don't want to do this thing and now I have like a sciency sounding reason why I can just not do it at all. Right. So I think that one, cardio is almost underrated for muscle growth. It leads to more muscle growth. Haven't you guys heard? According to that one study. But I also think that concurrent training in terms of, Well I, I think it's underrated because one, there's a clear relationship between aerobic capacity and longevity and life. But also I, I think that cardio is just, it's something that a lot of people really enjoy. And I think a lot of people tell themselves that they aren't able to do it. Like some people might really enjoy running or going for like hikes or swimming or whatever it may be. And they'll choose not to do those things because the only time they have in their day is close to their workout and they think that it's going to diminish all of the progress they made in the gym. Right. But I think that outside of that concurrent training in like other ways. So like people thinking that you cannot make gains in strength and hypertrophy simultaneously, I think that one is probably even more overrated in that because of the closeness of those two scales, generally speaking, you can, you're probably not going to maximize strength gains while also maximizing hypertrophy gains. You just probably aren't. Right. But when we're talking about suboptimal, suboptimal to quote Dr. Pack, could mean 98%. Right. Like you can still make incredible strength gains and incredible size gain. Incredible size gains following the same program simultaneously. And I think that a lot of people have kind of over corrected to thinking that if I am not focusing solely on strength then I'm like throw, I'm pissing away like 70% of the gains that I would be able to make. You know what I mean? And vice versa for hypertrophy as well. Do you have anything you want to add to that?

Yeah, I think I agree totally. I'll just add on one small thing in the direction of, I think it could actually facilitate gains. So I think there's probably a Requisite amount of aerobic capacity where aerobic fitness, I should say that actually facilitates gains. Pretty like obviously like even without the study you're referring to where they had people do cardio and then lift with one leg and no cardio with the other leg and the leg that did cardio beforehand grew more. Regardless of that study, there's obviously people that are really unfit aerobically and have to take seven minutes between sets before they can, you know, breathe between squats and stuff like that. Like worst case scenario, they or, or best case scenario, they wait long enough where it's not affecting their gains potentially. And it could still be affecting their gains because of the mechanisms. But you'd be hard pressed to say that that person probably wouldn't benefit from just being more efficient in their training where they're not so aerobically unfit that they are, you know, just dying between sets and need to take way more time than a person who's just like middle of the road fit. So it could definitely be a bottleneck and then after that it's probably not the end all be all. So just a few points on the opposite side of the spectrum where it can actually be really helpful. And on the, you know, very opposite side, if you're doing way too much, it can be detrimental. So most people are in the sweet spot where I agree with you, it's pretty much a non sequitur where it's not that big of a deal.

Yeah, I think like increased capitalization and increased mitochondrial density aside, which are not terrible arguments for why it might lead to more growth. Right. But I do have a, a, not a counter, but a question. So like generally speaking, most people are 50, fit enough aerobically to do a set of 15 to 20. Right. Because that's generally, I mean we're rarely working above 20s. Sometimes we'll do something close to 30, but rare, rarely I would say. What is your argument to saying doing those sets of 25 to 30 is getting you all the aerobic work, aerobic practice, aerobic training that you need to make you good at doing sets of 25 to 30. Does that make sense?

Yeah, I don't think that that's aerobic. So a set of 25 and 30 would be, you know, a lot more anaerobic than aerobic. So I think increasing your aerobic capacity is not you being able to better do the 25 to 30, but rather you being better at recovering from a set of 15 to another set of 15 in three minutes or so or two minutes and a half. And also you being able to recover session to session in a more productive way because of the fact that you, you can be more efficient in how you, you know, supply blood and so on. So I don't, I don't think it's that you're gonna do that set better, but rather all the things that aren't the set, if that makes sense.

Yeah, it feels really. Beautifully said. So overall, big, big, underrated. For cardio. For. For. For the interaction between cardio and, and, and training for. For hypertrophy. Again, unless Danny boy and I specify, we're almost always talking about hypertrophy training and, and hypertrophy in general and muscle growth. Right. We're very rarely talking about other things. But I do think it's important to point out that there does seem to be somewhat of a higher cost of concurrent training when we're talking about power output. So there does seem to be somewhat of a detriment to power. Maximal power output when you see large amounts of, of, of cardiovascular aerobic work in conjunction with work intended to increase maximal power output. Right. So all good there as far as concurrent training is concerned. Right? Yeah. Okay. Protein timing. Let's hear it, Danny boy.

Yeah, so protein timing, I would say for a multitude of reasons, is overrated because of the fact that. Surprise face. Because of the fact that it's almost impossible if you're consuming three adequate protein doses per day to really screw up the timing that badly. So it's gonna be close enough to your workout where if there were to be a window that is, you know, somewhat large, which we know it to be pretty large, then as long as you're not consuming just one huge bolus of protein per day, you're really not gonna miss too much. So it's hard for me to find a strong rationale for really, really being meticulous about exactly when you get your protein in. As long as you're hitting your 1.6 grams per kilo of body weight and splitting that up into three doses, I think it'll be golden. And then after that it's just like worrying about small details where if you're a bodybuilder and you're worried about every gram, probably take that three number and make it a four and maybe take the 1.6 number and make it like a two, and then you're really, really, really covering your bases. But for the most.

And to clarify, you are covering your ba. Like, as. As far as the literature is concerned, and we are concerned like that bodybuilder is still covering their bases, like to the same extent at 1.63 times a day, but just to really, like make sure, like no stir, no stone goes on overturned, like just to really play it safe, that that's kind of what we're saying. Maybe throw it up to 2 grams per kg and maybe split it up evenly across four meals instead of three. Do we think that's good? I don't want to speak for Danny boy, but do I think that's going to make a big difference on stage? I would say it's not going to make any difference on stage, but. But maybe. And it's not going to hurt you to do it, especially if your livelihood is predicated on how you look on stage. Right. Sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off there. Good.

No, I totally agree.

