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If you want to know how to build muscle, lose fat, and be healthier, happier, and wiser…faster than you ever thought possible…then this podcast is for you. Hosted by the bestselling author and entrepreneur, Mike Matthews, each episode gives you simple, science-based know-how and inspiration that will help you build your best body and life ever.
Find out more at www.legionathletics.com
Copyright: © Mike Matthews
There’s a basic law of living that goes like this:
If you want more, do more.
It applies more or less across the board. You tend to get out of life in proportion to what you give.
Want more money or a bigger business? Work harder at it and you’ll have the best chances of success.
Want deeper, more fulfilling relationships with friends or family? Spend more time building those relationships and watch them blossom.
Want to be the best player on your team? Practice longer and harder than your confreres and you’ll slowly pull ahead of the pack.
You get the point.
Working out isn’t that simple, though.
The “more is better” approach works…until it doesn’t. And then it becomes counterproductive.
That is, in terms of building muscle, strength, and endurance, more training is generally better than less…but once you exceed your body’s ability to recover, the wheels start to fall off.
Here’s a short list of what can happen next:
-You struggle to finish your workouts.
-You lose strength and endurance.
-You sleep poorly.
-You struggle with fatigue and lethargy.
-You have odd aches and pains.
-You get sick more frequently.
These are all signs that there is a systemic imbalance between work and recovery.
Scientifically speaking, this symptomatology is known as “overtraining syndrome,” and chances are you’re going to wrestle with it to one degree or another at some point in your fitness journey.
Well, this podcast is going to help.
In it, you’re going to learn how to spot overtraining before it becomes a serious problem, what to do if/when you find yourself overtrained, how to prevent it in the first place.
So, let’s start with one of the more common (and misguided) cliches about overtraining…
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The first few weeks of a cut are usually smooth sailing. You aren’t that hungry, your energy levels are good, and you’re still enjoying your workouts.
Somewhere around the four- to six-week mark, however, the other shoe begins to drop. You’re starting to feel hungrier leading up to meals and less satisfied after. Your energy levels begin to sag, and especially in the afternoons. You’re no longer progressing in your workouts, which are feeling harder and harder.
There are two schools of thought on what to do next:
1. Grit your teeth and keep dieting so you can move on to the fun stuff as soon as possible (maintaining and lean gaining).
2. Take periodic diet breaks where you increase your calorie intake to maintenance for several days or weeks, then continue dieting after your reprieve.
Many diet break advocates say that taking a break here and there can speed up your metabolism, help preserve muscle mass, and even “hack” your hormones to supercharge fat loss.
Others claim diet breaks offer no real benefit beyond “feeling good” and are only necessary if you’re too “weak” to stay the course.
Who’s right?
That’s what I ask James Krieger in this episode.
James is an accomplished researcher and writer as well as a lifter who knows what it’s like to diet down to extremely low body fat levels, and in this episode he tells you everything you need to know about the real science behind diet breaks and refeeds.
In this episode, you’re going to learn:
- Why people incorporate diet breaks and “refeeds” into their cutting regimens
- How taking diet breaks affects fat loss, muscle retention, and metabolic rate while dieting
- When you should or shouldn’t take a diet break
- The pros and cons of diet breaks versus continuous calorie restriction
- How to take an effective diet break
- And more.
6:06 - Why do people do diet breaks?
10:30 - What did your research find regarding diet breaks?
13:52 - For most people, isn’t the bulk of their total daily energy expenditure really their resting metabolic rate?
17:35 - How can you use diet breaks effectively?
24:38 - Is the weight loss related to a reduction of cortisone levels?
25:29 - Where can people find you and your work?
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I’ve churned through over 100,000 emails, social media comments and messages, and blog comments in the last 6 years.
And that means I’ve fielded a ton of questions.
As you can imagine, some questions pop up more often than others, and I thought it might be helpful to take a little time every month to choose a few and record and share my answers.
So, in this round, I answer the following five questions:
1. What do you do when resting between sets in the gym?
2. Can I still gain muscle and strength while training for long-distance running and, if so, how should I set up my training?
3. How much fat can you lose in the first 30 days of a cut if you’re doing everything right?
4. Do you need to adjust your meal plan while losing fat, or can you stick to the same plan from start to finish?
5. How many hours of sleep should you get to maximize muscle growth?
If you have a question you’d like me to answer, leave a comment below or if you want a faster response, send an email to mike@muscleforlife.com.
Recommended reading for this episode:
https://www.muscleforlife.com/how-long-to-rest-between-sets/
https://www.muscleforlife.com/cardio-or-weights-first/
https://www.muscleforlife.com/cardio-workouts/
https://www.muscleforlife.com/not-losing-weight/
https://www.muscleforlife.com/how-to-sleep-better/
Want to get my best advice on how to gain muscle and strength and lose fat faster? Sign up for my free newsletter!
