Learning, teaching and making enemies

# Learning, teaching and making enemies

**Channel:** Adam McCubbin
**Published:** unknown
**Source:** https://youtube.com/watch?v=JM-NwaqgvqA

Today, we've got Luke Lehman, who is the founder of the company Muscle Nerds, which is a fantastic online resource for coaches and trainers looking to upskill, which offers seminars, mentoring, amongst many other things. Luke is an incredible resource of information pertaining to nutrition, coaching, and training. I first came across Luke's work through the Polican Group many years ago, where he was helping teach there. And what I love about Luke's content is his use of humor and not being afraid to make enemies through speaking his mind. So welcome to the podcast, Luke. That's probably the best intro I've ever had, actually. Not afraid to make enemies. Yeah, so that's one of the things we try not to do, but it's really easy in this industry when people are you know, basically talking false science and things and trying to just wow people with, you know, bullshit. So it's not that hard of a thing to do. So, but yeah, so this is cool. It's good to be here. Yeah, it was great. Great to have you on. It was easy to connect. So before we get into the nitty gritty of the interview, can you just give us a little bit of a history, who Luke is and how you got started in the industry. And then I guess the natural evolution of what you're currently focused on. Yeah. So, you know what it started, man, it started way back when I was a little kid. Growing up in Texas, everything's about Texas football. And, you know, so we start lifting weights when we're really little and just, It was 1984, so I'm pretty old. And I kind of got into it after watching Arnold Schwarzenegger in one of his movies. So I saw that, and I was like, man, that guy's the man. And I kind of made an off-the-cuff comment to my parents saying, yeah, man, I want to do that. I want to bodybuild and that type of thing. So they thought it would be funny to get me a weight set. And I just started lifting weights, and it never stopped. And here we are 40 years later. So I started kind of doing that when I was a kid and then kept doing that. And in high school, started the powerlifting team at my high school. And so I got into powerlifting for a while and, you know, always loved bodybuilding and all that type of thing. and started studying Charles Poliquin when I was about 14 and started saving up money and finally was able to go out and actually meet the guy and start taking his courses. And I fell in love with the whole education thing and just the whole being in that environment and learning about stuff and how to do things better with a physique and with strength and all that and the people that I was meeting. And that's kind of how it all started. and I just never stopped and went to a Polycon group to work for them for about 10 years and left them a few years ago and started Muscle Nerds. Yeah. And so how did you get that sort of first step into the Polycon group? Obviously, you're someone who's well-read and into what he does. But I guess how did you get that first initial start? Yeah, well, you know what? I went to the seminars and I went to my, I got, I think it was 2007. It was May of 2007. I went to Chicago and I got my, uh, PICP level one and my first bio signature seminar. And, you know, Charles walks in the room and we're all like, Holy shit, there's Charles Poliquin and all that. You know, it was, it was one of those like life changing things where this is a guy you've read about since you were, you know, basically for half your life and now here he walks in and he's got these fucking forearms that are bigger than your head and you're going oh my god it's charles holy shit and then he pulls you in front and he grabs your uh he grabs your love handle and he goes oh my god you're fat and i'm like oh shit so that sorry i just lost you i just lost my earpiece oh good um so yeah so um i i went to that and i was like man this is this is cool this is what i i've never been outside of Texas before. So when I went to it, I'm like, man, this is cool. These are my type of people. Uh, this is what I want to do for the rest of my life. And, um, I just, I started saving up again and I went to my level two and then I begged my parents to loan me some cash so I could do a bunch of other courses. And after, you know, after five or six courses, Charles walked up to me and he said, Hey man, uh, you know, you look pretty keen. You look like, you know what you're, what's going on. Do you want to come work for us? And then I started doing some assistant stuff with them and eventually came on full-time in 2013. Yeah. And you were obviously coaching at the same time yourself with clients Yeah So I was I was kind of in and out of the industry So for a while I was training and then I was only kind of doing online stuff And then basically, I kind of had it with the industry, and I left for a while and started doing things in the IT industry because I was a computer programmer originally. That's what I was doing when I was a kid. And so I kind of went kind of in the IT and audiovisual field, that type of thing. And then I was just like, man, this is not for me. I'm going to go back into the training. And then Polycom Group called me and said, hey, you know, we're looking for another coach. Do you want to come on full time? Stop doing the kind of the part-time thing. And I went, yeah, that's cool, whatever. So then I just packed all my shit up and I went to Rhode Island. Yeah. And you obviously identified that like being more of an educator versus just a coach in the gym? yeah 100 like i was i was always kind of in that role of wanting to help other trainers and saying hey maybe there's better ways of doing these things it's what they you know let's look at the research and this is what the research says here and here and this is maybe maybe there's better ways of doing things and uh and yeah so like i i was always a really good like coach like face to face and I love doing that type of stuff but um there's just not that many really good mentors in the industry so I kind of gravitated towards that because of you know like you said in the intro the no bullshit type of policy and um there's a lot of people selling lots of bullshit these days and that's the one thing I wanted to to always fight against so yeah yeah now obviously you've you've mentioned uh Polquin he's he's obviously someone who shaped your career um in the early beginnings who are some of the other uh mentors and guys that have sort of put you on your path uh to and sort of created to where you are today oh my god there's so many um like obviously charles as far as strength and conditioning goes and um the person who really got me interested in doing like the looking at hormones and the way things really interact with the body as was Charles, but there was also, you know, a big heavy influence with, uh, Paul check. He was a big influencer, uh, Dr. Brian Walsh, Dr. Ben house, Dr. Mike T. Nelson. And there's tons of guys that, um, that I still, to this day, the, the people that come to our courses and take education from us, what they have to realize is there are guys on that next level that I'm, I'm actually going to their courses and learning from them. So this whole thing, the learning and all that, it never stops. When you're really serious about it, you just move to that next level and you're just basically leveling up. It's like a video game. Yeah. And I guess with that, who sort of, I guess, taught you how to learn? Because you're obviously someone who's very well-read in terms of research but also obviously connected to the industry. Is there someone that you learnt off and go, okay, I like how that guy is acquiring his knowledge and he's sort of deciphering the bad science from the good science. Is there someone that comes to mind with that? You know what? That's a good question. And I don't know if I can actually answer that because most of the people that I learned from, they're all like no bullshit type of people and they don't really buy into the pseudoscience and the woo-woo stuff and all that. But I guess if I'm going to have to give you an answer and I don't give her enough credit, it would probably be my mom. So education was a huge thing with my parents, especially with my mother. And man, looking back at it, if my mom hadn't... My mom taught my sister and I how to read when we were three. So reading and searching for the truth and that type of thing and being a champion for the truth was always something that we were taught from a very young age. and I've always carried that since then. And she obviously taught you to question stuff as well because that's a big part of, I guess, what you do is to, not just to learn but to question why something's taking place. Yeah, 100%. 