Yeah, I would say, I would actually. I'm so glad that you said. I, I would say underrated for protein timing. And the reason I would say underrated is because we are seeing upticks in like the intermittent fasting community. And I think that's not necessarily a bad thing. We also have some data to suggest that training, while in an unfed state, enduring intermittent fasting protocols. I believe this was. I came out of Tinsley's lab. I'm not entirely sure, so don't, don't quote me. But you do see some detriments to muscle growth when intermittent fasting is used if the training window that happens is outside of the eating window. Um, so I, I would say that if you're someone who follows an intermittent fasting style diet, that's not. There's nothing wrong with that. I love intermittent fasting. I think it's great. But what I like to do when I do intermittent fasting, especially when I'm dieting, is still eat protein throughout the day. But, but just make sure that I'm eating like large boluses of carbohydrates and fat towards the end of the night so that I can feel a little bit more full when I go to bed. But I'm still checking that box of making sure that, you know, my NPS responses are still high throughout the day. You know, so I would definitely say underrated for that because I think we kind of overcorrected for a long time. At least I did. I don't know. I don't know about the entire community of really what matters is how much we eat throughout the day. The rest is kind of bells and whistles and stuff. But we now have some convincing evidence that a semi even distribution of protein throughout the day is, is probably good. So there was one study, Danny Boy, you probably remember this better than I do. I don't even know the author's name, unfortunately. I do apologize. But where they looked at uneven protein distribution. So a group that had a very small protein breakfast, but a, but they were matched for protein. So I think they're both groups were still eating around 1.6 grams per kilogram. But one had a pretty small protein breakfast and one had a more even distribution of protein throughout the day. And the one that had a more even distribution throughout the day did grow more lean tissue than those that did not. So I think that that's, that in conjunction with the intermittent fasting studies that we've seen kind of suggests that maybe there's, there is probably a good idea to eat protein throughout the day. But like Danny boy said, like as long as it's not a very small window that you're getting your, your protein in, it's definitely not something to be to, to worry about. Like if you're getting protein in the morning and you're getting protein at the night and maybe some protein feeding throughout, like in, like at lunchtime or something like that, you are checking your boxes and you really have nothing to worry about. But for those of you who do like to intermittent fast and stuff like that, you like to have a shorter eating window. It's probably worth doing something having some protein throughout the day even outside of your feeding window. Or if you're going to intermittent fast, make sure your training window is within your eating window as well just so that you are in you're training in a fed state. So overrated if you're worried about going from three meals to six meals. Underrated if you're someone who eats one meal a day or even just two smaller meals a day or two. Two smaller meals in a, in a shorter eating window. Sorry, big word vomit there. I apologize. Anything you want to add to that or pullback on?

Yeah, I think, I think I definitely agree depending on who, who overcorrected where it could be under or overrated. So I'm glad you pointed that, that out but I'm not sure that the study, there's a few studies on this, but I don't know of one that was longitudinal. I think all the skewed protein studies were like MPS MPB studies, but I could be wrong. So if you're positive that that's cool, you could send that.

Well now I'm not positive, but I, I do think this exists because I Because study. But also, Dr. Pack posted it on his Instagram, and I remember reading it, but we'll link it in the show notes if it exists. If not, there'll be a big flashing thing that says, max was wrong right here, right now. But we'll make sure. We'll make sure to find that before this goes live. Okay. Anything else you wanna pull back on there? Okay.

Sweet.

And that was in reference to the uneven protein distribution throughout the day. Not necessarily. The intermittent fasting, eating in a fed state. Training in a fed state. Right, that one, yeah. Okay.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay. Hydration. Hydration status. Are we drinking enough water, Danny boy? Do we need to carry our gallons with us everywhere we go? Let's hear it. Yeah.

So there's two people in my lab that carry a gallon jug with them. So this is a direct shot at them. So if you're listening to this, just know that I'm laughing on the inside. No, I'm kidding. I am totally kidding. I'm not a dick. All right, so I think, as per my, you know, just great intro here, you could probably tell that I think that it's overrated. I don't think there's any evidence to suggest that somebody's grown less lean tissue because they were under hydrated.

So it'd be hard to get that approved by an ethics lawyer.

It'd be. It'd be really hard to say this, you know, super, super strongly. So, you know, I'll start with that. But I would find it very, very surprising if an event or an activity that doesn't cost a lot of water, meaning you're not just sweating buckets in the gym, for the most part.

Resistance training.

Yeah, exactly. When you're lifting weights. And that's primarily what we're doing to try to grow bigger muscles. Our body's pretty good at regulating the amount of water it needs to, you know, do bodily functions well. So particularly for events that don't involve a lot of loss of water, I would find it very surprising that we were limiting ourselves in the amount of muscle we can gain based on our hydration status. Most of us are probably hydrated enough. And if you're not hydrated enough, it's a pretty easy thing just to make sure that, you know, your urine is a. A bit more clear, a little less orange. A little. Yeah, exactly. If it just smells absolutely putrid and is, like dark orange, drink a little bit more water. I don't know if it'll be better for your gains, but probably go for it. But I do Think that it's massively overrated because it's the first thing that you hear. Any influencers come on and say, make sure you're hydrated or you're leaving, you know, this on the table. You're not gonna, you're gonna get cancer, you're gonna get heart disease. You're gonna not lubricate your blood vessels.

And, or your joints or just.

Yeah, your joints.

Yeah. Insert any ailment that you could possibly have. It's attributed to water for some reason. Yeah.

And then it almost always goes water than multivitamins. So for some reason that duo is, it just goes hand in hand. We should create a multivitamin water. Oh, wait.

So, yeah, so I, I, I now I will say a couple things. Hydration status can impact performance. No question about it. Danny boy and I aren't, aren't questioning that at all. In fact, in Daniel's lab, they test for hydration when subjects come to the lab especially for testing, to make sure that they are at an adequate level of hydration. And that affects various tests that they do there, but one of which being making sure that they're going to be able to perform well, even though that's not really the reason y', all, y' all test for hydration anyway. That being said, hydration status can impact performance. So there was a study that came out. It might have been even a meta analysis, but it might've just been a primary study. I'm not sure. Again, this is what happens when we don't prepare. We don't actually have pmids that we can, we can memorize or just, or recite. Basically, hydration status affected rpe. So those that were like, under hydrated, they, they, they perceived the tasks that they were doing to be harder than individuals who were hydrated adequately. Right. Does that affect muscle growth over the long term? Maybe if you're chronically under hydrated, I can see how that would impact things. But most people aren't chronically under hydrated like you guys. My dear, my dear, built with science listeners, your kidneys are so good at their job. And if they're not, you know it because you, you would know it. We, we don't do the, the thing with water. Like, we don't do what we do with water with other things. You know what I mean? Like the gallon of water that people carry around that have like little. You can do it. You're doing so oh, so close. Oh, you did it. You drank all the water you needed for the day, but really all you did was Force feed or force drink yourself into peeing 30 times a day. Just listen to your kidneys, all right? I promise they're good. You don't. You're not forcing yourself to go pee 30 times a day because you think that that's going to be better for. For. For your health or whatever, but you do force yourself to drink more water than you really need, and that's probably not hurting you, but it is. Like, I. I just don't. I don't get it. I've never understood it. I'm never going to understand it. I'm underrated. Or overrated. Biggest. Probably the biggest overrated on the entire list, if I'm being honest. Okay. Sorry. Anything else you want to say there?

No. Yeah, it was a good point. I mean, I. I don't think I underlined it enough. Being under hydrated can negatively affect performance. I'm just making the point that most people aren't actually under hyd. To that extent. Exactly. Yep.

All right. Wheat hydration water, it's great for you. We're not saying it's not surplus for growth. Danny boy. Do we have to be gaining weight to gain muscle?

