10 - Solcast Episode Ten w/ Mike Medici: Why You Should Eat Carbs, Self Improvement and Chest/Leg Training Tips

Hello there and welcome to episode 10 of the Soulcast. We have a guest with us today, the great and powerful Mike Medici, physical, intellectual, social, and artistic development for the modern Renaissance man. We had a great conversation about training, diet, supplementation, sleep, as well as just self-improvement in general. We had a great discussion, so I hope you enjoy. I know I did. And please welcome Mike Medici.

I think maybe we should— maybe we could just step back a second instead of like that, maybe talk about like training philosophy, I guess, and One thing I think a lot of people miss is what's important, especially like, I think one of the most recent things has been this bigger trend of the keto diet stuff, right? And this focus on the blood sugar, not spiking the blood sugar and stuff like that. And I think that's like great and all. And actually, I think you're probably a little closer to keto than I am. You do a lot of the sourdough toast and potatoes and stuff, but I mean, I probably eat tons of carbs. I eat more processed foods than you. I do protein pancakes pretty much every morning. That's kind of like my go-to, right? But I think people start looking at trees instead of forests on that kind of stuff. And the number one thing that, in my opinion, that matters is getting as much muscle mass as possible, right? Obviously, second after not being obese, right? Right, as long as you're not obese, the next goal is, okay, how can I get as much muscle mass as possible? And I think that generally, on average, most people are gonna do better with gaining muscle mass when eating a decent amount of carbs. I think you, right, so I think you can't, I'm not saying you can't gain muscle in keto, but there's a reason that every single bodybuilder eats massive amount of carbs. Every single natural bodybuilder needs Mass About Apart. You're gonna have better training sessions, it's easier to get into a caloric surplus, and you're just gonna have better energy levels overall. I don't know if— do you think you agree with that?

Oh, 100%, man. Like, my thing is with training is like, if you want to gain muscle, look at the guys that have the most amount of muscle and kind of copy what they do. It's a principle that you can apply to kind of everything, you know. Who has the most money? Do what they're doing to make the most money. Who has the most muscle, the bodybuilders, and they're eating, you know, 500, 600 grams of carbohydrates a day just to keep themselves going. You know, I see carbohydrates as the kind of the fuel that you top up your body with. So if you're not expending or using that amount of fuel, you don't have the muscle mass in your body. You don't need hundreds and hundreds of grams of carbohydrates, but you do need some level to fuel yourself, like you said, to have better training sessions. And also to refill those muscle glycogen levels. You know, that's right, the energy that your muscles need to work out. I think that, you know, having fruit, sourdough, white rice, potatoes, they're all fairly clean sources of carbs. You don't have to have the mass gainers and, you know, the full of the processed sugars and things like that. I think you should stay away from those carbohydrate sources. But being afraid of carbs because, you know, you think that's gonna spike the, the blood sugar too much, you know, your body uses carbohydrates for a reason. Uh, blood glucose is required. It's the main source of energy for the brain. So if you're low on carbs as well, you're probably going to see some kind of mental fatigue to some degree. Um, but yeah, otherwise I think they've been unfairly demonized, uh, in the, in the Twittersphere, at least, uh, over the last, you know, few months. So I think it's good to talk about the benefit of them as well.

Yeah, I agree. I think you— I think one of your tweets, or maybe you mentioned on the previous podcast, was that the way you kind of manipulate things is by manipulating carbs. And I think that's the perfect way to go about it, right? So when I'm— I never really change the amount of protein I eat.

Yeah.

And then I just I just lower and raise my carbs. And I mean, sometimes my fats will be higher and then I'll just take out of my carbs, but mostly I'm just manipulating carbs up and down to go from surplus to deficit. But I think, I think it's really, and the reason I've kind of been harping on it on Twitter a lot lately that like you need to eat carbs, you shouldn't be fasting, stuff like that is I spent, I spent 4 or 5 years like trying to be lean or whatever. Right. You know, like you figure, you figure out how to get lean for the first time and have abs year-round and you're like, holy shit, this is awesome. I don't want to, I don't want to be big again. Yeah. But, but in reality, I probably should have been spending, especially like the first 5 years of my 20s, like I should have just been spending that in a surplus trying to get as much muscle as possible. And so really like, yeah, I'm kind of, I'm kind of picking on the keto people when I say this kind of stuff, but really the point I'm trying to make is, is that you're, you're missing the goal and the goal should be to get as much muscle as possible you can. And then You could kind of do whatever you want, but that's, that's the most important thing.

Yeah.

Right. To look the way you want to look. And actually I'd say for general health and longevity, the more muscle mass you have, obviously up to a limit, we're not talking about people who are heavily dosing insulin and stuff. Right. We're talking about natural lifters here. You're never going to get to a point when you have too much muscle for your body.

No.

So your goal should be to have as much muscle as you possibly can get. And to do that, you're probably gonna have to eat carbs and you're probably not going to be fasting.

Yeah, I fast fairly regularly, but it's usually only on non-training days. So those days—

Right, I do the same thing.

That I don't need necessarily the extra calories because my effort for the day is lower. I'm not expending as many calories. So like you said before, you manipulate your carbohydrates and usually with dinner I just won't have carbohydrates and that enables me to kind of stay trimmer. You know, I'll intermittent fast until 11 AM, 10 AM, uh, instead of having breakfast at like as soon as I wake up usually. Um, but overall, if your weekly calories, uh, are enough to build muscle, then, then that's the main thing.

Yeah, that's, that's pretty much exactly what I do. So I've been— I train 5 days a week right now. Yeah. Um, and I've, I've kind of— I found that to be a good little setup where I get enough training, and then on my off days I can get— I can do some sort of physical activity that's not, um, that's not lifting, right? So usually it's sprinting, or I've been trying to teach myself how to play lacrosse, so I would go out and throw the ball around. Or today I did, um, like 300-meter rows on my rowing machine, like some sort of physical activity but not lifting.

Yeah.

And then on those days when it's not lifting, I'll push my breakfast back to like 11-ish, and I'll usually only eat one big meal. So I'll do like small breakfast, which is still usually my protein pancakes, and then I'll have a giant meal like Chipotle, right? You know, I get like a triple chicken burrito bowl with the tortilla on the side and, and guac, and I just— that's my big meal.

Yeah.