100%, like one of the, probably one of the, what I feel is probably my best attribute that I got from my mother is being very stubborn and always searching for the truth and being someone who never backs away from a debate or an argument. If I think that somebody's throwing out some bullshit, it can be a huge character flaw, but it's also a huge positive bonus if you know how to kind of harness it and move it in the right direction So I think my wife would probably not say the opposite of that of what I telling you but it been a huge driving force for me because for me the truth is all that really matters. Yeah, but that's obviously been a big thing for you, I guess, online as it creates a little bit of a stir online because you'll call out someone And you'll say, you know, and I think that's probably part of the reason for, I guess, your success in Muscle Nerds, creating sort of that, I guess, buy-in from people and seeing that you're able to sort of question those people. Yeah, but, you know, here's the thing. Like, I sit back and I say, okay, if I say something stupid, I absolutely 100% want people to call me out. So it doesn't make you the most popular person in fitness when you're calling people out. And I try not to put names to anything. And anytime we say something about something that someone's doing anonymously, we get like 8,000 emails of hate mail of somebody thinking it's about them. But it's probably not. If you think it's about you, it's probably not. But if you think it is, then maybe you should start thinking about the things you're doing. But yeah, it's a weird position to be in because I didn't really want that. But I hate the drama. Sometimes I secretly love it. But for the most part, I hate it. And I don't really want it. But it's kind of part of the job. And when you're in the position that we're in where you are, okay, we're like we are teaching young coaches how they need to be looking at science and searching out for the answers and all that and how they need to be conducting themselves. And if they're going to be idiots about things and say things that aren't true, then they're probably going to expect to be called out. And that's not a bad thing because if we don't call each other out, then we're never going to look, we're never going to find where the truth actually lies, you know? So we're huge into having discourse with people. That's totally fine. And debating, and there's been a lot of times where, you know, I've gotten on my soapbox and preached something and somebody showed me where I was wrong and I had to kind of go out in public and say, hey, I was wrong. So this is what the actual truth is. And so, you know, we're not above criticism. You know, nobody is, and that's the way it should be. Yeah. And that's obviously how you learn as well. If you make a big mistake, that's obviously going to be a powerful teacher. Oh, huge. Yeah, absolutely. And that's how we learn, right? So you say, hey, this is what I believe. And someone else says, well, actually, this is the way it really works. And then you go, oh, yeah, you're right. Okay. I'm not going to teach that anymore. That's how it should be, right? Yeah, exactly. Can you just speak about Muscle Nerds and sort of how it was created and how it's become, I guess, a positive online community for coaches to go and the resource that you provide? Yeah, you know, so a few years ago, I was working for a Republican group and I had met Zoe in Sydney and we were talking and she decided to fly over and we kind of went on a tour of the the eastern and central united states and um we got to a point where i i went back to polican group and unbeknownst to me i was gonna getting let go and i had no idea and so i showed up and they're like hey yeah we're letting you go and i'm like uh okay cool um why no they you know they didn't really give me a reason why so i was like okay fine okay cool so now i don't have a job zoe doesn't have a job we're screwed and so the whole muscle nerds thing had been on the back burner for a while um so i finally said all right screw it i'm just gonna announce this and see what happens and it's it's just been freaking bananas ever since so yeah um we spent like we spent a good a good two years like being completely reactive not knowing what was going on kind of chasing our tails we didn't know anything about business so we've kind of figured that out And it's now in like the third year we've started to actually find our footing and actually realize what the hell we're doing. So it's been a huge learning experience, you know. Yeah, absolutely. And I guess what's the ultimate goal for Muscle Nerds? What's the bigger picture? That's a good question. and I don't really know. Because you say, okay, so I'll be happy if the business does this and then you achieve that a year later and you like okay so we done that all right So you kind you kind of move the goalposts right Yeah And you move it a little further away and you like okay in the next five years I want to be there And then the next year you hit it and you're like, oh, well shit, that happened faster than I thought. So you just keep moving the goalposts. I guess, you know, for me, I want to build something that matters. I want to build something that has never been done before. I want to build something where there's a community. Like I want, um, I want to have like, I want to be like the CrossFit of education. And by that, you know, people, people love or they hate CrossFit, you know, but it's undeniable the, um, what CrossFit has built as far as a community and like people that are super linked in all around the world. And that's what I want. I want people to come to our courses and like, feel like they're in a family environment and they can ask anything and we're having a good time and we do this, you know, and then we're having events and it's really fun. Like, I just want to have fun, you know? Yeah. So for me, I want to make sure I want muscle nerds to be that thing, that entity where people go, I'm proud to be a part of this. Like this is, this is the type of company that I'm proud to, to go to their courses and to say that I'm a muscle nerds certified coach. And, you know, it actually means something and they actually give a shit about me. Yeah, yeah. Well, that's a great answer, great message. I've heard you speak before about, I guess, your job as an educator is making sure that coaches understand the responsibility that they have to make their clients better and to put, I guess, their health back into the industry, I guess, all too often on social media. we see those 12-week body transformation and but but we know you know obviously health is in it for the long haul um what i guess just it's a bit of a long-winded question but what i guess are you hoping to get your coaches uh to to think about overall in terms of the big picture oh man that's a great question um yeah so at the end of the day like the one thing that's not really sexy and the one thing that doesn't really sell well is health right so um so let's say you come to me and your your bloods like your labs look like completely atrocious and i fix all your labs and i put a before and after picture of your cholesterol and all your other markers like i'm looking at this like this is great but most people are going to look at and be like and why do i give a fuck so then they see a picture of like somebody that went from like you know uh being fat to dick skin lean in 12 weeks and that resonates people because we're you know visual animals and we look at that stuff and we're like oh well that's cool so what what what i really want for the industry is for people to stop basing their self-worth on having fucking eight-pack abs, right? So, you know, this is what I've learned as I've aged is, like, when I was in my 20s, all I cared about was having veins in my abs and getting laid and, you know, bench-pressing five pounds and all that. Now that I'm in my 40s, I'm like, I really don't even give a shit about that stuff anymore. And so what I want to do is like tell these young trainers like no one gives a shit about Your glutes or your abs or this is that what people are gonna remember is the type of person you are Right and how you treated other people so you're going to be able to do that much better If you keep yourself healthy and I can tell you right now When you get older like all you want to do is feel good and get eight hours of sleep a night night. Like that's the most important thing to you at that point is I just want to sleep eight hours a night and I don't want anything in my body to hurt anymore. Right. So in kind of in that, um, scheme of people wanting eight pack abs and they want to have veins in their elbows and all that, like people are completely fucking destroying themselves trying to get there. You don't really have to do that. If you would just back off a little bit and do things in a more scientific manner and something that makes more sense, you could just get your health in order. And guess what happens when you're healthy? Your body doesn't really want to be fat. So it just kind of falls off you. Speaking of science, that's a completely unscientific way of saying it, but it really is true. If you get your body working correctly, your body does not really want to be fat and it will basically just melt off you. Yeah. And I guess that it comes down to the human element as well. I've read some of the stuff you talk about before. Can you just talk about, I guess, I'm not sure.

