If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook, you know that I say a lot of “ridiculous” sh*t, especially when it comes to nutrition. Things like, “if my fatloss stalls for a week, I increase my calories, not decrease them.” Or, “I ate a family size package of brats over the weekend and lost a pound.” When it comes to training, people don’t understand why I would EVER do 13 sets of 8 reps on just 1 lift. Why is it that I do the “crazy” sh*t I do?

Listen, I do say that stuff mostly to troll for a response from all the clean eating, follow a rigid program fanatics out there, but I really am doing everything I say. What I’m not doing is giving you any background information as to how and why I get away with it. Why? Because I’m trying to distance myself from all the experts and gurus out there. F*ck those guys. Who wants to eat clean 100% of the time? Who can afford the lifestyle to be able to eat 6 perfectly portioned, all-organic meals throughout the day? Not hardly anyone in my experience. So rather than fight it, why not work within what your body will allow? Why not try to optimize yourself in order to eat the way you want to eat?

I don’t think anyone will ever say that eating clean is bad for you. In fact, if they do, I would probably consider them more of a ritard than the people pushing a 100% clean diet all the time. Eating clean is NOT bad for you…..it’s just extremely difficult to stick to and very intrusive on most people’s lifestyle.

So why wouldn’t you want to eat the foods you like and still accomplish your physique goals? It is freakin possible people. After years and years and years of experimenting, meeting the right people, and doing a little research, I’m pretty sure I’ve found the way to eat what you like, when you like, and still progress in your training and physique goals. There’s no miracles here. I won’t promise you that you can lose 40lb. in 2 months. That was, as all the infomercials say, “results not typical”. If you eat and train the way that I’ve finally figured out, you will see results, get to ENJOY food, and NOT have your life impacted by your diet. Why not do what works for YOU, not what someone else says will work for you?

The next thing that absolutely freaks people the f*ck out is that I don’t foam roll or do any static stretching.

“Well, that may work for you, but it won’t work for everybody. Not only that, but you’re probably inflexible and just don’t know it.”

O’rly?!?! When I do a sitting toe touch, which only shows the flexibility of the hamstrings and lower back in isolation (which almost never occurs in real world movement btw), I can plant my face directly between my knees. I can do a bodyweight squat ass to grass without falling backwards. I can rattle off more than 10 pistol squats ass to grass. I can catch an Olympic Snatch behind my head. How much more flexibility/mobility do you need? Why do I *HAVE* to stretch? Because some guru said it was good for me? F*ck those guys. If you address your weaknesses in your training, there’s no need to do extra stretching.

“You must follow a rigid program with exact percentages, reps, sets, rest periods, and exercise selection.”

Why? If your goal is to squat more weight, why not let your body (using biofeedback) tell you the best way to do it? If you look at any program out there: Westside, 5/3/1, 5×5, DeFranco’s WS4SB, they will ALL have you doing different variations of a squat at some point in time. The difference is, they will take some block of time and say, “ok, for this phase, you’re going to front squat. After that you’re going to do a phase of safety bar squat, and then we’ll go back to a regular back squat.” So, what if your body could tell you each and every workout which one of those variations you should do? It can! It does! Just because you’re not specifically setting up blocks of time to do them, doing a front squat one session and a box squat the next session within the same week will both transfer to a bigger back squat as long as you have progressed since the last time you did them.

It is good to know an approximate percentage of your 1RM but only for reference sake. Instead of following a program that makes you increase your weight by 5lb. the next week, why not do what your body tells you to do naturally? Maybe your tissue hasn’t grown and adapted for a 5lb. intensity increase. Maybe it has only adapted to allow you to do more volume or density at that same weight you just did. If you can increase the volume (reps) or density (decrease the time), have you not still progressed?

There’s a reason why we measure everything in volume, density, and intensity, and it has to do with physics. The definition of work done (as performed by the muscle) is mass x (distance/time)^2. So, if you increase the mass (intensity), you increase the work performed. If you increase the distance (reps and/or sets – volume), you increase the work performed. If you decrease the amount of time it takes to lift the same amount of weight with the same amount of volume (density), you increase the amount of work performed.

In the end, the amount of work performed is all that matters. If you can increase the amount of work your muscles can perform, your body will continually adapt in size and strength (given that you’re not starving yourself in an attempt to lose weight).

“Progress cannot be stopped, but we can slow it right the f*ck down” – Adam T Glass



Don’t Miss Your Chance

I was stuck in Corporate America for 9 years. I was miserable.

Then I took control.

You can too, and it starts right here.