Modern WisdomAn Expert Guide To HRV & How To Improve It - Joel Jamieson | Modern Wisdom Podcast 264
EVERY SPOKEN WORD
155 min read · 30,504 words- 0:00 – 15:00
We've kind of been…
- JJJoel Jamieson
We've kind of been fed this idea that you just need high intensity all the time. Unfortunately, you need more than that because you can only do high intensity for so long before you break and you need something in between. And so those lower and more moderate intensity sessions allow you to do more volume, to get more stimulus-
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JJJoel Jamieson
... without breaking yourself. So you need that balance. So your average person, if they just spend four or five days a week, up to six for higher levels, and they're consistently doing some form of aerobic training, you know, the majority of time they're doing lower, more moderate intensity work, 30, 40 minutes, sometimes more, sometimes less, and then they're spending maybe two days a week doing those higher intensity intervals and they are getting their heart rates up towards maximum and they consistently do that, you will see your HRV consistently climb, guarantee you. (wind blows)
- CWChris Williamson
I wanted to dig into HRV today. HRV is, like, the hot new girl in school at the moment, I think-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, you know, it's, uh, it's-
- CWChris Williamson
... in terms of the metrics.
- JJJoel Jamieson
... it's funny because I've been using it since, like, the early 2000s. And I used to go into a presentation and I'd, I'd say, "Who here is using HRV?" Or, "Who's got an HRV?" And people would look at me like I was asking about an STD or something because they just had no clue-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JJJoel Jamieson
... what the hell the thing was back then, right? Uh, but, but yeah, now it's everywhere. Apple Watch has got it, and people are talking about it. It's, it's, you know, it's such a, a big change from where it was, like I said, 15, 20 years ago when I was first getting into it. So it's, it's ex- it's exciting to see because it's a valuable metric. It's, it's one of the few pieces of fitness tech that truly can change people's outcomes and have them, you know, get better results.
- CWChris Williamson
You were ahead of the curve, man. Trendsetter.
- JJJoel Jamieson
(smacks lips) Yeah, I mean, it was... I was just, uh, you know, I wish I claimed that it was entirely intentional, but I just kind of stumbled upon to it. And once I did, then I immediately saw the value and, and jumped into it. But I would never have predicted, you know, way back then it would be- get as popular as it is now. So it's, uh, you know, it's definitely been a, a journey to get there, for sure.
- CWChris Williamson
How did you get started with it?
- JJJoel Jamieson
(smacks lips) Yeah, so kind of a crazy story. There was a guy named Randy Huntington, uh, who a lot of people probably are not familiar with, but Randy was a fantastic track coach. He worked with Mike Powell when Mike Powell broke Carl Lewis's, like, 20-year long, uh, long jump world record. And he's a local guy and I'd just kind of come to meet him as a young coach and asked him some, you know, some tips and things he would advise and, you know, just general advice from an old guy to a young guy. And he said, uh, "You should- you need to look at this thing called the Omega Wave." And I was like, "Well, what the hell is the Omega Wave?" And he just kind of gave me a number and said, "Call, call this guy." And so, okay, I'm like, "Okay." So I call this, this number and it's this thick accent, sounds like Russian or Eastern European, and I'm, like, barely understand the guy, but he's telling me to meet him at an airport the next day. So I'm like, (laughs) I'm like, "Am I going to get kidnapped? Like, am I, am I going to sell the guy vodka? Like, what's going on here?" So I go down to the airport and there's this guy in this long trench coat and literally I'm like, "Is this KGB or is this, like, a practical joke? Like, what the hell's going on here?" And he tells me basically in the hotel airport to lay down on the couch and take my shirt off. And I'm s- I'm seriously like, "This makes no sense, but I trust Randy and if I'm go- you know, like, uh, well, okay, I'll go- I'll play along."
- CWChris Williamson
If a Russian man in a trench coat says to take my top off in an airport, I'll do it.
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah. (laughs) Exactly. So anyway, so I laid down on the couch, I take my shirt off and he connects a bunch of electrodes to me and, and tells me to be quiet for a couple minutes. And I look over and he's plugging all these electrodes into this big computer and all this shit's happening on the screen in the background. I'm completely lost at this point. I mean, bear in mind, this is like 2000, maybe 2001-ish, so there's no fitness tech, there's no mobile apps, you know, there's no Fitbit. Like, none of this stuff exists. So there was nothing. And so all of a sudden, two and a half, three minutes go by and he's telling me like, "Oh, your cardiovascular condition is shit and your central nervous system is good and your recovery is very bad right now." He starts just kind of, like, telling me all these things about my training and re- and, and kind of the nature of... I was an anaerobic athlete at that point in time and just power lifted mostly. And he's able to tell me all this stuff despite not knowing anything about me. And so I was just like, "How in the hell is this working?" You know, is this some Russian voodoo or, like, what is this? And so essentially he kind of tells me that the, the Russians pioneered this technology called heart rate variability that in- they used it in the original space program with the astronauts or cosmonauts back then. So the interesting thing is, he said that basically it had been used in space medicine for, for decades, and in the 1980s, the Russians had tried to figure out how do we make this, uh, applicable to athletes. And so they, they started this giant program where they were developing it for their Olympic athletes and for their national athletes. And kind of as they were developing this program, the Soviet Union crumbled and the whole thing fell apart basically. The program was never completed. And so, you know, fast-forward maybe 10 years and a bunch of the original scientists had still kind of been in the sporting world and had stumbled onto each other at a track meet in Eugene, Oregon of all places. And they'd all just kind of started talking about this project that they should have finished and never got to see through. And they formed the Omega Wave Company and started the project back up and finished kind of the first commercial grade heart rate variability tech. And it was, you know, it was very expensive. And so when I, I was, you know, sitting there in my early 20s and I'm like, "Well, how, how much is this thing? I've got to have this damn thing." And he's like, "$35,000." (laughs) And I was like, "$35,000?" Like, Jesus, I didn't have $350 at the time. I was, I was, you know, barely out of college and I was totally broke. Uh, but I, I just said, you know, "Is there any way I can work some payment plans or help you sell this thing? Like, what, what could I do?" Like, you know, I was desperate to have it because I just saw the potential of it. And so, um, you know, I just kind of wheeled and dealed, and fortunately the Russians are, are willing to negotiate a bit.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JJJoel Jamieson
And so I was... You know, I, I got a, I got a used system that had, you know, just kind of an old laptop, an older one of their models that they were just kind of going to recycle anyway, um, and convinced that I could introduce it to other coaches and then show them that I knew it would help them get it started in North America, because at that point they had almost nobody in North America using it. I mean, maybe Randy and a couple other coaches, but they'd primarily been focused on Europe and track and field and, you know, high level sports. And so, uh, you know, to make a long story short, I was able to, to help them out with that and get, get more coaches aware of it and then I started using it. But the funny thing was, because I had kind of negotiated this discounted rate...... there wasn't much training involved. It was, like, uh, 10 minutes of, "Here's this thing (laughs) here, here's how you connect it, here's kind of how it works." Versus the two-day training that I found everyone else got. So a lot of it was just trial and error and figuring out what the hell this thing was doing. And then I kind of realized, "Okay, I kind of understand what it's doing now, but I don't really know how to explain it to people." And so I, I kind of became the Russian guy. Like, people would come in my gym, be like, "Lay down and take your shirt off," right? (laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JJJoel Jamieson
And they'd be like, "What? What?"