or whether you teach this in your courses as well, but I guess the coaching and how to get people to make a shift with their mindset, not just from a physiological and a science-based standpoint. Yeah, 100%. And it actually is something that we teach, and we actually have a course that revolves around that whole concept. Yeah. so the course that we do we currently only do it in australia and new zealand because it's kind of a it's a cooperative that we do with some trainers that we know in new zealand and it's a it's an entire course based on the basically the science of self-sabotage like why your clients can't get their shit in order like why you know your client wants to get lean but why are they always binging Why are they always, you know, doing things that are opposite of what they need to be doing to get their health back in order? And what we found is in a lot of cases, it's not really them. You know, it's like early childhood traumas or it's like adolescent traumas or even like adulthood traumas that's causing them to do this stuff. So it could be something as simple as, you know, your dad calling you a fat ass when you're a kid. and that could get stuck in your brain and now that's who you identify with and so anytime you ever start leaning out you identify with being overweight because of something your parents said so then you start overeating and binging because that's who you identify with right so yeah in this in this course it's a kind of like a professional and a uh a personal development course and everybody that comes to it they end up like completely like breaking down and crying and you know i'm crying and zoe's crying and isaac's crying everybody's fucking crying and you know it's it's a it's such a super powerful course and it's hard for me to actually explain what happens in it because i don't really i don't really understand what's happening so uh but everyone comes to it and you you inevitably end up talking about all the fucked up shit in your life, which if you're a trainer, you're fucked up. Like there's not a single personal trainer on the face of this planet that isn't fucked up. So you end up coming to this and kind of figuring out, wow, I'm, I'm more fucked up than I thought. So let me think about how fucked up my clients are. Maybe I shouldn't be such an asshole when I'm asking them to do certain things. And maybe this is why they're fucking up all the time, because it's something that's outside of my scope of reference and maybe I need to look at somebody that can probably help them with stuff that's going on, like getting them with a counselor or getting them with a psychologist or whatever they need to kind of work through that type of stuff. Yeah. And I guess that comes down to needs analysis. You've got to problem solve and then know as a coach when to refer out to someone else when it's above your, I guess, duty of care. Yeah, what I call it is it's above your pay grade, right? And you see this all the time. You see coaches that they're not happy just teaching exercise. Now they want to be a psychologist, and they want to be a functional medicine doctor, and they want to perform open-heart surgery. And now they can cure your fucking asthma and all this other stuff. And it's like, bro, like you've got enough shit on your plate to teach people how to exercise correctly. Right. So in like it's kind of in my world where I'm not only a trainer, but I'm also a nutritionist, like I'm a sports nutritionist. So it's like, oh, yeah, I get people that they're working with other coaches and they come to me and I'm like, oh, well, this is why you're injured all the time and why you have no energy. And this is why, you know, you're not doing well in your sport because you're not fucking eating. You know, you're eating like a physique athlete instead of eating like a like a real like a field athlete or whatever. So the trainers have to understand you've got to stay in your scope of knowledge. Right. so it would be it would be crazy if if my client came to me and said yeah um i've got plaquing in my heart you think you could run a stent i'm like oh yeah sure cool we can we can do that let me book you in you know on thursday and uh we're gonna run a stent or maybe we'll just do some fucking open heart surgery cool awesome like that that sounds so incredibly ludicrous but that is the the the thinking behind a lot of coaches in our industry is they like well i can do it all i don need to send you to a proctologist I just put my finger up your ass and I see what going on with your prostate Cool It like fuck man Come on Yeah. Well, I think that happens a lot because if you go to a course on the weekend and they might be talking about certain things like cholesterol and then the trainers or the coaches might have taken it out of context and they think that you know that they're they've got the solution because they know that if you take this supplement here you could potentially reduce the the cholesterol but it's you know there's there's a bigger picture and obviously um coaches need to i guess understand that no and that's you're absolutely right you know what we need to have probably we need to create a course that teaches context like okay guys so we're gonna have a two day seminar on how to understand context and understand like i'm gonna show you some lab values i'm gonna explain to you what's going on but you have to keep it in context of what you can actually say and not say to your client and when you need to refer out right so because what happens is, and this is why I don't teach labs. I don't teach organic acids. I don't teach bloods. I don't teach any of this stuff because trainers can't be responsible to take the information for what it is. So when we actually teach you a lab value, like let's say glucose, right? Fasted glucose or hemoglobin A1C or fructosamine or whatever. I'm going to teach you this number and this is why it's relevant and this is how you actually use the information. So then the coach goes home and he goes to his client and he goes, hey, you're fasting blood sugars 5.8. I was at this seminar on the weekend and they said that at 5.8, you're going to get diabetes and you should take blah, blah, blah and blah and your doctor's a fucking moron. And then I'm over here slapping myself in the face going, oh, that's not what I taught you. Like, no, please stop. And this is why we don't talk a lot about bloods or a lot about medicine when we talk to coaches because they can't be responsible with the information. Yeah, yeah. And I think I've heard you talk about it before is I guess the context of certain things and people might read somewhere that diet soda or diet soft drink is bad and certain junk foods should be eliminated from diets altogether. but obviously this can lead to behaviors from the clients which we spoke about before is like that sort of binging cycle where you'll abstain for a long period of time and then after your six or 12 weeks, they go crazy on the foods that you've taken away. I guess how do you approach that in the real world scenario like as a coach but also as teaching your students? Yeah. So that's the thing. Like if you give someone something that's really, really restrictive, they're inevitably sooner or later going, it's going to backfire. Right. And it's going to go really bad. So it's, it's really, it's really like, um, kind of common practice in our industry to basically just starve people and give them a shit ton of work. and that's not really what you want to do. And what you end up doing when you do that is you give people a horrible, horrible relationship with food and they don't understand, like the clients don't understand what nutrition even is. And so what you should be doing is kind of feeding them for the activity. So if I'm going to give you, you know, five hours of weightlifting, I need to fuel that five hours of weightlifting. Okay. Which is what most people don't do. and so if you don't feed them for that then eventually their brain is going to go you know what i really need energy so screw you i'm going to eat whatever i can find to try to get that energy back and they end up binging and they end up binging on things like we're like super sugary and and savory food so they're searching for things with a lot of calories and then they can't control themselves so you end up creating all of these uh clients that they're really good monday through Friday and on the weekends, they just go crazy. And you're looking at their, their food log and you're like, wow, Monday through Friday, you're doing really, really well. I don't understand why you can't lose weight. And they're like, I know. And then you're like, okay, let's talk about your weekend because we're friends on Snapchat and Instagram. And I saw all the shit you got into this weekend. So why don't we talk about that fucking pizza you ate? Let's talk about like the the two fucking liters of booze you drank and let talk about all this stuff that not actually in your food log and then your client like oh yeah well you know what red wine doesn have fat or carbs so it's like free calories, right? And you're like, yeah, no, that's not how it fucking works. So it's a lot better to just feed your athletes and give them just enough of a caloric deficit to get them moving in the right direction and then play the long game, you know? I would so much rather have a client dieting for six months on a 10% caloric reduction than to put them on a 30% or 40% caloric reduction for a 12-week transformation and then find out every five or six days they're going on these massive binges, which is not healthy. So I would rather take longer and do it in a healthy manner and teach my clients how to make a sustainable lifestyle change than to say, hey, we're going to fucking totally crash your shit. You're going to feel awful, but you're going to look amazing. Like something about that just doesn't resonate with me anymore. Yeah, and I think that's a big part of, I guess, the fitness competitors, bodybuilders and bikini athletes. You see them go on these restrictive diets for three, four months at a time and then they get their competition and then they're like binging on donuts and pizza for two weeks and not necessarily it's the healthiest relationship to food at all. Oh, absolutely. And it's like you look at their Instagram and all they're doing is talking about what foods they're going to binge on once they get done with their contest. It shouldn't be like that. like bodybuilding that if you look at it in