How Close to Failure Should We Train? | ETP#116

[Aaron Straker]: 0:31

What's going on guys, happy Tuesday. Welcome back to another episode of Eat, Train, Prosper. Today, Brian and myself are going to have a conversation around the recent pre-publish release from Zach, Josh, the data-driven strength guys, and the rest of the research team that helped them on their new, let's call it a pre-publication, like I just said, titled, How Close to Failure Should We Train? So this is a really, really cool new research project out of them where they basically took a lot of the existing research that has been put out and they did a bunch of fancy researchers, statistical analysis, meta regression sort of thing to put out a really beefy kind of report on it. And it has some interesting findings that I would say are more interesting from my standpoint based on just the... what the current body of literature tends to suggest, not what my personal anecdotal kind of findings with myself and clients suggest. So we're just gonna have an open conversation about it. Before we get into that, as always,

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:40

Thanks for watching!

[Aaron Straker]: 1:40

Brian, can you kick us off with some updates, please?

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:43

Yeah, that was a beefy intro, much like this document that we tried to peruse before this episode. Yeah, so updates this week. Decent amount going on here. I'll try and be as quick as I can. So there is a new cycle on Brian's program. That's my program for anyone that may not know. It's offered on the Train Heroic app as part of my Paragon Training Methods programming. And so my new cycle is going to start on June 4th. We have just completed two meso cycles of six weeks each that are nine days per micro cycle. So basically 108 days that I've spent on the current program and I am feeling a bit ready to switch things up a little bit. And so where the prior program was kind of like a There were two specific days that really targeted delts, actually three days that targeted delts and two days that hit quads pretty thoroughly. This new cycle is gonna be much more well-rounded and so I just wanna quickly go over the split and some of the kinda cool features of it as my first update here. And so where is that little document that I created for myself? All right, cool. So the split is now four training days a week You guys know I don't often like to train on a calendar week Aaron and I have discussed this before But in this cycle, it actually is going to be laid out as four training sessions over a seven-day week However, I think for me personally it is probably likely that I will be doing this over eight days For a couple of different reasons, but primarily because I am going really hard in the paint cardio this cycle. Not to say that this is something that everybody following my program needs to do, but I am really trying to push the boundaries of how much cardio I can do and still recover slash progress in the weight room. And I'm kind of doing this as a little bit of an end of one experiment, because we've seen this kind of change in the literature and concurrent training and. I mentioned in prior episodes, you know, like my discussion with Mike T. Nelson that we talked about last week and this idea of having something that's your one A and your one B and I don't want to make my cardio one A and say I'm now putting my weights on the backburner. I just want to try to make both of them my one A and we'll see what happens. I mean, maybe, you know, I end up burning out and I end up backsliding and if I do, then I know kind of where the limit is and I can. pull back and subsequent iterations from there. But essentially this cycle, my intention is to train four days throughout the seven or eight day period with weights and have six cardio sessions. And so I'm gonna have four zone two sessions. And these are my like more recuperative, you know, for some people there, go out and walk 10K steps can get you into zone two. For people that are in better shape, you need to work a little bit harder. But for me, I really do find the Zone 2 sessions recuperative and I don't find that they take any toll on my weight training, at least that's what I've found over the last six weeks. So I have, or six months rather. So I have the four Zone 2 sessions. I have one that's gonna be more of like a VO2 max interval based type session. These are gonna be more of like a four minutes on, four minutes off repeats, which is just hell. It's like the worst thing in the world. And then one day that's, I call it ride with friends. And it's basically whatever cardio you feel like, basically whatever cardio you feel like you wanna do on a Sunday. So that's your Sunday workout. And it could be like a hike, it could be a long bike ride. There's no specific zone structure or anything like that. It's just kind of go out, be a kid, go explore adventure and have fun. So like I said, I don't really expect people following my program to do six cardio sessions a week on top of four weight training sessions. That's just what I'm gonna do as I'm kind of going through this end of one experiment. As far as the training program itself, you guys know I don't like to often use normal splits like push pull legs or upper lower or whatever. I like to be unique for whatever reason. So Monday we have hamstrings and lateral delts as the main focus. and leg extensions as a way to target the quads on that hamstring dominant day. Tuesday is our zone five VO2 max intervals. Wednesday we have upper body pulling with triceps and then I put pushups on that day too so that you get a little bit of chest stimulus. Thursday is either zone two or kind of a rest day, walk 10,000 steps type idea, basically chill. Friday is a quads and lateral delts day with leg curls. So this is the opposite of my Monday day, which is hamstrings, lateral delts and leg extensions. This is quads, lateral delts and leg curls. So we're hitting legs twice a week in this manner. And then the final day on Saturday is upper body push with biceps. And then I put pull-ups in there so that you get a little bit of back. And so essentially what we're doing with that structure is having one primary day where 70 to 80% of the volume for the week will exist for that muscle group and Then there'll be a smaller amount of volume on a second day For example the pull-ups for the back the push-ups for the chest the leg curls or the leg extensions for the hamstrings and quads respectively And so that cycle is starting on June 4th. That's actually a Sunday So just take all the days that I just said Monday through Saturday and just move them back a day The cycle is actually gonna go Sunday through Saturday but anyways That's the, that is the general idea. And so, yeah, I think it'll be a super fun cycle. I'm actually gonna be incorporating three movements that are gonna use the quote Milo Wolf approach to lengthened partials. So the difference just quickly being that when I do lengthened partials, I generally will go to failure and then we'll do partials after failure type idea. the way Milo tends to do them and we've had some discussions off air about this and he doesn't like fully approve of my way of doing it but I've you know pushed back a little bit on that and we've had some some good rapport back and forth about it, but His way of doing length and partials is essentially to establish a predetermined range of motion and then just go to that range of motion every time so say 60% of the range of motion is what you establish then that is just kind of determined as your full range of motion, and therefore you can use RIR. You can obviously stop shy of failure using RIR, that's the same thing. But the cool way, the cool thing about this approach that he's using is that you can use RIR, whereas when you're using my approach, it's usually pass failure. And I think that this new meta regression that we're gonna talk about today actually provides some substantial rationale for the way that I have been doing my partials versus the way that Milo does them. So I think there's probably, you know, rationale for both ways. But this cycle will be including that approach to partials for three of the movements, leg extensions, tricep cross-cable pushdowns, and 45 degree hip extensions. So anyway, that is the basic intro to my new cycle starting on June 4th. and I have a couple other faster updates that I will get to here in a second, but let's kick it over to Aaron for some thoughts.