Yeah. So you asked it in two different ways. One is overrated. Underrated. I think it's underrated. But whether we need to be in a surplus to grow, it's very clear we don't need to be in a surplus to grow. However, whether we need to be in a surplus to grow optimally is a fairly open question. But it seems like the answer is yes. And it sort of makes sense, mechanistically, that the answer is yes. Could you make a whole lot of growth, or could you grow a whole lot at maintenance calories and then not suffer from the detriments of, you know, a slight amount of muscle loss during cuts and then end up in the same place? It's possible, but I think there's very strong psychological reasons and very strong mechanistic reasons why, for the most part, unless you have a really hard time dieting, you should probably spend a considerable amount of time slowly gaining weight and making sure that things are going in the right direction for facilitating the highest probability of muscle growth.

Yeah. I think we now have three studies analyzing surplus and the degree of surplus that individuals are on and muscle growth. And I know two of the studies relatively well, but I don't know this third one that was done on, I believe, like, Brazilian bodybuilders. I. I think so. I don't know that one super well, so I'm not gonna talk about it. But individuals who were eating in a larger surpluses across both of these studies, Right. They did grow more muscle nominally like almost, almost an insignificant, almost a trivial amount more, but no less. And, and they gained a lot more fat. So, so big takeaway is take your time on your bulk. Like that's, that's no, no question. But given that in both studies it trended towards the individuals in a larger surplus growing more tissue, it at least provides some rationale for a surplus being beneficial for muscle growth. Right. And then also we can just talk about the fact that we've had so many clients who see really positive results from taking surpluses. And you also, especially when you look at individuals who are like fat phobic and when I mean fat phobic, I don't mean like the socio, like the social form of fatphobic but like scared of becoming fat themselves because they're afraid of what it'll do to their aesthetics. Right. You take those individuals and you, you allow them or they allow themselves to put on a little bit of fat and you see incredible results from them going through more rigid bulk and cut cycles as opposed to trying to maintain for extended periods of time. So do I think a surplus is absolutely necessary for muscle growth? Of course not. We have an entire episode on body recomposition, go check it out. But I do think that if you are looking to over the course of a 20, 30 year training career, build the most amount of muscle you can, you should be spending a considerable amount of time eating with the intention of gaining weight and therefore gaining muscle. So yeah, eat just above maintenance, don't put on too much fat, take your time. A surplus is we would say underrated for growth but honestly that one's probably adequately rated. It's just most people know that it's, it's useful. But I do think it's worth talking about because there are a lot of people out there who have kind of overcorrected into the like shout out. No offense Jeff Cavalier Athleanx. Like he, I know for a long time, I don't know what his opinion is now, but for a long time he thought that cutting and bulking was like silly and like there was really no reason to do it.

But I think another very popular not to, I'm not disparaging, you know, this is a person who funded one of my studies. He, I think he's pretty strongly against cut bulk cycles especially for his female athletes bread contraires. So there are popular people who disagree. So just to point that out, I don't really know exactly what he said it before, but never gave like a full rationale, so I'm not gonna speak for him. But there are, it's. I think it's important to point out that there are people who are getting results while having people do what's more along the lines of main gaining kind of, kind of thing, or at least not having concerted bulk cut cycles. So it can definitely be done, but we're just saying veer on the side of having a more pronounced bulk.

Yeah, it's bodybuilding. Right. Spend time building the body. Right. Okay. Unilateral training or growth. Should we be spending more time training one arm and then the other versus both arms at the same time or, you know, any muscle, obviously?

Yeah. So this one's kind of complicated because there's a lot of prongs to this. I think it's. Overall, if I had to get a lay of the land on the fitness, you know, scene, I think it's underrated because I think on average. On average, yeah.

Nice. Okay.

Because I think that a lot of people believe mistakenly that doing one arm or one leg at a time is going to take more time. But if you actually time yourself, which I've done, the amount of time that you spend is about the same because you can take a small rest in between and then go for it as opposed to, you know, it does depend on the exercise, I will say that. But on average it seems to be about the same, especially for accessory exercises.

Yeah. Upper body, it's like a. Easier. Yeah, that's an even easier argument there.

Yeah, exactly. Upper body and leg extension, leg curl, calves for sure. So I think for the majority of like bodybuilding esque exercises, it's not much more time spent. So I think that you can sort of dismiss the whole it will take much longer argument, which is what a lot of people say. And I think that one benefit that's missed out on often is that one, an arm could be stronger than the other or a leg can be stronger than the other. And two is one can be more flexible than another. So one of my calves is less flexible than the other. So anytime I do calf raises with both legs at the same time, I get a pretty distinct stretch in one side and not the other. So I think utilizing them is a very useful tool that doesn't have a distinct downside for the most part for many exercises. So I'm gonna say underrated. However, you may have a difference of opinion and that's what we're here for.

So I, I I just don't even have an opinion on this one at all. Like, I don't know if I would say that this one is overrated or underrated. So I, I think I. If I had to guess, like, if I had to put a cat it in a category, I would say overrate it because mostly because in athletic populations, like sports coaches and, and strength coaches and stuff like that, like, think it has to be a part of your program to account for any small disparities between muscles. There may be, like you said, one arm might be stronger than the other, but is that something that we really need to be concerned with? Like, obviously we want to be as well balanced as possible.

Well, I don't necessarily mean from a functional standpoint. I mean from the standpoint of taking that muscle to, like, I don't know what the nervous system is doing in terms of during that exercise, where, if I want to cover my bases and there's not a significant downside, why wouldn't I take that muscle, my left arm, to failure instead of potentially, you know, one taking over more or one failing, meaning my left failing, while my right has, you know, three reps left in the tank, so to speak. So that's what I mean by that. Not a functional thing. But how far away from failure is that muscle? I don't know how much that matters for sure. And it probably doesn't matter a whole lot, I'll say that. But if it doesn't, if there's no downside, why.

Exactly. So the, the time thing. The time thing, I would say, given that the majority, like, if you think about a bodybuilding split, when we're talking about unilateral training, what is the first thing that comes to your head?

Yeah, I mean, most people think Bulgarians, right?

Bulgarians, lunges, Any, any. Any split squat type, like, movement. And those do. Those do take more time. I would say, like, no question, you have to rest. Like, if you're resting 30 seconds between your right leg and your left leg, you're probably hurting your left leg's progress because, I mean, just the psychological fatigue from doing a set of Bulgarians, like, is the most miserable thing ever. So, like, I just, I know personally, I'm not gonna give my left leg my all if I don't give it adequate rest, right? What I think is kind of the best of both worlds here is what. I don't know if there's. This is the right world word, but like isolateral, meaning like machines or like using, okay, dumbbells, dumbbell curls instead of A barbell curl. Right. So you are working both arms at the same time, but each one is still independently having to. To produce the force to overcome the load in each hand. Right. And that might, to a certain extent, take care of any issues you would have in that regard. But there's also still the bilateral deficit.

Isn't that still unilateral?

Well, that's what I was saying. So isolateral, meaning, like you're still training, but. Because then you can't even use the argument if it takes more time because you're literally.

You're.

You're. It's the. It's still using both arms or both the same.

I thought you meant, like, one by one.

No, no, no, no. Oh, okay.

Who's doing that?

I haven't seen someone do something like that, like alternating curls in the gym, and I don't know how long, which is interesting. You. You never see people doing that anymore, but you still see people doing, like, walking lunges or reverse lunges, where you go, right leg, left leg, right leg, left leg.