- CWChris Williamson
"Come, meet me at, meet me in the airport, bring a Kalashnikov."
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah. Yeah, exact- exactly. So it was, it was awkward days. And then y- then I'd kind of have, I needed to put six electrodes on, and, like, three were on the chest. And I'd, you know, I had female athletes and clients come in, and I'm like, "Um, I'm gonna put my hand here, but I promise this is, this is gonna be valuable for, for you. And this is real, this isn't me trying to do something odd." So it was, you know, like I said, back then there w- there was just, there was no fitness tech. And so I had this laptop and this little bo- black box and all these electrodes. And it was just, you know, it was the Wild West of, of early days of fitness tech. But, uh, you know, like I said, now it's evolved to the point where you've got this thing in a million different devices and people know what it is, or at least they have some idea of what it is. But it's, it's, it's certainly come a long way from, from those days.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah. Probably for the better as well. If you've got to strap a bunch of electrodes onto someone, it wouldn't be quite as popular, I don't think. Take us through it then.
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
H- HRV, how do you define it?
- JJJoel Jamieson
(smacks lips) So, y- you know, in a nutshell, all we're really doing is measuring the pattern of your heart rhythm. So people typically think the heart beats like a metronome, which makes sense, but that's actually not how it beats. It's got a natural rhythm to it, and that natural rhythm changes depending on how your body is regulating itself and how your body's distributing energy. So when you're at rest, your body has a certain heart rhythm that's associated with what we call the parasympathetic nervous system. That's the rest and digest system. And the s- and the stronger that pattern towards that side of it, the more your body is driving energy towards recovery. When you are under a period of stress, or your body is producing more energy, or that sympathetic system is, is more at play, then we see a different pattern in heart rhythm. Because again, these two systems influence how the heart beats. And so we're just basically looking at that pattern to figure out, okay, is the body in this fight or flight state, or is the body in this recovery state? And where is it in that spectrum? 'Cause it's a spectrum, it's not really like a light switch. It's, it's more about a spectrum. It's only a light switch on the far, far ends of that spectrum. So what we're really trying to do is just see where is the body distributing the energy that it's producing? Is it focusing its energy more on the rest and digest and recovery and rebuilding side of things? Or is it currently under a period of stress, or is it still in that, uh, that fight or flight state after workout, or mental stress, or, or life stress, or whatever the case may be? So we're really just trying to understand how is the body regulating itself internally. And we're doing that just by looking at how that heart is beating, because again, that heart rate and that heart rhythm and that pattern is governed by the autonomic nervous system, which is again what manages how energy is distributed throughout the body. So it's a, you know, it's a hugely valuable tool because of that. Because if you could understand where the body is in terms of its recovery versus its stress, and how well it's recovering from everything you're throwing at it, then you can have a whole lot of better information about what's the right choice to do now. You know, do I need more recovery, or is my body already handling everything well? Do I focus, uh, you know, more on this or more on that? It gives us a lot of guidelines as far as what, you know, we should be doing and what we shouldn't be doing. And then likewise, the, the number itself, heart rate variability, is, is mostly a measure of that, that parasympathetic recovery driven energy system, or, or, sorry, autonomic part of the nervous system. So higher, in general is protective because it's anti-inflammatory, because it's connected to aerobic fitness. Um, and, and lots of reasons. It's basically a, a really good marker of overall longevity and overall ability to recover from the stress of life. So it's, if we look at that single number over time and we see that number going up over time, then that's telling us our body is getting more resilient, it's getting more durable, it's getting more, uh, robust and able to handle a higher level of stress. If that number is lower, then it's a bad thing, and it basically tells us we're going the opposite direction. So if we look at it on a, a daily basis, we see these changes up and down as we train and as we deal with life stress.
- CWChris Williamson
Mm-hmm.
- JJJoel Jamieson
And that just gives us this kind of daily roadmap to figure out what's, what's an appropriate level of stress. But if we look at the long term, we can see is our body getting more adept? Is our body getting more resilient? Or are we going the other direction? So it can kind of give us two big pieces of data that are really important for fitness and health and performance when we look at it either in the daily level, or if you zoom out and we look at kind of the long-term trends behind it.
- CWChris Williamson
HRV is associated with longevity. Higher HRV-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Oh yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... is associated with people who live longer.
- 15:00 – 30:00
So high HRV's good.…
- JJJoel Jamieson
much more likely to be healthy and we're much less likely to have, you know, chronic inflammatory diseases and, and all those things that come with that.
- CWChris Williamson
So high HRV's good. Is that relative-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Mm-hmm.
- CWChris Williamson
... or absolute? If I have a HRV of 50 and you have one of 100, are you twice as parasympathetic as I am? Is it all relative within my physiology?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, so there's a couple of things. The first thing is, there's a lot of different ways to calculate it, there's not, uh, just one calculation. So the, the difference is if we look at heart rate, it's very simple, it's the number of beats your av- your heart's beating per minute. But if we look at heart rate variability, there's multiple types of calculations from what's called RMSSD to SDNN to pnFit, there's, there's multiple ways to calculate that-
- CWChris Williamson
Shit, I bet.
