Life Hacks - The Gym Edition

Chris Williamson 0:00 ... landmine press for shoulders and it's so safe.

Jonny 0:02 Just feels right, doesn't it? Just feel like the right thing to do.

Chris Williamson 0:04 But that's because-

Yusef 0:05 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 0:05 ... you've managed to take a movement that was supposed to be pressing vertically and made it go a little bit more close to a bench press. (laughs)

Jonny 0:12 (laughs) If you lie under it like that, then, and then just do...

Chris Williamson 0:18 (laughs)

Yusef 0:18 (laughs) I would say don't use a pre-workout. These things are false economies.

Jonny 0:21 But I don't agree with that.

Chris Williamson 0:23 Apart from the times when you injure yourself, which isn't usually due to the workout, it's due to something else that's going on, you almost never regret going to the gym. Another Lifehacks episode, Tools, Techniques and Tactics for a Productive and Efficient Life. We're going to go through a big list of things that we've used over the last couple of months, and everything will be linked in the show notes below. Because it's January, we thought that we would do some special gym training, little exercises that we've picked up, variations on workouts, maybe some kitchen hacks, but also probably some things from the internet and maybe some Netflix shows and such like that we've been enjoying. So, Johnny,

Chris Williamson 1:07 what have you, what have you got for us?

Jonny 1:08 (laughs) So my, this is my exercise variant. Cool. Um, so this is, I guess if you are in a gym that doesn't necessarily have a chest press or something like that, um, or if you suffer from back pain consistently or an aggravated lower back and find that, for example, when you're doing bench or doing dumbbell variants, that like it irritates your back when they sort, you sort of cramp up. And it's a pretty simple variation, but it's one that probably people outside of the like strength training world might not have tried, which is just a, it's a bench press, normal bench press with your feet up, not necessarily on the bench, but not like s- straight out, um, so your feet aren't on the floor basically, you aren't applying any force onto the floor. And it basically turns it into chest isolation and completely removes your lower back, completely removes your, your lower body. Um, so just a good variation. Limits the, limits the load and very quick to warm up for.

Chris Williamson 2:11 So how does it replace a pec machine? Is it, it's just a bench press, right?

Jonny 2:17 It is, but it, so like, I guess it depends on how you would normally bench. But a lot of people, even if they're not a powerlifter, you'll see them kind of as the bench gets harder, they'll sort of like squirm and move around and like press their feet on the ground to try and like use their, the rest of their body to help the weight up. When your feet aren't on the ground, you can't, (laughs) you can't do that. So it's-

Chris Williamson 2:36 I'm guessing as well, the, the angle is you're a little bit more flat as opposed to decline 'cause you can't get that arch in. Right. Okay.

Jonny 2:43 Exactly. Yeah. So you basically have to lie flat, which means that you can't get the, like the lower back cramping that sometimes happens. Um, it's also quite a good, um, like if you, if you don't really, if you're like scared of bench press and you want to just use light weight, but you want to still get something out of it, it's a good way of doing that as well.

Chris Williamson 3:00 What's the reason biomechanically that this is harder? Is it 'cause you can't use your lat- your lats as much, you can't recruit?

Jonny 3:05 Like technically legs and lower body, there's no like, there's less stability because you're not, like you're relying on balance at the same time.

Chris Williamson 3:12 Oh, okay.

Jonny 3:13 There's no force through the floor and yeah, you aren't in a, in a, in as much of an arch if you wanted to compare it to a powerlifting bench press. Have either of you ever tried it?

Yusef 3:22 Yeah, it's nice.

Jonny 3:23 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 3:23 So I, the only time I would have done that would have been if I was doing bench press from the floor, like floor press.

Jonny 3:29 Like a floor press.

Chris Williamson 3:30 Yeah.

Jonny 3:30 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 3:30 Uh, that's the only time that I would have done that.

Jonny 3:33 Do you get, do you, have you, I imagine you have used it where like you're benching and your back like cramps up, seizes up?

Yusef 3:40 Yeah. It doesn't take much for my back to... (laughs)

Chris Williamson 3:42 Yeah, I can imagine.

Jonny 3:43 I would have thought you'd have had that, Chris. You've not experienced that before.

Chris Williamson 3:46 No, so my, my back doesn't really seem to be too extension, uh, perturbed, but it gets-

Jonny 3:53 Flexion.

Chris Williamson 3:54 Yeah, yeah, a little bit worse when I go, when I go forward. Yeah, that's nice. I like it. Um, I need to try that. I might try that, try and add that in this week. Seth, what have you got? What's yours?

Yusef 4:06 So mine is probably one that we're all a fan of. Unfortunately, this is a sexist exercise variation.

Jonny 4:13 Can I guess what it is?

Yusef 4:15 Yes.

Jonny 4:16 Is it barbell chest supported row?

Yusef 4:20 My favorite exercise in the world.

Chris Williamson 4:23 (laughs)

Yusef 4:23 So if you do have back problems or if you just find that you're in this cycle of doing bent over barbell rows or Pendlay rows, and then each time you add the weight, you're just like humping it a li- little bit more. And then over the months, you're like, "Well, did I increase my row by 2.5 kilos or did I just hump 2.5 kilos more?" And it, it's, it gets to the point where like if you're rowing more than your body weight, mechanically, like balance-wise, you can't actually keep it strict because you'll just topple you over. So there is a point where (laughs) beyond 80 or 100 kilos you're going to have to start doing some kind of chest supported variation to get a strict back workout. So just give it a go. Set up a bench on I- I say from flat, it's up two inclines, so two clips. Um, get the seat of the bench up as well so that you can rest your knees on it. Or if, uh, if it's one of those benches that has feet, then dig your toes into the feet, make yourself as stable as possible. And then barbell with, you know, normal plates on, on the side, so it gives you enough range. And then each rep counts as when you touch the-

Chris Williamson 5:33 Underside of the bench.

Yusef 5:33 ... the bottom of the bench with. Uh, and then it keeps it replicable.

Chris Williamson 5:36 What's your reason for doing incline bench chest supported row as opposed to setting a bench up across two boxes and it being perfectly flat?

Yusef 5:46 You can do that as well. It's just pretty janky. Like-

Chris Williamson 5:48 Just convenience.

Yusef 5:50 Yeah. Most, uh, most gyms I've been to don't really have a safe setup for doing-

Chris Williamson 5:55 That's because you-

Yusef 5:56 ... a proper seal row.

Chris Williamson 5:56 ... continue to train-

Yusef 5:59 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 5:59 ... out of very specific types of gyms and they're the ones-

Yusef 6:02 That are close to me.

Chris Williamson 6:02 ... geographically... (laughs)

Jonny 6:06 Most gyms I've been to that are within a five-minute bike ride.