[Aaron Straker]: 9:47

My first question, my main question, the Zone 2 sessions that are six of them over the week,

[Bryan Boorstein]: 9:53

Four, four

[Aaron Straker]: 9:54

am I...

[Bryan Boorstein]: 9:54

zone two sessions, six total cardio sessions.

[Aaron Straker]: 9:57

Okay, when you said like the six zone two sessions, I was like, God damn, that is a lot.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 10:02

Six total cardio sessions, but yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 10:04

Still a lot.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 10:05

Yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 10:05

For the zone two, am I correct that you are doing those on your bike outside?

[Bryan Boorstein]: 10:10

for the most part on days where it's raining or I can't get outside, I'll do a Peloton,

[Aaron Straker]: 10:16

Mm-hmm.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 10:16

which I've actually done more recently, which has been interesting because the Peloton allows you to see wattage, which I don't get on my bike until I get a power meter, which I am entertaining the idea of getting a power meter. $1,000 is a large commitment, but I am considering it. But the Peloton has been cool because it gives me like some... Since I don't do it very often, I'm able to see progress manifested sort of when I do go out onto the peloton. But yeah, the majority of the sessions are going to be outside on my bike.

[Aaron Straker]: 10:49

Gotcha, I think that's the real differentiator. When you said that, I was trying to picture myself and I'm like, because zone two, so how, I guess the next question is, how long are your zone two sessions, approximately?

[Bryan Boorstein]: 11:01

Uh, always under an hour, or most of the time under an hour, usually 45 to 50 minutes.

[Aaron Straker]: 11:06

Okay, that was my assumption. I was assuming like 40 to 60 minutes.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 11:10

Yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 11:10

And I was like, dude, there's no way in hell. I'm just

[Bryan Boorstein]: 11:12

Ha

[Aaron Straker]: 11:12

gonna

[Bryan Boorstein]: 11:12

ha

[Aaron Straker]: 11:12

sit

[Bryan Boorstein]: 11:12

ha.

[Aaron Straker]: 11:12

there. I'd need something really, really good.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 11:17

Yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 11:19

Like I know back in Bali, like Jackson put like a stationary bike in his living room and he'll just watch anime or something like that on his normal TV. I'm like, that I could do. But on my phone, trying to make it work, in the gym, I'm like. There's just no way. I'd get

[Bryan Boorstein]: 11:36

Yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 11:36

to maybe 17, 18 minutes, and I'm like, I'm outta here. Specifically because with zone two, not a lot changes. When I'm doing my HIIT bike sprints, there's a lot of things changing every, literally, 30 to 90 seconds, so there's that, I guess, kind of mental things taking up your mental capacity. But okay. I'm interested to see the findings over this coming. cycle for you,

[Bryan Boorstein]: 12:05

Yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 12:05

I guess, feel free to share my insight, is I do honestly think that you will recover quite well. I think it's like the things we're going to talk about in today's episode. I think a lot of things are kind of approached from not necessarily pessimistic, but from the glass is half empty as opposed to the glass is half full sort of thing. When you take care of your body, when you're putting really high quality food in and fueling yourself. I think the recovery capacity and stuff is quite higher than many people give themselves credit for.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 12:40

Yeah. And I really just like the zone two stuff. It just isn't fatiguing. Like I really finished these sessions feeling like invigorated and like all positive qualities that result from it. And so certainly I expect the other two cardio sessions, the longer ride with friends and then the kind of VO2 max intervals. I expect those to suck and to have like a bit little bit of fatigue debt. But I definitely don't expect that from the Zone 2, and that's not what I've experienced since doing them. So I think more than anything, they're just a tool to help me, A, prepare for the 50-mile bike ride that I'm doing, but also just help all the health markers of life along the way. Which leads me into my second update here, which is I mentioned a while ago, I think post our blood work episode. So maybe two months ago that there was a guy who follows, evolved, who's also an MD and he's an ATIA, a scriber, Peter ATIA, and kind of follows a lot of those theories. And he's in the process of looking to open up his own clinic, kind of like ATIA has done. And so I've been communicating with him a bunch on email back and forth. And he just yesterday sent in, a whole ton of blood tests for me to get done. Some of them that I've done prior on the life extension panels that you've suggested I've done. And so I did a thorough life extension panel in February, which is what stimulated us to do that blood work episode, I think in February or early March, whatever it was. And there were a number of tests that we either, A, wanted to repeat after a washout period, or B, tests that I just have never done before. And so specifically one of the things that I find amazing that I never knew this, and I probably should have intuitively, I almost feel silly for not, but the idea of taking time off of working out before taking a blood test, I have never done this.

[Aaron Straker]: 14:58

Have

[Bryan Boorstein]: 14:58

And

[Aaron Straker]: 14:58

we never talked about that?

[Bryan Boorstein]: 15:00

I don't think it's ever come up.

[Aaron Straker]: 15:03

I have failed you, Brian. I apologize. Yeah, every single one of my clients, it's at least 24 hours. If there's someone who's training very intensely or we have a lot riding on that blood work, it's at least 42, or sorry, 48 to 72 hours. Yeah, my bad, dude, I dropped

[Bryan Boorstein]: 15:22

No,

[Aaron Straker]: 15:22

the ball.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 15:22

you're cool. I just like, I now feel like all of those liver and kidney markers that I'm seeing, that I am concerned about because of their elevation. I now just wonder whether that's because I've always trained the day before taking a blood test and not even thought twice about it.