And I'll usually eat breakfast, that big meal, and I'll have a protein shake before I go to sleep. Yeah. And that's, that's kind of that day. And then the other days, I'm usually eating 4 times, 4 or 5 times, where it's a breakfast, a lunch, a dinner, a dessert, and maybe desserts always just like protein shake or maybe some Greek yogurt with, uh, with protein powder in it. That's probably— that's one of my favorites.

Yeah.

And, uh, and I'll have like a protein bar in the middle of the afternoon. So that way I'm getting those— I'm getting those hits of, of, uh, 5 doses of protein kind of spread out throughout the day to help, help with the, uh, muscle protein synthesis.

Yeah.

So I think we have pretty similar setups.

Yeah, definitely. I think that's a very key point to kind of COVID is like I, I really like the idea of when you're trying to put on muscle, uh, constantly keeping your body, uh, levels high with those amino acids. Um, and I agree, so it just makes sense to me to, to constantly top up your body with those essential building blocks of muscle, uh, in order to repair, uh, and regrow the muscle that you've kind of broken down in training. Uh, because your body is repairing muscle and, and building muscle all the time, not, not just at at one time throughout the day. So it just makes sense to me whether that's eating, you know, real food throughout the day in, you know, an hour and a half blocks and these kind of smaller meals. So you're not fully kind of hitting your digestive system all at one go, taking essential amino acids capsules throughout the day. And I don't know if you take these, but liver pills as well. So desiccated liver pills, they're like kind of dried beef liver. I have these ones from Argentina, you know, organic, whatever. But I find taking those throughout the day with my meals as well, they have a lot of essential amino acids in them. The vitamins and mineral levels are off the charts compared to any other animal food source. So I recommend anyone kind of take those throughout the day to kind of add to that amino acid profile and muscle repair throughout the day, it's going to support a whole lot of, a whole lot of processes in the body as well.

I, I haven't taken the liver pill yet, but we're— I'm getting closer. I'm on the path. I haven't gotten there yet.

Yeah, um, you should.

Well, uh, I'll have to give it a try. Does it taste like anything?

No, I mean, they're like dried tablets, so it's, it's not like a wet, gross liver or anything. It's just You know, yeah, yeah, they're quite big.

The raw liver, the raw liver guys are intense.

Yeah, that's like, that's next level.

Yeah, but, uh, what, uh, what, what else? There's, uh, yeah, we pretty much covered— I think we pretty much covered nutrition, man. Like, that's, that's really it. And I think, I think the only other thing is I've found something I, I struggled with because I, I struggled to put on muscle, I think, in my early 20s, or how I'd say I'd put it that I struggled. Maybe I didn't. I did a decent job. Like, I added a few pounds over time, and I probably wasn't as consistent as I should have been. But one thing I was really bad at was I loved being lean, and I still like being lean. I feel more focused, and I feel lighter and more agile, just like generally more agile. I feel like, you know what I mean? Like, what's the saying? That a tiger doesn't hunt when it's full, right? It hunts when it's hungry. Yeah. And so I kind of like that vibe, but Yeah, I think that prevented me from— yeah, but it prevented me from adding muscle, I think, right? Like I wasn't— I wanted to stay in that 10% range and I'd try to— I would try to get in like a tiny surplus and wouldn't be willing to put on fat. But this time around, I think I got— I started about a year ago, kind of like I saw a picture of myself after a boys' trip to Arizona and I was like, dude, you need to get back in shape. And it was, I mean, like most people would look at the picture and be like, yeah, you're like the guy kind of lifts, but You know, but like they wouldn't say I was out of shape, but for me I was like, dude, I'm fat. I think I was, I was 191, I think. And I'm 5'11" for people who— so 5'11", 191, and I was probably 15 to 17%. So like you could see a little bit of abs, but the muscle definition wasn't there because I hadn't been lifting consistently. And so I was like, all right, time to get back in shape. I spent basically the whole summer getting lean again. And I got back down to about 177, and I was probably, probably in the best shape of my life. 177, 5'11", I was lifting 5 days a week, is great. And I was like, all right, like, let's, let's do this. I'm gonna add 10 pounds of muscle.

Yeah.

Um, and so I've been in a surplus since last September, and I think this, this is around the time we're in, what, end of May? So about a month ago, I usually would have started leaning out for summer. Right, I'm probably around 14-15%. I think I've done a decent job. It's probably, I'd say half of it's muscle, half of it's fat. I'm weighing about 192 to 193 in the morning. Yeah. So I probably added 5 pounds of muscle, 3 or 5 pounds of muscle, added 5 to 7 pounds of fat. And this is the time when I quit. But what I found is that you kind of have to have an essential level of fat before your body is willing to, to add on the muscle. Like even when you're lean, you're trying to put on muscle, like yeah, you can kind of do it, but your body's still trying to, trying to store that fat, right? Yeah. And I don't know, I'm sure a lot of people will take that back to some evolutionary thing. I don't really know what the basis is. That's just something I've personally experienced. So what I'm doing is I'm sacrificing 2020 summer and I'm just going to be fatter than I usually am. And I'll probably feel a little bad about it. I'll be 15%. I still have a little bit of abs, but it's not like And he— not like usually, I'm like the leanest guy of my, of my friends and probably get some made fun of a little bit, but I think it's worth it to like tell my body, hey, it's okay to add some muscle, right? So we have the fat, now take these calories and do something useful with them.

Yeah.

And so I'm probably going to spend a whole nother year at least, maybe another one, just in this muscle building mode. And I guess we're kind of coming back to the same message of like muscle is probably the most important thing you can do for yourself long-term health and, and, uh, aesthetics-wise. Yeah, 100%.