I do. Whoa. Who do you think you are? I do unilateral. I do alternating curls. Wow, that's crazy.

No, I don't think it's a bad thing. It's just something I almost never see people do in the gym for some reason. That's weird.

I do see people. So what. What gyms do you go to?

I don't. I don't. I don't work out.

Yeah, you work out at home. So you're shutting.

I don't work out. So this is all. This is all an illusion. Okay. But the best of both worlds kind of thing. So like, another example of this is you see Cass from NF1 Training using this, like, isolateral leg press machine. So it's a leg press that has two sleds, so you still are it. And to a certain extent, you, like, each leg is independently moving a load, but you get to do them both at the exact same time. And doing those can highlight disparities that then may allow you for, like, better. Like, for better insights into, like, any potential detriments that that might cause. Right. So I would say overrated. But the literature, first of all, is just not there. Like, there's not. There's not a lot of research looking at a unilateral versus bilateral training for muscle growth study idea for any master's students listening. I think that would be a. I think it would be a cool study, though. You probably need a sample size of like 4000 to see any meaningful differences. Between groups. Okay. Wow. That was one that we spent way more time talking about than I thought we were going to. Unilateral training. Danny Boyce is underrated. I say overrated, but to be quite honest, we're way closer in agreement in agreement than it. Than it sounds just by our different answers. You want to move on?

Yep.

Cool. Sleep, Prioritizing sleep. Underrated. Overrated.

Yeah. Well, I guess it depends on who you ask for this one, but I think sleep super, super, super important, so I'm gonna say underrated. And I just think that there's tons of things that people can be doing outside the gym that will really facilitate gains. I think the strongest anecdotes I've ever heard were revolved around what people were doing outside the gym. Like, a lot of people, they. They work adequately hard. Like, I don't think that, you know, small changes in the gym are going to make, you know, a huge impact, but I do think potentially big changes in what you do outside the gym can make a. A pretty dramatic impact, especially in people who are already well trained. So getting adequate sleep, especially consistent, consistently, can, I think, really change your physique game. So I'm gonna say underrated.

Like, what's gonna make a bigger difference in your delt growth? Like turning. Like. And this is. This sounds like a joke, but it's. It's a real question. Like, what makes a bigger difference in your ability to grow capped delts, turning your pinkies up to get more internal rotation while you're doing the exercise, or going from six to eight hours of sleep a night. And I know that sounds kind of silly, and it sounds like reductio ad absurdum, but the reason I do. The reason I say that, the reason I use such a ridiculous analogy is because people spend so. Yeah, underrated, Duh. So people spend so much time thinking about how they can manipulate such small things at the gym that may compound over time to make a big difference in your physique while not really considering perhaps the biggest boulder outside of the gym, which is prioritizing sleep and making sure you're getting both quality and the right quantity of sleep that you need to facilitate muscle, like muscle growth. Right.

And.

And there's. We can even talk about some. Some studies looking at this. Right? So everyone knows about the study that. Or not everyone? I don't know there's a study, and clearly I don't know it super well. Danny boy. You might know, like, the author and the protocol a little bit better, but basically they had individuals who they Were they were dieting and they had individuals either. I think they were, like, allowed them to. They, they. They. They missed, like, an hour of sleep each night, essentially, but they were able to make it up on the weekend. Like, they were able to sleep as long as they wanted on the weekend, but during the week, they, like, lost an hour or two of sleep each night. Right. And the other group just. They made sure that they got anywhere from seven to eight hours of sleep each night. Both groups lost the same amount of weight, but I think there was, like, literally. And it could be wrong here, but, like, 80, 20, like, the group that was getting adequate sleep lost. 80% of the weight that they lost came from fat. 20% came from lean tissue. And the other group that was missing sleep, 80% came from lean tissue, and 20% came from fat. So huge impact on our ability, our body composition, especially during dieting. But there's also another study where they. They gave. They, like, split, like. I think it was like some sports team. They split them into two groups. One that they just ad libitum, kept sleeping, like, the way they normally did. And then another group that they gave, like, sleep hygiene lessons to essentially were like, these are things you can do to improve your sleep. And I think they went from sleeping, on average, like, seven hours a night to like, nine hours a night. And you saw, like, increased sprint performance, increased vertical. Like, just increased performance metrics in general. So clearly. Was. Was there. Was that a measure that they took? I very vaguely remember the study. I thought maybe, but I didn't want to say that just in case. But so, yeah, so all the shit.

We care about study to look at. So there's two studies that were in individuals that were not resistance training that essentially they just went and underslept them. And I think it's easier to do in, like, those are, like, clinical kind of populations where they can.

It's easier for them to have access to. Yeah, yeah.

Um, so they found, yeah, Dramatic differences in body composition. So more muscle mass kept and less fat loss from the group that was getting adequate sleep.

More fat loss, more fat loss, more fat loss, more muscle mass kept.

Less fat loss. For the group that was getting more sleep, more muscle mass kept. So they retained more muscle mass.

Yeah, they lost the same amount of weight, so wouldn't they be losing more fat than the other group? Theoretically?

What?

We're gonna have to edit this out. Everyone stop watching. Danny and I are about to fight. Just.

Okay, wait, hold up. So I'm saying that, like, the group that gets more sleep Would lose less fat, Right?

Wouldn't they lose more fat if they're losing the same amount of weight but keeping more muscle?

I don't know that they lost the same amount of weight, but just assuming they lost the same amount of weight, I think. What was the percentages on there? It's been a bit since I read that study. But they wouldn't have gained muscle.

There was no muscle gain for sure. It was just more retention of lean tissue. It doesn't matter. The principle of what we're saying is exactly the same. Where they kept more muscle and the other group lost way more muscle due to a lack of sleep. So regardless of that, like regardless of the, the specifics of it, the principle there, we definitely agree on that. Yeah, sleep is very important for muscle retention while dieting.

Yeah. But in any case, we can cut all this out. Two studies, no resistance training. They had more favorable body composition where they're the tissue you would want stayed around where and the tissue that you don't want being fat tissue. Yeah, fuck that. Let's just say favorable body composition, then cut it there. And then one study in resistance trained individuals where it wasn't that they chronically underslept one group, it's just that they gave education to one group and the group that got the sleep education ended up sleeping more and ended up making more gains.

Yeah, leave it. Leave all that in. Contrary to popular belief, Danny boy and I aren't perfect. So leave that in so people can see that we are not just losers who have p mids memorized and can just recite studies like that. Uh, okay, so sleep, no question about it. We, even though we can't agree on the specifics of studies, very much agree that it is a drastically underrated component of muscle growth and just fitness in general. Okay, last one before rapid fire. Danny boy. Training to failure. Overrated. Underrated. I love this one.