- JJJoel Jamieson
... actual number. Yeah, so it's, it's just more difficult to compare me to you or... the, the reality is that it's much more difficult to compare one system's HRV number versus another system's HRV number, because right now there's so many systems out there and they all have different calculations, and then they all put them on different scales or different ways to quantify them. So the number on one system really is meaningless to say, "Oh, well, I, I have a 50 on this system, but you're a 75 in that system," that, that number is not as universally comparable as heart rate itself. So you really can't say, "Okay, well, you're 50, you're an 80," unless you're looking at the exact same heart rate variability system or the exact same heart rate variability calculation, those numbers to compare against are meaningless. But if you're... two people are using the same system, the same exact way of calculating HRV in the same exact scale, then yeah, higher number would be healthier for anybody. It doesn't really matter. But what we see is that age groups have norms. So as you age, you lose some of that recovery ability, y- you start to decline over time. So that's... what we see is if you look at someone's average... like if you take population, and you take somebody in their 70s, people in their 70s are going to have lower HRV on average than somebody in their 20s, who's gonna have higher HRV than 30s, 40s, it's gonna decline with age. So there are certainly age-driven norms that you want to be at the top of, and you want to be as, as high as possible given your age. So it's more about where's my HRV in relation to somebody in my age range, uh, given the tech- the exact HRV system I'm using to compare myself against. So, and it's also, it's not like a two to one, like, "Oh, I'm 100, so I'm twice as..." You know, it's n- it's not quite that, uh, linear. Um, but i- in general, you want again, you want to compare yourself against other people in your age group on whatever system you're using, 'cause it's, it's, a- again, it's really the only way to get a, a fair comparison to see where you stack up relative to other people. Now, the good thing is, if you... the other metric you can use that's much more, uh, universal is resting heart rate. So resting heart rate and HRV will have an inverse correlation, meaning people with higher heart rate variability are going to have a lower resting heart rate, because part of what drives that resting heart rate down is that parasympathetic nervous system, and the other part of it is just the structural and functional changes that come along with aerobic fitness, which is also what drives your HRV up. So if you want to compare yourself, you can pretty much look at what is my resting heart rate-... relative to somebody else and chances are pretty good that if I have a lower resting heart rate, I'm probably also going to have a higher HRV on average than somebody else. So again, we can use just resting heart rate, which is a more comparable number that everyone can look at and compare themselves against, uh, to have a pretty good idea of what our HRV is likely going to be. It's pretty rare that you're gonna see somebody with a very low resting heart rate and, and also not have a pretty good, uh, uh, HRV. You, you generally would see those, again, correlate in the inverse way. So if I'm gonna compare it to people, I can't really do it with HRV unless they're using the same system, but I can compare resting heart rate and that's where we can have a fair, a fair game to see what, you know, what those numbers look like.
- CWChris Williamson
Are those the two most important metrics that you look at?
- JJJoel Jamieson
They, they are, yeah. I mean, so if you dig into the research, I mean, most of the research on longevity and all that sort of stuff is done basically on, uh, VO₂ max, which is kind of the gold standard lab testing of hard cardiovascular fitness. But again, those things are... they're difficult to measure. I'm not gonna go to a lab and get my VO₂ max tested. It sucks. It's a shitty test.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JJJoel Jamieson
People don't wanna do it. So we... Right? We, we can, we can look at resting heart rate and we can look at HRV as a proxy, 'cause those are gonna correlate at such a high level and they're much, much easier to measure. Now the third one I would say that also correlates extremely well 'cause it's all on the same vein is heart rate recovery. So there's a number of studies and things you can look at where the, the faster your heart rate will drop after exertion, the better your overall parasympathetic nervous system is, the higher your HRV is, the better aerobic shape you're in. Because ultimately, the faster we can drop the resting heart rate, it means that we're in better aerobic cond- condition and we're gonna see all those other characteristics that come along with that. So I use that one all the time for training, you know. We'll look at, you know, a period of exertion, we'll look at some high-intensity work and you give them, you know, either 30, 60 seconds and you see how fast their heart rate comes down. The faster heart rate comes down, the more likely they are to have, again, higher HRV and lower resting heart rate and all that sort of stuff. But those are really kind of the... You're gonna look at... You're not gonna look at HRV in workout, this is done at rest, and you're not gonna look at resting heart rate in the workout because it's, again, done at rest. So from a tracking standpoint, we'll use HRV and resting heart rate. From an in-workout standpoint, we'll typically look at heart rate recovery.
- CWChris Williamson
That's cool. What's the highest HRV that you've ever seen?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Uh, you know, again, it depends on the system, but the one that people in the UK might be familiar with over there is iAthlete, which is a really good one actually that I first... one of the first companies I worked with was with Simon at iAthlete over there. And Simon and iAthlete and my first system, Bioforce HRV, we worked with basically the same general algorithm, the same general scale. So on that one, you know, if you get up around 100, it'd be a very high HRV. You'd see a few people here and there, it'd be like 105, 110, um, which was extremely high and kind of the far end of the endurance spectrum. Um, but again, that's... there's other systems out there that can show you 200, so it's, it's all relative. But you usually will definitely see the endurance athletes and the people that are doing hours and hours of volume tend to fall up in that 100 range if you're looking at some of the more popular ones like I said, Bioforce, my original one, iAthlete, and a few of the other ones out there. But, uh, again, it really depends on the system that you're using so it's hard to say.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, given that 110 is like the absolute top end of what you saw there, I'm in a WHOOP team with Ryan Fisher, who's a CrossFit athlete-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
... who works out at CrossFit Chalk, and his HRV regularly hits 200 on that, so there's no way.
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah. Yes. There's... You can't compare.
- CWChris Williamson
It's impossible that he's going to have double the HRV of that. He'd be beating like once a minute, certain minutes.
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, it's not possible. I mean, so again, HRV is not really measuring heartbeat per minute at all whatsoever. So it'll correlate, but it's not always as simple as that. But yeah, you just... you can't compare it. Every system is using a different calculation. I mean, a lot of them are... these days are using RMSSD, um, but then a lot of them are also not using RMSSD, like the Apple Watch doesn't use that. Usually, they use SDNN, I believe. So the calculation itself will drive the number and then a lot of times after the fact, people do math. So Bioforce and iAthlete would take that raw data and it would basically transform it so it's a little bit more usable so it didn't jump around all over the place the way that some of these other ones would. So you got to be careful. I think too that you... the differences between a chest strap sensor versus an optical sensor, how it's measured, the time of day, all that sort of stuff. So I'm personally not a big fan of WHOOP, to be honest with you, just because it's measuring at very random intervals. You know, if you really want to get consistent measurements, you need to measure at the same time each day and you need to measure it in a standardized fashion so we can compare where were you yesterday at this time to where you are today at this time. Because if I'm just walking around or if I'm sleeping on my stomach versus my side or if I have caffeine, all these numbers get thrown out the window because they're just going to reflect that exact situation, but we want to have a comparison of a baseline state. We want to see where is your body in a baseline state at rest. So some of them, you know, WHOOP and some other ones will try to measure you overnight because they think it's the easiest time to measure. But the problem with that is they're not getting a steady stream of data, they're just taking these random snapshots because unfortunately, HRV is battery-intensive. It would run your battery into the ground on any strap like that if you had an HRV running all night long. It would literally... you'd have to charge it every six hours to keep the thing or eight hours to keep it actually running. So instead what they do is they take these random little snapshots every couple hours or every six hours, whatever they do. You can't... we can't know exactly how often they measure it, but they take these little snapshots and then they compare that. But the reality is those snapshots are broad. I mean, you could be sleeping on your stomach versus your back and that'll change your HRV entirely.