history, bodybuilding is supposed to be like a really healthy pursuit. And it's gotten to a point where it's, there's nothing healthy about it at all. And it's all about deprivation and how, how much can you suffer and drugs and all this other stuff, you know? And so then you get these girls that have completely wrecked their metabolisms by, you know, uh, taking, you know, way, way too low calories, way too much training. then they add drugs in when that when that doesn't work and then by the time they binge their metabolism is so far in the shitter that they can't have you know they can't have 700 calories without getting fat and so then they binge and they're they're massively overeating for weeks and they put on like 10 or 15 kilos and then it doesn't matter what they do they can't take it off and they're like i don't understand like i'm eating 700 calories a day and i'm doing three hours of training a day and this fat won't go away. And I'm like, yeah, your body's not stupid. It's like, yeah, we're not going to fall for that again. Like, screw you. Yeah. What would your approach be? I mean, other than telling them not to do a bikini competition, what would your approach be, I guess, for a healthy outcome? I mean, it's, you know, you're obviously pushing the limits to the body in terms of getting the body fat in particular, obviously, with females down to single digits is going to be a huge stress on the body. But I guess my answer is, is there, I guess, a healthier way that you would advise someone? Yeah. And so, okay, two parts to this, right? Number one, there's not really anything like, can you do a bikini show and do it like in a healthy manner? Absolutely. Right. So we can't really coming off the back end of that, like you can do these physique shows and you can do them and maintain your health, but only if you play the long game and understand that you're doing this for a long period of time. Now, on the other side of that, can someone in like a general population person get really, really lean and create a body that they really, really like and a physique they like, but also create optimal health? Absolutely. But again, it's about taking things slow and steady and doing it over a long period of time and not doing it at the last minute when you're like, whoa, I'm going to fucking Mexico in three weeks. I need to be lean and I've got 20 fucking pounds to lose. I'm going to do it in three weeks. That's not the right mentality. What it should be is like, okay, cool. I've got some weight I need to lose. I'm going to create a game plan over the next 12 months and I'm going to chip away at it so that I can still enjoy life and still, you know, go out with my friends and still do this and that and the other. But I can also slowly get my body where I'm comfortable, you know, on the beach or I'm comfortable being naked or whatever it is, you know, whatever it is that you're assigning to your physique or your health. It like people this day and age people want things so fast They want that they want to be insta famous and they want to be they want insta You know credibility or whatever Yeah and it like it it there nothing different with Physiology now than there was 20 years ago. It still takes time to get where you want to be Create a game plan and be very consistent over a long period of time and then guess what? But you can be healthy and look awesome. Yeah. And when you say over a long period of time, what's the time frame? Fuck. I mean, it depends on the person. So I would say for most guys, you could probably lose about a percent of your body weight a week every seven or eight days. That's probably in the good ballpark. For most girls, you're looking at probably about 60% of that. Unfortunately, the girls, they don't have the same hormones that guys do that help them to lose weight that much faster. But I would say probably girls, let's say a girl that's 70 kilos and she wants to drop 5 kilos, she's probably looking at around 10 to 12 weeks to do it in a safe manner, which is sustainable. And then she can keep that long term and without it being a pain in the ass. a guy can probably do it a hundred kilo guy he could probably lose about a kilo a week for six seven weeks and then that's going to start to drop really uh drastically probably you know six seven hundred grams a week but when we start talking about this we're talking about like how many grams a week and how many grams a day and that's how people need to start thinking about it instead of thinking like hey i need to drop 20 kilos i'm gonna do this in 12 weeks not a good not a good uh plan you know yeah yeah absolutely what what are some misconceptions i've heard you speak in uh another podcast a bit around nutrition and in particular on this other podcast you uh the the host is talking about uh fruit makes you fat um can you just talk about some i guess popular things that get pushed around on the internet and forums that necessarily aren't true at all? Oh, man, you're going to get me riled up now about the fruit thing. Yeah, fruit makes you fat and all that. And that's one of those things that's been around for so long. I remember there being an article in testosterone magazines like tmag.com in 1996 or something. I think I was like 18. If you're going to do a bodybuilding show, you can't eat fruit. Fruit will make you fat. It's the fructose and blah, blah, blah. It's absolutely untrue. So when you look at everything biochemically, it's not a big deal, like the fructose stuff, especially fruit, because most fruit that you're going to be eating doesn't have a ton of fructose in it anyway. So if you look at a banana, a medium-sized banana's got, what, 20, 25, 26 grams of carbs, and when you look at how much fructose that is, it's really only about 5 or 6 grams. And when you start digging through the research, it's pretty inconclusive about what's the lowest threshold of fructose you can have before it starts making you fat. And you'll find numbers anywhere from 30 up to 150 grams of fructose, right? And that's in big bolus dosages. So if I think about bananas, so there's five or six grams of fructose in a banana, I can't tell you the last time I ate like six bananas in one sitting. And that's realistically what it would take to actually be a problem. And for most people, that's not a big deal. Even if you look at fruitarians who only eat fruit, you don't see a lot of big, fat, obese fruitarians because they don't eat a lot of calories. And at the end of the day, the calories are what matters. Absolutely. Yeah. And I guess with trends of like the whole keto movement of people claiming that it's the answer to fat loss, I guess it comes down to calories. You're restricting certain food groups out of your diet completely. and I guess you get people subscribing to one way of eating, whether it's paleo, whether it's ketogenic diet, whether it's veganism or whatever it is. I guess the answer is not always that sort of one-eyed approach. Yeah, you know, it's all the isms, right? Veganism, paleoism, you know, whatever. The problem with nutrition is it's a lot like religion, right? everybody has their god that they worship, whether that's the god of ketones or the god of vegetables.

or whatever. And they're all right for a lot of reasons, but they're also all wrong for a lot of reasons. And so we have to look at everything. It's what we talked about earlier with talking about context, right? So you really want to look at the context of what it is. So are there times where a ketogenic diet might be really good? Yeah, they might be. Like, let's say you've got fatty liver. Maybe you got fatty liver, right? And the doctor says, oh, you got to get rid of this fatty liver. You say, okay, cool. I can get on ketones. Where do we make ketones? In the liver. Okay, what do we make it from? Fat. Oh, okay. So if we want to take a fatty liver and try to make it non-fatty, then we could probably assume that doing a ketogenic diet would defat your liver by breaking down that fat to make ketones, right? Now, we don't really know that, but it makes sense. if you love animals do your be a vegan whatever but what people have to understand is you just got to find the right diet that works well for you what diet do you eat that you feel the best on I did a vegan diet for you know three weeks just to see kind of what my clients go through and not only did was it vegan it was keto vegan so it's like a lot of coconut oil a tiny bit of beans and a shit ton of fucking vegan protein powder, which tastes like shit, but it works. And I actually felt amazing. And Zoe, after like a week of it, she thought I was crazy. And she looks at me and she goes, wow, you look really good. Like your skin looks good. And I'm like, yeah, but I want some meat really fucking bad. And so I did it for a few weeks and it was a good experience, but it's not something I could do long term. So, you know, people need to understand like stop stop pushing your fucking nutritional religion on people and let people eat the way they fucking want to eat there is no best way of eating the best way of eating is eating eat some food how do you feel i feel great awesome eat like keep eating like that how do you feel i feel like shit don't eat that shit anymore cool that's it's as simple as that you know yeah and i guess bring it back to to principles and fundamentals would you i guess look at someone's biomarkers on a certain diet and then say to them, okay, well, you're eating this certain way, but your HDL cholesterol is through the roof, your C-reactive protein is up. Is that something you'd, I guess, look at with a client and with your coaches as well? You could, you could, but you have to, again, let's go back to context. Who are we talking to? Are we talking to a nutritionist? From a nutritionist perspective of what they can do, are we talking about like personal trainers, right? So, you know, you've got 10% of the population with a, what is it, the APOE44 gene polymorphism, where if they eat high fat, their cholesterol is going to go up. And that's like 10% of the population. So if I'm looking at someone's labs and I say, oh, wow, your fucking cholesterol is really atrocious. What are you eating? Okay, yeah, we're going to probably do the opposite of what you're doing right now. Um, you know, it's, it's, it's that type of stuff, right? So, and not everybody's going to, not everyone has access to labs and not everybody's willing to do it. And most trainers and most nutritionists can't read labs correctly anyways. So, um, I don't really base things