I think it's underrated for a few reasons. One is that I think that you can likely get more out of less sets when you take sets to failure. So many people are not necessarily training for optimality. They're just training for growth and being somewhere in that sweet spot while not necessarily trying to cross their T's and dot their I's. And we sometimes forget that. And I think that taking sets closer to or to failure would be useful in people who aren't doing, you know, 15 to 20 sets per muscle group per week, but rather doing closer to, you know, seven to 12 sets per muscle group per week or twice a week. And Lower, Yeah. Training like very little and training, yeah, relatively infrequently. So I think that would definitely benefit that individual. And I also think that training to failure is a tool that helps you calibrate your training where you know that, you know, depending how, on how often you do it, you can decide how much fatigue cost for you personally that warrants. But having something where you're like, okay, I know for a fact that I can only do this many reps at this load for this particular exercise. And then later in your training, knowing with greater certainty what one away from that is and what two away from that is and so on, I think is a very useful tool to know that you're not at least just sandbagging your, your training for, for an appreciable amount of time, particularly for individuals that are a bit less trained. But I think all of us can definitely benefit from taking a set to failure here and there. I do it more often on a per session basis where I'll take the last set of an exercise to failure and then calibrating that way for most of my isolation movements. But I know other people go week to week where they increase, they increase their RPE or decrease their RIR each week where they get closer and closer to failure as the weeks go on. So I think both are viable options. But both include going to failure at least for a time for that calibration purpose and making sure that you're continuously pushing yourself.

Yeah, yeah. I think that we as a community way overcorrected as far as failure is concerned, when all the volume stuff kept coming out, which is interesting because all of the volume studies are on subjects going to failure. So we really made some, some logical leaps to say we didn't need to go. And now, now look, there are studies that suggest that we don't need to go to failure. Of course, course I'm not saying that there aren't, but as soon as a bunch of the volume studies started coming out, we started saying, okay, let's sacrifice a little bit of intensity so we can allow for more volume. But I think that's an important thing to talk about as well because.

We.

Are not that certain of the fatigue cost of, of going to failure. Like, I think that is an overblown issue, personally. The, the idea that if I, I cannot go to failure on this set of calf raises, I, I cannot because it will interfere with my workout tomorrow on chest and back. And like that, like that's ridiculous and I know that sounds silly, but like there are a lot of people who would like, say not with cavs, but just in general would say something like that. And I think that training to failure is really good for setting the anchor, obviously. So like Danny boy was saying, like, training to failure is one of the best ways of knowing what 1 to 2 to 3 RIR should feel like. Right. But I think there's benefits to training to failure in general. Like, outside of just setting the anchor. Right. I, I think that it's kind of an overblown issue also that people aren't good at assessing how close to failure they are. Like, especially in like the hypertrophy rep range. Right. So to speak. Like in the 8 to 12, like, people generally are less than one rep away or like, sorry, they're like their precision. Right. Is like around one rep or, or so I think it might even be less than 1 based on the most recent.

Like an average around 1. It might have been.09 or something like that.

Yeah. So I don't think it's even super necessary for. To speak setting the anchor, but I do think that it is very beneficial just generally for muscle growth. Do I think it's absolutely necessary? No. Zach Robinson's paper is convincing, but it's not perfect, obviously. So we can't be certain that it's necessary if there really is a marginal difference between being one or zero reps away from failure and two to three. But I think it's under. I think that just given the overcorrection that we've had about training to failure being this huge high fatigue cost and stuff like that, I think that it's, it's. It's squarely in the underrated category because I think it is really good for a multitude of different reasons. And it's kind of fun. Training to failure, if you're a masochist like Danny boy and me is, Is an enjoyable. Is an enjoyable thing to do. Uh, okay, Very quickly. Tracking macros. Over. Forcing progressive overload. Over exercise selection. Under food composition, under detriments of concurrent training. Over protein timing, depending on who you ask, over or under, leaning more towards over hydration. Very overrated. Surplus for muscle growth. Somewhat underrated. Unilateral training, depending on who you ask, over or under. But actually, I don't know that we do just kind of squarely disagree about that one. So which one? Over the unilateral training. Like I said, overrated. You said underrated. But we basically agree that.

I just think that the reason why we ended up like, sort of having deviations in opinion is that they're just not rated that much by, like, I don't think the community has, especially the hypertrophy community, doesn't really have strong opinions on it. So depending on, like, the small exposure that you've had to people's opinion on it, you'd probably say over or under. So I think we sort of gave a good overall picture of context.

Who it's overrated for.

Yeah, exactly. So I think we're good on that.

Yep. Prioritizing sleep, Drastically underrated, Perhaps the most of all of anything on the list. And then, of course, training failure. We both agree, underrated. All right, Danny boy, Rapid fire time. You ready? I'm going to get the timer going.

All right.

I have my stopwatch pulled up, and I'm gonna hit you with one. And let's just go back and forth. So I'll hit you with one. You'll have 60 seconds to answer. You hit me with one. You're good. All right. All right. Strength training for hypertrophy go.

Well, I guess we need to take out one of my topics, but I think we're gonna overlap a decent amount.

All right, 62.

I. I think that it's massively overrated. So they're very, very similar in adaptations, and I think as long as you're going above five reps, you're probably going to have very similar gains from strength training and hypertrophy training. The problem is, is that, generally speaking, the sets that you're going to do in order to get the most weight on the bar is going to be lower. So you're sacrificing volume in order to have a lower amount of fatigue in order to see greater increases on the bar. Not to mention that the exercises that you care about the most won't necessarily be the best for your hypertrophy. So typically, strength training exercises are squat, bench, deadlift, overhead press, compound exercises, which may not put you in, you know, ranges of motion or fit your specific body type. So I think based on the exercise selection and how, you know.

Yeah, that's, I think, really well said. Also. I'm not going to cut you off again, like, you know, it doesn't have to be.

I think it's. I think it's probably good that, like, we try to be as succinct as as possible.

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. Incredibly overrated. But don't, you know, dude, like, if I can do 225 for 10 on the bench press instead of 185, that's more of a growth stimulus.

Yeah. I also think that the mechanism around that is just kind of weird. Like, oh, more motor units are going to be, you know, firing because you're stronger when you, when you come back.

We also know that, like, the, the transfer of rep range strength is not, it's not perfect or even really that great. Like, it's just. Yeah, okay, so strength training for hypertrophy getting stronger because you think it's going to lead to more growth. Ridiculously overrated. All right, hit me, bro. Hit me.

All right.

This one is strength training for hypertrophy.

Squarely in your wheelhouse. Drop sets. Go.

I would say drop sets are underrated because, because I wrote a meta analysis on it.

I was going to say biased bias.

Yeah, no, I, I, you know, I mean, I think they're adequately rated. I think the majority of people know that it's just a tool in the tool belt. It's just something that can be really fun. But I would say, I would say underrated because people say that it is a transient thing and there's really no evidence to support that. So one of the studies that saw the largest magnitude of effect was one by Fink et al, and they, that lasted three months of training and they saw no differences between groups as far as hypertrophy was concerned. The drop set group did see less strength increases, but it was on a 12 RM test. Tricep extension. So I would say underrated because people think that it's something you can only use for a short period of time, but I think it's something that you can use very chronically, especially as a really good way of saving time and getting a really efficient stimulus in a short period of time. Boom. 57 seconds. Three seconds to spare. You kidding me? Let's go. You have thoughts on that, though?