It kind of back to like, I always— the best long-term strategy, even if you do want to lose fat, is to put on muscle, right? And I'll explain that a little bit, right? So when you increase your muscle mass, your resting metabolic rate goes up, right? So the resting metabolic rate is the amount of calories that your body uses at rest. So not doing anything, you're not exercising, your body requires a certain amount of calories to just go through the normal processes, the bodily processes and functions to power, you know, the brain, the digestion, everything. All, all of this requires calories. When you have more muscle mass, you need more calories to just maintain that muscle mass, even if you're not using it for anything, you're not even exercising with it. So the best long-term strategy to reduce fat is to increase this resting metabolic rate because then you can eat more calories and use more calories up when you're doing nothing. You don't have to slog in the gym. You don't have to hike to get these extra calorie deficit. So it's counterintuitive in a way and kind of scary to some people if they are overweight but they want to lose fat. You have to look at it over the long term and say, okay, what's the best strategy? You know, you don't want to be starving yourself for months and months and months. So in terms of that is you have a slight caloric surplus. Enable your body to put on muscle, like you said, have that kind of safety net of calories so your body allows you to, to use the energy, and you know, you have that excess to build the muscle, um, keep all those amino acids up so you have the building blocks to do so. And over the long term, as you increase in muscle mass, your body naturally starts to use more calories even at rest. So your body fat is going to decrease in the long term, and the more muscle mass you have, that kind of— the greater that effect is. The more muscle mass you have, the, the, uh, what is it, the thermogenic effect. Um, yeah, you know, all of these things add up and kind of lifestyle changes over the long term that naturally decrease your body fat without having to kill yourself with extreme diets or anything and, and feel hungry. Um, so I recommend anyone look into that. It's, it's The principle itself is the reason why bodybuilders can eat, you know, 6,000 calories and not put an ounce of fat on is because all of that muscle requires upkeep and enables them to have these huge meals without putting an ounce of fat on. If you don't understand that concept, you might look at people that eat so much. Like for me, I ate a lot and people see what that I'm eating and go, how can you eat so much and, you know, still be so shredded or whatever? It's like, because I need this to survive, kind of.

Yeah. What, what are you, what are you weighing these days? Are you like 210, 215?

Uh, yeah, I think I'm 209, around there. Um, you know, so you're probably eating what, 3,500, 4,000 calories a day? Yeah, if when I'm in full training mode, it's, it's close to 4,000 calories a day, uh, for upkeep. And yeah, I'm not in any kind of At the moment with the gyms closed, I've been eating less calories because I've been working out, you know, less. You don't— you can't expend the same amount of calories as you can deadlifting, you know, regularly heavy weight. When I don't have access to that, you know, I'm doing my, my rings, my bodyweight stuff, some dumbbell stuff, but it's not the same as that whole total body workout that you can get from— unfortunately, I don't have a barbell or anything, uh, so I just naturally drop the carbohydrates a little bit, uh, but Hopefully within the next kind of few weeks when the gyms open again, I'll be ramping up the carbs, ramping up my training, uh, and like you as well, trying to gain a little bit more muscle mass. So opening up those calories to allow that.

Yeah, it was, it was a tough decision when quarantine started. I didn't really know if I should do like a mini cut or something. Yeah, right. Because I knew that I wasn't going to be getting the training in Um, but I just kind of decided to go with it and just keep the— maybe like surplus to maintenance level. And, and I— the day quarantine started, I went and bought, um, adjustable dumbbells up to 90 pounds.

Okay.

So I have two 90-pound— new two 90-pound dumbbells. I have a full adjustable bench. I have like one resistance band, and I have a, uh, a pull-up bar with some like handles, kind of like ring kind of thing on it. So I mean, I was able to put together a pretty decent workout. It actually didn't change other than like heavy deadlifts, heavy squats, barbell bench, stuff like that. I put together a pretty decent routine and I just trained in a higher rep range and stuff like that. But I mean, I was, I'm doing, I've been doing hamstring curls with a band tied to like a dumbbell. Like you kind of get creative. And I mean, it was fun for a little, but I went to some of our gyms that started opening up here. And I went to the gym last week and deadlift for the first time in 2 months.

Yeah.

And I couldn't walk for like 2 days. It's definitely different.

Oh, it's entirely different.

Training with the heavier weights.

And I would just add to that in general to people, just to say to them, you won't be as strong as you were going back. Just accept that, you know, don't go in and kill yourself working out for 3 hours as much as you want to do that. And I want to do that as well. It's not probably the smartest thing to go back and try to attempt even like, you know, 90% of what you were doing before unless you have kept some level of strength training throughout. It's like, that'll all come back within a few weeks. You just have to become consistent again and push yourself, but not to the very limit. Otherwise, you know, all your tendons are going to be a bit weaker, your joints are going to be a bit less mobile because you haven't been training those movement patterns for, for a while. So all of these things just kind of to keep in mind and not overdo it when you first get back in the gym when everything starts opening up again. And I know it's going to be hard, it's going to be hard for me, but I think that's important to kind of consider.

Yeah, I, I totally agree with that and you should ease into it, but I'm going to admit I did not listen to that at all. I, first day back I was like, let's, let's hit some— like usually I— so my My training is pretty, um, I have 3 goals, right? I have strength goals, aesthetic goals, and athletic goals. That's kind of how I break it down. And so I usually barbell my training. And what I mean by that is, um, on the exercises I care about being strong at, which is deadlift, squat, overhead press, weighted pull-ups, um, kind of bench. I'm really bad at my— I have really long arms and a really narrow chest cavity, so I have to move the barbell like 3 feet to bench, so I'm just never going to be good at it. So I don't care that much. But, um, on those movements, I pretty much only work in the 1 to 3 rep range.

Okay.

And, and that's just because I've found over time, like, barbell squatting in the 10 rep range doesn't do anything for me. Like, it's just my body's— my legs are too long and it just doesn't help me grow my legs. So I'd rather— and I don't really care, like, at the end of the day, I care about adding muscle, but it doesn't matter how I do it, right? So What I did instead was I care about how much I squat, not how many reps I squat. So I cut it down where I'm only squatting on 1 to 3, and then I do goblet squats, or I do leg press, or I do hack squat in higher rep ranges because that's what helps me put on muscle.

Yeah.

But, um, so I went in there first day back deadlifting, and I was just like, you know what, like, let's just do some triples. It'll be fine. And I, I, and I'd been working out like consistently. So I thought I'd be all right, and I threw 455 on there for a triple. Felt pretty good. I lost, I lost like 20 pounds off my, off the triple, but, uh, it's still— 455 was better than I thought I was going to do. So, but I wouldn't— I like, was not a good decision. I should not have done that.

Yeah, uh, I, I'm very interested to see what my strength is like. Um, I'll probably take it a bit easier than doing that, but, um, yeah, if Unfortunately, that's just the way it is, and we'll get back to it. So, you know, you got to think about the— it's a marathon, not a sprint. So getting back to it, we'll be right.

Yeah, so I think we touched pretty well on nutrition. You want to talk about training a little bit? I'm actually pretty interested to hear. So I've been thinking, actually been thinking about this a lot, is, um, what makes a physique look really good? 'Cause there's obviously, everyone talks about the taper and stuff like that, but I've seen people with tapers and I'm like, you know, it's not really, it doesn't really, it's not that impressive. But I've noticed that every physique that I find impressive has two things, and that's a big chest and big quads. And if you can build a big chest and big quads, like, it doesn't really, like, yeah, the shoulders help and the taper helps, but those two things, you're gonna look pretty good to most people. Yeah, well, um, and you do— I was gonna say, you do a pretty good job on both those things. So I'm pretty interested to hear you talk about chest training and leg training specifically.