- CWChris Williamson
Will it?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Uh, you know, you could be... Oh yeah, absolutely. Your body position changes your HRV, your breathing rate changes your HRV, your mental stress, I mean, your HRV is... it's a sensitive number, that's kind of the challenge with it is you can change it... I mean, you can literally cut it in half by holding your breath. So-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JJJoel Jamieson
... basically like...... different things you do are going to change your HRV significantly. So your body position, your breathing rate. I mean, I can sit there and mentally think about something stressful and elevate my heart rate, and that's gonna lower my HRV. You know, all these different things are going to influence it. So these little teeny snapshots, you know, are not a very good indicator of your baseline state. They're just kind of showing us what's happening in the moment. So most of the research that's out there that's done, uh, is done with HRV in a kind of standardized measurement period where it's, like, usually two to five minutes every day around the same time, because that's the best way to see what is this person's baseline state. Uh, the, the overnight HRV research that's typically done is done from, like, sleep studies, where they do use ECGs and they connect a bunch of electrodes and they measure you all night. And they take all this data because they're, uh, you're in a sleep lab. So there's very little research out there that shows good accuracy with kind of random overnight periodic measurements, because again, it's really, really hard to extrapolate what a baseline state is when you're getting these kind of random ad hoc measurements throughout different periods, uh, throughout the day or throughout the evening. So, you know, there's, like I said, there's, there's lots of different systems out there and, and there's some value to each of them. But personally, the way I've always done it and the way the research supports it is, you know, a consistent daily measurement done at the same time, um, and generally in the same fashion to compare, again, what does this person's normal baseline state look like and how is that changing on a daily and a long-term basis?
- CWChris Williamson
What's your preferred tool and preferred time of day to achieve that?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, so I mean, I have my own HRV system now. I started with Bioforce, uh, 2011 was when I first came out with one, and I really, I just saw the need because it was really early days. There really wasn't HRV systems out there back then except for iAthlete's and, you know, Omega Wave and some really expensive ones. And we measured HRV for, uh, you know, a number of years with, with, with Bioforce. And then ultimately I kind of realized people would, would use it and they would say, "Well, why did my HRV do this?" And, "Why did my HRV do that?" And at the time, you know, all we were measuring was HRVs. I'm like, "I don't know." Like, it could have been, it could have been, you know, what was your diet like? What was your mental stress like? What was your sleep like? What have you been doing for training? You know, HRV does not really tell you the why, it just tells you what's happening, and it's up to you as an individual to figure out why is it doing this. And the reality is, it is, it varies a lot, as you probably have seen. It goes up, it goes down, it's all over the map, right? It's, it's not always as obvious, uh, what's causing these variations. So I came out with Morpheus a couple years ago with the idea being let's track all this other data that's already out there. So we take activity data from any wearable people have, whether it's, you know, a Fitbit or a Garmin Band or Oura Ring or Polar, and then we do the same thing with sleep, and then we measure heart rate from training from any Bluetooth chest strap or any chest strap, really, that people are using. And then we basically measure HRV with our own device, and then we turn all that data into a recovery score. So we're taking, you know, same thing Whoop does, Whoop takes the same similar data, but we're using other devices rather than force you to wear just one. So we're trying to be a bit more flexible in the market because not everybody wants to wear a band 24 hours a day. Uh, not everybody's gonna buy it, nobody wants to pay a subscription, all those sorts of things. So we're trying to use the data that people are already getting from wearables they like, Garmin, Fitbit, Polar, Apple Watch, all those sorts of things, and then we measure HRV using our, our Morpheus bands and then we show you the whole picture of that. So we make it easier for people to, again, connect those dots. So if you see your HRV is doing something that's affecting your recovery score, you can generally see, okay, well, I, I went 15,000 steps yesterday, it's obvious why it's different versus my average of 8,000. I doubled my steps or my sleep's been six hours a night, it's been really shitty, so that's probably what's doing it. So you can actually see all these different pieces connected, because again, it's gonna be your activity level, it's gonna be your mental stress, it's gonna be your training, it's gonna be your overall fitness level, your nutrition. All these things are going to drive HRV on a daily basis, and if you don't see the big picture of that, you're just kind of like guessing what your HRV is doing or you're guessing why it's doing that. So, you know, like the system I developed called Morpheus, and we're really developing it for coaches. We're working on a coaching platform, it'll be out here shortly, so that coaches have access to all this data, because that's the one thing I would say is, is if you're a coach, your results or your program depend on all these things that happen outside of your control. So if I write a program, this is really what I learned early on with HRV, is I would write a program and I was like, "This is great. This is a perfect program." And then it would go to shit and I couldn't figure out why. And I'd see all the numbers happening and it made it way back to me, like, this person's not recovering well, the program's not having the results I wanted, what's going on? And then you would talk to the person, they're like, "Oh, yeah, I was up, I was up till four in the morning last night playing video games." Or, we, you know, I work, we're in Seattle or, you know, we have a product launch at Microsoft, I, I haven't slept in five days. So you would just start to see, like, my program results weren't really all on me, they were on the person once they left the gym to go do the right thing. So it's, it's really, it's, it's the 23 hours a day outside the gym that drive the results you get from the one hour inside the gym, and the problem I always had as a coach was if I couldn't see that and they couldn't see that and there was no accountability and they were screwing themselves and blaming me for it, it's, it's a bad business model. You know, (laughs) like, you're, you're, they're, they're coming in and paying me to give them results, but my program is a small piece of that. It's the potential to have results, but if they don't get enough sleep or if they don't eat the right foods, if they don't deal with their mental stress appropriately, they're screwed. They've sabotaged all the hard work they've done and all the work I've put into their program. So, you know, I realized that as a coach, I was just shooting in the dark without this data and without making decisions because of this data. So I've always seen there's got to be something out there that helps coaches have access to this and helps coaches sort through it, 'cause it can be a lot of data. And so that was really where the genesis and the idea behind Morpheus came from, was I wanted to figure out, okay, how can we take all this data? Because clients are carrying it, right? Clients have wearables, clients have Apple Watches, they have Fitbits, they have Oura Rings, they have Whoops, they have all these different tools that's collecting this data the coach could be using, but the
- 30:00 – 45:00
Go to fucking bed,…
- JJJoel Jamieson
coach has no access to it, right? It's not exactly like, "Hey, let me look through your apps when you bring your phone in to me." Like, that's not gonna happen. You're not gonna see it. So again, we're really excited because we've been working on this damn thing for two years, um, and we're literally a few weeks or months at this point in time from having it ready to start beta testing and, and launching next early quarter one of 2021. So I'm really excited because as a coach for so many years...... you know, I, I wouldn't know how to coach anymore without having access to that data because I'm, I'm so used to being able to see, you know, from, from my own systems and just talking to people and, and dealing with the systems I've built, you know. But even now I still have to kind of piece things together because I have to ask them to look, you know, I have to look at Morpheus data and have these conversations. But once we have this tool out there, then it's just going to make it easy for every coach out there to, to have access to this data. And then we're building in, you know, messaging tools and communication to be able to say, "Hey, what's going on in your sleep last night? Why-"
- CWChris Williamson
Go to fucking bed, it's 5:00 AM.