Chris Williamson 6:09 Yeah.... uh-

Yusef 6:10 Don't have this. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 6:11 That's it. Well, I ... 'cause the only thing that I think with that. I love it. I, I, I think it's a great movement. Both me and you have ... Everyone here's had back pain at some point, and I've never been a fan of bent-over rows. I think that they're too easy to cheat, and it just feel ... Uh, what am I working here? Am I working my hamstrings, my glutes, my lower back, my shoulders, my traps, my upper back? Like I-

Yusef 6:32 So, some, sometimes you'll do a set of Pendlay rows and you'll be like, "I actually feel that most in my lower back."

Chris Williamson 6:37 Yeah.

Yusef 6:37 W- what have I done there?

Chris Williamson 6:38 Yeah, um-

Jonny 6:39 I had one just attached to that, which is what you just said, Chris, which is a seal row, which is what you just described.

Chris Williamson 6:44 Okay.

Jonny 6:44 So when, when you're lying flat and you row, you're basically-

Chris Williamson 6:47 Reverse bench press.

Jonny 6:49 Yeah, yeah, and you're pulling it to, like, the bottom of the bench. You can get specific benches that are just a seal row bench.

Chris Williamson 6:55 High, high, thin, uh, seal-row benches.

Jonny 6:58 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 6:58 Yeah, they're cool. Didn't the place in Edinburgh have one of those?

Jonny 7:02 Y-

Yusef 7:03 Most likely.

Chris Williamson 7:03 No.

Yusef 7:04 In, in fact that's the direct, upside-down version of the first exercise you described, Johnny. (laughs)

Jonny 7:08 Yeah. It is.

Chris Williamson 7:09 Yes, yes. (laughs)

Jonny 7:10 You just go l- lie, lieca seal, completely flat. The reason it's called a seal row, I think, is as you start getting closer and closer to failure, I don't know why this is, but you-

Chris Williamson 7:19 But your feet do the thing.

Jonny 7:20 You just, like, flail-

Chris Williamson 7:21 Oh! Oh!

Jonny 7:21 Someon- You know, you know, like, those, those, uh-

Chris Williamson 7:24 (laughs)

Jonny 7:25 ... red, red fish that you lay on your hand and they ... Do you know what I mean? It's like a, like a thin piece of see-through paper.

Yusef 7:31 Usually a present in a Christmas cracker from 1997.

Jonny 7:33 Yeah. You must know what that is, Chris.

Chris Williamson 7:35 No, no.

Jonny 7:36 It's like a s- ... It's like a see-through piece of plastic, and it's a fish that you put in your hand-

Yusef 7:39 If you know what we're talking about, put your thing in the comments below.

Jonny 7:42 ... and it, it curls up.

Chris Williamson 7:43 Okay.

Yusef 7:43 Everyone's gonna go like, "Oh, my God, Chris, I can't believe you don't know-"

Chris Williamson 7:45 "You don't know about the fucking fish."

Jonny 7:47 But, but that's it. That (laughs) -

Chris Williamson 7:48 Idiots.

Jonny 7:49 But that's what you do.

Chris Williamson 7:50 Okay.

Jonny 7:51 You curl up.

Chris Williamson 7:52 Um, I got ... I, I had a few here because I thought that we were going ... I thought that we would have a couple each. So, the first one, which is my favorite, and I think I've ... during training with you guys, we've both done this, uh, skull crushers, but floor lying skull crushers. So most of the time if you're doing a skull crusher, which is a tricep movement, you would do on a bench. Um, getting yourself to the point where you have the EZ Curl or the barbell up here is actually a little bit awkward 'cause, okay, do I get it past to my hips, then I've got to kind of hip it to my chest, then I've got to push it up and then get it down. Dumping the bar is also really difficult. It's easier for you to go past the range that you're supposed to. You can't do dead stops from it. All of this is fixed by doing skull crushers from the floor because you lie down in front of the EZ Curl bar. It's already on the floor behind you. You can just put your hands behind you, take it up. If you fail a rep, the ... You're not going to drop it on your head. You're going to just push it up a little bit away from you. Drops on the floor. Uh, plus you can do some cool stuff, like it's easier for the person that's with you to do, uh, strip sets or drop sets 'cause they can just pull the weights off more easily, and you can do dead stop sets as well because you can just lower it to the floor, wait until it's taken all the momentum off and then go again. It's like that, for the long head of the tricep is number, numero uno workout exercise.

Jonny 9:12 That's for elbow pain as well.

Chris Williamson 9:13 What?

Jonny 9:13 Like, I think elbow pain with normal, normal skull crushers can be quite bad for people if they, if they're consistently, like, passing their head.

Chris Williamson 9:20 Too much extension.

Jonny 9:21 Yeah, or just too much going through the elbow.

Chris Williamson 9:22 Mm.

Jonny 9:23 So yeah, the, the commonality here is lots of lying down.

Chris Williamson 9:27 (laughs)

Jonny 9:27 And (laughs) lots of removing the lower body apart from a very specific part of the upper body and ... But the good thing is, lots of repeatability-

Chris Williamson 9:37 All right.

Jonny 9:37 ... in each one of the exercises.

Chris Williamson 9:38 Uh-

Yusef 9:39 So ... Oh, sorry, Johnny, it's yours.

Jonny 9:42 I just have ... I've got a couple more exercise variations that-

Chris Williamson 9:44 Me too.

Jonny 9:44 ... I don't know.

Chris Williamson 9:45 Me too. Johnny, have you, have you got any more?

Yusef 9:46 Uh, well, I, I've got some more fitness stuff, yeah.

Chris Williamson 9:47 All right, hit us.

Jonny 9:50 Myo reps, you both know what those are?

Yusef 9:53 Vintage.

Chris Williamson 9:54 No.

Jonny 9:55 (laughs) So it's something that, like, again, like, Yusuf and I'll, will just use all the time, but I think a lot of people won't have tried. So if you're short on time, um, or you wanna, like, add some assistance at the end of your training session, but you're, like, you're not that ... I, I ... Like, I don't really like doing curls, for example, or like arm, arm ... direct arm work or anything like that. Myo reps is basically, um, uh, I think it's by a guy called Börge Fagerli. Um, I think that's his name, or something like that. So you do an initial set, which is called an activation set. This is usually, like, 10 to 15 reps near failure, and then you take 10 breaths, and then do between three to five reps, 10 breaths.

Chris Williamson 10:35 I have done this.

Jonny 10:37 Thought you might have done. 10 breaths, three to five reps, and you keep doing that until you hit, like, a close-to-failure set, basically, on an

Chris Williamson 10:43 You strip the weight?

Jonny 10:44 ... repeat bug. You ... There are, like, variations where you can do that. But normally, if you do it properly, and this is what's so good about it, you, you get, like, five minutes in, and you've done so many reps, and you're knackered. And you're like, "Okay, that's all of that movement done," and then it removes all of the resistance of like, "Oh, I've got five sets of eight," or, "I've got three sets of 12," 'cause it's just done before you really know what's happened. And you can make it into a bit of a game, so, like, week by week you try and do slightly more weight or you try and do an extra set at the end or something like that, or do it in, in less time-

Yusef 11:17 Yeah.