Well, thank you for that, I appreciate it. Um, chest training, I think, is like— a lot of people have a misconception of the best way to train chest. Um, you know, they think that benching big is going to give you a big chest when I think that it's mostly front delt work in a bench press, especially if you're, which a lot of people have, is rounded shoulders. They don't have that external rotation in the shoulders which allow your chest muscles to take the actual weight rather than your deltoids. So for me, my chest training is really focused on making that distinction between the, how to describe it, kind of the flexion of the chest muscle like a bird would flap its wings. Like that's the, the movement that the chest is doing, right? Not that extension of the arms that you would kind of think about in a bench press. That's— I mean, you can feel it yourself when you're flapping your wings. What's pulling your, your arms back into the center is the chest muscles. That's why birds have those, you know, those huge chest muscles to kind of facilitate flying because they have to pump those pecs the whole time. So thinking about that, uh, rather than the traditional bench press. Um, I don't bench press that often these days. I personally am not really into chasing strength numbers for that. Uh, I'm into the most efficient way of training the muscle. So whatever that exercise is for you for chest training, for me that's things like dips, uh, probably the number one chest builder. Um, starting with a kind of just the bodyweight stuff, getting as much, uh, as many reps in as you can with that, uh, using that as a finisher after a chest workout. But there's a specific way of doing dips. So I got this from Vince Gironda. Uh, he's obviously a very famous old school bodybuilding trainer who worked with Arnold and all the greats. Um, so he has, you know, a handbook that he's kind of sketched out He's drawn exercises and ways to kind of manipulate your body to focus on different areas. So for the dip, you set up as a normal dip, but you're gonna put your chin down to your chest, uh, and then kind of bring your feet forward to be underneath your head rather than behind you. And what that does is put the stress on your chest muscles, and you'll feel the difference straight away. So doing dips in that way is a big one, uh, a great way to develop the chest. Um, other things that I do for chest: incline presses, uh, with the dumbbells. So dumbbells versus barbells— the barbell, it's a great tool, but it doesn't enable, um, the most optimum flow, uh, the optimum range of movement. It doesn't enable your shoulder to kind of move in the natural way uh, that it, you know, feels best. So I've shifted to more dumbbell training for chest. At least it seems to be easier on the shoulder, and it seems to be easier to consciously get that chest flexion like I was talking about before, that kind of, uh, adducting your arms towards the center there as well. So doing incline dumbbell press, dips, another one is, uh, cable flies. Is— I kind of use as a finishing movement. So getting those cables set out to that kind of wide, uh, wide setting and set high as well. So you're gonna get the cables either side, kind of step half a step forward so you get that full stretch at rest. And then the same again is really focusing on actually contracting the chest muscles to move your arms as if you were flapping your wings like a bird. Rather than having your delts take the weight and pulling that forward. It kind of leads into a, a more general point about training is yes, an exercise can be good or, or, you know, for, for a specific muscle group, but if you're not performing it in a way where that muscle group is, is taking the weight, then it's effectively pointless. If your goal is physique building, then you have to focus on specific areas that you're training. And if you're performing an exercise but, you know, your delts are taking over rather than your chest, then it's effectively pointless. So you have to take that idea of being consciously involved in every single set, every single rep, and thinking about, you know, is my chest taking the weight here? Do I need to lower the weight? So that my chest feels it more, so I'm more in control and I'm more kind of engaged in the moment. So that principle I think is, is super important, um, to take into all training, not just chest training. But I think that itself is, is very important to chest training, so people can move away from just thinking if I get a big bench then I'll get a big chest. It's like, no, you need to focus on that flexion, um, like a bird flapping its wings, and really have the chest kind of do the work in those exercises. Um, quad training, um, I think it's pretty standard, you know. I think I'm genetically blessed. My dad has good legs as well, and he hasn't really trained other than playing soccer. Uh, so my leg training is, is pretty standard. It's, uh, heavy squats, um, kind of 3/4 of the way through the, through the workout, I'll start off with a kind of blood flow primer kind of exercise. So I'll get on the hamstring curl machine, uh, and then the quad machine— the, what is it called, the quad extension machine— and I'll do 4 sets of 15 superset with that. So that's just all about getting blood into your legs, which is super important. The blood into the knees as well, the ankles, all of these things which support you during the heavier loads in the squat. I don't think it's smart to do your heavy compound big lifts at the start of the workout. Like, yes, do it while you're fresh and don't do it at the very end of your workout, but I think it's important to get the muscles firing, you know, get warmed up and everything before you go into the heaviest loads, uh, in your workout. So for that, for leg training, has really helped me doing those blood priming exercises before the squat. Um, and then I'll also— I don't take my squats as— sometimes I do, and I'll, I'll see how heavy I can get it for like 2 or 3 reps. Uh, but that's, you know, relatively rarely for me personally. Uh, I think it's important and should be incorporated sometimes into your routine, but as far as the muscle building, I think having that greater level of, of muscular control through all ranges of motion with a lighter weight, um, and kind of slowing it down, slowing that eccentric portion down so that you're, you're actually using your quads and your glutes and your hamstrings to slowly take the weight down and then explosively come up, I think is the best way. It's all, it all feeds into that kind of, that bigger thing of being in control of the rep. Um, also if you're not at that top end range of, of heaviness, then you're not going to open yourself up to injury as much. Uh, so in terms of a long-term view of building muscle, I think it's just smarter to do that, um, in general. But yeah, squats is a big one. Um, lunges I really like. It's a very functional movement. Um, everyone, you know, you need to lunge and carry weight kind of while you're walking, so it all feeds into each other. Um, I like to incorporate more functional movements and functional training sessions on top of the hypertrophy routines as well, just so that you're kind of prepared and ready and strengthened for life in general, uh, as well as just in the gym. I think that's important. So it— yeah, in general, um, lots of blood flow pump kind of exercises, but coupled with heavy exercises, uh, done semi-regularly so that you're still getting that kind of heavy shock to the system and, um, making your muscles kind of adapt to all those different, uh, all those different forms of exercise as well. I think is important to develop a well-rounded physique and feel healthier and feel good in your body in general. That was a bit of a spiel.