off of that. What I basically do is we'll, we'll, you know, if you hire me for your nutrition, I say, okay, um, this is what your weight's at. This is where you want to be. This is the way you want to look. This is how much you're training a week. This is how much energy I think you should be eating a week. So your food volume in calories is here. So based on your build and your ancestry and all that, we're probably going to do more carbs or less carbs or whatever. And this is where we're going to set our protein, that type of thing. Now let's track your food over a couple of weeks. And then I look at it and I say, okay, how do you feel? Oh, I haven't pooped in two weeks. okay that's not a good thing let's look at your diet oh i see you're eating this why don't we switch a couple of these things out let's see if you start pooping again and then you know we revisit it in a couple of weeks and they're like oh yeah i'm pooping like five times a day awesome you know so it's when you look at like nutritional consulting and and what you tell people is you just got to ask how they feel and you look at it and if they've got bloods awesome like we can look get bloods and we can make things really fancy. But for the most part, people don't need fancy, they need consistency. And you don't have to be fancy to get consistency. You just got to encourage them to be really, really strict and eat the things they're supposed to be eating, which is a huge part of the battle. Yeah. And so you wouldn't necessarily go down the path, or if you working with a functional medical doctor you wouldn go down the path of food intolerance testing and that side of things You know what I hate food intolerance testing I don't want to say that it's completely pointless, but I am going to say this, that the food intolerance testing is incredibly inconsistent. you could i i know i'm not gonna say any names of who had done this since we're on a podcast but i have friends that are strength conditioning coaches and they train a lot of pro athletes and in a lot of cases they've taken three samples from an athlete put three different names on it sent it in they got three different fucking reports and it was the same athlete so when I see that I'm like okay why am I going to charge my client $500 to run this expensive testing when the testing isn't even that good like it's nothing that we can't accomplish with a good elimination diet which doesn't cost them anything but like 5 minutes so I can set you down and I can say alright cool what are the like tell me all the major proteins you eat a week tell me all the major vegetables and fruits and all that and what fat you eat. And the protein, you're going to get the same thing, like beef, chicken, eggs. That's going to be like your main ones, right? So depending on who you're talking to, you might get a few different things. Okay, so we're not going to eat those for the next like three weeks. We're going to instead eat turkey, more fish, prawns or whatever. So we're going to give them alternates to eat and we're going to eliminate the stuff that they eat all the time because we're going to assume that they probably have an issue with some of that food. So we'll just get rid of it. Right. So I don't need you to pay me $500. I don't need to interpret any fancy testing and IgG panel or MRT or any of that stuff. I'm just going to tell you, don't eat the shit you usually eat and let's give you a different menu. And then we eat that for three weeks. How do you feel? Oh, I feel amazing. All right, cool. Are you bloated? No, my bloat's gone away. I'm not gassy and that type of stuff. Oh, that's great. Okay, cool. Let's add some of those foods back in the next day. They're like, oh my God, I'm bloated. And I just farted and all the paint started peeling off the walls and my hair fell out and I'm like okay don't eat that again let's pull that back out you know so people try to over complicate things and and this industry is so so about just like ripping people off and making money it's like just keep shit simple until it needs to be complex like I don't even run I run zero labs on people unless we get to the four month mark and something's not working if i can't fix it in four months off symptoms now we're going to run tests because there's going to be something that only a test is going to show us at that point yeah yeah i think that's a powerful message uh that i guess coaches and people need to to get is is that you you know you don't have to start with looking at those biomarkers you can just make it completely uncomplicated and using the person's feedback is often just more powerful. And as we talked about before, the food panels aren't necessarily the most reliable things in the world. In terms of what are your non-negotiables in terms of the fundamentals that when you get someone and they say, okay, I want you to coach me, what I heard you've talked about before in terms of you've got a huge question section where they have to, you know, fill in a log of, you know, what they've done in the past and obviously food recall and that sort of stuff. What, just I guess to summarize, what are the key areas that you're looking at in that questions section that you see when you see a new client? Okay. So, like some of the stuff we're looking for is probably what's the most important thing to their progress other than training, which is how are you sleeping? Are you sleeping okay? How many hours? At what time do you get in the bed? What time do you wake up? Do you need the alarm clock to wake up or do you just wake up naturally? Do you wake up a bunch of times to pee? That's huge. We also look at, let's look at a dietary recall. But after 20 years of this, I'm hesitant to take people's word for their dietary recall because they usually give you the two best days of the week and they don't tell you about all the other shit that they don't want you to know about, like all the binging and all that stuff. We want to know, like we do a huge, we do two different digestive and assimilation questionnaires. And the reason is, is because we normally will see stuff on one that was a negative, but then we see a positive on the other one So if you ever done like the what is the Briggs like personality testing type of stuff And you like fuck they asked me the same question like 400 times but they ask it in a different way every time That's kind of how our digestive questionnaires go. Because at the end of the day, like when you look at food, food is not really technically fuel. It's pre-fuel. The body does not run on carbohydrates. The body doesn't run on sugar. It doesn't run on fat. It doesn't run on amino acids. It's what that stuff is broken down into, which is what the body actually truly runs on. And so you have to start looking at, okay, here's the calories, here's the macros. Is that stuff actually getting into circulation appropriately? Cool. Okay, that's good. now is that stuff actually being turned into things that my body can use chemically to make energy yes no maybe so we need to figure out what's going on there so that there's all the stuff that we ask revolves around basically what's on your plate okay how are you chewing it how are you digesting it how are you assimilating it and is it actually getting turned into usable energy And then are you eliminating it by, you know, pooping and that type of thing? So that's basically our questionnaires revolve around pooping, you know. That's awesome. So you just touched, you mentioned before the Myers-Briggs. In terms of working with people, I guess, compliance is a huge part of it. Getting people to do what is going to make them healthier and better in the long term. Is there any approach that you use to get, I guess, better compliance? And I guess we talked about it before in terms of habits and not, you know, taking things away from them necessarily that they're going to force them into a binge cycle. Is there, I guess, a communication style or coaching style that you assess for the individual? Not really. You know, a lot of people do the – they do the like the Braverman test and all that. I think it's all a bunch of bullshit, to be honest. I think the closest thing to figuring that out is probably Christian Thibodeau's. He has a seminar that you take a really long test. It's kind of like the Briggs-Myers, and it classifies you in three different categories, and there's some subcategories and things. I think he probably has the closest thing that we're going to have at this time to figuring out where someone needs to be as far as a coaching perspective, but also in like what rep ranges you're going to, you know, like more and like what type of lifting, whether it's explosive or drop sets or whatever. And then also like food and stuff like that. But honestly, like coaching is an art, man. Um, you've got, you've got all the science, but there's nothing that beats experience. So you, you, you learn over time that there there's, you know, dozens and dozens of different types of personalities that you're looking at and you have to figure out what makes each of those tick um that way you can get you those clients to move in the positive direction you're moving them towards but the problem is like take spending you know two decades trying to figure all that shit out um and then also and also being honest with yourself of you don't have to train everybody like there's gonna be some personalities that just don't agree with you like I have a personality that it's not for everybody. You either really love me or really hate me. And I'm okay with that. And you should be okay with that too. When I train somebody, they know what the deal is. I'm fucking daddy. What I say goes, if you can't do what I tell you to do, then I don't need to fucking train you. I'm going to, if I can't, if you can't follow daddy's rules and that type of thing, then daddy will find you someone else to train with that has a different personality style. you know and that's the way it goes you know so um i think that a lot of that a large part of that's really really on the the coach's shoulders to um kind of look at himself be honest with himself which a lot of us have a problem doing and saying well maybe i'm not the type of person needs to train everyone so i need to really make a niche market of these are the types of people that i want to train and i enjoy training and they enjoy training with me and then i need to refer anyone else to someone else that like really vibes with that type of personality trait. Um, because you'll, you'll