Jonny 11:17 ... like take fewer rests between.

Yusef 11:19 They're great. The, the rationale from ... Is it pronounced Borge or Burger?

Chris Williamson 11:24 (laughs)

Yusef 11:24 I think it might be pronounced like bu- Burger-

Jonny 11:26 Burger?

Yusef 11:26 ... or something.

Jonny 11:27 It can't be Burger.

Yusef 11:29 Uh, can't ... I, I don't know, but, um-

Jonny 11:31 B-E-R-G-E-R.

Yusef 11:33 B-O with a ... with a line through it, which is pronounced "ih," so-

Jonny 11:38 Ih, yeah.

Yusef 11:38 So it could be Burger. Anyway, (laughs) the idea is, the rationale that you recruit the majority of your motor units at reps seven, eight and nine of a 10-rep set, if that's close to your, your max, and so you take your 12-rep max, you do 10 reps with it, you start to approach that, sort of almost-failure point. You then stop, three to five deep breaths, recycle the ATP, but you keep the kind of fiber recruitment at that point, and then you just do two or three, and then you kind of ride the wave and stay at that peri-failure state, and-

Jonny 12:12 Yeah.

Yusef 12:13 ... supposedly, those 30 reps that you do end up being more effective than if you had done three sets of 10, for example.

Chris Williamson 12:20 Yeah.

Yusef 12:20 Because in that second example, it would only be sets, uh, reps seven, eight, and nine of all three sets that were effective.

Jonny 12:27 Or sometimes even only, like, the final set, depending on the load you use as well.

Yusef 12:32 Yeah.

Jonny 12:32 Um, the only thing I wouldn't use this for is... So it's great for any isolation stuff, most upper body stuff. I wouldn't use it for squat, deadlift, leg press or, or anything like that 'cause that gets, uh, quite hairy, quite spicy.

Chris Williamson 12:45 Why not for, why not for deadlift?

Jonny 12:48 Just the, like the total body overwhelm. (laughs)

Yusef 12:52 Overwhelm. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 12:54 Overwhelm.

Jonny 12:54 Like if you take, like a, if you take your 12 rep max on deadlift and do 10 reps with it, and then you're gonna rep out with that, I think the chance of you, like, ramp-

Yusef 13:02 Dying.

Chris Williamson 13:02 Yeah. If you're gonna do five-

Jonny 13:03 ... of them dying...

Chris Williamson 13:04 ... by three after that. Yeah. Okay. I understand.

Jonny 13:07 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 13:07 But I think it-

Jonny 13:08 With, with ten reps in between as well.

Chris Williamson 13:09 It just needs to be anything that's easy to reset.

Jonny 13:12 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 13:12 If it's a complex... If it's a standing shoulder press, like, no, because you're gonna have to rack it and then take it off. But if it's something that's easy, if you're doing machine, if you're doing any arm, d- direct arm work, um...

Jonny 13:23 Yeah. It's perfect for machines. Like they're...

Yusef 13:25 Yeah. Don't, don't do it with, like, cleans or anything. Like, be reasonable. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 13:29 (laughs) Also... Well, that's CrossFit. That's what CrossFit is, isn't it?

Jonny 13:31 It is what CrossFit is.

Chris Williamson 13:31 It's just the name on the CrossFits. Um, also probably better for bilateral movements rather than unilateral movements, just that you're going to be fucking about with rest periods in between.

Jonny 13:45 So I, I do it for dumbbell row. It's in my program for dumbbell row. I disagree with its, the fact that it's in my program for dumbbell row but it is, so I do it. And I have to basically do the full cycle on each side.

Chris Williamson 13:56 Yes. Yes.

Jonny 13:56 So you'll do, like, a set of 15, three, three, three, three, three. So it takes twice as long. But yeah, I would, I w-

Chris Williamson 14:01 Oh, fuck. So you're doing it all right arm?

Jonny 14:04 Well, because if you try and do it the other way around, you end up, like, forgetting where you are-

Chris Williamson 14:08 Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jonny 14:09 ... 'cause you're like, "Oh, uh..."

Chris Williamson 14:10 Do I need to start with the left or the right? Yeah. I understand.

Jonny 14:12 And technically, you've we- you've rested twice as long per side.

Chris Williamson 14:15 Yes.

Jonny 14:15 So it's, it's kind of defeating the... Like, at that point, you're just doing dumbbell row.

Chris Williamson 14:19 Yeah.

Jonny 14:19 Ribs (laughs)

Chris Williamson 14:19 Just high-intensity dumbbell row. Okay. Yeah. So myo reps, I'd totally forgotten about that. Dude, I'm gonna-

Jonny 14:23 They're brilliant.

Chris Williamson 14:24 ... I'm definitely gonna add that back in. Yeah. It's like a, it's somewhere between a drop set, it's a permanent drop set, um, without the drop of the weight, isn't it? Or a rest pause. It's like an-

Jonny 14:33 Yeah. Rest-

Chris Williamson 14:33 ... aggressive rest pause.

Jonny 14:34 It's rest pause training.

Chris Williamson 14:35 Yeah.

Jonny 14:35 There's something called dog crap training, which was sort of a similar, um, similar style, but it's, it's more of a family-friendly version, I guess.

Chris Williamson 14:45 All right. Seth, what you got?

Yusef 14:47 So there is a place in most programs, as you- as we were saying before, to increase the stability of the movement so that you can focus on the muscle that you're working. So up until recently, I always did my split squats, so my, my Bulgarian split squats, which is where you hold two dumbbells. You've got one foot in front, one rear foot resting on a bench behind you at about kind of knee height, and you're doing squats like that. They're, they're notoriously brutal and there's loads of memes going around, like, you know, when, when your coach puts split squats in your program and it's, like, tearing up the paper 'cause people just hate them. Um, but often when you're doing them, a lot of your bandwidth is focused on, like, don't fall over, like, 'cause you're trying to balance laterally or sagittally (laughs) rather than, um, focusing on the muscle that you're training. So this was a tweak from someone called Bic who works with us. She is Australian, called Rebecca, um, and she's the originator of the bi-rows, you know, the little black bi-rows as well. She invented them. Um, but it's just to stabilize one hand. And so if, let's say, you have your right foot forward in a split squat, left foot behind you, you'd wanna hold the dumbbell in the opposite hand, so your left hand, and then just hold onto a rack or something or ʻarak onto your... (laughs) this is getting very surreal. Um-

Jonny 16:16 (laughs)

Yusef 16:16 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 16:16 ... hold onto something stable on your right side. That way, you can just really focus on getting a nice, nice glutey sensation.