You know, that was good. I have a few things written down that I thought we should probably hit on is you train more for— you're like, I'd say you're more purely like aesthetics-based training, right?

Yeah.

Like you're not trying to compete in powerlifting.

No, no, I'm too tall for that.

So you what? You're too tall for that?

Yeah, I'm 6'4" and I have like— like it's good for deadlifts because I have long arms. Um, yeah, bench, probably like you as well. I'm never gonna be the strongest guy in the gym. Uh, so I kind of shifted away from that a little bit in terms of my day-to-day.

Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. Um, yeah, I guess I, for the most part, if you're not trying to compete in powerlifting, there's really no reason to. I mean, other than— and there's some people who just like, they're going to be hardcore and they just want to push themselves. There's really no reason to max out. Yeah, right. Like, what, what's the point of that? Like, just, you're just gonna see— like, it doesn't— no one— yeah, it's just ego, right? Unless you're trying to compete. And like, I I kind of at some point would like to compete.

Yeah.

So that's, that's the reason I train the way I do. And I want to hit both those. But if not, like, I probably wouldn't— I probably would never squat again, like barbell squat. It just kind of tears up my body a little bit. So there's no reason to do that when there's another way to get the results you want, right? Yeah. And I think another, another point that you hit that was super important is that, and you got to find exercises and ways to do exercises that work for you. Yeah. And so like people will say like an exercise doesn't work or an exercise works, and that's completely an individual thing. Yeah. If an exercise doesn't work for you, then the exercise doesn't work, right? Or if an exercise does work for you, doesn't work for someone else, the exercise works, right? So whatever works for you is the exercise that works. Like for me, squats aren't going to grow my legs, and I know that, so I, I go leg press and I go hack squat, right? And you just— that's a lot of personal experimenting. You just got to kind of figure that out. And, and I think another thing you hit on that was important is, is feeling the muscle work, right? Slowing down the eccentric, feeling the muscle. And that's kind of coupled with finding exercises that work. Like, most exercises that work are the exercises where you're going to feel the muscle, where you're going to get that good pump. Like, for me, you hit dips. Like, dips give me a crazy pump. I always, always hit dips, weighted dips. And that, that's one that's always helped my chest.

Yeah.

And so you can kind of tell, like People say, oh, like the pump doesn't matter, but the pump just means that you're— the muscle's working, you're getting that blood into that muscle. Yeah, right. It's just, it's just an indicator that you're hitting the right area.

Yeah. Um, I would just quickly add to that. Um, I— so let's take for example squats. I had internal hip mobility rotation issues, um, just from a lack of stretching and a lack of flexibility. That made squats feel kind of weird to me. So I was kind of put off by them, at least for the first few years trying to do them, because I never really delved into the stretching and the mobility side of things. So I think it's important to make that distinction between, you know, if you do a squat and it doesn't feel right, don't throw the squat in the bin because there are things that you can do to improve mobility and flexibility across all muscle groups and exercises. Like sitting in, in a deep— what is it, the, the third world squat? You know, you see people sitting in that kind of super deep squat. If you're doing that a few minutes a day, uh, and getting used to that, you're going to feel better having weight, uh, going down into that position. And once I started stretching, once I started doing hip releasing yoga, things like that, uh, my squatting got super better. Um, and you know, it just felt more natural. I felt my glutes and my hamstrings more engaged, uh, and I was less tight. So I started to enjoy the squat more. So it was— first of all, it was like, yes, find exercises that are good for you and feel good, but also make sure that you're doing the mobility, that end range flexibility work, so that you can enable to hit those, those good exercises as well.

Yeah, that's, that's true. You gotta— just because you think an exercise doesn't work for you, the reason might be that you actually just don't have the mobility to do the exercise properly, right? And I think that actually might be part of my problem with squats. I have very, um, poor ankle mobility, right? So, so one way you can— I think one way you can help that is— yeah, one way you can help that is getting weightlifting shoes. Or stay— you can— if you can't buy weightlifting shoes because they're $200, you could put your heels on a plate, or sometimes they have these like cork blocks that you can stand on. But that's a huge one that'll stop you from being able to squat properly. But yes, you have to do the mobility work. I think one that people miss a lot on upper body is the trap and shoulder mobility. And two of my favorite exercises for that are just simply like a hollow body hang, where you just grab onto the bar, whatever way you want to put your hands. Some ways are harder than others, like an underhand grip's gonna be really hard. And then you brace your core as if you were going down for a squat, and you'll immediately feel like tightness in your traps and shoulders. And that's a really good one, you just sit there for a minute. And another one's called skin the cat, where you go in this, you hold the bar in the same position, you lift your, almost like a gymnast, you lift your knees up and you put your whole body through your arms. So you can just Google skin the cat, and that one will loosen up your chest and traps and shoulders as well. I wonder, what kind of stuff do you do for, for lower body? I've been kind of— I've been trying to do the weighted, like you said, the weighted squat, like at the end range of motion and stuff like that. It's— I mean, my mobility is just not very good. It's always something I've had trouble with, but I keep working on it.

But is there any exercise you want to recommend to the, um, as far as lower body mobility? It, it seems, you know, whatever, but yoga— like, the more I've done yoga, and there are You can just Google, um, lower body mobility flow yoga. I, I do a, a channel called Boho Beautiful on YouTube, which is really good. But ever since doing that regularly, yoga— like, you're, you're increasing your flexibility, but you're also increasing the kind of the conscious movement between all the positions, you know, like connecting all the positions and, and moving through them so that it's a much more natural kind of feel than maybe just a stretch where you're sitting in one position. But a lot of yoga poses are just stretches anyway, so it's a good way to kind of just get a structured— put a video on and do that. And, and the more you do it, um, I find the better it is. Like with anything, the more you practice something, the more results you get. So, you know, even just a full hour that you kind of dedicate to stretching, you're gonna see a lot of improvement just from doing that. Another one is the combat stretch. So this, um, kind of deals with ankle mobility. So you kind of— it's going to be really hard to describe on audio, so, so try and, you know, search the combat stretch. But you're kind of perched on one, on one foot. You have your foot on the ground and then the rest of your body weight, uh, above, and you kind of lean onto your hands forward but keep your heel grounded. And that kind of mimics the movement of the— of when you're squatting, uh, the calf kind of shifting forward. But you want to keep your heel on the floor and kind of slowly relax, uh, the calf and the ankle. And that'll, that'll enable you to get a bit deeper in the squat. Um, but yeah, 100% do yoga, man. I was— you know, if you're against it because you think it's feminine in general, I, I would say just kind of revisit that assumption because you'll feel better. And the other thing is you'll be way less stressed. Like, there's a lot of emotional tension that we hold within our muscles, and you'll notice the difference as soon as you start doing them. It's like when you come out of a yoga session, whether it's a class or a half an hour just in your room on YouTube, you just get this peace of mind and this last lack of stress that, you know, once you notice the difference, you'll never want to go back.