just bash your head in the wall for, for ages. Like why can't these people get their shit together? And sometimes it's way out of your wheelhouse. You know, it's, it's, uh, something you need to see a counselor for, or, you know, part of it's like, so sometimes if you're a real dick um your clients are gonna fucking eat cake just to spite you you know So so You trying to help your client and you like hey you fucking retard why can you fucking eat the way I tell you to And they like I fucking eating this cake because you a dick and I hate your gut and you know that type of thing So, you're probably not a good fit for those types of people. Yeah. Well, I think that's a powerful message. You know, you can't fix everyone. And to think that you can, you're sort of, I guess, deluded. and now obviously you learn that you know for being in the industry for for two decades now obviously being a coach and being an educator obviously there's there's been some mistakes that you would have made in the past is there any sort of big pivotal things that I guess you think of and think shit why the hell was I doing that but obviously you learned from that is there anything that comes to mind with that oh christ where do i start um yeah so okay so the number one thing is demonizing exercises and thinking that things are stupid so i i posted on facebook the other day it was a reshare something i shared like a year ago and my friend my friend dr mike t nelson had posted something um last year saying you know what if if my client thought that standing on an upside down Bosu ball doing single arm like Zottman curls or some shit like that while, you know, singing Dixie or whatever, if they thought that was the best fucking exercise in the world, guess what? I would let them do it because in their mind, they're going to give it a hundred percent effort and that's going to actually get them results. And I really, I really like that, that statement he made really like hit a chord with me because in 2013, I was in a seminar with um uh dr robert spolsky who wrote uh why zebras don't get ulcers um and he's a i mean the guy's a phenomenal guy he's a freaking ridiculous brainiac genius and he was talking in front of 300 strength conditioning coaches and he did a whole 90 minute talk about um stress and stress response and that type of thing and somebody asked him what the best exercise was and he goes you know uh i think that the best exercise for people is the exercise that they enjoy doing and i looked at him and i went wow fuck what a dick i've been because i kind of grew up in that era of you know if if if you can't fix it with squats and fish oil you're probably gonna die so you know so then i thought back about like all the people over the previous 15 years like wow all the people I made I made them squat because I like to squat and I think everyone should have to squat but they didn't actually enjoy squatting like what a dick I've been to make people do exercises that for whatever reason dogmatically I think they're the best but they're not really the best for everyone and not everyone enjoys it and what I should have been doing was creating an environment where people are having fun and having joy in their training and getting results so that we're all happy and I'm providing a service, which is what they're paying for, that they actually want to do. So a lot of it, like the whole first, the majority of the first 75% of my career was being an absolute alpha male silverback gorilla dickhead douchebag and making people do things that probably they didn't really have to do to get to the goals that they wanted. Um, and just, you know, you know, that type of thing and dangerous things in the whole, when I was teaching some of the stuff I was teaching from the company, I won't name, um, and realizing that a lot of it was a whole heap of bullshit. And now that I'm actually gone and reading textbooks going, wow, I was really teaching some shit. Um, and then trying to rectify that now. So yeah, you know, just like every other trainer, there's growing pains and you kind of learn by being a real dumb ass and then one day you wake up and you go okay wow i actually kind of figure out what's going on and i've got good mentors now and wow some of the stuff i was teaching back then or training people with probably was really fucking stupid and i won't do that again but that's i think that's indicative of any career you know that you go into is there's going to be a point where you get into the career you're amped up you're learning you start teaching stuff that's probably not correct and then eventually 20 years later you wake up and go holy shit i want to go i want to build a time machine to go back and kick my own ass because i probably should have been teaching that stuff yeah so yeah yeah it's a great answer and i think you know we're all guilty of it um and but you know it's something you only learn after after you've made those mistakes and then you meet the the mentors that sort of open you up to

I guess the bigger picture and that is, you know, compliance and long-term overall health. Yeah, 100%. And, you know, when you first get in, when you're 20, you know, when you're 19 or 20 and you get in the industry, like your whole MO is having six-pack abs or eight-pack abs. And, you know, you you basically all of your training cycles revolve around either holiday in Mexico or Ibiza or whatever or or going to seminars. We have to take a shirt off like, oh, I'm going to bio-sig. So I'm going to fucking diet down. So I'm like the leanest dude there like that. That's your whole like M.O. when you're in your 20s and you get in your 30s and you're like, OK, things start to your values start to change. And then you get in your 40s and they change massively. So, you know, it's the inevitable growth cycle of a personal trainer when it's someone who's a lifelong trainer and somebody who like this is like their career. Like this wasn't a secondary thing for me. I didn't go into real estate and didn't decide, oh, fuck this. I'm going to be a personal trainer, count reps. It was something that, you know, you've always wanted to do. So if you're a lifer like I am, you kind of go into it and you look back on like every 10 years, you look back and go, wow, man, that stuff I was doing back then, what a fucking idiot I was. Man, I really wish I could kick my own ass right now. But that's the way it is. Yeah, but I think it was also being – some people sort of take the view that it's not as good, but being a generalist and seeing, I guess, the health as a total, the sum of its all parts versus if you go see someone who's a specialist just in one specific area, they're going to get you good. say it's a powerlifting coach, they're going to teach you powerlifting. They're not going to sit you on a, on a BOSU ball or do yoga with you. And if you go to see a yoga teacher, it's the same thing. They're going to teach you, you yoga. But I guess for you, I guess you've seen a bit of a bigger picture, um, in your career. Yeah. You know, but I, I've also been fortunate enough to never limit myself. So like, um, when I first started, I started lifting because I wanted to be a bodybuilder. And then I got into high school, and I wanted to be a wrestler because I watched Vision Quest with, I think it's Matthew Modine. I don't even know if you've ever seen that movie, but it's like an early 1980s movie, Vision Quest. The guy was a wrestler against all odds and all that stuff. But I went to the head coach in my high school and said, hey, I want to start a wrestling team in our high school. And he was like, nobody in Texas wrestles. That's like the Midwest and the North. And I'm like, okay. And he goes, plus we're like a fucking really poor school, and there's nobody we can actually wrestle against. So I tell you what, why don't we start powerlifting? And I went, yeah, what's that? And he goes, you'll get really fucking strong and jacked. And I go, cool, sign me up. So I started a powerlifting team in my high school when I was 14. And, you know, you get kind of locked into that. So I was a powerlifter and a bodybuilder and this and that. And some people never leave that type of thing. And there's nothing wrong with that because we need people who specialize in things. Like there's people that I call on a daily basis to specialize in something that I'm not good at. So whether it's medicine or whether it's orthotics or whether it's powerlifting or whether it's weightlifting, I've got a list of people I call. And that's all they do. um but for me because i'm i because of my add i can't just specialize in one little thing i i want to have my hand in a lot of different things and you know for lack of a better word being like the crossfit of trainers the crossfit of educators i know i know a little bit about a whole lot of stuff and um and if i don't know a lot about one subject i do know the right people so let's get you with those people. So, um, there has to be a, an area where there's a general hub like muscle nerds where you're like, Hey, I like this. Cool. Learn this from us. And then when you're ready, we'll send you to this other person to then get, you know, further education and what you want to go into. Um, but there's not a whole lot of that going on. Like, uh, most people in the industry, they specialize in like one or two different things. Um, whereas, you know, like you said, We kind of have our fingers and a little bit of everything And then we had we do have our specialties like physique and general population training and powerlifting but There's there's a lot of stuff we don do like if you came to me and you said I have to get a this guy ready for the Olympics in badminton And you say Luke what do I do And I go don ask me Fuck call You know what I would do I would call Stefan Kozolt over at Kilo and ask him because that's the guy. If I had to train somebody for the Olympics, that's the dude I would call. So it's good to have the generalized foundational stuff. But then you also have to have specialists that they know their thing inside and out. and that's the guy you want to talk to if you have to go that route. Yeah, and I think that's great in terms of coaches need to understand that referring out isn't a sign of necessarily weakness. It's a sign of knowing and if you're someone who refers out and gets a result for someone, then they're going to come back to you and ask you next time because you've sort of built up that trust and reputation. Yeah, 100%. Like referring out is not a sign of