Yusef 16:24 Do you not now... Y- you're gonna have to hold double the weight in one hand. If you're even remotely, like, competent, your, your grip's going to be a problem here, right? 'Cause you've got-

Chris Williamson 16:32 Your grip could be a problem. So, so actually I don't think you should go too heavy with these because what you've done there is you've improved the quality of the movement. You can, you can get more out of less. It's not a movement that I think you need to, like, load super heavy. And, you know, even holding a 30 kilogram dumbbell is gonna be enough for most people- Mm-hmm. ... to get some good stuff from. And you can go up to, like, 15, 20 reps as well.

Yusef 16:56 Mm-hmm. Single arm, rear foot elevated (laughs) -

Jonny 17:01 (laughs)

Yusef 17:01 ... split squats with-

Jonny 17:04 Unilaterally loaded.

Yusef 17:05 Yeah. Um, okay. So this is from a guy on, uh, Instagram that I follow who has some really cool, uh, infographics that explain breakdowns, Dr. Eddie Joe, PhD, uh, on Instagram, and he just breaks down what the sign says about strength training. And he looked at the exercises which recruit the most muscles, uh, most muscle fibers for glute development. So what are the exercises? And out of 100, which was the maximum of recruitment, the top three movements are all types of step-ups. So the number one, which I think was in the 90s, was step-ups. Number two was, like, contralateral crossbody step-ups, and number three was some other sli- type of step-up. So basically, overall... And the next closest thing was maybe RDLs or deadlifts. Way, way, way down were, um, hip thrusts, fucking kickbacks, uh, rear foot elevated split squats. Even lunges were quite... In fact, lunges might have been the next closest thing after, uh, after the step-ups. But basically, if you wanna have big glutes and if you want to develop your glutes and if you want to improve your lower back-

Jonny 18:20 ... just do step-ups. And the best way that I've found to do this is dumbbells held up (laughs) by, no, not that

Yusef 18:27 (laughs)

Jonny 18:27 Not that thing that athletes do where they go up, up. Um-

Yusef 18:30 Oh, the funky plates?

Jonny 18:30 Yeah.

Yusef 18:31 We love that.

Jonny 18:31 Um, if you have your dumbbells by your sides, it means that you, your center of gravity is lower, so you're actually more stable. It's easier for you to balance. You are only on one foot here as you go up and go down. Um, I wouldn't go above about, well, depending on how tall you are, but I wouldn't get your thigh of the stepping-up leg to ever be really above parallel to the ground. You don't need to get a super, super amount of range here. You can just go from there and then push to it being straight. I would also do all of one side at once, and then I wouldn't do it alternating because just resetting each time, foot goes down, foot comes up, it's too complex. Just keep one foot on. And I think that this is a hack I learned from you guys, which is when you step down to the floor during step-ups, only put your heel on the ground because it means that you can't push off with your toes. You'll find yourself as you start to fail the reps, wanting to give yourself a lift off at the bottom. And I guess if you're going super, super heavy, it, it might give you a little bit of assistance and help you to add some more load. It's probably a pretty good movement to overload on because if you need to fail, it's quite easy. It's probably pretty safe on your lower back because you're in this perfect straight position. And also you've just got dumbbells on your hands, so it doesn't really matter. Um, but yeah, if you want to make it, if you want to go for the super-duper hard version, uh, only touch the heel on the ground so you can't kick off with your foot, and four by 12 on each leg.

Yusef 19:55 Brutal.

Jonny 19:56 Uh, oh, just totally disgusting. It's a cardio workout disguised as a strength workout.

Yusef 20:01 If you-

Jonny 20:02 Just make sure you go wa-bap, isn't it?

20:03 (laughs)

20:04 Wa-bap. (laughs)

20:04 Well...

Yusef 20:05 (laughs)

Jonny 20:05 If you curl up your big toe on the first rep, so the foot that's on the ground-

Yusef 20:11 Yeah.

Jonny 20:11 ... you got the, the left foot on the box, ri- uh, right foot on the ground. Curl up your toes with your right foot, and then load the leg that's on the box first.

Yusef 20:18 Yep.

Jonny 20:18 And then step off. So much harder.

Yusef 20:21 Just keep that-

Jonny 20:22 Yeah.

Yusef 20:22 ... posture. Yeah.

Jonny 20:23 It is ba- 'cause y- obviously, this is the problem with movements like this, isn't it? Like, if you're aiming for a number of reps, you end up just doing anything to hit that number of reps, which feeds-

Yusef 20:32 This is why we need quality of movement rather than worrying about trying to load them heavily.

Jonny 20:37 Well, that, it feeds into my, my, my next hack/dash tip.

Yusef 20:39 Ooh, beautiful.

Jonny 20:41 Um, which is to have, uh, a split in your sessions where you have, um, well, if you care about how much weight you lift at all, have one or two movements in the session where you do just care about how much weight you lift, 'cause, for example, if you're trying to increase your bench press or your squat or your deadlift or something like that, I don't think you should necessarily be focusing on the quality of the contraction in your glutes and your hamstrings. You do just want to be lifting more weight or hitting your rep target. But all of your assistant stuff, I think in general, you, you get far more mileage out of yourself, your joints, your muscles, your connective tissue, and the exercise. If you say, "Well, okay, this rowing movement, like, I don't care how m- how many plates are on the machine. I'm going to go for, like, the, the best quality movement. I'm going to control the reps. I'm going to go for maximal contraction. I'm going to pause at the top, and I'm going to use half the weight that I maybe would have done." And it's a massive ego hit, especially if you train with people. You're using like two-thirds of the weight that they are. But if by the time you hit the weight that they are using now, can almost guarantee you'll be in a much better condition than them. So, just reduces your injury, rate of injury, um, and also how much longer you can use the exercise for as well.

Yusef 21:58 Do you commit to certain movements within your workout plan then being for quality rather than for load?

Jonny 22:04 Yeah, so for me it's anything that... I have like four, four or five exercises that I care about the, um, the number. So those are ironically considering what we're just talking about, seal row and chin-up. So like a rowing movement and a vertical pull, squat bench, and deadlift are the only things that I like track how strong I am. Everything else in my program, even really a lot of the assistant stuff, so like a pause squat or a pause deadlift or a feet up bench press or anything like that, I'd rather take the hit on the load and go for, like, "What am I trying to do here?" Like, I want to feel something working. Mind-muscle connection. (laughs) Exactly, yeah. (laughs)

Yusef 22:42 This solves the problem. People always are like, "Oh, but I thought you have to kind of pick powerlifting or bodybuilding and there's no in between and you have to-"

Jonny 22:50 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 22:50 "... everything... or you're either only lifting more weight and looking fat and rubbish or, or just being a bodybuilder who's weak." You know, I know it's, it's a bit of an outdated kind of mentality now, but it's okay to lift more and also look like you lift and that's the answer.