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, exactly. So then we're, we're, we're building, we're building little alerts. Exactly. So basically we'll, we'll have it so all the, all the data is in there and then we've built in this alert system that'll basically automatically search through the data and give you a little notification. So it could say exactly that, "Hey, Chris isn't sleeping. Tell him to, tell him to get his ass to bed." And then you'll be able to see their message and say, "Hey, what the hell, if you're reading this, go back to sleep." Right? So we're, we're building all these tools in there just to, to make this process easy and seamless and more practical for coaches to use. So it's something obviously I'm excited about because we've been working on it forever and I think it'll be hugely valuable just because again, all this data is out there, it's just going to waste. I mean, people are collecting massive and massive billions of data points that nobody's actually using in a meaningful way. They're just kind of looking at, "Oh, that's cool." Uh, you know, but nothing's actually happening in their program. The coach doesn't really know what it is or the coach doesn't help, know how to make changes in their program. And you have just basically a bunch of data that's being completely used. And I think that's a huge problem that we can solve.
- CWChris Williamson
That's awesome, man. I'm happy for you. Where should, if people want to go and have a nosy around, where do they go?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Uh, just trainwithmorpheus.com. So trainwithmorpheus.com is where we have the... right now we just have the, the consumer app. So if you're, you know, just wanting to use our, our HRV system for yourself, you can certainly order, order the strap as a coach. We will have, we'll have that new system coming out early next year. So once, once we get there, we'll have all kinds of stuff on the website about it right now it's kind of under the radar because we've spent so much time, uh, working on it. But we actually had a huge gym, we had Gold's Gym ask us to build this big platform for them initially, and then they
- CWChris Williamson
They went into administration this year. (laughs)
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, they, they, they, they, uh, they did, they, they went under, they went completely bankrupt and sold the company to a German company actually. So that whole thing kind of went, uh, went by the wayside. But by the same point in time, they, they gave us a significant investment to start building this thing out a lot faster we would have been able to without that. So we were able to basically get the whole thing built on their dime or
- CWChris Williamson
Are you saying that-
- JJJoel Jamieson
... at least.
- CWChris Williamson
I was going to say, are you, are you saying that you hastened the bankruptcy of Gold's Gym?
- JJJoel Jamieson
(laughs) I think we were very, very small part.
- CWChris Williamson
They repurposed all of their profits into your app. (laughs)
- JJJoel Jamieson
(laughs)
- CWChris Williamson
Motherfucker.
- JJJoel Jamieson
I wish it was that simple. But there was, there was quite a few months where they owed us a fairly large sum of money. So I don't think we, uh, they didn't pay us what they were supposed to for a long time, but we finally were able to get that once things went all the way through. But, uh, you know, they saw the need. They basically wanted to build a gym concept where you had live heart rate training classes, but the heart rate training and all this stuff was built around the individual and not just built on, you know, some static heart rate screens up on the wall that weren't individualized to you. So concept was basically we're going to have, everyone's going to get their recovery measured through HRV and all these other things. And then they were going to have a range of classes from lower intensity recovery classes up to your high kick your ass in classes. And the system would basically make a recommendation about which classes were appropriate for you each day. So if you were already smoked, it would say, "Hey, you should probably go to this recovery class today." Or if you looked like you hadn't been working hard enough or you needed to get your good ass kicking, it would say, "Hey, go to these classes today." So I think we're, we're starting to see this recognition in the industry that maybe telling everyone to go in the club gym every day and crush themselves is, is, is not a long term sustainable approach for most, most people. And it's why fitness doesn't work, you know, unfortunately very well for most people because they go in, they bust their ass for a few weeks or a couple months, and then they get burnt out or they get injured or just don't, you know, eventually they plateau and they, they get frustrated and then they go try something different. And you kind of just get this merry-go-round of trying different things. But the reality is, it's not the, it's not the thing that's going to make the difference in results, it's, it's how you put all these pieces together. It's, it's how much sleep you can get, it's how much nutrition or what your nutrition looks like. It's can you manage intensity on a daily basis? Can you manage the em- the, the stress in your life? Can you put all these things together because all of those things ultimately drive results because they all take energy. And if there's one thing people need to understand is that your body's capacity to produce energy is, is limited. It does not have this unending pool of energy to deal with everything you throw at it. So it has to prioritize and make choices. So if I'm extremely men- mentally stressed, that takes energy. If I'm walking around 20,000, 30,000 steps just working on a daily basis, that takes energy. If I'm not getting sleep, that takes away from my energy. And recovery, first and foremost, takes a ton of energy because we're going to break muscle tissue down and break down all these things as part of the workout. Well, we have to put energy back in to rebuild them. We have to turn on anabolic processes and protein synthesis, and we have to put energy into making ourselves bigger and stronger and more efficient and all these sorts of things. But there's a limited amount of energy we can produce in a day so the body has to make choices. And the, the last place it actually wants to put energy is into recovery if it has to just fight for survival. So again, people have this idea that I'm going to be stressed out from work and I'm going to go take it out to the gym, and then I'm going to slam a Red Bull or some caffeinated drink and get six hours of sleep and repeat that. And they, they try it and that does not work because again, sooner or later the body's going to take energy away from recovery and just direct it into survival mode, and your fitness isn't going to get better. And eventually you're going to get a shoulder injury or you're going to get a... your hip's going to start bothering you, or you're just not going to feel like going to the gym for a week, and then you're going to miss another week, and then you're just going to start to kind of fall off in being consistent with your training. It's consistency over the long term that produces results. It's not how many times you can smash yourself in the gym in a week. And unfortunately, that's what people try. And, you know, that's why people often don't, don't succeed.
