STARTER DECKS

I was first introduced to Magic the Gathering back in 1995, and I know this because “Ice Age” was the most current edition available, so it’s like combing through the fossil records to determine the era of the epoch.  I was 10 years old, and my adult second cousin who was a god in my eyes because he was in his late 20s/early 30s and played video games and DnD and all sorts of other nerdy stuff sat my brother and I down one day while we were visiting the family for Christmas and told us he was going to teach us “Magic Cards”.  I, of course, anticipated some sort of card trick, and was instead introduced to a new colorful world of imagination and tactics and mythological creatures and, truthfully, yet another reason for middle school bullies to throw my own lunch at me and steal my cards.  That next Christmas, my brother and I now being full on Magic the Gathering addicts, we got the coolest gifts ever in our stockings: brand new starter decks!  My brother given a deck from Mirage, and myself a 4th edition (I apologize for all my non-MTG versed readers out there, but this is one of those “if you know, you know” kinda things).  We tore the little plastic coating off of them, gave them a few quick shuffles, and immediately went to war.  And, dear reader: that’s the way it SHOULD be.  My brother and I, at this point, already had hundreds of our own cards, we have our own decks we had built by carefully hand-selecting each and every individual card, weighing and measuring it’s impact on the overall balance of the deck and it’s effectiveness as a weapon of war against another, and we even had decks specifically built to beat other decks (if they play a mono-burn deck, I play my counter spell/protection from red deck!).  But that morning, on Christmas, while we waiting for everyone else to wake up so we could open the rest of our gifts, we just opened up the decks, had NO idea what was inside them, sat across from each other and just played whatever came up, learning as we went.  Let’s bring back those starter decks on Christmas morning: let’s just play some Magic.

I genuinely don't care how niche' this photo is, it's a nostalgia bomb for me.  Also note how it uses the same packaging as a pack of cigarettes: not even trying to hide the addictive nature of the game

What are the starter decks of physical transformation?  I’m speaking on the topic of taking things that are already built for us and running with it.  Not starting from the ground up and trying to piece together something from a bunch of singular ideas, but, instead, accepting the gift of an entire system already built and ready to run.  Because what was a starter deck in MtG?  They were ALWAYS 60 cards, 20 of which were lands, 4 of each of the 5 colors, the remaining 40 cards were a combination of creatures and spells across those same 5 colors, giving the player a sampling of what was contained within that edition of Magic and all the tools they needed in order to successfully play a game.  They even came with a tiny manual explaining all the rules of how to play and what new rules were included in this current edition.  There was never any doubt when you opened up a starter deck that you WOULD be able to play a game with this deck.  Would it be exactly the way you wanted to play?  Was it 100% uniquely your style?  No, but it was totally and absolutely functional: you never had to worry that you had some sort of unplayable deck due to an inadequate amount of lands, creatures or spells.

 

That’s the same guarantee when we follow the programming of someone who is worth trusting: someone with the necessary credentials of producing results.  Yes: if we just jump on board with the latest influencer, we could in fact be using an unplayable deck, similar to if you were to just borrow a deck from a stranger or your friend who never seemed too sharp on the rules vs one officially endorsed and built by “Wizards of the Coast”.  And, similarly, just going onto youtube and grabbing a bunch of ideas from a bunch of different influencers and trying to cobble together your own SUPER PROGRAM from all the “best ideas” is most likely going to give you the same outcome as just grabbing a random pile of all the “best cards” and trying to make that into a deck: you may, in fact, find out you have no lands to cast spells with, or no idea how to actually USE all these “best cards” you grabbed.  Meanwhile, when you buy into a program with a proven track record, ala 5/3/1, Tactical Barbell, Super Squats, Juggernaut Method, RTS, Deep Water, Cube Method, etc etc, it’s like having a deck officially stamped with Ice Age, Mirage, 4th Edition, Revised, etc etc: you KNOW you’re playing with something that WILL work, and you can alleviate yourself of any anxiety of failure. 

This is pretty much how every "rate my program" thread goes online

 

And these starter decks apply to the world of nutrition as well.  Yes, for sure, you can absolutely try to build your own deck here with the world of “If It Fits Your Macros” and decide that you’re going to just set the bumpers of your diet and fill it in with whatever, no different than saying “I’m going to have 20 lands and 40 other cards and go from there”.  But without REALLY knowing “how to play the game”, there’s a fair chance that the deck you build just ends up being random janky garbage.  Meanwhile, if you pick a starter deck, like keto, paleo, carnivore, whole foods vegan, Mediterranean, Vertical Diet, Mountain Dog, etc etc, you KNOW that you are picking something that HAS worked before, and WILL produce some manner of result.  You don’t need to spend days, weeks and months trying to build your own deck to play: it’s Christmas morning, and you can just rip off the plastic, give it a shuffle and go to war!  And if we COMBINE these two approaches together, picking a program AND a diet that have already been built FOR us, we are really off to the races!  Nothing is slowing us down on our journey to progress: we are ready to play!

 

And just like I wrote about on that Christmas morning: we were learning our decks AS we played.  The same will hold true on the path of physical transformation: we play with these starter decks of programming and nutrition SO THAT we can learn AS we play.  Too many trainees want to learn BEFORE they play: they want to spend MONTHS trying to figure out the EXACT perfect program and diet before they embark on them, comically enough, in the interest of “not wasting time” by doing something suboptimal…not understanding that, by doing NOTHING during that time of research, they’re putting themselves SO far behind compared to if they had just started with SOMETHING and adjusted as they went.  We play with these decks, not knowing what’s inside but knowing it’s enough for us to play a game, and each turn we learn a little bit more about what we’re dealing with, such that, after we play a few games, we have a better grasp of our capabilities, limitations, and where we could stand to make some improvements.  Much like how I say to run a program AS WRITTEN before we make adjustments to it, let’s see how we play with these approaches and THEN see if it needs tweeking.