I think I agree almost totally. This is a, this is a surprise. You know, usually I have some strong opinions in the opposite direction, but yeah, I think people do. Definitely. I think it comes back to the sort of like the theme of the previous question, where I think people believe that if they're not getting stronger at a particular exercise, that they're not making progress. And I think people consider straight set strength differently. Like, they don't conceptualize strength during drop sets the same way that they do with straight sets, just because our community sort of really emphasizes straight set strength. But I think that if you're making progress on that drop set and you're treating it very similarly to how you treat, you know, straight sets, I think it would be an uphill battle to, to say that it's not useful, particularly if you're not using it as like the main tool for every exercise type. Like I think you can make an argument for like a squat not doing drop, you know, like. Yeah, so like there's clearly some, you know, areas where it's obvious drop sets wouldn't be super useful, but for, you know, tons of isolation exercises. And I think it's definitely time saving wise. Yeah, pretty cool tool.

All the evidence suggests that it's just as effective even over like as far as three months. So like thinking that you're also. I think it's really good because like, it's a good way to do like metabolite style training, you know what I mean? While being confident that you're getting pretty close to failure because like, dude, failing at 30 reps, like how many people are failing because of the muscle at 30 reps, you know what I mean? And, and there's there might be some benefit to doing high rep sets for Potentially some type 1 specific grow, blah, blah, blah, whatever. Maybe there might be, but there's not a detriment. So I definitely recommend people do it. But people tend not to fail at high rep ranges because of the muscle. But things like drop sets kind of allow for that metabolite pool without having someone have to push to such a high rep number. Theoretically, I think it allows for a closer proximity to failure than your typical intensity technique or a high rep set. Okay, well that was like six minutes of us talking after my 57 second answer. Okay, supplements go.

Yeah, I think supplements in the fitness community might be underrated. And so we shit on them a lot. Like we say, oh, you know, the amount that you'll get from a supplement is so little where it almost feels like they're not worth it at all. But I think the amount of gains that you can make over time when you're using supplements kind of the way they should be used, which is like, you know, creatine over time will net you some gains, caffeine as needed, but you know, on a fairly ongoing basis. And then other things that you just, you know, maybe even if you've placeboed yourself into something that works moderately, like, you get excited about it, it makes you excited to go to the gym and so on. So we know we have a few supplements that work well and might net you, you know, good gains over time and, you know, stuff in the maybe category that might make you excited to go to the gym and there's not a significant downside. So.

Yeah, well said. Yeah, yeah, I, I was Hoping you exandrate it because, dude, I didn't even take creatine until like two years ago. Cause I was like, what's the point, man? Like, it's not gonna do anything for me. And you were like, max, it's like three cents a scoop. What? What are you doing not taking creatine? Like, what? It's silly. So I think, yeah, I think we had a tendency to be like, no, that shit's stupid. But yeah, I think supplements can be really great. All right, hit me.

All right, let's go with the easier one. Low carb for muscle gain, okay. For fat loss phases, specifically.

Oh, okay. Overrated. Okay. Over overrated. I mean, yeah.

Cause like, for muscle gain, you know, that's kind of like a gimme. But I think tons of like, it's not uncommon for bodybuilders to use low carb.

I mean, Alberto Nunez for a long time even was a big. A big fan. And that dude is like incredibly intelligent and well thought out with the way he goes about training. Shout out, Albert. So, yeah, I would say. I would say overrated. And unfortunately, there's not even a lot of evidence we can rely on here because the evidence that we have for high carb diets for resistance training suggests like, there's basically no benefit to it at all. That being said, anecdotally, I've been. I've tried keto, Danny Boy, and I have tried every diet and I've tried keto, and you just cannot perform in the gym nearly as well, especially when you're already chronically dieted. So for that reason, for performance reasons, anecdotally, I would say very overrated, especially given the weight loss is the same always. Right?

Boom.

Under a minute. Let's go. Yeah, that one. Thank you. That one was literally like a. Oh, here you go, Max. There's one you don't even have to think about. All right? Oh, hell yeah. Okay. Periodization phasic training for hypertrophy.

Oh, I don't have that one. Okay, sweet. All right, restart the timer.

Cause I was making sure that. All right, cool.

So I think it is overrated, I'll say, because of the fact that there's probably no very, very strong rationale for needing to have a very phasical approach to hypertrophy training. Because I think that the morphological adaptation, the tissue adaptation is gonna track kind of regardless of how you structure things. And you could even really make that argument for even sports specific training, meaning, like, you know, having like a GPP phase and then going into like a Power phrase. You could say that doing them at the same time might actually net you the same thing. But particularly for apertrophy, I would say that it is overrated because of the fact that the tissue is going to grow with a multitude of stimuli and phasing those stimuli has not been shown. And just logically probably doesn't matter that much, but it's possible, but we just don't really have very good evidence.

Yeah, yeah, I the, the very limit because like, so periodization by its very nature has to last like six months at three months at like minimum for it to be considered like a truly phasic approach to training. And look as researchers, Danny Boy and I can say 12 weeks is a shit show of a study. I mean that is a long time to be in the lab with subjects. It's really hard to get subjects to consistently come to the gym twice a week, three times a week, whatever it may be, or three months on end, especially given that Danny boy and I operate on academic calendars, which means there's like constantly breaks for the students to go home or for the campus to be closed so that we can't do certain things. Right. And the evidence that we do have suggests that periodization is not that big of a deal. So there's a meta analysis looking at a bunch of different studies looking at periodization and two of them showed a benefit. So only two of them were in trained subjects of all the studies they analyzed in this meta analysis and those two did show a slight, very slight benefit to those that periodize their training as opposed to not. But even then, like the periodization models weren't the same. Like periodization is such a catch all term that it's, it's easy to say overrated for that one because it can literally mean whatever you want it to mean, essentially. But when we say phasic approach to training in general. Yeah. Morphological adaptations, bodybuilding, one of the most forgiving things you can do. Not every road lead leads to, leads to Rome here, but almost all of them do. Right?

Yeah, I think because it's forgiving, I'm comfortable saying it's overrated. But to your point, I think that there's an unlimited amount of iterations of what you can mean by even a phasic approach. So you could have a phasic approach where what we talked about before, a strength phase, that's you know, five to seven reps and strength phase and, and a hyper, and a hypertrophy phase that's like whatever, 10 to 15 reps and you have eight weeks of that and eight weeks of that. Would that be different than an individual that was doing both rep ranges throughout? We don't really know. Do I think it matters? Probably not. But we don't know whether those phases you could do the same thing for like, you know, even freaking metabolite like rest periods, like a shorter rest period versus longer rest periods, you know, a phase of that versus a phase of longer. You can literally think of any variable and have some sort of, you know, rationale slash phasic approach and test them out and then see. So as a catch all, you know, do I think most phasic approaches, if we did those studies would fail? Probably. But is it possible that some would be, you know, more beneficial than others? It's definitely very possible. But that's sort of why I think periodization, even as a term is overrated, because it kind of became somewhat meaningless. Like, I think we should just talk about what we mean specifically and what we're phasing, you know, what we're modulating and how we're going about doing that phasic approach.