[Aaron Straker]: 15:40

Very likely.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 15:42

Yeah, so this time around, I'm going to take 72 hours off of lifting and I'm gonna do my. best not to do intense cardio. The doc and I kind of discussed that I could probably do zone two, but it would be better if I probably just walk 10K steps a day and didn't do any sort of anything, even zone two-ish. So I'm planning this week, this is my deload week before the new cycle starts on June 4th. So I am intending on taking a few days off, just walking and really trying to get like a more clarity on some of the blood work stuff. And then some of the other blood test panel stuff that I have not had done before, just because I think you and the listeners may find this interesting. I just want to run down this list because some of it's specific to me, but some of it's just, I think, good stuff to have in general. So we're getting HDL, triglycerides, ApoB. I've already done ApoB, and obviously triglycerides and HDL are part of my normal blood panel. Homocysteine I've never had before. CRP, I've had that. plenty of times, my CRP is pretty good. LP little A I've never had, so we're adding that one. We're getting omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids, I've never had that one before. Uric acid I've had before, but never after

[Aaron Straker]: 17:02

Mm-hmm.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 17:02

time off, so curious on that. C-statin C is a new one that I'm getting for kidney function because it is not specific to like the GFR and the bun ratios that we tend to look at on normal weight loss panels. Estradiol, FSH, LH, T3, T4, those are all pretty standard ones. Free T3, free T4, TSH, reverse T3. Those are all standard ones that I usually get, but again, not before time off. CBC, hemoglobin A1C, also get those. Beta cell function, can't say I've had that one before. Vitamin D panel had that one. ApoE, I've never had ApoE and I'm actually a little nervous about this because this is the one that tells you how many alleles you have that may put you at risk for dementia later in life. So most people are ApoE3, which is basically neutral. But if you have an ApoE4, then you're more likely to get dementia. If you have an ApoE2, then you're less likely to get dementia, it's protective. So that one will be interesting. And then a full testosterone panel, including albumin and SHBG. So that is kind of the stuff we're doing. And I have had a washout period as well for the last six weeks on creatine, because my kidney function was one of the things that really alerted two of the people I talked to. And it didn't seem to matter that I am a weightlifter and that I take creatine. They were still like, wow, these numbers are way too high. So I'm taking a washout period from creatine. I haven't done that for six weeks. And that's why I partially why we're doing this C-statin C. which

[Aaron Straker]: 18:43

stancy

[Bryan Boorstein]: 18:43

I believe is unaffected by the creatine.

[Aaron Straker]: 18:47

Yeah.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 18:47

Yeah, so any thoughts on any of that?

[Aaron Straker]: 18:50

The cystatin C is a great one because from my understanding, which is limited on it, it's like an independent marker. It's like an enzyme, I believe, produced by the liver when there is like kind of damage or sorry, not the liver, the kidneys, when there is essentially damage or concern going on like leading towards damage. So that would be a great one. The APOE, was it?

[Bryan Boorstein]: 19:15

ApoE

[Aaron Straker]: 19:16

That one.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 19:16

the dementia one.

[Aaron Straker]: 19:17

Yeah, that

[Bryan Boorstein]: 19:18

Yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 19:18

one I think is, I mean, it's one of those things that's kind of potentially scary depending on how you look at it, but it could be like, okay, maybe I have a higher than average risk for this potential dementia down the line. There's a lot you can start doing, right? I mean, there's a lot of good research there, especially around like, oh, Lyon's main and things like that. Like there's certain supplements that you could be like, hey, I'm 40, I'm going to start putting these in pretty much year round to kind of stack the odds in my favor. because I know this, right? Information is, there's a saying, right? Information, or knowledge, right? Knowledge

[Bryan Boorstein]: 19:54

Knowledge

[Aaron Straker]: 19:54

is

[Bryan Boorstein]: 19:54

is

[Aaron Straker]: 19:54

power,

[Bryan Boorstein]: 19:54

power, yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 19:55

yeah. So I think just being proactive, especially like we've talked about healthspan is so important to you to take action early.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 20:03

Yep, for sure. Yeah, so the APOE one also, like if you know, then you can basically just decide that, hey, I'm no longer gonna drink alcohol because even like one drink a week seems to have negative implications on dementia. So that would be like one thing that I would probably change. But aside from that, it's like exercise, eat well, sleep well, like basically all the things that I'm already trying to do. So yeah, those are my two major updates. And then I have two really quick small updates. So a new episode of the LBLB podcast. That's the one I do with Lori and Alex Macklin, it's Paragon Training Methods podcast. I'm on a new episode of that one coming out Wednesday. And we're basically going over just common things that people should know in the gym. So basic things like proximity to failure and other things like that. But anyways, that'll be out on Wednesday. And then I was on the Brains and Gains podcast recently with Dave McHoney, and it was a thorough review of our thoughts on the Peter Atiyah book. So he and I had both finished it recently. And so we got together on the podcast and kind of talked about some of that and some of the implications that that may have on our training and our life and stuff like that. So that's all I got on updates and I'll kick it over to you, bud.

[Aaron Straker]: 21:25

I have two updates. One is kind of funny and one is a big kind of realization for me. So there's this kind of common thought that I have and this is pretty much, it's probably a bias of being so knee deep in this world that like at this age, like people know these things. When I'm thinking about putting out a post about like using full range of motion and things like that, I'm like, on the back of my head, I'm like, people already know this, right? I don't wanna just like put it out just to make it sort of thing. Um, but I think that is a bit of a bias of like, I have conversations with people like you, you know what I mean? Like my significant, like everything in my world, my environment is, you know, nutrition, training, that sort of thing. And it's all it's taken is me, you know, spending some time back in like a very, what I'll consider like a rural gym here, um, with younger. people, there's a group of bros in there that are probably, here's the thing, I'm not sure they could be 25, they could be fucking 17, I'm not really sure at this point in my life. But they're younger bros based on the conversations and stuff that they're having. And watching them train, I'm like, it's literally like it's 2003 and I'm, you know, whatever, 17 years old again, nothing's changed. Nothing has changed and it's like re-firmed to me that. I'm fighting the good fight, right? There's still a lot of people that need this information. They're doing, I don't know, a push day, I guess, yesterday, and I'm watching them, they're on the incline barbell bench, and they're loading up a good amount of weight. I think they had like 205 on there, and I'm like, damn, that's what I would be using on there for a set of eight to 12 or something like that. And then I watch them, and it is a partial range of motion lift. At the top, that bar is a foot off their chest still,

[Bryan Boorstein]: 23:20

Hehehe

[Aaron Straker]: 23:20

and that's like the four reps. And I was like, my God, have we learned nothing? You know

[Bryan Boorstein]: 23:27

Yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 23:27

what I mean? And it was quite funny. And the conversations, Jenny's generally a very, one who doesn't wanna put headphones in in the gym, but she's like, I need to put headphones in. Like, I can't listen to these conversations anymore. And the one guy was just talking about like, training seven days a week. But. doing doubles each day and he's like, I'm gonna train shoulders in the morning and then come back and train shoulders in the evening. And like just,