You didn't swap out the squats for leg presses because you thought it would be better: you did it because you thought it would be easier

 

Because you know what was a great thing to spend some of our Christmas money on?  BOOSTER PACKS!  (Yes, MtG was pretty much drugs for kids: there is a reason I got out of the game).  These were little 15 card packs you could buy for a few bucks (back in the day) that allowed you to add ONTO your starter deck.  We had a core with that starter deck, we understood how it played and what we would want it to do better, and now we’d buy a booster pack and see what sweet new cards were inside that could enhance our starter deck into something “more”.  Unique to these booster packs though: they rarely contained any manner of land, and if they did, it was something unique, rather than a basic land.  Lands, in MtG, are your powersource used to cast spells/summon creatures.  No lands, no power, you lose.  In turn, you could NOT build a 60 card deck by just buying 4 booster packs and slapping them together: you NEEDED that starter deck to have a foundation to build off of.  Again, this is no different than trying to build your own approach by just taking a bunch of random great ideas and forming it into a program/diet: it’s not going to fly.  SAVE those great ideas for AFTER you’ve got some sort of foundation established and THEN you can apply your boosters.  And those unique land cards will be an AWESOME little tweak to your foundation of basic lands, but if you try to build an entire deck off of JUST unique lands you’re simply not going to be able to play the game because you’re lacking in the basics, just like if you try to have a diet based around biohacks and nutritional tricks and don’t have a basic foundation of whole foods and sound principles.

 

I’m honestly having way too much fun with this metaphor and could write a LOT more about it, but let me try to just summarize what I’m saying here.  On the path of physical transformation, one day we may very well make our own decks from scratch and play with a playstyle that is totally and uniquely our own.  However, in getting to that path, we need to play SOME games first, and to get started there, we start with a starter deck.  We have starter decks for training AND nutrition, and some enterprising individuals will even package the two together to have an entire SYSTEM already built for a trainee, but by picking a deck and playing straight away, we can learn the rules of the game as we go and get better THROUGH playing, rather than trying to learn everything FIRST and try to build from scratch.  And just like there are many editions of MtG, there are MANY decks for us to choose from, cycle through, and learn from the process.  Once we have a firm understanding of the rules and how WE play, we can start applying some boosters from those random one-off ideas we picked up along the way, as the experience we’ve accumulated will help make these ideas make more sense compared to hearing them as a newbie and not having the context of experience to leverage them.  Ultimately, we do ourselves a service by picking an approach and running it full force and full compliance in order to learn as much as we can about the system at play and how we respond to it, and with enough time playing, we will build something mighty.      

THE BEGINNER’S PARADOX

Unlike my re-release of “defeating the prisoner’s dilemma”, I KNOW I’ve written about this topic in the past, but I still see it come up enough that I want to tackle it again, perhaps with some new words that will help those that are a bit lost on things.  I’m a fan of logical paradoxes, which is why I named a squat protocol after Zeno of Elea, and because of my fandom I can recognize when someone is trying to hoodwink me with some sort of sophistic paradoxical nonsense when it relates to training.  Which brings us, once again, to beginner trainees.  Despite my long era of unsustainable training insanity, I am honestly a big fan of reasonable and sustainable programs that allow for incremental growth over the long haul, to include 5/3/1, Tactical Barbell, and Dan John’s Easy Strength.  And, in my fandom, I frequently find myself offering to young trainees the suggestion that they look into these programs from the start if they are interested in making gains for the long haul.  And, inevitably, some all-too-helpful chucklehead will come out of the woodwork and exclaim “those programs progress too slow for beginners”…and herein we have our paradox.

These two in the same photo contain more combined knowledge than the entire army of bros populating your favored social media platform

 

Allow me to explain.  What is being argued is that, BECAUSE a beginner is prone to fast progression, this program’s “slow” progression is not suited to the progression rate of a beginner, and will therefore prevent them from being able to progress to the best of their ability.  On the absolute surface, this makes sense, but as soon as you dig even SLIGHTLY into the statement, it completely falls apart on itself and the paradox is revealed.

 

The argument here is that the program itself is ineffective for a beginner to realize their fast gains.  However, IF that were true, wouldn’t that mean that the beginner who ran the program would NOT progress too fast for the program?  By nature of the argument that the program is ineffective for the beginner because it progresses too slowly, this should mean that the beginner who uses the program will ALSO progress too slowly while on the program.  The program should reduce the progression speed of the beginner, right?  But then, if that’s true, then the beginner WON’T progress too fast for the program: the program will actually make the beginner match the rate of the program.

You'd basically end up in one of these situations

 

But we’re arguing the opposite, right?  That the beginner is just going to blow through the program’s progression speed?  That the program will say to add 5lbs, but the beginner is going to be ready to add 10, 15 or 20lbs?  Wouldn’t this be an indication of the program working…excellently?  If the beginner is running the program and he is just progressing by leaps and bounds the entire time that they are running it, isn’t that a sign that this program is absolutely crushing the goal of making the trainee stronger?  Have any of you ever run into an issue where you were just getting too damn big and strong too quickly?

 

So then we get to the argument that, no, the beginner trainee is progression IN SPITE OF the program, because beginners will progress on anything.  If THAT’S true, then why NOT have the beginner START with a program with a logical and sustainable progression scheme that will set them up for long term gains for YEARS rather than some en vogue nonsense that just has them race as fast as possible to their first plateau?  If beginners progress with anything, why NOT start them off with something GOOD vs forcing them to endure some sort of training “rite of passage” with a party approved beginner program?

Because if we're GONNA have rite of passage programs, I got a few ideas...

 

And then the argument turns to 1 rep maxes, and how a beginner on a “beginner program” could be squatting 315lbs in months, whereas a beginner on a “slow” progression program won’t reach those numbers for perhaps YEARS, and will instead just find themselves performing 20, 30 or 40+ reps with 135-225lbs.  But, once again, we run into the paradox of how this beginner is simultaneously progressing rapidly and not at all at the same time.  A trainee that takes a weight that they could initially squat for 1 rep and, in a matter of weeks, is now able to squat it for 20 has absolutely gotten stronger.  People fixate on the low numbers when it’s about going from 135x1 to 135x20, but if took a trainee with an 800lb deadlift for a single and had that trainee manage to deadlift it for 20 reps, there is NO one who wouldn’t say “that trainee got STRONGER”.  Hell, most of us would DEMAND to know what they did in order to achieve such an absurd outcome.  In turn, we accept and understand that taking a weight you could initially move for 1 rep and growing to move it for 20+ reps is yet another way of growing in terms of strength, so now we just analyze the significance of a 1 rep maximum.