Click here: https://www.muscleforlife.com/signup/
You want to build muscle.
You want to get strong.
And you want to do these things as quickly and effectively as possible.
What exercises should you do and why?
Ask different people and you’ll get different answers.
Some will say that compound exercises are all you need. They train every muscle in your body and are “highly functional” to boot.
Others will say compound exercises are overrated or even dangerous, and that the right isolation exercises can give you everything your little heart desires.
Who’s right?
Well, in this podcast, we’re going to find out. By the end, you’ll understand the pros and cons of both compound and isolation exercises and how you should use them in your workouts based on your goals.
Let’s start with a simple question: what exactly are compound and isolation exercises?
4:11 - What is a compound exercise?
10:01 - What is an isolation exercise?
17:05 - What are the advantages of compound exercises?
23:45- What are the advantages of isolation exercises?
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This episode is part of a weekly series that I have dubbed “Motivation Monday.”
(Yes, I know, very creative of me. What can I say, I’m a genius…)
Seriously though, the idea here is simple:
Every Monday morning, I’m going to post a short and punchy episode that I hope gets you fired up to tackle the workouts, work, and everything else that you have planned for the week ahead.
As we all know, it’s one thing to know what you want to do, but it’s something else altogether to actually make yourself do it, and I hope that this series gives you a jolt of inspiration, energy, and encouragement to get at it.
So, if you like what you hear, then make sure to check back every Monday morning for the latest and greatest installment.
Want to get my best advice on how to gain muscle and strength and lose fat faster? Sign up for my free newsletter!
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If you’ve spent any amount of time pushing or pulling heavy things, you’ve probably experienced elbow pain.
Maybe it only flares up when you’re doing heavy compound exercises, like the bench press, military press, or barbell row. Or, maybe it only happens when you’re doing isolation exercises like curls, triceps extensions, or skullcrushers. Or maybe it comes and goes with no rhyme or reason.
Regardless of what triggers it, elbow pain can be maddening, and finding good answers for how to resolve it can be even more frustrating.
Luckily, one guy who has good answers is Mark Rippetoe, so I invited him on the show to shed some light on this common nuisance.
Mark has worked with thousands of lifters, and thus helped people work through many, many injuries, and he has quite a bit to say about how to deal with elbow pain.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
- The three most common types of elbow pain
- The difference between “golfer’s elbow” and “tennis elbow”
- How to diagnose what’s causing your elbow pain
- What exercises usually contribute the most to elbow pain
- How to resolve elbow pain
- And more
9:29 - What are the three types of elbow pain?
14:58 - What is the most common type of elbow pain?
18:58 - What is golfer’s elbow?
31:17 - What type of elbow pain did you have?
35:59 - What type of exercises cause golfer’s elbow?
37:54 - What’s the difference in form between chin ups and pull ups?
48:54 - Is the bench press commonly associated with elbow issues?
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“When’s your next book coming out?”
“What kind of supplements are you going to release next?”
“What would you name your boat if you had one?”
I’m asked questions like these all the time and so I thought I’d start doing monthly updates about what’s new and exciting here at Legion and MFL HQ.
So here’s a quick hosedown of what me and my jolly band of pirates and bums have been up to lately.
Enjoy!
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In this episode I interview Rachel, who recently completed my 90-day coaching service and dropped 15 pounds and 6% body fat, while getting stronger on all of her key lifts.
Before finding me and my work, Rachel didn’t look unhealthy, overweight, or feeble, but that’s how she felt.
Like many women, she was an avid runner who avoided weightlifting because she thought it would make her look “bulky” and “manly,” and especially because she’s tall and has relatively broad shoulders for a woman.
Also like many women, Rachel had subjected herself to all kinds of starvation and fad diets over the years, which had taken their toll both physically and emotionally. She was confused, she was frustrated, and she was starting to feel hopeless.
Then she stumbled across this podcast, liked what she heard, started applying my teachings, and was thrilled with the results.
Once she starting eating and training properly, the improvements came quickly, and she realized that gaining muscle in the right places in her body and reducing her body fat percentage is the key to getting the body she really wants—a lean, athletic, toned body, not a blocky, masculine one.
Rachel's next step was signing up for my one-on-one coaching service, and now, about a year into her transformation journey, she’s looks and feels better than ever before and is really just getting started.
So, if you like hearing motivational stories about how people have changed their bodies and lives, and if you want to pick up a few tips that may help you in your personal journey, then this episode is for you.