[Bryan Boorstein]: 23:53

Hehehehehehe

[Aaron Straker]: 23:53

there just so much to learn still. So I was like, okay, right? People still need this, maybe getting things to some of the people that need it, but it was just funny of hindsight. Because I mean, I used to do that shit. I would train, you know, and then I would, we had a little gym in the basement and I would go home and literally train the exact same, I'd go home, eat. you know, and then go back in the basement and keep training the exact same things I just trained. So it was just quite comical

[Bryan Boorstein]: 24:21

That's

[Aaron Straker]: 24:21

to me.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 24:23

something I think about a lot actually with social media too is like I don't want to put out that like basic B information because I feel like my followers are just not gonna be interested in it. But I think to your point like a lot of that is biased based on who we surround ourselves with and who comments on your posts. And so like I have 20,000 followers, if I put something out and I get a hundred comments of people that are engaging about a topic as. in depth as length and partials or range of motion, then my assumption becomes my followers understand range of motion and length and partials and why we're doing it and all this stuff. But then I only just need to either go to a gym like you did or go into my like DM requests. And there's like people being like, why are you performing half reps? And I'm like, ah, like, don't you know anything, you know? So yeah, I mean, I'm sure that that information definitely can be helpful. to a large portion of our following, I just, I still am so hesitant because I feel like a lot of my followers are gonna look at that and be like, oh, why is this like, obviously I know that, you know, like training the eight to 12 rep range for hypertrophy. And then you have the people that are like, yeah, bro, that's what you're supposed to do, that everyone knows that. And then there's people like, well, actually you could do six to 30. And it's like, no matter what you put out, you're gonna have people on both sides of the equation that are gonna be either help. by it or hindered by it, I guess, or not helped by it.

[Aaron Straker]: 25:50

Yeah, I agree there. And then the last one, and this one, man, this one's really hard for me. So I'm wrapping up my, I essentially have like, today's Tuesday, by the time Sunday night hits, I'll be back in Bali, I have a couple days in Hong Kong by myself, but wrapping up like essentially a month long trip away, and I have effectively made zero progress on my own personal nutrition and kind of fitness goals. And I'm in a bulking phase. And it's been frustrating, but ultimately like, I just realized when you are chasing the last kind of 5% or optimality, 80 to 90% effort just doesn't move the needle anymore. And I have great days, but then like Thursday, Friday, Saturday, it's like my family was in town. So like hanging out with them, not training, catering meals that are still very high quality meals, but just like not being able to eat my six meals per day and all my protein feedings and everything. My weights just continue to slide. I've hovered in the 208 to 210 for the entirety since we've been back. Suboptimal training sort of thing, even with trying to line it up. And it's just like, it's been very kind of frustrating, but eye-opening that like. at this point in my personal kind of lifting and physique journey, unless I can really be on it, it just doesn't cut it to move

[Bryan Boorstein]: 27:29

Hmm.

[Aaron Straker]: 27:29

the needle anymore. I think that has really kind of changed my outlook on traveling and those sorts of things for the rest of the year.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 27:39

Hmm. So you think that's mostly a product of just being out of your routine. And so it's not a product of you being in Bali per se, but it's a matter of you being like somewhere that's home.

[Aaron Straker]: 27:50

Yeah, I mean, like if I went, like if I took a month long trip, like directly to the lake, you know, where I am here in Virginia, where I have the grocery store, I know the gym, like I think I can make that work, but just some like travel days, variables, family type stuff, or traveling to see friends, there's just too many non-perfect days to continue inching, you know, the needle forward. And that's with, and I'm sure someone's listening to that, like yeah, you could just eat a bunch of food and of course you're gonna gain weight, but that's the difference between gaining the weight you want in a gaining phase and just getting fat. Like I could of course have 200 carbs with breakfast and then another 250 carbs with dinner, but you're not gonna partition that the way that you want to ultimately.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 28:42

Well, maybe you would be a great candidate to travel while you're dieting because you tend to lose weight when you're not pushing food consistently. So maybe it just becomes almost a tool for you to be like, well, I'm in a dieting phase, I'm just gonna go travel, I won't be able to get all my food, but I'll still get all my protein. It kind of almost makes the process, even if not just as easy, I mean, if not easier than just as easy.

[Aaron Straker]: 29:08

That was my kind of thought. I could easily protein shake in the morning, another one later, and then have two more reserved meals. My superpower is the, with dieting is where the majority of people struggle. Social situations, work events where you're expected to socialize and have alcohol and stuff, I have zero problems being like, yeah, I'm not fucking

[Bryan Boorstein]: 29:33

That's not

[Aaron Straker]: 29:34

coming

[Bryan Boorstein]: 29:34

my thing,

[Aaron Straker]: 29:34

because I don't

[Bryan Boorstein]: 29:34

yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 29:34

want to eat that.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 29:35

Yeah,

[Aaron Straker]: 29:36

Yeah.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 29:36

yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 29:37

So yeah, that was my thought exactly.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 29:39

Cool. Sweet. Well, I think that's all we got on updates.

[Aaron Straker]: 29:43

Yeah, so let's dive in. And I should actually preface this with this one. It's interesting to me because admittedly, this is confirmation bias for me. I've had conversations with some clients where I'm like, hey, listen, what you are getting is not supported by research. This is Aaron's kind of anecdotal perspective. Feel free to shoot me down or whatever. peers I've had clients with, but I guess ultimately, what I would like to open this with and what ultimately we will, my, I guess, firmest standpoint on it is I have found very, very few aspects of life from a massive perspective where less effort is generally more productive than more effort. Like if you try as hard as you can at things in an overwhelming majority of aspects, it generally produces better results. From this, which I think is something that is kind of quite clear, strength appears to be one of those that does not, actually. But hypertrophy, which is what the majority of the conversation you and I have on this podcast. does seem to fall into that umbrella.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 31:15