 

Is a 1 rep maximum ALSO a means of evaluating strength?  Yes, absolutely.  Some would argue it’s the best measure of evaluating maximal strength.  HOWEVER, we must appreciate that the very nature of “peaking programs” is indicative that there is MORE to a 1rm than simply strength: that a 1rm is also a SKILL that can be improved through the matter of practice.  Which is what many “beginner programs” offer: the opportunity to practice closer to one’s limits to better develop the ability to move maximal weight for minimal reps.  But, in turn, by understanding and accepting this, we ALSO understand that a beginner trainee following these “slow” progression programs has just as much opportunity to take some time developing the skillset of the 1rm IF they wish to maximize their ability to lift maximal weights in order to express the strength that they have built ON these “slow” progression programs.  Put simply: that high 1rm is simply a training cycle or 2 away from being realized, but the “strength” behind it has already been developed over the long periods of training.  Much like how the trainee who only ever trained 5 reps per set will need time to adapt to hitting a 20 rep max, the trainee that has kept things light, reasonable, logical and sustainable will need a little time to adjust to lifting near maximal poundages, but this is not indicative of a lack of strength.  Jim Wendler has many stories of trainees using a training max of something like 275lbs and then going on to move 400+lbs on the lift once they are given the clearance to go ahead.

Derek said the reason you didn't see guys in his era deadlifting 1000lbs is that there was no demand for it...so here he is pulling 800 for 9 reps...little did he realize you can't get strong with high reps!

 

So let’s break this down.  If the programs DIDN’T work, then the trainee WOULDN’T progress too quickly…which would actually make the programs work perfectly, because the program’s progression rate would match the trainee’s progression rate.  If the trainee DOES progress “too quickly for the program”, this indicates that the program DOES work, because the trainee that is following the program is progressing VERY quickly and absolutely crushing the program.  If the trainee is progressing in SPITE of the program, then the program itself is immaterial to the trainee’s success, and in such a case, it makes more sense for the trainee to FOLLOW one of these logical and sustainable programs in order to make continued steady progress over the long haul vs some flash in the pan program that has them race into their first plateau.  The notion that a beginner will simultaneously be progression so quickly they invalidate the effectiveness of the program yet the program will also limit them from progressing due to the slow rate of progression is, in itself, an impossible paradox, and anyone trying to tell you this is most likely trying to sell you something. 

NEW GAME+

One of the most iconic video games I ever played which had deep reaching impacts on my childhood, adolescence and upbringing in general is the Super Nintendo Classic “Chrono Trigger”: a game which is often brought up in contention as “the greatest came of all time” to this day: 30 years after it’s release (and writing that just made me feel incredibly old).  This game was put together by the dream team of Japanese gaming and culture: a combination of the geniuses behind Final Fantasy AND Dragon Quest, which at the time were the rival companies of Squaresoft and Enix (before the two companies merged into Squarenix), the two biggest Japanese RPG giants in the industry, with art helmed by the creator of Dragonball Z.  This was like if “The Expendables” was a videogame…and actually good.  It had incredibly sharp visuals, an amazing soundtrack (pick it up sometime for some awesome training music), a mindbending story, incredible characters, a great combat system, over 10 different endings based upon your actions in the game (giving it incredible replay value for an RPG): anything you could ever want in a game.  However, for me, the most incredible part of the Chrono Trigger experience was the inclusion of a concept that I had never seen before in any videogame outside of employing some sort of cheating device ala a Game Genie: the “New Game+” feature.

Those of you in the know just got hit with a huge nostalgia bomb

 

What was New Game+?  For my audience that grew up playing sports rather than video games, in role playing games, the entire premise is built around the idea that you start the game off weak, and you face weak enemies.  You’re level 1, and you’re fighting rats, goblins, slimes, etc.  You beat enough of these weak enemies that you grow stronger, and then you fight stronger enemies in turn, until you reach the end of the game at your strongest and are fighting the strongest enemies.  You’re level 99, and you’re fighting dragons and demons and eventually the end game boss.  You don’t fight dragons at level 1 and get obliterated, nor do you fight goblins at level 99 and absolutely destroy them…UNLESS you’re using New Game+.  What New Game+ did was allow you to restart Chrono Trigger from the beginning BUT you got to start at the level that your save file was from a previous game, and you got to keep all of your equipment as well.  So if you had a save file at level 99 with all the best equipment in the game, congrats: you’re starting a brand new game, fighting the weakest enemies in the game while you are at your absolute strongest.  The game is an absolute and total cakewalk, and you get to just completely blitz through it all toward the end.  For a young kid who wasn’t terribly great at video games, this was totally mind-blowing for me: I could START off strong, rather than having to spend so much time grinding levels, and I could just enjoy the parts of the game I liked as I effortlessly cut down enemies.

 

Ok, how am I tying this into physical transformation?  I was reflecting on this idea this morning, and realized that New Game+ is, once again, a metaphor for the notion of periodization in our training and nutrition.  There are a few premises at play here.  First, we must appreciate the application that New Game+ demonstrates the notion that our previous training cycles set us up for success with our future cycles.  In order to obtain the benefits of New Game+, you DID have to play through an original run of the game first.  It was based off of your previous save file, so if you didn’t get that far in your first game, you weren’t going to get much out of a New Game+ file.   This, of course, speaks to the premise that we need to give these training cycles their due diligence.  If we are too quick to abandon a training cycle because we’re terrified of “losing our gains”, we’re just going to spin our wheels and never get anywhere due to perpetual program hopping.  The trainee that abandons the GPP cycle in week 2 because they noticed their biceps reduced 1/16 of an inch, only to then abandon the hypertrophy cycle at week 2 because they feel like they’re getting too fat, only to abandon the cutting cycle at week 2 because they feel lightheaded and low on energy, is going to have a really crummy New Game+ file to use, whereas the trainee that gives each cycle it’s allocated time to actually work is going to accumulate enough cool stuff that, when they hit “New Game+”, they’re going to absolutely terrorize the enemy.  Each training cycle improves some physical quality that lends itself toward the improvement of ANOTHER physical quality, like how being in better condition means being able to recover better between sets AND between workouts, which means working harder, resulting in better outcomes in either the strength or hypertrophy block, meaning being able to move more weight in the hypertrophy block OR have the potential to build more strength in the strength block, which means being able to have higher output in the conditioning block, which just continues to self-perpetuate awesomeness in a positive feedback loop.