- CWChris Williamson
Yeah, for sure. So getting into HRV training, what are the ways that we can help to increase that number in the gym?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, so the biggest thing, like I mentioned is, is it's correlated to aerobic fitness. So not... I, I don't want to put it out that the anaerobic and strength and power aren't important. Those play roles and they, they facilitate metabolic changes that help us in, in multiple ways in body composition.... but ultimately, you've got to improve your aerobic system. So, like I said, if you look at HRV, the highest people out there are the endurance athletes because they have the greatest levels of cardiovascular fitness and they also have the greatest longevity. So, there was a few papers out there, but there was one study that looked at, uh, a meta-analysis. It looked at basically a huge variety of papers, uh, a huge variety of athletes, I meant, uh, to see how their lifespan compared to the average. And the scary thing was, a lot of athletes, especially on the anaerobic side, their lifespan was either the same or worse than the average person, right? That's bad. If I'm going to spend my whole life training a sport, it should at least help me live a little bit longer or, or, or stave off disease a little bit, but it doesn't. So, the only athletes that consistently found that lived longer than the average person were the endurance athletes. And some of them, some of... The endurance athletes live an average of eight years longer than the average person, which is a lot, right? I mean, it's like 10% longer than the average lifespan. So, you basically have to develop the aerobic system, which, you know, like, t- could take a, uh, you know, a whole year to explain to you how to do that. But the simplest version, again, if you really want to boil it down to the easiest version is, if you spend 80% of your time... this is contrary to what most people think, but if you spend 80% of your time doing lower and moderate intensities below, I would say about, you know, below 90% of your maximum heart rate, and then you spend 20% of your time in those higher intensity zones, 90% above, and you do that consistently five, six days a week, you will see your HRV go up. You will consistently see your aerobic system improve. And it sounds simple, but the reality is, it isn't that difficult. It's just most people, again, they don't follow that guideline. They, they spend three days a week trying to do the highest intensity for the shortest duration possible. They neglect those lower and more moderate intensity zones, and they're not consistent. They don't, they don't get enough consistent work in. So, if you look at all endurance athlete training, it's not two days a week. I mean, there's a difference between... You can get stronger on two days a week. You can do two full body workouts and most people can gain t- gain or maintain strength on that. You're not going to see much fitness improvement at the aerobic side beyond a certain point at two days a week of training. It just isn't going to happen. So, you've got to be more consistent with your aerobic fitness and aerobic conditioning. And that's got to be four, five, six days a week consistently, but again, you want only about 20% of that to be what we call real high intensity, which I would define as above 90% of your max, and you want the rest of that to be below that. So, you want your combination of more moderate, longer volume days, and then you want your higher intensity shorter days, but you've got to have both. And unfortunately, we've kind of been fed this, spoon-fed this idea that you just need high intensity all the time. Like, unfortunately, you need more than that because you can only do high intensity for so long before you break and you need something in between. And so, those lower and more moderate intensity sessions allow you to do more volume to get more stimulus without breaking yourself. So, you need that balance. So, you know, again, your average person, if they just spend, you know, let's say, four or five days a week, up to six for higher levels, and they're consistently doing some form of aerobic training, you know, the majority of time they're doing lower, more moderate intensity work, 30, 40 minutes, sometimes more, sometimes less, and then they're spending maybe two days a week doing those higher intensity intervals and they are getting their heart rates up towards maximum and they consistently do that, you will see your HRV consistently climb, I guarantee you.
- CWChris Williamson
What's the lower bound on that heart rate that you were saying?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Uh, like, like, yeah, like 75, 80%. You know, probably for most average people, like 130 beats per minute, 120 is probably the lower end of where we're going to see the benefit of that. And so, like, most time I'll tell people somewhere between like 120, 150, 160, you're gonna be in that, in that range for that 70 or 80% of the time. And then that other 20% of the high intensity, now you're going to be up in that 89 or 85, 90, 90% or more of your max heart rate, which is going to depend on what your max heart rate is, but that's where you're seeing your heart rates in the, you know, the 160s, 170s, 180s, that sort of stuff. So, again, people think you need to go in there and, and do this high intensity every day. Even our fighters, even the best fighters in the world that have trained for 20 years at this point, two days a week of sparring has kind of been our recipe for success. You know, D-Dimitrious Johnson, the, the longest, uh, the world record holder in title defenses now, he sparred Tuesdays and Saturdays. He wasn't in there five days a week banging it out and being an idiot. Like, two days a week of high intensity sparring and most of the other stuff was technical drilling and just developing the skill set and strategizing, you know, building strength, that kind of stuff. But he wasn't in there five days a week trying to kill himself and that's part of why he had such a, you know, he's had such a long career and he's avoided massive injuries and he was able to sustain such a high level for so long because, again, we, we realized that if you sit there and beat the hell out of yourself for four or five days a week, there comes a price for that. You can sustain it when you're 20 years old for a couple of years, but what happens when you're 25, when you're 30, when you're 35? You know, a- and now you're paying the price. So, uh, I think the biggest thing is people just have this misguided notion that the harder they train, the better results they're going to be. But it's more about the consistency. The more consistently you can train, the better your results are going to be. So, you've got to ask yourself, is your training going to be sustainable? And if your answer is, "Well, I beat the hell out of myself every week. I'm feeling tired every time I leave the gym," then probably not sustainable for that long, to be honest with you.
- CWChris Williamson
One of the things I've definitely been red-pilled on this year, especially from Ben Greenfield, is that if you are not a professional athlete, you should be training for longevity in one form or another. Like, the number of people-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah. Absolutely.
- CWChris Williamson
... that I know of that are so religious, like, completely dogmatic, ideological about whatever particular training methodology is, whether that be CrossFit or BJJ or mixed martial arts or bodybuilding or powerlifting or weightlifting, whatever it might be, and you think, "Why is it that you're completely dedicating yourself to this one particular mode of training when it would appear, as you've said, and multiple other guests on this show, that so many downstream benefits come from just turning over, getting your heart rate into a good place?" Yeah, if you can do that during... Let's say that you enjoy cycling outside and you live somewhere that's got a great cycle track, fantastic. Like, that's a cool thing to do. But, you know, if it means that you've got to just turn over on an assault bike or on a spin bike or on a rowing machine or whatever it might be, you should get into that. But people seem to sacrifice an awful lot of what would make them not only be able to do the sport that they love for longer-... but also generally across their entire lifespan, just be healthier on all markers.
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, I mean, look, I think we're, as- as human beings, we're- we're- we're- we have two problems. We're- we're obsessive about things that we're- we see a- immediate feel good about. So, we love G- BJJ, we love something, we just get obsessive about it, a lot of people at least, uh, especially in the fitness industry. Uh, and then number two, probably our biggest downfall is we're incredibly shortsighted. Like most people out there are looking for the next workout next week or the next four weeks or the next six weeks. I mean, people- we don't look beyond the short term to think like, "Okay, what does- what does my- what does six months or six years from now look like?" Because the reality is those things are gonna- that time's gonna happen, you're gonna get there, but if we focus literally on the next six days versus six months or six weeks or six years, we make bad decisions because we're so focused on right now. We're not- we're really not good, at least most people are not good at making decisions now that are gonna pay off later. We like to make decisions now we think are gonna pay off now. We don't like to make decisions now that really aren't gonna pay off for down the road six years, six months, six- 16 years or whatever the, the number may be. We're just not long-term strategic, uh, thinkers or action takers. We tend to be very focused on in the moment and we don't really think about the long-term consequences of our actions because we just think, ah, that'll- let's- I don't have to deal with that. It's not for years from now. But here's-
- CWChris Williamson
Future- future Chris will look after it. Future Joel will sort it out.