Yeah, and it's confirmation bias for me too. I agree completely. Um, it is interesting. I mean, not surprising, but it is interesting that the data on this meta regression is kind of validating things that we have found just in general through our own training and through programming for others and stuff like that. I mean, it's been well established, it seems for decades almost that you don't need to train close to failure for strength. And I think the logical rationale makes sense too, right? Like if you're doing strength work close to failure, then your rep speed is slowing down, your velocity of the concentric is slowing down. And so you you're losing explosiveness and force production, which are going to correlate super well into strength. And when you're working closer in proximity to failure, for strength work, or I guess in general, you're inevitably going to incorporate some compensatory mechanisms. And so in strength, you definitely don't want that because you want to be reinforcing a movement pattern that is the optimal objective. It'd be like if you were trying to do like a one rep max vertical jump, but you were somehow messing your technique up. and doing it suboptimally. When you're doing strength work, you want to perform every single rep as optimally as you possibly can so that you're reinforcing the force production through that specific movement pattern. And so to me, the strength side was no surprise at all. When it came to the hypertrophy side, there's been so much recently in the literature and you can go, when I say recent, I mean the last... seven, eight years probably. But you can just look back to like when I first came out of CrossFit and I fell into the RP, Renaissance Periodization approach to training, where at the time Mike Isertel was, I mean, he was just following the research. He couldn't. exactly no better aside from maybe anecdote and understanding that like, hey, the research isn't necessarily in line with what I've experienced. But like he was following the research and there was the Brad Schoenfeld meta analysis that 45 sets was better than 27, which was better than nine, which is just crazy on so many levels. But there was that and there was a lot of research basically saying that you don't have to train to failure and you probably shouldn't train to failure. But I think the thing that is often missed as this research has progressed in the years since it first came out is that there just kept being this repeated statement that you'd hear of like, why would you train to failure when you can get just as good results not training to failure? And the thing that people forget is that you have to do more volume for that equation to work out. And people just like somehow that just got lost in translation over the course of years. And so I literally have conversations with people in the comments and my DMs or on email or whatever that are literally saying that exact same thing. And I'm like, yes, but you are going to have to do four to five sets of an exercise instead of two sets because you want to keep three reps in reserve on each set. And so now we have this opportunity cost associated, right? The opportunity cost of time. the opportunity cost of man, I call them the Zach actually coined this term, but the the the amount of unrax. And so unrax is a term that's often referred to like deadlifts or back squats, like you're having to unrack the bar and like, but it's, it's an analogy for having to psychologically mentally focus and bring it to each set. And so an unrack could be like a set of T bar rows to like, it doesn't really matter. but to have to go in there and mentally focus and get in the zone for four to five sets instead of just having to do it twice, it just, for me, it never made sense because I could do an additional two reps in that one set or I could stop two reps shy but have to do that four more times. And like by the time you've gotten to the point where you're two or three reps shy of failure, you've already worked really hard. So an additional 10 or 15 seconds of time for you to commit in there. to get more out of your set. It always seemed, at least for me, to be a better ROI opportunity cost or whatever. So yeah, curious on your thoughts there.

[Aaron Straker]: 36:08

Yeah, I mean everything you said I agree with completely there's like the and and I and I don't want to borrow like too much from the man Chris Beardsley kind of principles with like Heneman size principle Which essentially states that we have you know, you have motor units that control different varying sizes of Muscle fibers and that like you're gonna use your small motor units first when you're doing like your lighter reps or non as challenging reps and then as the reps get more and more challenging and you have to put you know, put in more and more effort you recruit the larger and larger motor units until you know eventually pull on like the largest motor unit you have to put is to recruit as many fibers as you know, your physiology has within that muscle to move that load and That is where you know, the most effective hypertrophy comes from If you're doing your five sets and you're getting to whatever, 70% of that motor unit recruitment, you're gonna set three, you go back, you have to work through the small ones again, then into the medium ones, set four, you're working through the small ones again to get into the medium ones. As opposed to if you do two all out balls to the wall sets and you're only working through those progressions. to get to what ultimately is going to be the most beneficial is using those very large ones and again Coming back to what I opened with using a maximal effort Is what seems to be most hypertrophic for

[Bryan Boorstein]: 37:49

Yep.

[Aaron Straker]: 37:50

the majority?

[Bryan Boorstein]: 37:51

Yeah, no, that's really well said. And then on the point of the Henneman size principle, one of the interesting and, again, not surprising pieces of this meta regression that I took away from it is the idea that if you're picking a heavier weight for hypertrophy, say like a set of six to eight reps, you're essentially recruiting all of those big motor units from the very beginning. So when you look at that meta regression, there was actually much more rationale and justification for stopping somewhat shy of failure if you're doing these low rep five to eight rep sets of movements, because from the get go, your body is having to recruit all of the motor units. But essentially as you get into the further and higher, higher reps, it becomes more and more important for you to go to the point of failure or get closer to failure to get the full result. And then that also comes with the ambiguity of, are you actually at failure when you're doing higher reps? Because I know, shit, I've been training 25 years and there's still times where I'm doing a set of 20 rep leg extensions or something. And I'm like, am I really at failure or does this just burn so bad that I just really, really, really wanna stop? And so. So this is like another reason why I personally love the five to 10 rep range for so many things, because you can more accurately assess your RIR. You can get more without having to go all the way to failure, or you can just go all the way to failure and you're gonna be more accurate doing it. And then when you're doing the high rep sets, like Erin said, you're just, you're having to go through all of these ineffective reps, if you wanna say that, non-stimulative reps. to get to the reps that are actually gonna matter and move the needle. So I thought that was kind of an interesting caveat or piece there as well.

[Aaron Straker]: 39:53

Yeah, the thing that you said was the ambiguity of failure as reps get higher because you effectively have your, you have your mind, right? Like for example, like yesterday I have some cable upright rows, right? And then I have like a run the stack kind of set, you know, drop set essentially. Your brain is screaming at you, just like put the weight down, put the weight down, put the weight down, right? Just quit it. you can still perform those reps, but it just feels horrendous, right? Like the metabolite buildup and everything. And it is when as set, or excuse me, as reps get higher, it introduces the, I guess, the human limiting factor of the brain into discomfort. Whereas if you're training in like a six to eight or whatever, it's like, I'm giving it all I got. It doesn't really burn, but the weight's just not moving sort of thing. as it's more closer to what we could say is like a strength sort of range.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 40:58

Yeah, but still hypertrophic.