Yeah, I did yoga for a while. I kind of stopped. I should get back into it. But it also— yoga is also great for your core.

Yes.

I mean, that, that I credit that along with glute ham raises, which is a hamstring exercise, with, with adding like 50 pounds to my deadlift at least. Yeah, like that, that made a huge difference. So I definitely recommend yoga as well. That's a good one.

It's all about kind of linking all aspects of movement. You know, you're using your core to brace even if it's just a chest exercise, if it's a back exercise, or everything kind of fits together. So any movement that you're doing that's improving your flexibility in one area is going to enable you to— even if it's, you know, it's not as obvious, it's all linking together, all making your body a more fluid joined, uh, unit, which is gonna you know, make you feel better just day to day through your life, whether you're hiking or whatever else, not just in the gym room, which I think is important.

Yeah, makes sense. That's, that's a good transition on the yoga side to, uh, probably the third topic is sleep, right? So I, when I do mobility routine every night, and maybe I'll, maybe I'll start doing yoga even 100% instead, but, but, uh, I do that ankle stretch you talked about actually, and I do The pigeon— what's the, the quad stretch where you put your foot up on something and stretch out your hip and quad? That's another really good one. So I do, I do a few different stretches every night and, uh, and while I watch like a show or something with the blue light, the blue light blocker glasses on. Of course, can't have the blue light messing up our sleep. Um, what, uh, I know you're a big glycine guy. You got the glycine shirts. Yeah, I actually, I haven't tried that yet. I, I bought some on your recommendation, so I'll have to give that a try. But I think for me, I think the biggest thing that helped sleep was having a consistent bedtime.

Yeah.

Like going to sleep at the same time and waking up at the same time is kind of what I found. Like I have an Oura Ring, I've tried all sorts of stuff as far as sleep. But that turned out to be the biggest one for me, was just going to sleep at the same time and earlier than most people would expect. I try to get to sleep between 9 and 10 now, which before I was probably going to sleep at like 11 at the earliest. So I usually try to get in bed by 9, 9:30 and sleep by 10, and I'm usually up 6:30 to 7.

Yeah, so I'm the same, just consistent routine. Yeah, there's— it's all about timing your circadian rhythm, you know, that's the internal biological clock that regulates so many different processes in the body, uh, namely sleep, but also the secretion of hunger hormones like leptin and ghrelin, these things that make you feel hungry or not hungry, all of that relates to your circadian rhythm. So sometimes people ask me, hey, why do I, you know, how can I not feel hungry at night? How do I stop myself eating at night? It's like if you have a consistent bedtime, for instance, me, I'm going to bed at 8:30, 9:00 and getting up at 6:30 without an alarm. I think is, is a really important thing as well. It's like if you're waking up to an alarm and it's kind of jarring you awake rather than you waking up naturally at that time, that's a kind of indicator that you're not getting enough sleep. And whether that's you need to go to bed earlier, which is the case in 95% of people that ask me about sleep, is like, okay, what time you going to bed? Oh, you know, like 11:30. And then it's hard to get up at 7. It's like, no shit. You know, like, let me ask you, let me ask you a question. Yeah.

Do you, do you believe, I've heard the saying and I don't know if it's true, that an hour of sleep before midnight is worth 2 hours of sleep after midnight?

Well, I don't know whether it quantifies exactly like that, but I know that the quality, but the concept, the concept is, it rings true and you need to really look at getting to bed relatively with the sun, right? So you start to wind down once the sun goes down at 6:30 or whatever it is. Um, you, you eliminate all your blue light sources. Like, if you have blue light blocking glasses, is good. There's also a program called Flux which you can put on your computer which, which gets rid of all the blue light on, on your screen. The other thing is, the best thing is just to not have any electronics. In the, in the 2 hours before you head to bed. So, you know, do your social media stuff, reply to emails before that time, and then have the last period of your day separate from technology. You know, turn as many lights off throughout the house as possible as well. If your bathroom has a harsh light, look at getting candles or even little electronic candles that have batteries that kind of give off the same light pattern. All of these things will help time your body, uh, help your body kind of set down for sleep and everything. And you know, the candle thing is so huge. Reading by candlelight before bed, in the hour before bed, you'll— I guarantee you'll feel tired enough to go to sleep. Like, a lot of the time, people going to bed at 11:30, midnight, they're on their computer watching garbage. Like, it's not, it's not a hard thing to do, and your body really responds to it well by, by eliminating these technology sources before bed. And in general, you feel more tired, so you'll naturally want to go to sleep at an earlier time, and then you'll wake up earlier as well. So I think that's super important.

I think, yeah, I think that's a good point. The candle, I think, is a good idea. So I was tracking my sleep and trying a bunch of different variables, and one of them was, was reading a book instead of reading my Kindle, right? Like, I'd— or not my Kindle, my iPad, right? Whatever, the Kindle app. And I found that my sleep was literally quantifiably better when I read a book instead of reading my iPad, even if I was using— I turned off all my blue light, I used my glasses, and my sleep was still like 10 points higher just by reading a paperback book by light instead of looking at a screen.

Yeah.

So that's something I'd suggest people try if they're really having trouble sleeping, is actually don't look at screens. Like I know the blue light glasses say they work and stuff, but just give it a try.

Yeah. It's a, it's a Band-Aid solution when you could just get rid of the source itself.

Right.