Jonny 23:08 On average, on average I would say... It's weird 'cause we go through phases with this, right? I think maybe because I'm coming out the back of CrossFit and people, although it might not look like it on the outside, people are quite concerned about doing exercises in there when you're doing accessories really for quality. So I think on average when I look in the gym, I see people that don't progressively overload enough. I see people that are underloaded and overlifting a lot of the time. Like how many people are still bench pressing the same weight that they were 10 years ago-

Yusef 23:41 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 23:41 ... are still going into the gym because they've never actually committed to doing progressive overload. So I think that the way that you've got it split there, which is okay, where am I looking to gain strength? Commit to those. That's for strength. And then on the other things, I'm committing to quality. I think that's a good way to do it because it allows you to still become stronger. 'Cause if you did... This is what, uh, we have a, a, a friend who did a bodybuilding competition a long, long time ago and was adamant that going into the gym and doing like five, five reps 10 times on a single arm row but with a ten-second eccentric was going to be the best way. And he stepped on stage and didn't look like he lifted-

Yusef 24:21 (laughs)

Jonny 24:21 ... because he'd been convinced by a particular type of tra- some blog on the internet that this was the optimal way to do it. And you're like, "Look, mate, if you just fucking put some weight on the bar, you would've probably been fine."

Chris Williamson 24:32 But you didn't.

Jonny 24:33 I think the, like, the, the test is, what would happen with this exercise if I had to really open the taps with it? Like, if there was a load that I'd never lifted before and I had to really go for it, what would I end up doing? So, if you imagine that with a barbell curl, for example, and you had to really go for a one RM. Like, it feels unsafe, doesn't it? It feels like you'd end up doing, like, lots of swinging around.

Yusef 24:52 Well, I'd be like one of those, one of those little plastic fish that you get in a, a Christmas cracker.

Chris Williamson 24:57 You'd put your finger across the back of it.

Yusef 24:58 You know what I'm talking about?

Chris Williamson 24:58 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. Of course.

Yusef 25:00 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 25:00 Uh, right. Seth, what you got?

Yusef 25:03 So, if you're

Yusef 25:04 in a gym that doesn't have a pull-down machine, that only has cables, for example.

Jonny 25:09 Five minutes. Five minutes from your house.

Yusef 25:09 For, for example, if the gym is only within, you know, a couple of minutes of your house, and you-

Chris Williamson 25:13 (laughs)

Yusef 25:14 ... then you can get really ni- and, in fact, I might start doing this instead of pull-downs in the future, which is just a, a deep lunge with the cable overhead and just doing single-arm pull-downs. So, the way that I would do it, for the people who are lucky enough to see this on YouTube, is you'll have an orange-

Chris Williamson 25:32 Are you wearing orange jogging bottoms?

Yusef 25:34 Yeah. You like them?

Chris Williamson 25:35 No.

Yusef 25:35 So (laughs) , so a, a deep lunge.

Chris Williamson 25:38 Yep.

Yusef 25:39 Arm overhead, so right foot forward, left foot, left hand

Chris Williamson 25:42 Is back knee on the ground, though?

Yusef 25:45 Uh, you can, but I just, I'm flexible enough to just do it in a deep lunge with my foot on the floor.

Jonny 25:52 So your back foot is elevated?

Chris Williamson 25:54 Lovely.

Jonny 25:54 Back foot is off the ground. Sorry, your back knee.

Yusef 25:57 My back knee is, yeah, just 'cause it feels nice and stable.

Chris Williamson 26:00 That's a good exercise. So, I have a buddy, uh, Alfie, who's adamant that a, kind of a similar movement, but sat on the floor, uh, with both cables attached at the top, two handles, and then allowing yourself to basically do a vertical, kind of like a pull-down, like, like a close-grip pull-down. But because it's on the cables and because you're not locked into a seat, it allows you to play around with that angle and that stretch that you get at the very, very top.

Yusef 26:23 That's a John Meadows exercise.

Chris Williamson 26:24 Is it?

Yusef 26:24 They're called, called Stretches. Yeah, lovely as well.

Chris Williamson 26:27 Yeah.

Yusef 26:27 You can also do that with, if there's like, a, a seat bit (laughs) , you can put your foot on there.

Chris Williamson 26:34 Uh, I know what you mean.

Yusef 26:36 So, so that then you can hinge-

Chris Williamson 26:37 Yeah.

Yusef 26:37 ... while keeping it reliable.

Chris Williamson 26:39 Uh, this is something that I think, it was such a good, um, cue that was given by a CrossFit coach, and his argument was your concentric should be quicker than the eccentric on everything that you do. That if you're doing bicep curls and you're lowering the weight down, you can lower it as slowly or as quickly as your program demands.

Yusef 27:03 For nine seconds.

Chris Williamson 27:04 (laughs) Yeah, for nine seconds like that other one. But, um, you need to contract it quicker than that. And I think that just generally, when I've seen people training, I fig- they're forgetting about tempo. Not everything needs to be a tempo movement, not everything needs to be like a four-second eccentric. But if you were to take a little bit more care about how you're lowering the weight down, and then you use power on the way up. I've also seen, this may be bro science, but that if power is load, whatever, load, distance, and speed pulled together, that moving a heavy weight more quickly recruits more power. So, that should mean that you get more muscular.

Yusef 27:38 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 27:39 Is that, how accurate am I here or am I-

Yusef 27:40 Absolute, absolute physics lad there (laughs) .

Jonny 27:44 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 27:44 (laughs)

Jonny 27:44 It's right, though. That is correct (laughs) .

Chris Williamson 27:47 Well, 'cause that's why you track your bar speed, right, Johnny?

Jonny 27:51 Um, no, it's not.

Chris Williamson 27:55 Oh.

Jonny 27:55 But, so I, I track my bar speed because bar speed is, has a correlation to RPE, so how many more reps I could've done. So, it's a way of me managing the intensity without using percentages.

Chris Williamson 28:06 Okay. Uh, what do you think about people integrating tempo better into training?

Jonny 28:13 I think it can be, it can definitely be overused. So, I think the, the rule that I would have is if you, like, you're far better off with an exercise in general, just progressively overloading it over time, than you are worrying about... As long as your tempo isn't ridiculous, like, if you're throwing it around, I think you should have control over the weight. But you're probably gonna get more mechanical tension muscle growth over time if you just add more weight and don't try and do, like, three th- seconds down, three-second pause, three seconds up, um, because the tension created from using 10 more kilos is greater than the tension with the, the longer eccentrics and concentrics. So-

Chris Williamson 28:49 We'll scrap tempo everything-

Jonny 28:51 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 28:51 ... and I'm just going to put more weight on the bar.

Jonny 28:55 (laughs) And lift it faster.

Chris Williamson 28:56 And lift it faster, okay. Johnny, I'm pulling the ejector seat and, uh, I'm passing it onto you 'cause tempo everything was a bad idea (laughs) according to the two PTs in the room.

Jonny 29:04 (inhales deeply) Uh, well, I've just literally just lost my thing.

Yusef 29:10 Your hack.

Jonny 29:11 Yeah. That's so annoying.

Yusef 29:13 Shall I just-

Jonny 29:14 I've got, I've got it. No, I've got it.

Yusef 29:15 Got it.

Jonny 29:16 Right.