[Aaron Straker]: 41:00

Yes.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 41:01

Yeah, so to like, to your point of the higher rep stuff, one of the things that I find really bothersome about higher reps is that like, I can be performing the reps in a certain manner. So call it like that confident press on the gas pedal. So we're not trying to like explode and like floor it like gone in 60 seconds style. We're just confidently pressing on the gas pedal, right? But when you get up to those, say, say you get to 18 reps of upright rows. and you're confidently pressing the gas pedal. Well, now your rep speed is starting to slow down. However, if you just decide like, well, now I'm gonna start exploding from the bottom. And I'm not talking about using momentum or anything like that. I'm just saying you initiate your reps slightly differently than you were before. Suddenly there's no more slow rep speed. You're just like back to having zero. You're back to like the start of the set, you know? So... So the precision and the manner in which you perform the reps also is more critical as the reps get higher. Whereas like you were saying, when they're lower reps, you're giving it everything you have from the beginning. And even if you were doing a confident press on the gas pedal on the hack squat, and then you get tired and you're like, this rep I'm gonna explode up. It's like, and not really much changes. You're still kind of working as hard as you can. So I think it's kind of like a safety net. as well when you're training in those lower rep ranges. It just mitigates the likelihood that you might be not working hard enough.

[Aaron Straker]: 42:32

Yeah, I agree there. I wanna kinda steer the conversation a little bit back towards some of the findings from the meta regression. And something that I think is really, at first when I read it, it was, I was like, okay, I mean, so basically the term nonlinear, right, it is used in the title, or the description of it. And it really takes the main graph that they kind of like, put in the Instagram post and sort of thing to really identify that. because it does appear that as you get into sub RIR, sub zero RIR, which would be like intensity techniques taken to act, or what they, I guess let me back up. One thing that I pulled out of the meta-aggression that I really liked is they made clear categorizations of how they would kind of group the studies and effectively weight them. And then, I'll just actually read what I have here. So they basically assigned an RIR of negative one to the sets where people were taken, you know, to actual concentric failure or, you know, momentary muscular failure or you actually failed to achieve the next rep. This is different than like, hey, I just grinded that last rep of the leg press out. I know I don't have another one left. That would be an RIR of zero. The example of, hey, I know I don't have another one left. I'm gonna try anyway. They would put that as like an RIR of negative one, right? The interesting thing to me is it seems that with that like kind of negative one or things taken essentially like a past failure, the line kind of hockey sticks at the end where it appears that you get like more hypertrophy. appears, right, I'm making, trying to make sure I'm not speaking conclusively here, it appears that your hypertrophy, you know, upticks as failure and past failure, which would in fact be intensity techniques and sort of things, sort of things are applied.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 44:47

Yeah, no, I mean, that's such a really good point. I'm actually curious though, anecdotally, like how often are you actually going to negative one RIR? Like, like you, I, I know when I train and I say I'm going to zero RIR, I'm almost always completing a rep and feeling like there's very little chance that I would be able to complete the next one. And I feel confident in that after this many years of training. but very rarely, especially on compound movements, am I going to try another rep afterwards? Whereas I think it's different on like a movement where you're going into partials because then you know that you failed and then you try another one and it's just a partial rep and then you try another and it's another partial. So in those ones, you're going to negative six or negative seven or whatever the denotation would be. But yeah, for compound movements, like how often do you actually make a rep? think it's zero and then go down and attempt another one.

[Aaron Straker]: 45:47

For compounds, very rarely. And that's what the next point I was gonna bring it into is when we have these meta-regression studies and those sorts of things, I think, as with so many things, it's really, it's difficult, and then interpreting it is difficult, and many people drop the ball there. And one thing that I wanted to really make sure we brought up is there's a time and a place. Right? So when I'm doing any, any lateral delt movement sort of thing is 90% of the time is going to be, I don't think I got another rep, but I'm going to try. And then I'm going to move into partials for body parts that I purposefully do lower volume on biceps and triceps. Everything is taken to failure and then past failure because I'm like, This week, I may only do two sets of biceps, so I'm gonna make sure that I give them 110%, including partials, et cetera, et cetera. When I'm doing a hip hinge, aside from the 45 degree hip extension, I'm not really, if I don't think I have another one, RDLs maybe, because I do feel that's a grindy movement that I can all surprise myself with sometimes, but a hack squat and those sort of things, I'm not. taking to concentric failure, mostly because I don't train with anyone and I don't want to get pinned under something. And I also think that is where your injury risk would also hockey stick.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 47:24

Yeah, yeah. No, it's a good point on the hip extension compared to the RDL. And I think that that goes back to the idea of movements being either lengthened overloaded or short overloaded. And when you look at lengthened overload movements, they kind of fall in two buckets. You have like the RDL, so if like a deadlift type movement or a hack squat, any type of back squat type movement. But then you also have your lengthened movements that are like your overhead tricep extension or your face away. cable curl or something like that. And so the risk associated with trying an extra overhead tricep extension, if you're not sure you're going to make it, is basically negligible. You're just going to try to get up and nothing's going to happen, right? But when you're doing that, like you said, with a hack, SWAT, or an RDL or something, there actually is a risk associated due to all the different muscle groups that are involved in there. And so that goes back to that compound versus isolation thing. So The tricep extension and the face-away curl are lengthened, but they're in isolation movement. So we're only working at one joint versus when you try another RDL after you don't think you can make another one, there's so many joints at action in there that there could be these like little small compensatory mechanisms that take place that could potentially lead to tweaking your low back or getting out of position in some way. So yeah, I think that separating those movements into buckets and looking at it that way is important because when I'm doing my face away curls or my tricep extensions, if I take a set to failure, it's very likely I'm going to go down and try another rep just to not, if not even to test myself, so to speak, because I kind of know that I'm not gonna make the rep. It's just like, hey, there might be a little extra stimulus down there if I try another rep or two. And so that's kind of the approach I take on those.

[Aaron Straker]: 49:17

Yeah, that's very, very well said because the term you use there is like, hey, there might be extra stimulus there. And for something like the bicep curl, the overhead tricep extension, that magnitude is...it's quite small because it's localized to a smaller muscle group sort of thing. But I think moving to that application towards the larger body parts, right, the glutes, the hamstrings, the quads, chest and back sort of thing. many of us, right, because they're larger body parts, they're more compounds, they're more fatiguing, and then you put that kind of mental fear of failure and that risk sort of thing in, the human nature is to cut further from failure as opposed to actual failure because of that kind of fear, and thus, with that, like the meta-regression is essentially saying, like there is a stimulus being left on the table. Something that I think in the future will come out more as, I mean, we're still this sort of RIR, you know, to failure research is what I would consider maybe just breaking out of its infancy, especially in objectively quantifying or, I shouldn't say quantifying, objectively placing the correct labeling, you know, of failure. Are we talking volitional failure, concentric failure, momentary muscular failure? As we get firmer there, I think we will, obviously this is a quite general statement, get better research in the future, but that's pretty much could be set across to any research over history. But I think that is one thing is of actually defining it because there's been so many small, obviously not very controlled social media, experiments and such where you're saying like, What is this RIR watching someone do something, you're like, ah, I think they got like two reps left and they'll have like six. And even yourself and myself who are quite trained, very competent with RIR, I get it wrong. I say I get it wrong more than 50% of the time with myself. And that's trying every single day, like week in and week out for years on end. So I think kind of saying like as it. progress as I do think we will get better research out of it, which will only kind of, I guess, further confirm what we're effectively agreeing with the data-driven strength guys here on hypertrophy.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 51:58