Um, see another, uh, yeah, I'll quickly just comment on the other, the sleep supps that I take and maybe a few other things about sleep. So glycine, uh, is an essential amino acid. Um, I'm not sure if it's essential, but anyway, it's an amino acid. It's the simplest amino acid, uh, and it's used for hundreds of things throughout the body. But one of the major effects that seems to be super reliable and, um, you know, across the board with people is taking a small serving, starting with 3 grams. I take a bit higher, like around 8 grams before bed. Some people, if it's a higher dose, it seems to excite the brain a little bit if they have methionine deficiency. Glycine enables your brain to kind of clear all the excess inflammation out. So sometimes people can experience a bit of a rush when they take it. So if that's you, just kind of start off with 3 grams. I take it in chamomile tea just before bed, which is a sedative as well. So having that, that in a drink before bed enables your— it increases your— the depth of your sleep. ZMA, which is a blend of zinc magnesium and vitamin B5, I think. I take that as well. That also increases the depth of your sleep. So that is like a little bedtime drink that I have about 20 minutes before bed, which, you know, is— it's a bit of a routine thing. Your body gets used to it, and you'll be out like a light if you have that. So if you're having issues with sleep, I've told heaps of people to get on to that, and it's invariably come back with, hey man, I didn't wake up once last night. It's the first time that's happened to me in months, you know. And, and you don't, you don't know what you're missing out on with quality sleep until you have a good sleep and you wake up refreshed and you don't wake up groggy because you're, you're recharged, you know. Most of your muscle is rebuilt when you're during sleep. All of the kind of detoxification processes in the body, all of this goes on while you're unconscious during sleep. So you're really shooting yourself in the foot if you're not taking— if you're not optimizing your sleep. Um, a few other things that I do, um, I might look a bit stupid to any outsiders, but what I'll do before bed is I'll tape my mouth as well. Um, I don't know if you've ever tried that, but taping your mouth basically just makes sure that you're only nose breathing. Throughout the night, and that prevents snoring if you're a snorer like me. But you're, you're enabling a much better airflow throughout the whole night. So you think about the 8 or 9 hours that you're in bed for— if your breathing is compromised, maybe if you're overweight as well, you have— get a bit of sleep apnea, or even if you're just a big dude with a lot of muscle, you can get sleep apnea from your neck as well. So taping your mouth is a big one. I also have an eye mask, earplugs. Both of those help to reduce the inputs subconsciously into your brain to see it doesn't have to process as much noise or, or light signals. Like, even if your eyes are closed, you're still getting— if you have lights in your room, or, you know, your windows aren't particularly like— they're not blackout curtains or whatever, if there are street lights outside, all of these lights your brain is subconsciously processing through sleep. So if you have an eye mask, it helps to kind of get rid of that. Uh, earplugs, the same, helps to reduce the noise that your body's processing when you sleep and just kind of enables your body to turn off more, which is conducive to better sleep. I guarantee you'll feel better rested and, and all that if you, if you do those things before bed as well.

Yeah, those are all solid. I think you pretty much covered it. I think the only one I'd add is, uh, temperature.

Yeah.

Is lowering your body temperature.

Cold shower.

Just generally the temperature at which you sleep is usually better.

Yeah.

You'll get a better sleep. But you, I think two things we should probably cover is one was we talked about going to sleep early. I'm sure a lot of people like listening are, this is gonna be maybe a little broader conversation, but a lot of people listening are like, yeah, that's great, but I'm super busy, right?

And, But they're not, but they're not.

Right, right, right.

They never are.

You really wanna, especially, I know, you wanna optimize, one, I think your point about optimizing sleep being super important is crucial, right? And this kinda comes back to what we were talking about at the beginning of, if muscle mass is your goal, you need to get better sleep, right? That's when muscle's built during the recovery. So you gotta make sleep a priority, and to do that, what you actually have to do is during your life, during the day, you have to be more productive, right? You need to get the same amount done as you were getting done before, and you need to get it done in less amount of time. And that's gonna let, like, that one thing, and maybe that's, I don't know, maybe that's cutting out social media, or maybe that's a variety of different things, but being more productive is gonna, it's a reflexive cycle, right? It all builds on itself. So if you are productive during the day, one, you're gonna be more tired, and two, you're gonna be able to, you'll feel good about the day, you'll feel like you've accomplished something, and you're gonna be able to get to sleep, right, knowing you've got everything done and all the tasks are completed. You get better sleep, you start building more muscle, you start feeling more confident, you're gonna get more done. It's kind of just, it creates a positive self-reinforcing cycle that builds on itself. And I think while we're on productivity, I know we've mostly been talking about health and training and fitness, but I think one thing that I talk about a ton is a system that I use for just general organization. Probably worth dropping in here just so your followers can think about it, is I call it— it's PISA, like the Leaning Tower of Pisa. P-I-S-A. And that's physical, which is pretty much what you mostly talk about. And then there's intellectual, which is your career, your work, your business, all the ways you make money and the things you're interested in. Social, which is girls, friends, family. And artistic, which is like hobbies and other things you're interested in, music. Hot, stuff like that. So that's just like a little system I use because especially when you're, you're trying to be a well-rounded person and you're trying to get a lot done and be productive, is you have so much coming at you and so many, from so many different sources, from Twitter, from your job, from reading, from all sorts of different stuff, and you kind of need a way to organize it all. And that's what I found is just a little simple mnemonic systems to remember and kind of self-organize things. And I organize my entire life that way. And, and so I think stepping back is, if you can do something like that or find a way to make yourself more productive and simple, using simple little systems, you're going to be able to do things like go to sleep early and, and have a better body. And I think all those, the physical, the intellectual, the social, artistic of life, all interplay on each other. And if you're doing well in one, it can help lead to success in the others, right? So I mean, for example, you follow me on Twitter. I don't even talk about girls or relationships that much because if you focus on the first two, if you're in good shape, you're a good looking guy, and you're doing well financially, the rest of it kind of just takes care of itself. You know what I mean? And that's why it's in that order, the P-E-I-S-N-A. And so I call it a 6-pack, 7 figures, and 8+ girls. And if you can do those 3 things, there's no reason, anyone who can who can be in great shape, who can do well financially, and you can be with girls he finds that are 8 out of 10 or better. Like, it's pretty tough to be unhappy when you're doing those 3 things.