The opposite of this basically

But along with that, one of the blessings of New Game+ was that it gave us “permission” to beat the game.  Some of you non-ultra nerds may not appreciate the bit of ennui that comes when you’ve invested 50 hours into a videogame and reach the end of it…because you don’t WANT to beat it…because that means the game is over.  If we don’t beat the game, we can just keep playing it forever and ever, but once we beat it, the game is over…and now what are we going to do?  But with New Game+, we RACED to beat the game, because it meant we could hit that New Game+ button and start the game over again, and this time we’ll be even MORE powerful than we were before.

 

And this is the same permission we need to give ourselves WITH periodization.  Opposite of the program hopper is the trainee that will NOT move on from a program when the time has finally come to do so.  We’ve seen these dudes before: those folks running STARTING Strength for 2 years (dude: it says “starting” for a reason) because they want to make ABSOLUTELY sure that they have “milked their beginner gains”, which means just starting and restarting the program over and over again while reaching the same plateau each time because they haven’t improved any other physical qualities to overcome that.  This is also true with those that are married to a method because it’s easier to buy the party line vs think critically about programming.  And it’s true for those that are simply afraid to allow some physical qualities to take a step or 2 back in the pursuit of other qualities, failing to understand that we often need to take a few steps back to get a running start for a giant leap forward.  With periodization, we give ourselves permission to “beat the game” of our current phase of training, knowing that, once we start the game over, we’re going to be even STRONGER than the last time we started the game.

Yeah, it's kinda unfair

 

Because that was what was cool about New Game+: unless you WERE the absolute strongest you could possibly be, you STILL got stronger with your playthroughs.  You didn’t see the exponential growth that occurred when you started a brand new game for the first time and were leveling up practically every 3rd fight, but even at level 50, when you got through the game again, you’d be level 55 or so, a little bit stronger, some more gear and gold in your pocket, and ready for ANOTHER New Game+.  In that regard, Chrono Trigger reflected the lifecycle of a trainee as well, with newbie gains resulting in rapid growth and adaptation, while the longer we stayed on the timeline, the less significant the growth occurs from cycle to cycle.  But growth does STILL occur with each playthrough, and we continue to build upon our successes with each playthrough in turn.  It’s only when we put down the game and stop playing that we stop growing.

 

Chrono Trigger still rates as one of the greatest games of all time to this day.  If you haven’t played it, go do so.  The fact that, 30 years later, it’s still teaching me lessons is testament to just how outstanding of a product it is.  And absorb it’s lessons: embrace the time you spend growing, allow yourself the time to experience the necessary adaptations to set yourself up for success on future cycles, but also allow yourself the grace to beat the game and move on to the next playthrough. 

WAVETOPS

I’ve recently returned from yet another cruise vacation, this time my longest one yet at 13 days, as this one had stops in Rome, Sicily and Naples Italy along with Mykonos and Athens Greece, so we spent some time in country as well to be able to enjoy the sites.  As part of such a long trip, I picked up a few observations and got to try out some new stuff, so I wanted to do a quick review of a few things and lay out some ideas.  If there’s any demand, I can go even further into detail, as each singular item could be a blogpost in and of itself.  Very similar to my bulletpoint entries, which seem to be a favorite among longtime readers.

 

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BEARFOOT SHOES AND SLINGSHOT'S DEADLIFT SLIPPER

 

* First shoutout goes out to Bearfoot shoes, a North Dakota based company co-owned by Chris Duffin.  I first heard about them from Brian Alsruhe, and have been wearing them exclusively anytime I wear shoes outside of work, to include their boots in the colder months and their low tops in the warmer months for about the past 2 years now.  But for this trip in particular, I strapped on a brand new (right out of the package) pair of Ursus black suede generation 2s literally before heading out to the airport for my flight to Rome.  If you’ve never been to Europe before, it is VERY walking friendly and, in turn, you do a TON of walking.  My watch’s step counter has a goal of 10k steps per day, and I never failed to meet that goal, quite often doubling it.  My 13 day trip’s final port destination was Naples on day 11, wherein we climbed to the peak of Mount Vesuvius, which I did in that SAME pair of Ursus.  In any other situation, taking a brand new pair of shoes through this sort of “stress test” would be a surefire way to develop a bunch of blisters, hot spots, and broken feet, but these absolutely handled the task without issue and my feet were totally comfortable through out the trip.  Once again, I HAVE been wearing these styles of shoe for around 2 years, so my feet are adjusted to this style of shoe, but it still speaks to a very quality product.  The generation 2 is a bit more rugged than the generation 1 as far as the rubber sole on the bottom of the shoe goes, which proved to be an asset on that mountain hike and while walking through cobblestone streets in Europe.  And the black suede look was fashionable enough that I could wear these shoes to my wife and I’s anniversary dinner at the upscale returant on the ship along with the various wonderful dinning locations in Italy and Greece and never receive a second look.  The volcanic ash and soil of Vesuvius DID get the shoes a little dirty (which is why I was thankful to tackle that at the END of the vacation), but I was able to clean them pretty effective with some wet napkins, and some suede cleaner should definitely do the trick. 

 

* In full disclosure, I DID actually pack a pair of Mark Bell’s deadlift slippers to use as workout shoes during this trip, only because I didn’t want my Bearfoot shoes to get too sweaty as my only pair of real shoes for the trip, but if that wasn’t a concern, these would also make excellent gym shoes, as that was their original intent/design.  But as a side shout out as well: those deadlift slippers DO make excellent travel training shoes, as they take up very little space (low footprint: get it!) and are stupidly lightweight and easy to pack.  The rubber sole on the bottom is VERY grippy, so you won’t run into issues of slipping and sliding around, and given I was training on a cruise ship, that was a positive. 