weakness. It's a sign of strength. It's a sign that you're comfortable enough to admit that you don't know enough about a certain subject, so you're going to have to get some help. And in an industry where it's fueled by narcissism and egotistical guys and people that want to be alpha males and they want to be leaders, they don't want to ask for help. And that's the dumbest thing. Like I ask for help all the fucking time because, you know, you can only know so much. And so I have meant just like a muscle nerds is a mentor for a lot of people. I have I have mentors that I go to as well because there's stuff I want to know that I don't know enough about. And, bro, there's always going to be somebody who knows a lot more than you do at a certain subject. So trying to pretend like you're the expert is lunacy because there's always a guy with a bigger dick that's going to be like, oh, really? Let's talk about this. And then you're like, oh, shit, my dick isn't as big as I thought it was. So I don't know if I can cuss and say that, but that's the thing. Everybody stands at the table to pull their dicks out. Who's got the biggest dick? And I can tell you right now, in some of the circles where I get my information from, I got the freaking smallest penis there. So when you're dealing with people like Brian Walsh and Ben House and Mike Nelson and guys that have like four PhDs, they make you feel not by intention just because they're so brilliant. They make you feel like the smallest person in the fucking world, and that's the people you want to hang out with the most. Yeah. Yeah. So being a peak performer, I'm sort of interested in what you do, I guess, personally on a daily basis to, I guess, operate on a peak level with your business and just your own sort of training. So what does your daily practice look like, napping, nutrition, and training routines yourself? okay so man my schedule has not been normal since i started traveling and uh dealing with 800 time zones so um i try i try my best to go to bed like and this is it's gonna make me sound like i'm a fucking grandpa i try to get in bed at like 8 or 8 30 at night yeah because i i i have a really poor sleeping pattern so sometimes i can wake up at like three in the morning and i'm awake and there's no going back to bed. So I don't try to fight it anymore. I just, I just basically will wake up at three 30 and go to the gym and I'll get my, knock that out, have some coffee, get some work done. So if I know that it's going to be one of those types of days, I just go to bed super fucking early. So I'll, I'll, uh, I'm one of the, those, uh, weirdos that likes baths. So I'll get in the bath you know i'll take a little bit of phenobot and uh i'll take some zinc and magnesium and some other stuff and you know i'll do a little little sleepy time tea and you know get in the you know bathtub a little soft music and read a little bit and i'll sit in there for a while and then you know then i'll get in bed and what i'll typically do is i've got the the bows kind of noise canceling headphones and i'll put on uh spotify i'll put on like delta waves so i'll put on delta waves or some type of sleep type app and that pretty much knocks me out um and then uh i'll wake up in the middle of that because i'm snoring and zoe's punching me um and then i'll go back to sleep yeah and when i get up it's like wake up check messages you know check facebook check instagram check uh email have some coffee then go to the gym and then when i get at home, it's like we just get started and we just do our shit. But there's some supplements and stuff that I take that people might be interested in But I do Thorne Basic Detox Nutrients I take like fuck it if the people at Thorne found out about this I take 24 of those a day Oh wow Yeah, which is double the label dosage, but it gives for someone who's 100 kilos and it gives me all the stuff that I need at the right amount. There's a brain supplement that I take that I really like called Qualia. Q-U-A-L-I-A. if you're from qualia please start sending me free shit because i'm tired of paying for it yeah it's it's ridiculously expensive but it's it has like every nootropic known to man um and it is like i can't even function without it so those are two of the ones that i do like a really good multivitamin multi-mineral and uh the qualia that those those things i have to have and coffee mass amounts of coffee yeah yeah and and you just touch on your training what is your sort of training, I guess, program generally look like? What sort of stuff are you into? So right now I'm kind of doing some functional hypertrophy, you know, at the point where I'm finally under 100 kilos for the first time since I was like 12. So I'm trying to stay under 100. I know that sounds so weird because everyone else is trying to get bigger and I'm like, no, I'm trying to get smaller. Like I actually want to be able to buy stuff off the rack and have it fit normally. So, um, most of my training right now revolves around getting my strength back, um, and also getting some of my anaerobic power back up because last year I focused really heavily on getting my aerobic fitness back up. And so now I kind of went too far. So now my aerobic fitness is like fucking smashing it. Like I can go forever, but I can't produce power anymore. So now I have to kind of dial it back and bring more anaerobic and more power development back into it. So that's kind of that. And basically just trying to stay injury free. Um, I've had some issues with my lower back and a scapula and stuff like that. And basically doing dumb shit and snap city. So, yeah. Um, most of my training revolves around like getting into a squat and having it feel really awesome without like having any pain and suffering any consequences. Yeah. Yeah. You touched on before, obviously, with your bath routine and taking those sort of relaxing supplements, obviously, to get yourself in more of a parasympathetic tone. Do you also practice any sort of like breathing drills or breathing mechanics or meditation, that sort of stuff? I do. And I have in the past. It just depends. I've gotten to a point now where I really took my, um, my least mode seriously. Like I'm like, okay, okay. We, we kind of developed this least mode type of, um, concept. So I really need to get into it and make sure that like I'm living it. So I've gotten to the point where I don't really need it anymore because I spent so much time doing it last year where I was doing a lot of aerobic work, aerobic intervals, and a lot of breathing and breathing mechanics and getting treatment on my ribs so I could breathe better and that type of thing. And now like my waking heart rate is ridiculous. My blood pressure is ridiculous. Like everything's really good. So I don't actually have to consciously work at it anymore. Now, like what I'm doing now is consciously adding more beast mode back in so that I can then basically turn myself into a fucking machine again. For a while, I was a machine, but I was breaking all the time. So I got to a point where I was like, I'm fed up. I need to fix things first and then build myself back into the Terminator. And that's basically what I've done. So doing a lot of the aerobic work, doing a lot of breathing, a lot of meditation, a lot of headspace. Yeah, I got all of my metrics looking really good now to the point where I can pretty much abuse the hell out of myself and my blood pressure never gets above like 113 over, you know, 64. Yeah. Um, so now it's like, now it's all about, let's see how much volume I can keep pushing to myself to then make my metrics go in the direction I don't want them to go in. Because then that shows me that I'm overreaching. And now, you know, I can figure out what I need to do to actually progress and what I, what I have to do and then back off of that. Does that make sense? Yeah, absolutely. And I guess those biomarkers that you're looking at, you're looking at HIV, blood pressure, is that generally how you're sort of doing it? Yeah for me the main one is blood pressure because what I found is with all the traveling and the time zones and the late nights and the work that the one that most transient That and your waking heart rate those are the two that are going to move the most the fastest And those are the two that I feel like you have the most amount of control over. So I'm looking at blood pressure. And for us, the standard is 115 over 75. That's kind of your gold standard. So above and below that, you know, five beats or whatever is fine for waking heart rate. I'm looking at somewhere like in a low to mid 50s is pretty good, you know. HRV is fine. The problem is we've kind of standardized our stuff on the Polar H10 heart rate strap and then Elite HRV as being the application. but it's kind of a pain in the ass for clients because even like we specialize in training other personal trainers and a lot of those guys they've got like five or six days where they'll actually put on the heart rate strap and take the data and then it just goes to the shit real fast and they never do it again so we're looking for other ways to measure that type of thing where you don't need any equipment so we've been playing around with hrv for training um i just don't know they don't actually give an hrv so you kind of have to figure things out using other data and i just haven't figured it out yet but yeah um i also do uh blood glucose so i've got a glucomer and i take my glucose every morning um so yeah there there's a ton like within five minutes of me waking up i've taken like eight biometrics yeah yeah and what For blood glucose, what are you aiming for with your waking? Yeah, based on the research, I'm looking around like 4.7, 4.8 or below. So just depending. I personally, I feel best around 4.4, 4.5. If it gets much below that, I start feeling hypo. I know I've got clients that feel really good at like 3.8. They just don't seem to need that much. But, you know, you just got to measure it and see where you feel the best. But the majority of the research that you'll see out there when they look at like with the ranges, I think the range is like 3.7 to 5.7 or something like that. And what they found is once you start getting above about 4.8, your predisposition to getting cardiovascular disease or diabetes goes up exponentially. The more above 4.8 you get. Yeah. So that's kind of what we look at. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that makes sense. So we're drawing to the end of the interview, but I've got a couple of rapid-fire questions. They don't have to be rapid-fire answers. You can take as long as you want. Okay. But just a series of questions. So first one is, what's your all-time favorite training book and or self-help book, something that's, I guess, shaped you and your career? Okay, I'll give you two. The first one I think should be a must-read for everyone is Charles Poliquin's Poliquin Principles. If you haven't read that, if you don't have a copy that looks like it's been through hell and back, I seriously question your ability to be a good trainer. because I remember I had a copy that just looked like it had been beaten and drawn and quartered and all that. And back when they only had one edition of it and you couldn't buy a new one. And man, I just completely destroyed that. And I firmly believe that should be one of the top books that people read. I think if you really want to get into the science of training, you've got to read Super Training. and you got to read it like 500 times so you actually understand it yeah so that's mel sift super training um and then kind of kind of off not training but something i think everybody should read is the sword of truth series by um terry goodkind um it's it's a fantasy if you feel like like wizards and shit like that which that's the type of stuff that i read yeah um you'd really like it but there's a lot of philosophy underlying in it and there's a lot of objectivism so which i'm a big fan of so yeah basically you know teaching people how to fucking help themselves instead of thinking that other people need to help them you know yeah yeah that's a good answer i haven't haven't uh heard that one before uh next if favorite any favorite movies Deadpool Deadpool is a pretty funny absolutely yeah yeah Deadpool that's my spirit animal man yeah

He's me. I'm the Deadpool of the fitness industry. Yeah. Well, I can equate the two of you together. It's an easy link. Do you have any quotes that you'd say on a daily basis? Don't necessarily have to be from someone else, but is there a certain phrase or thing that you'd say to your students or to people around you on a daily basis? Man, there's so many. Um, yeah, I mean, one of the ones I've been using a lot lately that I really like is keep things simple until they need to be complex. Like in an industry that wants to try to overcomplicate things to sell you full of a lot of bullshit, just keep things fundamentally very basic and simple and hammer those basics really well and you won't have to get too complex with things until later. Right. So that's one. there's one from that book I just talked about, the Sword of Truth series. It's the Wizard's First Rule, which the Wizard's First Rule says that people are stupid, right? And when I say that, it sounds so bad, but when you explain it further, it makes sense. Like, people are stupid. People want to believe things, that they want to believe things are true because they fear that they're untrue. Right. So this is, and you see this a lot in our industry where you've got young trainers that flock to these, there's a, like a new, um, there's a whole new era of educators or want to be educators that were never students. They just started teaching people, but they don't really have any experience and they don't have a portfolio and they don't really know what they're talking about, but they, they latch on all these crazy ideas and young people who are, you know, typically very gullible and naive will latch on to these ideas and they latch on to these educators and that's what they start to follow and it's something that i i think that we've got to put it into because it's it's not doing anything really positive for our industry and uh we need to get back to like really sound solid science yeah that's a fantastic answer now last last question, if you could give yourself advice when you first started out working in the industry what would the advice be to yourself Ooh stop being a douchebag That what I would tell myself I be like you know what There's a lot of stuff I would change and a lot of stuff I wouldn't change. My desire to speak out against the dumb shit in the industry, I've always been like that. And I would go back in time and say, don't ever let that go because not a lot of people have the courage to speak out. so that's something that sets you a bit apart um is the fact that you're you're you're willing to stick your fucking neck out even if you get your head chopped off um so i would definitely tell myself to keep that up but what i would do is i'd go back in time and say be more empathetic like um really give a shit about your clients and stop being such a fucking idiot like mary muffin top doesn't need to do milo sarcev fucking giant sets and shit like what she needs to do is she needs you to fucking understand what she's going through and tell her how to eat properly and in a way that isn't fucking inconvenient and something she can actually do and give her a training program she actually enjoys so she stays with you forever and ever you know that type of thing that's the the shit i would give myself is the same shit i tell our students now is yeah give a shit about your clients you don't know everything there are people out there are much smarter than you, so stop being an idiot. Just go out there and help as many people as you can. Don't give a fuck about money. Just help people. That's what you really need to focus on. If you just spend a long time helping a lot of people, you're going to get everything you want out of life. That's very true. What's in store for the next 12 months for you and Muscle Nerds? oh my god um i wish i could tell you that i had 12 months um playing my place six months or three months yeah i wish i could tell you that i had 12 months of playing god of war and trying to finish that but um the truth of the matter is god uh zoe and i are taking our first ever holiday we're going to um thailand uh july 11th for like a week and a half yeah which Which is crazy because we've never actually gone somewhere that wasn't tied into work. So we've got that. And then I go to Ireland, the Irish Strength Institute. I've got a couple of talks there. Then I in London in August for a couple of our seminars Then I in Chicago after that for a seminar of ours um then i probably go see my parents and go back to texas to get some barbecue uh then i come home to brisbane then i go back to america and canada and in uh august or october for a swiss and some seminars so yeah and then uh yeah so then it's like looking at 2019 like what's going on where do we have to be yeah sounds like a crazy uh schedule now finally where can people uh get in contact with you and find out more about muscle nerds and and what what you're doing so we've got our website which is pretty shitty but we're working on it um we i say that in every podcast and we never make it any better but um it's there it's it's it's there it's uh uh muscle nerds.net. We're also on, you know, the, the old, the good old Facebook. So, uh, you can find us there. Muscle nerds. We have a forum that's not very active, but muscle nerds Inc. We're on, um, Instagram. You can search me on Instagram, uh, Luke Lieben, um, Zoe Knight, Isaac Davidson. Um, you can also, uh, do our muscle nerds page on there's muscle nerds underscore health. Um, and that's where we post a lot of our social media stuff. And we're, we're, look, we're terrible at that, man. I mean, to be honest, I don't know. I don't understand how people can be so good on social media. I just assume that if you're really good on social media, you're not actually doing that much business. So that's the only thing I can, that's the only thing I reckon, because these guys are on social media all fucking day. And I'm like, I don't know how you have time to do this stuff. Cause I got too much shit to do. So, um, but you know, we, we, we throw up as much stuff as we have time for. And you know, if you really want to get into what we're doing, come to a seminar and find out what we're all about, man, because that's where we give you the good shit. Yeah, we'll have to get you out to Dubai at some stage and get a seminar happening here. I love Dubai. Man, I would love to come as long as it's not in summer. I mean, I'm from Texas and it's hot in Texas, but nothing prepares you for Dubai in the summer. Holy crap. It's summer at the moment or just the beginning of it and it's 40 something degrees and it beats you down outside. There's no other way to put it. I remember the first time I went to Dubai I had to teach bio and I walked into the hotel and I didn leave the hotel until it was time to go to the airport like I wouldn even I wouldn even go outside to go to the pool and I was in one of the lounges there and one of the waiters kept opening the door to go outside and every time he opened the door it felt like I put my head in an oven and I went man, this is bullshit. Yeah. I mean, on the opposite end, it has like six or eight months of like beautiful sunshine sort of between sort of 25 to 30 degrees. That's so good. Which I enjoy. But yeah, it's definitely, summer's a tough one. Yeah. Like in Brisbane right now, it's, you know, you wake up, it's like eight or nine in the morning. so it's a bit chilly but by 11 o'clock it's like 18, 19 to 20 so it's like the best time of the year here right now it's so good but in the summer time it's like 4000 percent humidity and 34 degrees so it's pretty gnarly yeah awesome well thanks very much Luke for agreeing to come on the podcast it's been a great conversation picked up many things and no doubt the listeners will We'll pick up just as many things as I have. All right. Hey, thanks for having me on. I really appreciate it. I hope you guys enjoyed this episode. Luke is a very entertaining character and offered a lot in this interview. I encourage everyone to connect with him online. He posts great online content on a weekly basis. You can find the relevant links to his social media accounts on my website at hulk-strength.com. dot com please hit the subscribe button to the podcast through itunes stitcher tune in or google play so you can be updated for the very next episode plus if you'd like some of my free online training resources subscribe to my email list at hulk-strength.com i have a number of free documents for goal setting nutrition and training programs also don't forget if you want 25 off your next MyProtein order for supplements, training apparel or equipment. They can be also found in the show notes of this podcast or on my website. Until next time, stay strong.