Chris Williamson 29:16 (growls)

Yusef 29:17 (laughs)

Jonny 29:18 Close.

Chris Williamson 29:19 (laughs)

Jonny 29:19 Um, it is to use a, uh, l- um, you s- you've both come across a landmine attachment before.

Chris Williamson 29:26 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 29:28 So, you can, uh, most gyms have them, maybe not the ones within five minutes of youse's house, but-

Yusef 29:32 Mine actually does.

Jonny 29:33 They do? Fantastic. So, uh, I find overhead pressing, in general, quite cumbersome, so barbell overhead press, I know Chris is ridiculously strong at barbell overhead press 'cause it's just the forearms, forearms to rest the, rest the bar on.

Yusef 29:47 (laughs)

Jonny 29:47 But, like, that's, that's cumbersome. Getting dumbbells at a heavy enough overhead is cumbersome. Um, and also, like, it's quite, uh, yeah, for example, in a barbell overhead press you're, like, leaning back and all that sort of stuff, so if you load a landmine up, which for people who don't know what that is, it's basically a way of anchoring a barbell to a fixed point, and then it's y- leaning away and you hold it in your hand. You're doing a one, one-handed overhead press with a landmine is a far more natural movement because you naturally slightly press it away from you.

Chris Williamson 30:15 Mm-hmm.

Jonny 30:15 So, it, it's a far more natural movement for your shoulder. You don't have to, like, do all these sort of, like, weird lower back extension to get the bar in the air. And it's far easier to progress, so you can add, like, small plates to it and, and load it over time. And if you struggle with getting the, the bar into position, start with it resting on a box or resting on a bench, and then you just front squat it up, basically. So-

Chris Williamson 30:37 Kneeling or standing?

Jonny 30:39 Either.

Chris Williamson 30:40 I'm a big-

Jonny 30:41 I do, I, I do standing. I like kneeling.

Chris Williamson 30:42 I'm a big fan of, I'm a big fan of standing over kneeling.

Jonny 30:45 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 30:45 Yeah. It just, I'm never stable enough when I'm kneeling on the ground.

Jonny 30:48 Because then you can do a proper, like, one foot, you know, one foot forward, one foot back, like power stance-

Chris Williamson 30:52 Yeah.

Jonny 30:53 ... and really-

Chris Williamson 30:53 Yeah.

Jonny 30:54 ... really go for it.

Chris Williamson 30:54 It's a shame that... Well, there must be some... I'm sure that there's some fancy gyms that have got a way to do that, um, with both arms at once.

Jonny 31:02 But-

Chris Williamson 31:02 But-

Jonny 31:02 Might get... If the plates are big, might get quite a...

Chris Williamson 31:07 (laughs)

Jonny 31:07 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 31:08 Ay, ay, ay.

Jonny 31:09 But yeah.

Chris Williamson 31:10 Uh, yeah. Land, landmine press for shoulders, and it's so, it's so safe, you know? You need to-

Jonny 31:16 Yeah. Just, just feels right, doesn't it?

Chris Williamson 31:17 Yeah.

Jonny 31:17 Just feel like the right thing to do.

Chris Williamson 31:18 But that's because you've managed to take a movement that was supposed to be pressing vertically and made it go a little bit more close to a bench press.

Jonny 31:25 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 31:26 (laughs) Right. So, you know what I mean?

Jonny 31:29 Because if you, if you lie under it like that-

Chris Williamson 31:31 (laughs)

Jonny 31:31 ... then, and then just do...

Yusef 31:34 (laughs) Feels even more right.

Chris Williamson 31:37 Yeah. And then if you take it out of the landmine, actually, put it into a rack-

Jonny 31:40 Just put it on a bench.

Chris Williamson 31:41 Yeah.

Jonny 31:41 Yeah. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 31:41 Then you can just do bench press. (laughs)

Jonny 31:43 Just press it horizontally.

Yusef 31:44 This is a landmine press variation that you can do.

Chris Williamson 31:48 (laughs)

Jonny 31:48 And it's back to where we all started, which is lying down.

Chris Williamson 31:50 Lying down.

Jonny 31:51 His feet not on the floor.

Chris Williamson 31:52 Yeah.

Jonny 31:52 Completely isolated.

Chris Williamson 31:54 Bench press. Uh, Seth.

Jonny 31:57 Nice.

Yusef 31:57 This is one that I got from Elliot Hulse, of all people, which is, if you are having one of those days where you're just like, "Oh, I just cannot be bothered to do the session that I've got," and it's particularly if you've been following 5-3-1 for the last seven years, as you should be, and you're long Bitcoin, then there is a point where the numbers get to the point where, like... And we've all experienced this, like, Thursday night before your squat day for heavy threes, and you're like, "Oh," like, "I don't know if I can even face getting out of bed in the morning because I've got this, this thing coming up." If your training consistently starts to feel like that, just go in and say, "Right, I'm not allowed to lift more than 60 kilograms for three sets of 10 for everything," and, like, you have to just turn up, go through the motions. You're not allowed to give it any intensity, not allowed to... Like, it's literally you just turn up and just go through the motions. Like, you can even have that face, just... And he's, and he's right, that by the end of that session, you'll be so, like, fired up to actually do it properly again that solves the problem. Whereas if you try and push it, when something in you is just like, "Oh, I'm exhausted," you're only going to burn out faster.

Chris Williamson 33:14 So, what's the, the principle here? That if you're struggling with motivation, reduce the load, move through the session, and use the, whatever, like, latent desire to train properly to... Like, the boredom kicks you into the, the next session correctly?

Yusef 33:29 A- absolutely, yeah.

Chris Williamson 33:32 Do you ever do that, Johnny? Do you ever... Well, you know, 'cause you are pres- you are basically controlled by a man on the other side of the internet with your training, aren't you?

Jonny 33:40 It's worse than that, actually. I'm controlled by a very intricate spreadsheet that I don't understand.

Chris Williamson 33:44 That is run by a man.

Jonny 33:46 So, I tell the spreadsheet every day how I feel. Seriously.

Chris Williamson 33:51 And then the spreadsheet tells you-

Jonny 33:52 And then the spreadsheet says, "Well, this is what you should do." So, it's kind of a- adjusted and adapted for me.

Chris Williamson 33:58 Do you-

Jonny 33:58 I, I have a, I have a, uh, one actually. My ne- It's weird. My next one is very linked to that.

Chris Williamson 34:02 Okay.

Jonny 34:02 But I'll let you go.