Yeah, I agree. Um, it's kind of leads into, if you improve in one side of it, everything else improves. It's, it's, it's flexing that improvement muscle, if you will, that, that discipline. Um, it, it carries over. I think a lot of people find the gym and the physical training so beneficial is because it's like a real tangible benefit and measurable benefit that you get from working out, which kind of— it's the first step in a lot of people. If your life is in shambles a little bit, when you get the training down, your mental game improves because you're getting stress relief, you know, you feel better in general, and that enables you to kind of have that motivation and the energy to take that first step to improve the other areas of your life. Um, and yeah, like you said, you need to improve in all areas of your life, not just one. You, you don't want to be one-dimensional. You don't want to only be focused on, on health and fitness if the rest of your life is, is kind of suffering because of it. So it's this, it's a simultaneous balancing act. Um, but also when you're doing one thing, focus on that one thing. And then when you're training, focus on your training. You know, don't be worried about work while you're training. And then don't wish you were like— while you're working, don't wish you were in the gym training, like, oh no, I'm sitting down too long. It's like, yeah, think about that in general, but the idea of being in the moment and enjoying and focusing on that task at hand, whatever you're doing, um, Even social relationships. When you're on a date or you're hanging out with your bros, um, don't be worried about work and, you know, wishing that you were working harder and writing. It's like, when you're working, work, but when you're relaxing and chilling and developing social relationships, do that and focus on that and be engaged with that. Because otherwise you, you kind of miss out on the benefit of both if you're half in, half out. Then, you know, you're not allowing yourself to really absorb everything that's happening. And I think that's an important concept to do. Yes, you know, have these, these longer-term goals and plans and, and try and delegate your day so that you improve in all areas, but also recognize that it doesn't all happen in a day. You're not going to be able to do it all at once. So, just to kind of take it as it comes, take the steps. Improve and, and do your best you can while also giving yourself a bit of leeway if it doesn't all happen at once. And also just eliminating all of the bullshit, all of the time wasting. You know, people say they're too busy to get to sleep earlier, but they'll spend an hour and a half throughout the day on their phone. That's, that's all lost time, even if it's only little 15-minute breaks and things like that. So it requires a more general kind of assessment and an honest assessment of how you're using your time and what you can cut out and only really focus on the big, the big things and the big rocks that really kind of move the needle in your life as well.

Yeah, I think we pretty much covered it. I think we— so we hit nutrition, we hit training, we hit sleep. I think the only last— I kind of think of it as the core 4 of training, nutrition, sleep, and supplements. So the only thing we have left is supplements. I'm pretty— you're probably more versed in this than me. I take very little. I do obviously protein powder, I do creatine, I do D3, I do a multivitamin, and that's really about it. I don't really go too much farther than that. Is there any— what do you think are like the essential or like the top? If you only take, you know, like people who don't want to be mega dosing powders and pills and stuff, what do you think are like the best things to take?

Well, it, you know, it depends how far down the rabbit hole you want to go. I don't take any supplements that don't do anything for me. I, I think the most critical ones, I think everyone should be taking magnesium in some form. The most bioavailable form is magnesium glycinate, which is a chemical compound, magnesium and glycine. So taking a few of those throughout the day really enables your body to do all the, all the processes that keep you mentally sane. All of the detoxification process and things in the body use magnesium. Obviously magnesium is a mineral required for your muscles, prevents spasming, all of these things, and it enables your muscles to relax as well. So if you're feeling quite tense all the time, it's, it's likely that you have a magnesium deficiency in some regard, especially if you're an athlete or even just a lifter in general. Magnesium is a huge one that I take daily. Having magnesium oil as well, so that's just magnesium chloride in water in a spray bottle, you can locally apply that so that kind of sinks in dermally through the skin. It's a much more direct way of getting magnesium to your muscles. If you're cramping or spasming in one area, you can spray some of that on and deeply massage that into that, which is really nice. Another one is zinc. Super good for your skin, your health, your testosterone production. It's, it's kind of one of the nutrients required for all that. So I take zinc daily as well. The liver pills, it's a big one. If you're not eating organ meat, it's a great way to kind of top up those vitamins and minerals which are so highly concentrated in liver, in organ meat in general. Ancestral Supplements is a really good brand. They have a great ethos as a company in general. So you can look at that. They have, you know, liver, kidneys, spleen, bone marrow, colostrum, you know, a bunch of different things sourced from New Zealand. So that's a good one to look into. Um, my other favorites to have is— I think you would benefit as well from just taking amino acid caps with your meals as well. If even if you just have a fruit snack like a banana and apple with some amino acid caps as well, you can just pump them down with some water and just, uh, kind of tops up your body with minimal calories, but you know, you're getting those amino acids in which help to repair the body in general. I mean, I could go on and on about supplements, to be honest. I think there are a lot of good ones, and that can also—

What's the one you hit, the one you hit that I want to try is beetroot.

Oh yeah, yeah. Well, that's not even, I wouldn't even call that a supplement. That's just dried beetroot powder, right? If you're eating a lot of beetroots, not as important, but a lot of people don't. But as far as the supplement use of it, you know, it's, it's full of natural electrolytes and also is a nitric oxide booster. So nitric oxide is the mechanism through which blood moves throughout your body, that blood flow. So I, what I do is I'll do like a pre-workout stack of a tablespoon of beetroot powder and about 8 to 10 grams of citrulline malate. So both of those are nitric oxide boosters. And if you take that with a, with a shitload of water, like half an hour before you, before you work out, you're gonna get it. Like, you'll start to feel warm naturally even before you've done any movement. And then when you do start doing the movements and lifting weights, the pump is unreal, you know, like your veins will stick out in your arms. And, and also, you know, it's beneficial to blood flow in in the groin area. So if you have any erectile dysfunction problems, which some people do, that can be a good one to take as well. So yeah, I like doing that before pre-workout as well as acetyl— acetyl carnitine, I think it's called. Alcar is kind of a stimulant-y kind of thing. It's not really— it won't affect sleep as much, but it really kind of keys you into focus, and I notice the difference on that. So that's like my pre-workout stack is, is the beetroot, citrulline, Alcar, um, creatine. Like you said, I kind of— I take post-workout because it's better absorbed into the body when you take it post-workout. Um, and yeah, that's kind of the big ones that I would say, uh, that are important if you don't want to spend heaps and, you know, get a thousand different supplements. Those are the big ones that I know people will feel a difference with taking.

Sweet. Yeah.

Cool, man.

That's cool, man. I think we covered it. I think that's a solid first podcast. We're about an hour in.

Well, I think this is going to be the first of many between us. And whether you start a podcast or we appear on Solcast again, Is there anything you want to mention to promote? I know you have your mailing list that people can get onto.

Yeah, honestly, just follow me on Twitter. Yeah, @MikeRMedici, M-I-K-E-R-M-E-D-I-C-I, and you know, everything else will just, just kind of flows from there. I've been doing in the Twitter game for 4 years now and I do all right. So yeah, DMs are always open, so reach out with any questions or anything like that.

Awesome, man. Uh, well, thanks for coming on the Soulcast. It was great to have you.

Um, yeah, thanks for having me.

Yeah, I guess until next time.