Yeah, I'm not sure that I ever get it wrong at zero RIR. I mean, maybe there's like an occasional time here and there, but I feel like I've pretty much nailed zero RIR on almost all my movements at this point, because maybe especially because I do tend to go into partials after failure a lot. But the further you are from failure, the more ambiguity exists for sure. And then I also think it's probably important to note that like you said, you know, you were talking about the compound movements and that there is something, some gains being left on the table stopping Shia failure. But I think that it's also important to remember, at least for practicality, that most of these compound lengthened movements are being performed in the lower rep ranges. And so I think it's arguable how much stimulus is being left on the table. If you're stopping a set of hack squats at six reps at one RIR, versus really actually going down and attempting slash making that seventh rep at zero RIR. You know, like we opened the show talking about how with those lower rep ranges, and then as we know from research with the more demanding movements where compensation can occur more easily. I don't think there's quite as much left on the table. And I would guess that the... the fatigue cost of that extra rep of a hack squat or an RDL is such that even though there probably is additional stimulus with it, actually I'm pretty confident there is additional stimulus with it, I think that the fatigue that comes with it is much larger than the fatigue that comes with that extra rep going to failure on something that's a little bit less demanding.

[Aaron Straker]: 53:49

Regarding the fatigue, I 100% agree. Yeah, I mean the fatigue there is quite massive. One thing that, again, personal opinion here, I'm happy to be wrong about it. I would argue that the chasing that seventh rep in that example for you that you used, What it does to your mindset in applying that to training, I think does have merit of it kind of like the example of like, okay, you're in some, one of those like new video games that every decision you make changes the decision tree of the video

[Bryan Boorstein]: 54:35

Yeah,

[Aaron Straker]: 54:35

game.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 54:35

yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 54:36

Pushing, taking that seventh rep can kind of like unlock a new belief in yourself sort of thing, and then change your subsequent training sessions, which can kind of. Over time, enough separation kind of hockey stick your potential, I would say,

[Bryan Boorstein]: 54:54

Mm-hmm.

[Aaron Straker]: 54:54

of your future training sessions

[Bryan Boorstein]: 54:56

That's such

[Aaron Straker]: 54:57

there.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 54:57

a really good point. And something that like definitely needed to be said, cause yeah, if you're somebody that tends to lean towards safety over everything or fatigue management is like the most important, then you could just be even further from failure than you think you are. And so you would be behooved by trying that rep at times. So as far as practical applications, do you wanna jump into some of that stuff here? Cause I was thinking like, when it comes to practical applications, I think there's practical application as it relates to partials. But there's also the practical application of, there still is benefit to not training to failure, especially in the rep range and the movement that you select. And so if you have a program design that has one set of a movement, then yes, you probably want to take that movement to failure likely. But if you're doing a program that say has three sets of a movement, and then you know you're going to go from hack squat for three sets to leg extension for three sets, and then to say split squat for two sets, say that's like your quad day, right? Then I don't know that your benefit is that you're maximizing benefit by taking all eight of those sets to failure.

[Aaron Straker]: 56:19

Agreed.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 56:20

I think that you want to look at the long game a little bit and like, how am I going to get the most out of this workout? And so like if I was constructing a workout like that and trying to get the most out of that workout, my first set of hack squat would probably be four RIR, then maybe two RIR for the second set, and then I'd probably go to failure on the third set. Then we'd go into the leg extension, it would probably go two, one, zero RIR. So across the three sets, again, I would have one failure set at the end. And then for the split squat, it would probably go two RIR, and then zero or one RIR for the second set. And so you're looking at across those eight sets, not all eight sets are to failure. You're getting maybe two or three of those eight sets to failure and you're strategically placing them as the last set of the sequence. So I don't know, what are your thoughts on that?

[Aaron Straker]: 57:12

Yeah, I mean, when the conversation turns to practicality, right, context becomes so much more important. I think with a training program that the expectation or conversation around which sets are to failure and which and what your total volume is on the program or for a given day should vary needs to be communicated because that completely changes things. Like, if I got that program, right, I would probably modify it. if I'm being completely honest, and the first thing I thought of when you said that, I was like, those split squats, I would only do one set and just take them to failure because

[Bryan Boorstein]: 57:50

Yeah, yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 57:50

I know personally for myself, I don't need, what would that be like? Was it two sets of split squats? Like not, not. So a total six or three, three on the first two and then another two, like I just don't need that much, right? I would be absolutely crushed in my mental capacity to really like buy in and try and push it. would start, would wane very hardcore. So I think like you said, that RIR kind of descending scale that you used is very, very appropriate for that. But I think having that conversation, and then two, other things that come in. Times that, let's say, you're, great example, I have client. 37 year old mom of three, her children were all very small, we're back in the gym, like she doesn't need to be trained into failure. She's very stressed out, right? And as good and beneficial as resistance training is, it is an additional stressor on the body. And you have like a, your allostatic stress load has a ceiling and you don't wanna be busting through it or even approaching it all the time because you'll start to regress. So understanding where the other impacting factors in your life like. Even within a person, there's gonna be times where you have much more capacity to train to failure. Times when your food intake is higher, you're in a better period with sleep, other life stressors are lower. It's great to train to failure. If you're working full-time, in school full-time, and working night shift and stuff with not great sleep, you might not wanna be training to failure all the time. So I think there's many other external variables that will impact it in terms of practicality. Those are... quite important factors to consider. But going back to the original point that you brought up, like knowing where failure is supposed to be in the training program I think is very important. And that's another reason why you probably don't wanna be following people's leg days or whatever day on Instagram when it's like, incline press four sets of 10, incline fly four sets of 10. It's like.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:00:00

Right, right.