Chris Williamson 34:03 Um, this is the most overused hack of all time, so if people haven't already seen this, I'll be very surprised, but we haven't used it before. James Smith and Sonny Webster got into a fight on Twitter about who was able... Uh, sorry, on Instagram, about who was able to use this first. But just, if you have a barbell which is on the floor and has a lot of plates on it, stick a small plate under the closest-to-the-collar plate that's on the floor, roll it up and over it, and it means that you can de-load the bar so much more easily. You'll save your lower back. And you've always been in that position, especially if you've b- if you're in a gym which isn't built for powerlifting, where the pl- the rubber Gym Eighty plates, or something. They're like a gold plate, and it's with rubber that makes you stick. It's like Teflonized rubber or some shit. And it just doesn't come off. And, you know, this is impossible to get off. Roll the barbell up, kick it onto a plate, pull everything off the end. There you go, you've only got one plate left. Do the same on the other side. You've de-loaded a bar far easier. Now, you could go to a gym that has a bar jack or, like, a bar rack, like a Laico thing, to properly kick it up, but I actually think that this is probably quicker.

Jonny 35:12 As a... For a tip for people who've, like, never been to the gym before, this is the first year they're going to the gym, I've seen it happen so many times where people don't appreciate the... Like, if you strip all the one side of the barbell, if it's, like, on a rack or, like, an EZ Bar, for example, on a preacher curl, you'll see people strip one side of it, and then it goes woof, like that. And the, the end of the-

Chris Williamson 35:34 Straight into the face.

Jonny 35:35 Into, into someone else lying on the bench next to them, or, or whatever.

Chris Williamson 35:39 (laughs)

Jonny 35:39 So, like, unload barbell. When they aren't on the ground, unload them evenly. I- e- one side after the other.

Chris Williamson 35:45 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 35:45 Learn basic physics.

Chris Williamson 35:47 (laughs)

Jonny 35:48 Very basic.

Chris Williamson 35:48 Moment arm.

Jonny 35:49 It's... Do you know why I think that s- slightly, it's slightly forgivable, is the barbell, especially a 20 kilo, like, a six-foot barbell, you look at it and think, "That can probably, that can b- That'll probably be all right." Like, it doesn't look immediately like that's in, uh, that person's in imminent danger. But-

Chris Williamson 36:06 My ability to judge how much weight, like, how much weight the fulcrum or whatever needs in order to flip it over, I have no idea. Absolutely no idea. I always err on the side of caution 'cause I've seen this happen one too many times. And you're, that's the equivalent of being a server in a restaurant and dropping the glass. Uh, everyone, "Oh, hey!"

Yusef 36:24 Yeah, like, what's the cost benefit-

Chris Williamson 36:26 Yeah.

Yusef 36:26 ... of trying to push that fulcrum?

Chris Williamson 36:28 Yeah.

Jonny 36:28 It can take two 20s on one side without flipping. Three 20s is touch and go. Four 20s is okay, but it's game over after.

Chris Williamson 36:33 So, uh, this is a f- Dude, this is a, this is a fucking life hack. Explain what the limits are of a normal, men's-

Jonny 36:41 20 kilo.

Chris Williamson 36:41 ... barbell. 20-kilo barbell on a rack.

Jonny 36:44 20-kilo power, power bar.

Chris Williamson 36:44 Yeah.

Jonny 36:44 So, the way I would unload 180...... right? So that's four 20s each side, is as follows. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 36:54 (laughs)

Jonny 36:54 You go to one side and I strip off two 20s, okay? Leave two 20s on. That bit's very important. Leave two 20s on. Go round to the other side and strip all four, because it will not flip.

Chris Williamson 37:08 Oh.

Jonny 37:08 And then go round to the other side again and strip finally.

Chris Williamson 37:10 I tell you what.

Yusef 37:11 That's proper Tetris, like minimum number of strokes required to...

Chris Williamson 37:15 Yeah, yeah.

Jonny 37:16 I think you could probably push it to, like, take one off and then d- but, that-

Chris Williamson 37:19 You've already got to do two. Carrying 40 kilos isn't too hard.

Jonny 37:23 Is it... You can tell when it's at its limits. The way I check if I'm not sure is, um, 'cause we're- if you're using, like, 25s or anything, just give it a little. Give the other end a little tug.

Chris Williamson 37:31 Yeah, a little kick.

Jonny 37:31 And if it's very light, you think, "Mm."

Chris Williamson 37:33 Well, probably not for me. Um...

Jonny 37:34 But if someone touches that, that's going over.

Chris Williamson 37:37 Before you do your one, Johnny, here's a, a just a thought about that thing that you did there, Seph. If you're struggling with motivation, we're probably going to be getting toward the stage where people are starting to hit a little bit of a limit, especially if they're used to, if they're in a new training routine, if they're training f- at a different time, or if they're first stepping into the gym after a little bit of a break. What are some of the things that you do to get yourself motivated or in the mood for training if you're just thinking, "Oh," like, "I'm, I'm totally, totally not down for it today"? Either supplements, or movements, or routines, or mindsets, or anything.

Yusef 38:14 I would say don't use a pre-workout.

Chris Williamson 38:16 (laughs)

Yusef 38:16 These things are false economies.

Chris Williamson 38:19 What's that mean?

Yusef 38:19 They-

Jonny 38:20 I don't agree with that.

Chris Williamson 38:21 Okay.

Yusef 38:21 So, pre-workouts are very strong stimulants, usually with a bunch of experimental stuff in there to get you amped and to make sure that you don't sleep for the next two days, um, so that, so that you can lift another rep on your, on your incline curl or something. But you pay the price much more on the back end of it, so I'd be very sparing with that. If you are a coffee drinker and it's before 2:00 PM, yeah, just have a regular coffee before the thing. But don't go and buy something that's a derivative of, of an amphetamine-

Chris Williamson 38:57 (laughs)

Yusef 38:57 ... just so that you can do a couple more cable incline...

Jonny 39:01 I love how careful you are with stimulants.

Yusef 39:04 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 39:04 You have become... Remembering that we, back in the day, wouldn't have thought twice about having vodka, water and N- NO Xplode from BSN.

Yusef 39:14 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 39:14 That was a, that was a pre-night drink for me.

Yusef 39:18 Ridiculous.

Jonny 39:18 Some of my, some of my best sessions were with, like, a, an MR, an, uh, Metrex sample that came on the front of a Flex Magazine.

Chris Williamson 39:24 (laughs)

Yusef 39:25 Goodness knows what's in it.

Jonny 39:26 And I, like, had, had it just out the packet 'cause I didn't have a shaker with me and then went and trained.

Chris Williamson 39:30 Yeah.

Yusef 39:30 Well, the... Yeah, so I, I should frame this that I'm, I'm talking about this as a, an ex-abuser of all these kind of supplement (overlapping speech)

Chris Williamson 39:39 A retiree, retiree. You're a veteran.

Yusef 39:41 Yeah, where you would just dry scoop the, like-

Chris Williamson 39:43 Yeah.

Yusef 39:44 ... three scoops of-

Chris Williamson 39:44 Doing a scoopy.

Yusef 39:45 ... Jack3D or whatever else.

Chris Williamson 39:47 Yeah, and so what-

Jonny 39:48 We've all looked at the serving size of Jack3D and thought, "Nah, it doesn't cut it."

Yusef 39:51 No, you're right.