 

KETO BRICK

* Next up is the “Keto Brick”, a product by Robert Sikes, the “Keto Savage”, marketed as a “shelf-stable meal, with high quality ingredients, and a ton of calories” and, of course, with the name, you understand it’s to support a ketogenic diet.  This was a product Robert originally developed for himself in 2017 to support contest prep (which it’s pretty awesome he’s competed as a pro natural bodybuilder while maintaining a ketogenic diet through the entire process) and, as time went on, a demand presented itself, and he met it with supply.  Originally, these were simply ketogenic products, which is to say, they included a fair amount of plant material in them in the form of the protein and fat sources, but Robert expanded the empire to include “carnivore friendly” bricks, which is what I ended up purchasing for my trip: the “carnivore cake pop” variety.

 

* Check out the ingredients and the nutritional breakdown on this badboy

* 3g of carbs per 1000 calories: that’s pretty nuts.  91g of fat and 45g of protein, with the fat source being grassfed beef tallow and the protein source a blend of more tallow, beef protein and a bunch of organs.  I’d prefer to not have the flavoring and the stevia, but as far as processed foods go, this is incredibly clean, and my intent was to eat this on my 9.5 hour flights between continents in lieu of airline cuisine or stopping at an airport McDonalds and throwing down $45 on some burger patties.  I paired the brick with a bag of Stryve biltong, thinking I’d make these 1500 calorie meals with about 100g of fat and 125g of protein with 3g of carbs, but in truth I only ever made it through about half a bag of biltong before I had “enough”.  I DID eat the meat out of my airline meals along with that, so I most likely still came out around the same place nutritionally.  Meanwhile, my guts felt awesome after eating this compared to when forced to eat “off menu”, and the brick was incredibly satiating.  I’m not going to lie too: it was also very tasty.  I don’t get many sweet flavors with my diet, so a cake pop flavored brick was absolutely a sweet treat.  And “brick” definitely describes these things: my wife said it looked like I was eating a bar of soap…and also commented on how delicious it smelled.

Again, you'd rather I sit next to you with this on a flight vs a tin of sardines

 

...even if I look like this

* People balk at the pricetag of $15 per brick, but you need to re-read the entire review I wrote there.  This isn’t a protein bar, it’s not a snack: it’s a full on meal.  It’s 1000 calories, with quality ingredients, yet I could throw it in my travel backpack and break it out at mealtime without issue.  I didn’t have to be the guy on the airplane opening up a can of tuna or sardines and smelling up the joint.  And believe me: I TRIED to find other ways to get 1000 calories worth of carnivore foods for less than $15: it ain’t happening.  Those bags of biltong I mentioned run $12 EACH, and 1000 calories of it ends up being 160g of protein and 35g of fat, which is not really much in the say of satiety or energy.  Carnivore bars, which are effectively pre-packaged pemmican, are $17 each and only 400 calories, so I’d be wanting 2.5 of them to equal a brick.  If you’re keeping carbs low and ingredients clean/simple while traveling, I don’t know how you’ll beat the brick.

 

BOOKS

I know: I'm ashamed of myself

* Since I was without internet, my ability to screw around was diminished, so I did a lot more reading.  I made it through 4 books: 5x Crossfit Champ Mat Frazer’s “Hard Work Pays Off”, Tactical Barbell’s “Ageless Athlete”, and a re-read of Paul Kelso’s “Powerlifting Basics Texas Style” and Jamie Lewis’ “Grimoire of Victual Incantations”.  I’ve already written extensively about my love for Kelso’s work, and one of my most cherish ironhead memories is being able to tell him that we read his book to my kid as a bedtime story and him asking me to write a review of it on amazon before he passed away.  I’ll most likely do full reviews of the other books mentioned at some point, but here are the general takeaways.

 

* I really enjoyed “Hard Work Pays Off”, despite me not being a Crossfit athlete or having ambitions of being one.  Mat does a fantastic job of making the book part autobiographical, part Crossfit instructional manual and part insider secrets for those looking to gain an edge in competition.  It’s not dry at all: very “personal interest” style as you read about Mat overcoming his own personal struggles to become the greatest athlete in his sport, while he displays a great dead of candidness and vulnerability to the reader while still taking the time to breakdown crossfit movements and WODs in a manner that’s easy to understand and, ultimately, exciting.  I definitely found myself wanting to take on a few more WODs when I got back to the states.  Not surprisingly, my favorite sections of each chapter would be at the end, when he detailed the way he would eat to support the various chapter goals (Strength, Speed, Coordination, Recovery, and Mentality).  This even included recipes, which, my regular readers will know, instantly boosted this book, because I absolutely LOVE “all in one” books that provide you with programming, technique breakdown AND nutritional advice all in one spot.  I got this book at a discount from a second-hand bookstore, and was absolutely delighted with what a hidden gem it was.  If you have any interest in physical training at a competitive level, it’s worth picking up.

 

* Tactical Barbell’s “Ageless Athlete” was another wonderful read, once again because the author of the book actually knew how to write.  Unlike the rest of the TB series, this book was not written by K. Black but, instead Dr. Jim Madden, a member of the TB community, with an educational background in philosophy, so already you understand why I enjoyed this book so much.  Jim employs his educational background alongside his training and life history of athletics AND obesity/the overcoming thereof to relay some incredibly worthwhile insights on how to continue to train when one has ascended into the 40+ age bracket.  His employment of the idea of an “ageless athlete” vs a “masters athlete” is really key here, as he never once allows for a compromise in performance: he simply advises on more effective training methodologies to take onboard in order to ACHIEVE that same performance output in light of the considerations/conditions that impact an older athlete (biological along with sociological/family obligations/life/etc).  One DOES need to come into this book with some background understanding of how the Tactical Barbell system works as a whole, just to understand the lingo and methodology being employed, but Madden is able to take this system and make some tweaks and edits in order to really maximize its benefit for the audience, and also does a brilliant job reframing the mentality of the reader to best understand why it is we are doing what we are doing.  The nutrition information he offers doesn’t crest into the realm of recipes/instructions, but he does take the time to offer the reader a look at a 9 week training block from his own personal journal, so there’s quite a bit of helpful information to be had from here.  Anyone interested in longevity training or just ways to tweak Tactical Barbell should give this a read.