[Aaron Straker]: 1:00:01

There's only like 60% of the variables that you need are put forth.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:00:07

Yeah, I'm not even sure that in that example I provided where we had eight sets, but say three of the eight were to failure. I'm not so sure that I think that that would be better than just doing one set of each of those movements to failure. So I mean, obviously you would have your warmup sets and your buildup sets and all that stuff, but you just like one hack squat set to failure, one leg extension set to failure, one split squat set to failure, boom, done. I don't know that doing those eight sets with descending RIR or anything like that. is necessarily better. But again, to your point, it's very context dependent. So the last thing that I wanted to discuss here is partials and the idea of failure. Because as I opened up with, you know, when I was talking about my programming, Brian's program in the beginning, the two different approaches to partials are, you know, the Milo Wolf way or the evidence-based way would be you establish a stopping point, like 60% of range of motion, and then you can use RIR. So you can be like, I'm gonna do my hack squats and I'm gonna stop every rep right when I get above parallel and then descend back down and get above parallel and descend back down. And then in that manner, I can stop my set with two IR, three IR, or I can go to failure, whatever it is. You have some freedom there. And then the other way of approaching them is the past failure way, which is basically I'm gonna go until I fail, and then I'm just gonna continue accruing range of motion and let that range of motion kind of drop off rep to rep. And of course, that second style pass failure is really only applicable on short overload movements. Because if you're going through doing a set of hack squats and you're basically at failure, and then you're like, now I'm gonna bang out partials. I mean, you're just gonna get pinned at the bottom. Like you're not going to actually be able to get partials. So in one manner, the way that you do your partials has to be specific to the type of movement that you're doing. But secondarily, now that we have this meta-aggression showing the trend for more hypertrophy at or even beyond failure using the negative one RIR designation, I think that in some ways it validates the use of the partials past failure for short overload movements even. more. And so when I had this discussion with Milo a little while ago, you know, a month or two or whatever it was, part of his argument as to why I shouldn't be doing partials the way that I do them is that I can't use RIR with them, that I am essentially going past failure. And his argument was, well, you're incurring all of this additional fatigue and you're not getting a reasonable amount of extra stimulus and all that stuff. And so he actually went as far as to say that the way I was doing partials wasn't evidence-based. And that kind of rubbed me the wrong way at the time. Because yes, he was right, but they just haven't studied partials that way. The reason it's evidence-based is because when they study partials, they set a standard range of motion and then they go to that range of motion. But nobody actually has ran a study where you did partials after failure on a short overload movement, or else they would be evidence-based as well. So evidence-based is only... based on what you have studied. So that whole argument kind of rubbed me just slightly the wrong way a little bit, but in a manner I feel slightly vindicated now with this, that maybe it validates the past failure partials on short overload movements a little more, and especially when we think about the fact that short overload movements are just lacking. total fatigue cost in so many ways, like you said in the beginning, taking a set of lateral raises and then failing the top position and then just being able to knock out some partials at the bottom. Like, would we really argue that that's creating a ton of extra fatigue that you somehow can't recover from? Which I think most people in the trenches would say absolutely not. So yeah, I just think it's important to look at it context dependent, movement dependent and all of these things. So, I don't think in the grand scheme of things that this meta regression has changed, it's changed almost nothing in the way that I train or program training, but I think that it maybe has slightly changed the way that I communicate this stuff to people, which I think actually circles back to the very beginning where you were talking about this idea of posting on Instagram and people, you know, is this helpful to people or is this not helpful to people? And which of my followers would it be helpful to and which ones wouldn't be helpful to. And so I think that in some ways, this meta regression has shown some light on the different avenues by which we can kind of implement training and still find it productive based on context.

[Aaron Straker]: 1:05:11

Yeah, the only thing I will add to kind of wrap this one up with the partials like you just described it versus Milo's definition, one is essentially, let's call it an intensity technique. It effectively is. Because they're kind of an intensity technique and it's past failure and where you don't have as much control because of the... I mean, we can call it fatigue, but not like central fatigue, but just like a localized fatigue of you just perform something. It's hard to accurately quantify in terms of like science, I would say, especially like week to week. One day I might do partials on my tricep pushdowns and get like 13 partials. The next mine, I only get like seven. To me, I'm like, I'm dropping pennies in my hypertrophy bucket, whether I got 17 or, or sorry, 13 or seven or 14 or seven or whatever I said. But from like a research standpoint, that would be quite you know, problematic. So I think it really comes back to like, your goal is just getting jacked. You know what I mean? Like that's what it is. Whereas Milo's is like, I need to turn this quantification into a publication that's

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:06:23

Yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 1:06:23

very precise and highly kind of like safeguarded, per se.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:06:29

Yeah,

[Aaron Straker]: 1:06:29

And

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:06:29

yeah,

[Aaron Straker]: 1:06:29

the

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:06:29

yeah.

[Aaron Straker]: 1:06:29

goals are just quite kind of stark in the contrast of their differences.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:06:35

That's such a really good point too, yeah. No, I appreciate that perspective because it's easy in the moment to be like, well, man, like he's using evidence-based for everything, but it's just not evidence-based because it's never actually been studied. And like, I'm sitting there like fuming, like, oh, what am I gonna say back to this, you know? And so that is a good perspective.

[Aaron Straker]: 1:06:57

Yeah. Anything else to add to this one, Brian?

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:07:00

No man, that's good.

[Aaron Straker]: 1:07:02

This was a very good conversation. Hopefully we get some good discussion out of it. And just to wrap this up, big shout out to Zach and Josh and the rest of the data-driven strength guys. They do really, really cool, good work and everyone else who put their efforts into this research. It's been really, really cool. And I'm sure they will only continue to put out further cool work and doing good work in the space of combining like being bros lifting. powerlifting which he do a lot of and then obviously pushing forward with research and literature as well.

[Bryan Boorstein]: 1:07:37

Yeah, no, I co-sign all of that. I love the work that those guys put out and I'm just so excited that we have people like Milo and Zach and Josh and the rest of that team that are in their early 20s, literally doing this work. I mean, it is insane to me to think about being in my early 20s and having this type of like focus and direction and passion for something. It's just, it's set up really well for the future of hypertrophy and strength research.

[Aaron Straker]: 1:08:08

Yeah, you...I kind of did forget about that. They're all still so young, which is wild. So kudos to all of them. As always, guys, thank you for listening. Brian and I will talk to you next week.