Well, this has been a really good rapid fire session.

Yes.

All right, hit me.

All right. This one is directly in your wheelhouse. Deloads.

Overrated. Like genuinely overrated. Before I even started data collection, I started really reframing the way I thought about deloads. I think that taking a week completely off of training, especially if you're doing detraining, but that's not how most people de load. But I would say that there really is no evidence to suggest that deloading is beneficial, especially for muscle growth. So like the, the three studies that we have looking at the potentiating effects of periods of detraining suggest that individuals either grow the same amount of muscle or actually grow a little bit more muscle when they're not taking periods away from the gym constantly. Right. So I think that taking a structured approach to deloads, I would say overrated. I, I don't see, see a strong rationale behind them. Now, I don't think that that means that no one should ever deload, but I would say that deloads just as a general rule, overrated. And I would have said that, I said that prior to my study's findings as well. I just want that to be clear. I'm not just strictly biased by my own findings. One minute. Boom. Let's go.

Do you have.

I. I would love to hear your thoughts on that. Actually.

Structured deloads. I think I agree with you. Unstructured. Deloads in terms of like taking weeks off or taking lighter weeks and stuff like that, I think are. Especially now, I think they're underrated because I. I think that the downside is just so small that even if it's just psychological, I think it's worth it. I do think that there's physiological benefits to taking that time when you feel like you need it or ramping up to it and then taking it because of the fact that that sort of phasic approach just psychologically is super useful to me. Clients, things like that, where it's like, all right, we're going to push it this week and really see our limits and then, you know, next week we're going to have.

But don't worry about its effect on next week.

Yeah, exactly. It's going to be a lighter week and so on. So I, I like to use it more reactively in people who are kind of robotic and don't really care. And I like to use it proactively in people that clearly, like, get hyped and are more emotional lifters, where it's like, all right, like, let's lean into that. We'll push it, but next week you better pull back because you're gonna freaking, you know, your wheels are gonna fall off kind of thing. So I think it can definitely be a very useful tool just from a psychological standpoint and potentially physiological logically, because just because we don't have the evidence doesn't mean that it's, you know, not a thing.

The evidence we do have points to the psychology being worse in those taking adelo though. So my study, one study, 39 subjects. Don't. Don't take this with a grain of salt, but the one study that we do have looking at periods of detraining's effect on psychology suggests that it. It hurts your psychology more. Like their motivation to train at the end of the study was much. Was lower than the individuals who, who did not take a week off. Again, I'm not saying that that means that the site. There are psychological benefits to deloading. I've seen that with many of my clients. I've seen that with myself, of course. I just think that's an interesting thing to point out because I've never been convinced of the physiology of deloads. Like, I've always thought that the psychology was a much more convincing argument, but now even that isn't a super convincing argument, especially from a, like an empirical standpoint. Like there's just not a huge rationale for them being a Benefit psychologically, anecdotally, huge rationale. Right. But empirically, I would say not so much. Yeah.

I just think there's a difference between you ramping up and then giving people versus like, they're on the same program. And then, you know. So I think the context matters with psychology, where if you're like I said, like, choosing a person who's clearly like, you know, that type of way, and you're also increasing intensity or whatever you're modulating and then ramping it down versus you've been doing the same program, and now you're just taking a week off and you're back on the same program kind of thing. But it's very possible that. That it could be wrong. That on average, if you don't even think you're wrong.

Like, I don't. I don't even think you're wrong. Like.

Yeah, yeah, it's.

You're just saying that it's context specific. And there are individuals who would have a psychological benefit from Delos, no question. All right. Warming up.

This could go both ways, but I'm gonna say overrated just because you could probably just do. Honestly, if you really wanted to save time, you could do a set of 15 to start with on pretty much any exercise and take it to, you know, two, three, whatever RR you want. Yeah, you could take it to failure, too. I just mean, like, sometimes the initial set, like, you want to, like, ease into things or whatever, you can definitely take it to. You could definitely take it to failure as well. And those initial reps are sort of like greasing the groove and. And so on with really heavy exercises. Obviously you'd want to, you know, warm up to that load. Do we have super strong evidence for that? Probably not. But, you know, anecdotally I'd say if you can squat, you know, anything above 185, I'd say kind of warm up to. To that load. Cause there's just so little downside. But, yeah, not a strong rationale for. For warming up. But I will say stuff that you want to skip. Using that as your warmup is sometimes useful. So, like, I don't think calves are things that, like, people really love doing. So starting your. Your workout with calves is like kind of like a warmup or doing, like, whatever, any.

Boy, that is beautiful. I've never heard. I've never thought about that or heard you say that. That is a. I think that's a really good point. I think that could be a very good way of warming up for individuals while making sure. That they're getting their accessory. Accessory work in. Yeah. And I agree. I think warming up is mad overrated. Like, and when we say warming up is overrated, generally we're just talking about fucking crazy ass crossfitters or, or powerlifters that do like 30 minutes of foam rolling, plus like glute activation exercises and stuff to get ready for whatever movement they're going to do. And then, then they just do a normal warmup for the actual set anyway. So. Yeah, definitely overrated. All right, hit me. I think we have one more each. I might have two more.

Yes, you have two more. I have one more because I. You took the strength phases for me.

Yeah, yeah. Let's hear it.

Using the mechanisms of hypertrophy to deduce how to train.

Okay. Overrated. For the four people on earth who, who try to do that. Like, I'm like, overrated. Overrated. No question about it. I don't even like. So like oftentimes when I was talk, I was going on podcasts for either the drop set paper or the deload paper people. Wow. Deload paper people would ask me questions about like, why we saw what we did. And I don't even like, like postulating on mechanisms of action if we don't have the evidence there to support it. And I think that relying on mechanisms in a lot of instances actually does more harm than good rather than just focusing on the data that we do have. Like for instance, assuming that because of a type 1 fiber's ability to flush metabolites, it's better trained with like high rep ranges. Like, not that that's like really hurting your training, but it certainly isn't like it's I, I. Overrated. I'm just, I have three seconds left. Overrated. Overrated.

Yeah, I definitely agree. And I think that there's even like more or less bad ways, for lack of a better term, to do it. So I think like an example of one that sort of caught fire, that kind of made sense and maybe even made some people's training slightly better is like the last five reps thing. So like effective reps is like some mechanistic speculation about the fact that like Henneman size principle, more high threshold motor units, slow enough speeds where there's overlap and then, you know, as you get closer to failure and then those last five reps, so to speak, are the hypertrophic reps. But I think that even though it, you know, sounds about right, can lead you down an incorrect road where you undervalue, you know, where you overvalue certain reps and undervalue other reps. And just like you create a contextual framework where you're actually, you know, shooting yourself in the foot because like, let's use that one as an example. If you only count those last five reps, then are those reps similarly hypertrophic?