 

* Jamie’s Grimoire, like many of his e-books, is a compilation of many related articles all in one convenient location.  The book’s topics range from the impact of the enjoyment of food on the outcome of eating it insofar as it relates to getting bigger and leaner, the biological impact of spices/seasonings, the foods of warrior cultures around the world (celts, huns, sumo, etc) and, of course, full on recipes for a variety of stews, meat pies, and more conventional cuisine such as pulled pork, meatballs, steak, etc.  There are keto recipes, from when Jamie was going through a keto phase, and incredibly dirty recipes, for when Jamie was going through a mega mass gaining phase, which makes the book enjoyable as it’s completely nutritionally agnostic as far as approach goes: it’s just about reaching the goal.  Thankfully, the book is absent of the pornography that Jamie likes to adorn his articles with, but it’s not absent of his incredibly colorful language and use of metaphor.  I read this book with no intention of actually replicating any of the recipes, and ultimately enjoyed all the fun historical insights as it related to how different cultures ate and continue to eat today.  I feel like this can be a fantastic read for anyone new to the world of nutrition/cooking to support training and looking for a unique approach.

 

WORKOUTS

The answer may shock you

* I typically don’t do any sort of organized training when I’m on vacation, and often just completely stop training and just get in a lot of walking, but since I have a strongman competition coming up on 26 Jul and this was 13 days away from the iron, I tried to stay in shape this time around with a combination of bodyweight exercises and gym lifts the 2 times I snuck away to the fitness center on the ship.  For the bodyweight work, I settled on push ups and bodyweight squats as my primary movements, and used a variety of approaches to get in a lot of reps in a 20 minute space (my time limit, because, again: I was on vacation).  Juarez Valley, from Josh Bryant’s “Jailhouse Strong”, going 50-10-40-20-30 to get 150 reps of either movement, then another set of 50 and then 10x10 to get a total of 300 was a solid workout, along with my own Kalsu-esque workout where I set a timer for EMOM to do 5 burpees and then did sets of 10 squats and push ups, seeing how many I could rack up in the timespace, proved to be brutal.  There are a ton of different ways to play around here, and I never did the same one twice.  For lifting, I stole directly from Dan John’s “Armor Building Formula” book and took on the task of getting in 100 reps of dumbbell clean and press away with the 45lb dumbbells (20kg), because those were what I had to work with.  Using his 2-3-5-10 ladder approach for 5 rounds and supersetting with a chins/pull ups going 2-3-3-5 resulted in an INCREDIBLE upperbody pump.  To no one’s surprise: Dan knows what he is doing.  I’ve written about the ABF AND Jailhouse strong before: definitely worth picking those books up.  Jailhouse Strong, in particular, is the only Josh Bryant book I’ve read up until this point that I can honestly stomach, whereas everything Dan writes is gold.

 

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS

Pretty much this

* I didn’t see a single obese Italian or Greek person while I was traveling.  Whenever I DID see an observe person in Italy or Greece, they were always an American tourist.  Along with this, I observed that the food quality in both of these countries (and, in turn, on the cruise ship, where they stocked up on food in country) was absolutely phenomenal as a BASELINE.  Like, yes, I can absolutely get the same quality of food in the states, but I have to hunt for it as specialty stores or under labels like “organic free range grassfed pastured”, which to the Italians and the Greeks, was just how food came.  The relationship between these two things can’t be ignored, along with the fact that there was only 1 fast food “empire” I observed the entire time I was there: McDonald’s, and they had VERY few places of operation.  When people ate it, it was at local establishments, using those same high quality ingredients, and even the junkfood was in limited supply compared to the absolute bounty we enjoy in the states.  There was a lot more smoking as well, and the Italians enjoy a diet rich in cured meats, cheeses, pasta, breads and real butter, and are somehow not dying as fast as we are.  Damndest thing.

 

* On the topic of obesity, I also saw a human with the highest bodyfat percentage I’ve ever seen in my life.  I don’t say this to mean the FATTEST human I’ve ever seen: I’ve definitely seen fatter people, clocking in at near 600lbs or so.  This person was a woman who was most likely in the range of 180lbs at an average height, but her body was pure cellulite, and with every step she took, her entire body RIPPLED.  This was on the pooldeck on the ship, and they were wearing a bikini, and with every step she took, I’d see the shockwave start at her calf, rippled across her quads, roll into her stomach, crest into her upper torso, and then bounce back down again.  It was hypnotic: like watching a lava lamp.  And at this point, I made yet another connection with Powerlifting Basics Texas Style, wherein Paul Kelso discusses the importance of lean mass as it relates to maintaining health and longevity.  I was observing someone that possessed almost no lean mass at all: a body almost entirely composed of fat.  The sort of nutritional and lifestyle decisions one would have to make to achieve that is truly mind boggling, and just further emphasizes how important basic resistance training alongside a diet that isn’t pure junk is for those seeking any manner of longevity. 

 

* I had the best bacon of my life at a hotel breakfast buffet in Rome, which once again speaks to just how different the quality of food is.  Pigs NOT raised on a diet of corn and soy in confined feeding operations end up producing a VERY high quality meat: how wild.

* We were tutored in souvalki making by a master chef in Mykonos, and part of the process involved letting the garlic soak in olive oil for 4 DAYS and letting the onions soak in a saltwater solution for 3-4 hours in order to remove the toxins.  In the case of the latter, the onion no longer makes you cry when you cut it.  It's fascinating how many other cultures, to include ancient societies, figured out that we're not supposed to eat plants raw, and here we're making that a badge of honor.