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, exactly. And unfortunately, you know, it's n- that by the time that happens, they- they've- they've already made their mistakes. I can't tell you how many athletes I've worked with, uh, from a variety of sports and they're all, you know, th- that once you get to their- their 30s, maybe late 30s, they're like, "Goddamn, I wish I knew in my 20s what I know now. I would still be playing." I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've heard that. "If I- if I knew in my 20s what I figured out over the course of my career, I would still be playing the sport. I would still be in the game." And then you have-
- CWChris Williamson
What are those- what are those insights? What are they saying when- what do they mean when they say that?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, a lot of it, they just realize the importance of taking care of themselves, right? Like talk to Major League Baseball players, they're out drinking two, three nights a week after games, they're- they're chewing tobacco, they're not getting enough sleep, they're stressed out of their minds. I mean, a lot of them just don't realize the importance of taking care of themselves outside the sport and eventually they start to fall apart, you know, they- they start to lose their- their game and everything goes to shit. So, they start to, you know, eventually start looking for ways. And that's- it's kind of funny because you start to see the- the athletes that really embrace technology are the ones that are- are older and been around a while and they start to realize, like, "If I'm gonna keep
- 45:00 – 1:00:00
What are some of…
- JJJoel Jamieson
trying to compete with these younger guys, I gotta do something 'cause I'm- my game's going to shit and these guys are all beating me now." So, like I said, most of it is they just start to realize that again, you- you can't just go into the- the training with the idea that you've got to outwork everybody, you've got to go into the training with the idea that you've got to be smarter than everybody and that comes with taking care of your body and- and not just abusing it. So again, you kind of see the younger athletes, they'll just- they won't get any sleep and they'll- they'll have a bunch of caffeine or stimulants and they'll just beat the shit out of themselves. Like especially the MMA fighters, if you look at the young MMA fighters who are sparring four days a week, five days a week, six days a week, that's like half what they're doing and then they- they're- they do great for two, three, four years, maybe five at the very most and then they're out of the sport, you know, if they even last that long. So, you just kind of over time, you just realize maybe I should have taken a bit different approach and, you know, now it's maybe too late. So, you know, unfortunately it's just kind of the- the nature of the game, but there's enough- I think there's more and more education out there, there's more emphasis on recovering now than ever before, there's more tools, right? There's- there's all sorts of, uh, things that are coming out now from- from Hyperice and Hypervolt to Normatec boots, to all these different modalities are starting to be more widespread and I think it's because people are starting to actually realize how important these things actually are to sustainable performance and sustainable health.
- CWChris Williamson
What are some of your go-to workouts when you're in the gym and you've got an hour, you've got an all right amount of time and you think, "Right, I want to do something that I know is going to positively affect my HRV over the long term." What are some of the go-to workouts that you do?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, so I- I kind of do a- a variety of things. I- I- I like going outside and riding my bike. So, I- I do get outside and bike. There's- there's benefits to being outside. Uh, for my high intensity work, I typ- play racquetball, pre-COVID at least. I played racquetball just to keep my heart rate up and have a little more fun than- than just sprinting on a treadmill. So, I tried to get in the racquetball court twice a week. Um, and then the rest of the time I just do a variety of cardiovascular work. So I- I tend to do circuits. I'm, uh, I'm more of a lifter by nature, so I don't like monotony. Like I hate the- I'm- I'm just not the kind of guy who can do 90 minutes of the same shit. So, I might do five or 10 minutes of a VersaClimber, then I might jump rope for five minutes, then I might do some shadow boxing or something like that for five minutes and I might jump back on the VersaClimber for another five or 10 minutes. So, I tend to do like a- a, you know, I call like a road work circuit, if you will. So, I'll just use a variety of movement patterns and a variety of things and then, like I said, in the summertime I'll get out and ride my bike, I'll go swimming, I'll try to be, uh, you know, hiking, that sort of thing outdoors. So, I just like the variety of it. You know, some people are the exact opposite, they want to do the- the exact same thing, they want to be extremely monotonous. You tend to find the endurance athletes fall in that category are people that are naturally predisposed to the endurance side of things, they're very monotonous based, so they want to just do the same shit and then you find the power lifters or the strength guy- athletes who are more anaerobic, they tend to hate that sort of thing. So you just kind of fit- got to figure- figure out what people naturally gravitate towards too and find something that again, they enjoy doing. So, if I was forced to be in a treadmill for 90 minutes, I would kill myself, but other people, that's all they want to do is get on something monotonous, elliptical, and they want to just go for it and they want to just zone out and that's their- their way of- of training that they enjoy. So, you know, again, like I said, pre-COVID, I was playing racquetball about twice a week and then I would do a variety of circuits, you know, another three to four days a week and generally would do about three days of lifting, um, kind of mixed in there as well. So usually I do like a upper body, lower body and total body spread across three different strength workouts and then, uh, a variety of the circuit based training in between and then- then the racquetball, so yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
A little bit of sport to distract you as well. And do you found-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, exactly.
- CWChris Williamson
... over your long career of training and being a trainer, you found that that's like an optimal split for you, something that you can sustain and that gives you the results that you-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah.For, for me, yeah, that's exactly right. So, I, I tended to... I, again, I, I fall in the same trap. So, when I, when I started playing a bit more racquetball, I started getting more competitive, I'd start playing, trying to play a bit more and I'd start, you know, playing a little bit longer, and then I'm like, "Goddammit." Now my shoulder's bothering me. Like, I just kind of fell into my own trap, right? So, I could see it coming and I was still doing it, but then I, I learned from that, okay, I-
- CWChris Williamson
(laughs)
- JJJoel Jamieson
... basically kind of realized as I hit 40, about two days a week of high intensity, uh, because racquetball is high intensity. It's a lot of sprint work, it's a lot of change of direction, um, and it is a lot of, a lot of load on your body. So, I realized, okay, I can really only play high intensity about two days a week, and if I'm going to go in there and play any more than that, it's going to be just technical drilling and trying to get better at the sport and just learn how to play the sport better. But, um, yeah, it's kind of evolved over time. And like I said, the summertime, Seattle's, you know, a beautiful spot to be, so I'll go out, I'll ride, ride my bike, done a trail at work and, uh, you know, not, not fast, but I was going to get my cardio in through the bike and hiking and that kind of stuff. So, and I'm going to Hawaii here in a couple weeks, so same thing, I'll get some light work on the beach and, you know, be outdoors and train and just, uh, I, I enjoy the, the outdoor aspect of it, so I try to do that when I can. And then I enjoy, like I said, for my high intensity stuff, I like the sport aspect of it because I just, uh, you know, I enjoy that side a lot more.