4:58 - What was your diet and fitness like before and after our coaching program?
6:57 - How many push ups can you do now?
7:21 - Where are you at with your dumbbell bench press?
7:47 - Were you concerned about getting bulky while gaining strength?
12:49 - What was your diet and fitness like before our coaching program?
15:14 - How did you find our coaching program?
15:42 - How was your transition into our diet plan?
19:12 - What was your meal plan like during our coaching program and how did it compare to you previous diets?
27:20 - What was your exercise routine before you started our coaching program?
27:29 - Why was the gym intimidating to you?
30:21 - How much cardio and resistance training did you do on our coaching program?
35:04 - What are your current goals?
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My years in the fitness racket have taught me many things about people, and one of them is that binge eating is far more common than I previously realized.
In many cases, it’s prompted by extreme forms calorie restriction like water fasting, detox diets, and the like, and in others, it’s the result of bad eating habits developed on the way to becoming overweight.
Binge eating isn’t just a problem for overweight people, though. There are many fit people out there, usually ones trying to maintain very low levels of body fat for one reason or another (social media, usually), who binge and purge rather regularly.
Regardless of how fit or fat someone is, however, bingeing is a problem, and even when it’s done more “strategically” by drastically undereating for a period before or after a binge to keep body fat levels generally in an acceptable range.
That approach can work for maintaining a nice looking body composition, of course, but it’s unsustainable and unhealthy, both physically and psychologically. It takes its toll, which often includes eating and body disorders.
That’s why I invited Carter Good to come on the show. Carter lost 140 pounds—partly with the help of my Bigger Leaner Stronger program—and now has a large following built mostly through sharing simple, effective, science-based weight loss strategies and runs a successful fat loss coaching service.
One of the biggest obstacles Carter ran into in his journey from 305 to 165 pounds was binge eating, and as you’d expect, many of his clients come to him struggling with it as well. In this interview, he’s going to share his most helpful observations, recommendations, and insights on how to beat binge eating once and for all.
In this episode, you’ll learn . . .
- What binge eating actually is (how it differs from simply overeating)
- How much binge eating actually slows fat loss
- The most common factors that lead to binge eating
- Effective mental strategies for preventing binge eating
- What to do after a binge (because we all fall off the wagon now and then)
- And more
8:07 - How do you define binge eating?
12:48 - What are common factors that cause binge eating?
14:07 - How do you help people work through binge eating?
24:45 - How do you prevent binge eating?
36:13 - How do you help people work through the guilt of binge eating?
40:58 - Are there any outlets to prevent emotional eating?
56:24 - Where can people find you and your work?
Want to get my best advice on how to gain muscle and strength and lose fat faster? Sign up for my free newsletter!
Click here: https://www.muscleforlife.com/signup/
For years, milk has been touted as one of the healthiest foods you can eat.
It’s packed full of protein, calcium, and other nutrients, and it’s delicious to boot.
It’s also hugely popular among bodybuilders and people just generally interested in improving their body composition.
If you go asking around the gym for the best way to gain muscle and strength as quickly as possible, it won’t take long until you’re told to just lift heavy weights and drink a gallon of milk per day.
(The heavy weightlifting is a great idea, but the “GOMAD”? Not so much…)
Recently, though, milk has come under heavy fire from the health “gurus” of the world who not only question its nutritional value, but go as far as labeling it a poison responsible for all kinds of disease and dysfunction.
Drink milk, they say, and thanks to the lactose, pus, blood, hormones, and other “unhealthy” substances it contains, you’ll be more likely to gain weight, weaken your bones, and even get cancer and die.
Many of the people making these arguments seem to have logic and science on their sides, too.
Maybe they’re right? Maybe milk isn’t all it’s cracked up to be? Maybe we’d all be better off without it?
Well, as you’ll soon see, although the case against milk can be made to sound convincing, it’s based on trumped up charges.
When you analyze the bulk of the research, which we’re going to do in this podcast, the takeaway is clear:
Milk is not a magic bullet for bone health, muscle gain, or general wellbeing, but it doesn’t deserve condemnation, either, and you probably don’t need to stop drinking it.
Let’s find out why, starting with square one:
What is milk, exactly?
5:30 - What is milk?
5:30 - What is milk?
6:51 - Does milk cause weight gain?
8:26 - Does milk spike insulin levels?
10:43 - Does milk contain estrogen-like hormones that cause weight and feminizing effects in men?
11:28 - Does milk weaken your bones?
15:18 - Does milk contain dangerous hormones?
18:46 - Is milk too processed to be healthy?
19:48 - What is pasteurization, homogenization, fortification?
22:45 - Is milk filled with pus, blood, and somatic cells?
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