THE LAW OF DOMINANT THOUGHT

You ever hold an idea in your head FOREVER and wonder if you’re crazy for thinking it, only to eventually discover that it’s been around forever, a bunch of really smart people already knew about it, and you were, in fact, way behind the times?  But how validating when that happens!  I remember this happening when I first discovered Jon Andersen’s Deep Water, and realized there was already a lunatic out there training stupidly hard and not eating carbs and making it work, and suddenly I didn’t feel so alone.  Well this happened again when I discovered the “law of dominant thought”, which states that “the most frequently and intensely held thoughts are the ones that exert the greatest influence on your life and actions”, which is something I have been writing about since the very start of this blog and, in doing so, I felt like I was rallying AGAINST the majority thought process.  It’s so delightful to discover that this was already out there, and, in turn, it gives me even MORE room to maneuver in discussing this principle.  See folks: I’m not as crazy as I seem!

But that's still pretty crazy

 

The way this principle is frequently applied is in the avenue of pursuing behavioral changes.  Specifically, the principle speaks to the idea that, if all we focus on is NOT doing something, we, instead, work against our interest and direct our actions TOWARD the very thing we are wanting to avoid.  Why?  Because the law of dominant thought proports that it is the frequency and intensity of the thoughts that influence our actions, NOT the vector of said thoughts.  That is to say, if I were a smoker, and I wanted to quit smoking, and all I thought about all day was “don’t smoke don’t smoke don’t smoke”, ALL I am thinking about is smoking…which means, I am going to inevitably end up smoking.  If, instead, I were to reframe my thought process and not even think about smoking, and instead think “save $8 (average cost for a pack of cigarettes in the US…holy cow)”, I will achieve my goal of not smoking because my dominant thought is one that supports the goal through a POSITIVE reframe rather than a negative one.  Instead of thinking about how to NOT fail, I am thinking about how to SUCCEED!

 

And herein we see what I’ve been beating the wardrum about for over a decade now: success is NOT about not failing: it’s about succeeding.  And now we find out validate the reality that focusing ON succeeding is, in turn, a necessarily element OF success, and that attempting to focus on mitigation of failure is, in turn, a recipe FOR failure.  Where do we observe this in the realm of physical transformation?  In SO many places.  In the sphere of training, I frequently observe trainees wanting to know HOW to fail.  In the most literal sense, they’ll want to know how, mechanically, to fail the squat, for example.  They’ll want detailed instructions, a video demonstration, and even some honest to goodness practice on failing a squat.  ALL this is doing is creating a dominant thought of FAILURE and, in turn, failure becomes the self-fulfilling prophecy, and these young trainees, in turn, get stuck at a certain weight on their squats and never manage to make any progress…and quite typically this is a PLATRY weight.  Have I ever failed a squat?  Absolutely.  Did I have a PLAN for those failures?  Absolute not!  And each time, my body SOMEHOW managed to find a way to fail the squat WITHOUT any manner of rehearsal.  Meanwhile, I’ve had MANY successful squat sessions that most likely should NOT have happened, to include when I did box squats the week that I ruptured my ACL, tore my meniscus and fractured my patella on a yoke walk in a strongman competition, but with success as my dominant thought, success is what I achieved.

2 days post op I wasn't QUITE as ambitious, but still there was SOMETHING

 

But we also observe this as it relates to training itself.  I have written so much in the past regarding how one must be “all in” as it relates to a training program, and the instant doubt creeps in the program needs to be abandoned.  How significant the “power of belief” is, as it relates to training programs success, and how specifically this relates to programs like Super Squats, Deep Water, Mass Made Simple, etc.  And herein, once again, we see just how the law of dominant thought applies.  If ALL we are thinking about is “I hope I’m not wasting my time with this program”…we’re going to waste our time with this program.  We’re not going to put in the requisite amount of effort, we’re not going to fully comply, we’re going to skirt the hard work, stupidly adjust things that should not be tweaked with, and ultimately squander the time invested in the program by not succeeding on it.  I see this with all the doubting questions that come across.  “Do I REALLY need to drink a gallon of milk a day for Super Squats?”  “Do I REALLY need to cut out carbs when I follow Deep Water?”  And know what the real comedy of all this is?  If these folks would just stop ASKING for permission and write their own destiny, they WOULD succeed!  If the thought process was just “I’m going to grow because I’m running Super Squats”, they’d grow.  But by thinking “Can I grow WITHOUT drinking the gallon of milk a day?”, their fate is sealed.

 

Hey, while I’m talking about a gallon of milk, let’s talk about nutrition, because boy oh boy do we see this happen there.  I have frequently addressed the notion that, when the goal is gaining: the goal is GAINING.  The goal of gaining is NOT minimizing fat.  But, reference my recent post of “I had it easier”, because of stupid social media influence and unrealistic standards, trainees have it in their heads that they HAVE to have razor sharp abs 365 days a year and that putting on an ounce of fat during a gaining phase is some sort of unredeemable sin.  And so, during their gaining phase, their most dominant thought it “don’t get fat”…and, funny enough, that’s exactly what happens.  Instead of thinking “get muscular”, making THAT the dominant thought, and achieving that, they are SO hyperfixated on not getting fat that they end up jacking up their cortisol levels by training stupidly hard with an inadequate amount of recovery via nutrition, and the body “rewards” them by breaking down muscle tissue and upping bodyfat, resulting in a wonderfully underwhelming skinnyfat physique.

Notice how the bully doesn't have a six pack...and how it doesn't matter

 

And in the realm of fat loss, these trainees living in a state of frequent denial thinking “don’t cheat don’t cheat”…they cheat.  “Don’t binge don’t binge”…they binge.  These folks are so hyperfixated on what they are DENYING themselves that, in turn, their dominant thoughts set them up for a pattern of restrict, binge, restrict HARDER, binge HARDER, repeat, and ultimately achieve nothing.  I’ve written about my experiences with Vince Gironda’s Maximum Definition Diet, and the entire time I’ve undertaken it, never once did I lament all the foods I “couldn’t eat”: instead, I was absolutely overjoyed thinking about what I GOT to eat: all the meat and eggs I want.  And without counting calories or macros, my dominant thought was “I’m going to get lean”…and that’s exactly what happened.  Whereas, if I obsessed and thought “I can’t get lean without counting calories”…I’d be right about that too.