- CWChris Williamson
There's going to be a lot of bodybuilders and powerlifters and weightlifters listening who don't like the fact that they're going to have to jump on a-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yep.
- CWChris Williamson
... a bike and do some cardio now.
- JJJoel Jamieson
Well, they, they, they won't, unfortunately, but the, the, the unfortunate part about the sport is if you look around the sport, there's been a lot of them that have died incredibly young, right? There's, there's been a number of bodybuilders and a number of powerlifters who are not exactly in the best health, you know, and I respect the fact that... Look, if you want to beat the living shit out of yourself to squat 1000 pounds, be my guest, right? I mean, that's, that's your choice. You can certainly do that. But if you, if you look at the guys, even like the Dave Tates and the Louie Simmons, I mean, I think they, you know, as, as they've aged, you can see them taking a different perspective. And Dave, Dave's been vocal about his injuries and has been vocal about wanting to rehab himself. I mean, uh, the first, the first strength coach I worked with, this guy named Bill Gillespie, incredibly strong guy, bench press 700 pounds, um, I believe at 50 plus years old, and he's just an absolute monster. Um, and a lot of these guys, again, as they age, you know, you see the wear and tear on them. They can't move very well, they can't, they can't get out of bed half the time, they're just in pain a lot of the time. And the reality is, you know, they're, they're, they're probably not going to live any longer than the average person. They certainly might live a less, uh, you know, shorter than the average person. And again, it's a choice.
- CWChris Williamson
And definitely an unfulfilled life, right? Like, it's gonna be painful.
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah.
- CWChris Williamson
Anyone who's seen the Ronnie Coleman documentary, like, it's, you know-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, the Ronnie Coleman.
- CWChris Williamson
Very uncomfortable to watch.
- JJJoel Jamieson
It's not fun.
- CWChris Williamson
No, but that's a-
- JJJoel Jamieson
But, but you know what?
- CWChris Williamson
That's the-
- JJJoel Jamieson
That's it.
- CWChris Williamson
... uh, sacrifice that people make to get to the top-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Exactly.
- CWChris Williamson
... top, top of the sport. If you've got-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
... Jay Cutler breathing down your neck-
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yes.
- CWChris Williamson
... you have to go and squat 700 solid-ass pounds, like for reps, and scream, "Yeah, buddy." But the vast majority of athletes aren't getting to that stage. They're maybe competing at a local or a regional level or perhaps a national level, but they're not going to do that. So, it's a really difficult pill to swallow and a bunch of my buddies who've competed at worlds for powerlifting have had to take this on. They've had to realize-
- 1:00:00 – 1:03:47
What is some of…
- JJJoel Jamieson
as quickly as they can in between intervals. So whenever I'm coaching intervals or doing conditioning work like that, it's not just about the work, it's about the recovery in between the intervals. So I want people learning how to not just drive their heart rate up, I want people learning how to drive their heart rate back down. And so that's, again, a big part of why I talk about heart rate recovery. So I want athletes or people focused on how quickly can my heart rate come back down in between an interval and that they can develop that skill. 'Cause part of it is just fitness, the aerobic system, and then part of it is the mental processes and the mental skills that drive that. So you can learn how to bring your heart rate down faster by practicing it 'cause again, part of that is an actual skill, and it's being able to turn that stress system off as quickly as possible and allow the heart rate to come back down. So if you're in the gym, and you're doing intervals, just literally spend the time after your interval seeing how quick your heart rate comes down in 60 seconds, or if you're doing a shorter interval, 30 seconds, whatever the case may be, see how quickly you can get your heart rate to come down and focus on that. Make that part of the goal of the workout is to try to drop your heart rate as fast as you can in between those intervals. And the better you can get at that, the better you're going to get at just being able to activate that parasympathetic system, uh-... you know, outside of the gym as well. It's a val- it's a hugely valuable skill. I just call it, I call it dynamic energy control. It's learning how to control that energy expansion, not just by going as hard as we can, but actually recovering as quickly as you can. So, it's just a, it's an, it's, it's another thing to add to your conditioning, your aerobic work, that makes it a bit more interesting than just go as hard as I can and then repeat. Well, try to actually learn how to go as hard as you can, recover as quickly as possible, and then repeat that process. And just adding that layer in, uh, people often find makes it little more exciting and it adds a hugely valuable component to it as well.
- CWChris Williamson
What is some of the physical traits that people can do to achieve that controlled breathing, calm thoughts?
- JJJoel Jamieson
Yeah, all of it. So, generally speaking, if we're, if we're in a extended position, hyper-extended position, it, it slows down our recovery and it, and it slows down that recovery, uh, from the respiratory function. If we can get a little bit more of a flex, a little bit more diaphragmatically advantageous position and we can work on expanding and getting full expansion of the rib cage and full breaths and then, again, a complete exhale, um, while mentally being able to relax and turn that switch, uh, down a bit, that's the combination that will work really well. And then positionally, it makes a big difference. So, if you have someone that just can't get their heart rate down, they just suck at it, the first thing you can have them do is just sit or even lay down. Just, just positionally your heart rate will come down a lot faster if you're laying down or you're seated versus you're standing. So, it's kind of the remedial 101. Like, if you cannot get your heart rate to come down, have, have them lay down, have them close their eyes, and have them really focus on just that full relaxation as lay- in the laying position. Okay, well, now they've got that down really well, they can, they can get that down, okay, now have them do it seated. Okay, now they can do it seated, now have them do it standing. So, you kind of go through this progression, uh, of where it's easiest to recover is laying is, is, you know, then s- then seated, then standing, then moving. You kind of go through this progression of letting them get that. But, so in, in general, uh, I'll just kind of give you guys some general guidelines. If you're going to 90% more of your max for, you know, any length of time, generally speaking, we use a 60-second recovery after that. You want to be able to recover between 30 and 40 beats per minute from your max. So, if I am doing something... let's say my max is 190. If I get in the 180s, I should be able to do a 60-second recovery and consistently drop at 30 beats per minute. Now, if I do 20 of them, obviously that's gonna change and I'm gonna have a harder time towards the end than beginning, but that's kind of our hallmark because we want to hit 30 beats per minute in terms of recovery from a max intensity exercise. Again, that's a, that's a kind of a generic prescription, but if you can shoot for that, you know, chances are you're in pretty good condition and you're able to control that pretty well. Most people hit like 10, 20, you know, at, at the most, and they can't do it consistently. But we want to consistently be able to drop 30 beats per minute across at least three to five reps of, of high intensity work. If you can get there, you can do that, uh, that's a pretty good sign that you're on the right track.
Episode duration: 1:21:41
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