Right.

Probably not. Like, do we know? No. Right. So the fact that you can admit that you don't know there allows you for more leeway in that. All right, maybe if you do more sets, those last two reps don't actually, aren't actually as important for hypertrophy. Or let's say this person's, you know, just coming back and you don't want to smash them and they're six reps away from failure, are they not going to grow? And so on. So I think you, even with something that's like even more fleshed out, you can pigeonhole yourself into mechanistic weirdness where now you start valuing things that you shouldn't be valuing. But then if you go even further, which is what people do very commonly, where like metabolites and all this kind of like cell swelling and, and tons.

Of sensitization to growth MTOR rephosphorylation shit like that.

Yeah, exactly. Then you start ending up in a situation where you are not considering how complicated the system is and the redundancies of the system and just like untangling all of that is just an absolute nightmare where it's just straight up like mental masturbation to the point where like you, I see it all the time and that's the reason why I put it there. It's kind of self serving where like, you know, all the people who, you know, are, you know, pretty smart in the community are just talking about the minutiae of mechanisms where we don't even know like the bare minimum to start answering these questions. And instead of talking about all this weak evidence, let's figure out how to, you know, systematize some of these questions and actually get at, you know, some semblance of an answer, at least in a specific context, rather than like worrying about these things when we have like very, very little knowledge to answer the questions.

Yeah, I think that was beautiful. And I couldn't agree more. Clearly trying to tease out mechanisms from longitudinal data and also just trying to tease out longitudinal outcomes from mechanisms. It's, it's a fool's errand. It's a fool's errand that like usually doesn't hurt but can lead to poor training Decisions, Right. Like, I don't know, taking deloads every single four weeks or something like that. Okay, last one for you. And I'm toying between. I'll give you two, and you choose which one you want to cover. Sacrificing optimality for enjoyment or relying on a sensation as a proxy for muscle growth. Let's go. You choose which one you want to do, tell me which one you want to do, and then I will hit start.

These are hard ones because it's kind of depends.

I think those are. Those are good ones.

What was the first one?

Sacrificing optimality for enjoyment.

Yeah, because also spectrum. All right, let's go with that one.

All right. Boom. Sir.

I think underrated, particularly for a person who is seeking optimality. I think they're covering their bases enough for the most part that doing the thing that they enjoy will probably be net positive for them, rather than that super specific thing that they don't enjoy. In a person who's potentially, you know, not worried about optimality, then they could run into issues where they're completely missing one of the main pillars and they should. That they should be focusing on. But for a person who's, you know, aware of what's optimal and not, I think that they be better off focusing on what they enjoy and what motivates them, particularly because they've probably been lifting for a while and need that to continue and whatnot. So.

Yeah.

How many. I'm good. Sweet.

Really good answer there. Really good answer. Enjoyment is one of the most underrated. Prince, I'm, like, dead serious. Like, yeah, you're going to get so much more jazzed up and you're going to push so much harder if you enjoy what you're doing. I mean, it's just. And that's what matters, right? Being consistent and pushing hard.

Like, a lot of the hardcore people will tell you, like, the enjoyment comes from the gains or whatever. And, like, I enjoy it because I.

Know it's getting me chasing. Optimality is fun.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Which. Which, you know, to, to be clear, still fall into the bucket.

Yeah.

So, like, if you personally, like, I think it's baked into the question where, like, if it's obvious to you that you enjoy something more, regardless of the reasoning, it could be that you enjoy something more because you think that it will get you better gains, or you enjoy something more because, you know it's slightly worse, but you know you're going to work harder at it. Either one of those is the right decision because it goes into Your specific psychology. So those people that are cramming that down other people's throats are coming at it from their psychological place and then trying to put that on them where not everyone has the same value system. So. Yeah.

All right, last one for me. What you got?

Well, that. That's. I think the.

I'll do you know what? I'll take the one that I gave. Sensation. Relying on sensation for a proxy for growth. Yeah.

Cause I had the strength phase one. So, yeah, go for it.

Overrated. And the reason I think it's overrated outside of the context of things hurting your joints, Truthfully, outside of the context of things hurting your joints, I think that relying on a stimulus that you feel. And this is. This is a big thing for me. This is. I used to be much more in the camp of if you feel it, good. If not, pick a different exercise. But now because of the evidence we have showing that like, accentuating a lengthened portion of an exercise leads to more growth, and contrast that with the fact that people tend to feel the most intense burning sensation, the most intense pumps when they train in the most shortened position, I think that right there alone gives really good insights into the fact that we probably shouldn't be relying too much on a sensation for growth. And you can compare, like, low rep ranges to high rep ranges too. They clearly yield the same amount of hypertrophy. But generally speaking, high rep sets just feel more intense and like you're stimulating the muscle even more. So big overrated. For that one, I would say boom. Anything you want to add to that?

I think that one's a bit more complicated. Depending on how you sort of categorize sensation. It's clear that, like, in isolation, if you just ask somebody what they feel more, it wouldn't necessarily be productive because most people are probably going to value the just in a vacuum. Like, if you didn't tell them anything, they'd probably va. Vacuum that like, short and pumpy type sensation more than they would the stretch. But what about the actual stretch sensation? Would you. Would you value that? Cause that's a sensation, right?

It is, yeah. But generally speaking, like you ask someone doing a set of incline curls versus a set of preacher curls, like, that's a bad example.

Better.

And just generally speaking, you put a muscle in a stretch position. Oh, you know what's better actually? Squats versus leg extensions. So, like, you have an individual do a set of squats and they're spending a decent amount of time in that. In that length and position. Deep squats. Right you ask them what they feel more. That. Or leg extensions. They're probably gonna say leg extensions because.

Of the fact that's in a vacuum, right? Like, that's like. But do you value the sensation? Let's say. Let's say you take an individual, you tell them, focus on the stretch portion, and do you value that sensation?

I. Depends on the lifter. But the only sensation that I truly value is pain. So, like, if someone feels pain in a. In. In somewhere where they shouldn't be, that's the only thing that I'm like, okay, well, let's. Let's find some way to work around this. Let's find a different exercise that doesn't cause you pain. Aside from that, like, if you're like, hey, I don't really feel this in my. Blah, blah, blah, and I'm like, well, your bicep, literally, you're. You literally couldn't do that exercise if your bicep wasn't active. So that I don't put super. A ton. A ton of stock into. But the. The making sure we're avoiding pain is. Is. Is a big one for me, mostly because of just how scared people are of pain. So that's. That's definitely one. Okay, we're done. This has been like. We were like, yeah, no way. This one goes long. I hate us. Okay, anything else you want to say before we close out?

I mean, I obviously have a lot of thoughts on the sensation one, but I think we're good.

Yeah, I think so, too. We can talk afterwards. Okay, everyone, thank you so much as always, for listening to the Built With Science podcast. Make sure to let us know what you think of this episode. Comment down below on whatever platform it is you're using, and if you want to hear us talk about a different topic, feel free to reach out to us at Built With Science on Instagram. Peace.