 

Honestly, this is too easy to write about, and this post could get stupidly long, so I’m going to cut it at this point just because we’ve already covered training and nutrition and how this law applies.  But seriously, dear reader, consider how simple this principle is and how to apply it to your own path of physical transformation.  When all we focus on is how to not fail, all we achieve IS failure.  When we flip the vector toward how can we succeed, that is what we accomplish.  Approach all avenues of physical transformation with a mindset of “how will I succeed at this”, and you will guide yourself exactly where you need to be.      

IT’S NOT A CORNDOG: IT’S A BOMBPOP

As the weather warms up and county fairs and summer time treats come into the horizon view, my mind is easily pre-occupied with visions of gluttony and excess and, due to the twisted nature of my brain, I find ways to make these analogies for training, so here we go.  In today’s discussion, I present two stick based treats: the corndog and the bomb pop.  Yes, these treats are already inherently different, in that one is savory and the other is sweet (of course, assuming their base forms, for I am well aware of the corndog mutations out there that are dessert like along with, apparently, “spicy bomb pops”, to which I say “what is wrong with you?!), but they do, of course, share the commonality of a stick based delivery mechanism.  However, it’s not the savory vs sweetness that I wish to focus on here, but more the intended manner of enjoyment.  Enjoyment?  Isn’t it obvious?  They’re a food: you eat them!  Yes dear reader, but HOW do you eat them?  For, you see, the manner that we enjoy the corndog is NOT the manner that we enjoy the bomb pop, and, in turn, when looking at training through the lens of carnival delights, we must understand that our training is far more bomb pop like in nature than it is a corndog.  Allow me to explain…for otherwise, this is just sheer lunacy.

People out there are hot and dry, they're going to want something cold and wet: how hard is it to understand?!

For the briefest of introductions, for those of you poor deprived souls that have enjoyed neither the delights of a corndog OR a bomb pop: a corndog is a festive treat featuring a hotdog impaled on a stick that is then dipped in a cornbread (hench “corn”dog) batter and deep fried.  It’s is absolutely as decadent and needless as it sounds.  A bomb pop, meanwhile, is a popsicle delight featuring 3 distinct flavors: cherry, lime, and blue raspberry (traditionally), which, in turn, give it it’s distinct American flag coloring of red, white and blue (yes, a white lime, and we artificially colored the raspberry, because that’s how we roll).  What’s particularly unique about the bomb pop is that it’s colored in stages: a red top, white middle, and blue base.  It is this distinction that I wish to key in on.

 

When one enjoys either one of these treats, the expectation tends to be that they are consumed top to bottom.  If one took a bite out of the bottom or middle first, they would compromise the structural integrity of the treat: it would fall off the stick.  Meanwhile, when one starts at the top, one: they have less chance of biting the stick (no joke: that’s how I lost a tooth in elementary school) and, as they continue to consume the treat, they can slide the bottom toward the top, maintaining structural integrity while still minimizing risk of stick biting.  However, BECAUSE of this convention, one has a different experience consuming a corndog vs a bomb pop.  For one when takes a bite out of the corndog, they consume ALL the flavors of the corndog at once.  They get the taste of the cornbread AND the hotdog contained inside.  If they applied some manner of condiment OR if they dipped the corndog in something (nacho cheese is a popular choice, because we are decadent like that, and ketchup is, of course, controversial), those flavors combine with the cornbread and hotdog all in the same bite.  Meanwhile, when one bites into the bomb pop, they only get one flavor in that bite, at MOST two flavors if they’re strategic in their consumption and manage to bite at the dividing line of flavors just to intentionally indulge in two flavors at once.  In order to achieve this solo flavor experience with the corndog, one would have to intentionally eat the cornbread around the corndog first, leaving the hotdog behind, and THEN consume the hotdog on the stick, which, yeah, SOME people do…but it is considered deviant!  Meanwhile, in order to attempt to consume all the flavors of the bomb pop at once, one would essentially have to consume the popsicle in whole, and endure QUITE the brain freeze in the attempt.

 

Once again, props if you actually get this reference

That was a LOT of writing about eating corndogs and bomb pops, but here’s the payoff: our training is far more bomb pop than it is corndog!  Far too many trainees want to experience ALL the flavors at once, and in doing so they anticipate a corndog experience, only to be met with brain freeze.  Training’s function is to improve physical capabilities, and the improvement of capabilities requires a focus on said improvement.  We must be diligent and intentional in our efforts, and, per Dan John, our goal, is “to keep the goal the goal”.  When we are in a mass gaining phase of training, we must let conditioning be on the back burner, understanding that we will get to it LATER in the bomb pop of training.  Mass is, currently, the cherry flavor, and conditioning awaits us in the lime.  When we attempt to merge these flavors together at the same time, we do not get an enjoyable corndog flavor experience, but instead quite literally bite off more than we can chew and endure the freeze and pain of the situation.  But when we take our time to maximize the intent of the training phase, we get the most we can out of that phase, and then move on to the next one, holding onto those newfound abilities and capabilities as we enjoy a new flavor, until we get all the way through the bomb pop and move on to the next one.

 

From the 1000 mile view, we can look at these two treats and say “What’s the difference: they’re both food on a stick”, but as we examine just the slightest bit closer, we understand that these are truly different experiences despite a similarity in being stick-based.  The same is true of training.  It’s easy to convince ourselves “it’s all just training: as long as I recover I’ll be fine”, but it becomes a question of, simply because it’s “fine”: is it good?  Yes: you can one-bite a bomb pop and yes, you can peel the cornbread off a corn dog and have a meal of a hotdog alongside cornbread…but are you actually having the intended experience of either product?  Exercise the discipline necessary to train the right way at the right time in order to achieve your overall goals and you WILL achieve those goals.  If you put your ego and psychological need to always do everything all the time ahead of your desire to actually achieve your goals, you’ll be stasis locked with brain freeze, and that’s not a fun summertime for anyone.