Chris Williamson 39:52 Did you see, there was a video that came up on YouTube the other day, some guy did an entire tub of original Jack3D.

Yusef 39:59 Oh my God. I mean, that's, surely that's A&E (overlapping speech) .

Jonny 40:03 I'm, I'm pretty sure, I'm pretty certain that Derek from More Plates More Dates did a reaction video to it, um, about just what was going through this guy's system. Pretty fucking... All right, so...

Yusef 40:13 I lo- I would be calling the anesthetist. Like, if I had a patient that said, "I've had a tub of Jack3D," I'd be like, "Right-"

Jonny 40:19 Get ready for Epsom salt.

Yusef 40:19 "... make a couple of phone calls, make sure, like-"

Jonny 40:20 Yeah.

Yusef 40:21 "... they're ready." (laughs)

Chris Williamson 40:22 (laughs) Um, what do you do if it's... I'll get to you in a second, Johnny. If you don't like the idea of relying on stimulants, what do you do to get yourself... Let's say it's an aggressive session or you really want to go in and crush it, what do you do? You, Seph?

Yusef 40:38 You're asking me?

Chris Williamson 40:39 Yes.

Yusef 40:40 So, a, a lot of it is because you've got stuff at home that you're like... Well, for me, it's like, "Oh, I've got work I need to finish and I've got all these little bits and I can't really justify going to the gym." And, and then, uh, you know that on those times that you don't go and you try and stay and do the, the admin-y stuff, it's an hour later and you're like, "Ah, was it really worth it?" No. So, I think just knowing from past experience that whenever you try and skip the gym, the time that you would have spent otherwise is usually rubbish. And your energy is still low and stuff. Whereas if you go and you come back and you're like, "Okay, I feel like I've had a frame shift. I'm reenergized," as you said, Chris, a while ago, it's the same as, well, it's more, didn't you, than (laughs) the shift that you get from an eight-hour night of sleep.

Chris Williamson 41:28 Yeah.

Yusef 41:28 You know?

Chris Williamson 41:29 Your mood changes more pre- and post-workout than it does when you go to bed versus when you wake up. I think, as well-

Yusef 41:34 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 41:34 ... n- no one, if-

Yusef 41:35 So it's, it's treating yourself like a child, like putting it in your calendar and being like, "I'm gonna do it because I will be better."

Chris Williamson 41:40 Gotta go, yeah. I think not overthinking it is probably a pretty good principle. Okay, uh, just, I'm robotic here. I'm working for the boss. The boss said that I gotta go the gym, so I go to the gym. I also think that, um, apart from the times when you injure yourself, which isn't usually due to the workout, it's due to something else that's going on, you almost never regret going to the gym.

Yusef 42:01 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 42:02 I mean, apart from the times I've injured myself. And even then, I don't regret going to the gym, I regret the injury which was caused by something else not to do with the gym.

Yusef 42:08 It was really cold or didn't warm up properly or...

Chris Williamson 42:10 (clears throat) Yeah, um, uh, yeah, exactly. I was fatigued or stressed or whatever. Um, yeah, you, you almost are never going to regret a gym session. And keeping that in your mind, going, "Look, if I do this, it's something that future me will thank me for. Current me is a lying, duplicitous cunt."

Yusef 42:26 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 42:26 "And you, you cannot listen to him. Future Chris will thank you for it." Uh, Johnny, give me the justification for obsessive caffeine and stimulant use.

Jonny 42:41 Uh, well, so I just, I kind of think that everybody should experience that safely once. Because if you've never had a pre-workout before-... um, it, it ends up being quite a good session. I find.

Chris Williamson 42:53 What's a... 'Cause I haven't used a pre-workout in-

Jonny 42:56 Me, so, so n-

Chris Williamson 42:56 ... like, shit, you know, five years.

Jonny 42:58 Me ni- not five years, to be honest. Me neither. Um, the last time I experienced anything close to it was when I didn't have coffee for a month and then had an espresso and went and trained and that was... (exhales)

Chris Williamson 43:06 Yeah.

Yusef 43:06 Can we all just say our story from first time you ever had a pre-workout?

Jonny 43:12 Uh, mine was that. I just had-

Yusef 43:13 What, when you hadn't had a coffee in a while?

Jonny 43:15 No, no, I had a, a, so there was a sachet, like a sample sachet of Me- Metrex, whatever it was, their ver- their, their version of Jack3D, um, their version of NoXplode, and I didn't have a shaker cup with me so I just had it as a powder-

Chris Williamson 43:27 Dry.

Jonny 43:28 ... and then went and trained. I was like, "Wow."

Chris Williamson 43:29 Raw. Bareback.

Jonny 43:31 Yeah, like that was... (exhales)

Chris Williamson 43:33 What was yours, Yusuf?

Jonny 43:34 Never like that again, is it?

Yusef 43:35 So, uh, yeah, it was, it was Jack3D-

Chris Williamson 43:37 Chasing the dr- chasing the, uh, proverbial pre-workout dragon.

Jonny 43:40 (laughs)

Yusef 43:41 It was the, the original Jack3D with the DMAA in it. Um-

Chris Williamson 43:44 Which is?

Jonny 43:45 The amphetamine.

Yusef 43:46 The, the amphetamine, and I found myself g- like, gurning, um-

Chris Williamson 43:51 (laughs)

Yusef 43:51 ... (laughs) you feel pulsary, tunnel vision-

Jonny 43:54 Can you give us an example?

Yusef 43:54 ... like really, like, you're listening to like New Monkey on the way to the gym and you're like, "This is excellent."

Chris Williamson 43:59 (laughs)

Yusef 43:59 Um, my, my three rep max for squats was 140 kilos at the time, and I remember turning up and I did a set of 10, so it was a seven rep PB.

Chris Williamson 44:10 (laughs)

Yusef 44:10 Completely unheard of. It's b- the biggest, like, difference PB that I've ever done in my life. Hobbled home and was ill for a week.

Chris Williamson 44:19 (laughs)

Yusef 44:19 Like, really flu-type symptoms for a week.

Chris Williamson 44:26 (laughs)

Yusef 44:27 (laughs) And then, I remember the next week, my, my flatmate, um... I had another dose of it and my flatmate was like, "Wha- what's that? Can I try some?" She didn't lift. And I was like, "Yeah, sure." And so, she, she had a scoop and I, I went to the gym, came back, house was spotless. And she was like, "Oh, Yusuf had a really good day. I'm cleaning the whole house and it's feeling really good..." And we were like, "Oh, okay, interesting."

Chris Williamson 44:46 Might be the fact that you're on amphetamines.

Yusef 44:48 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 44:49 Fucking hell.

Yusef 44:49 And she was no stranger to her class As as well, so it's, uh...

Chris Williamson 44:53 Crazy that they s- they were able to sell that. All right, Johnny, what do you do? You'd, you going to go and do a workout, and you've got some pretty heavy sessions that you need to do. How do you get yourself in the mood?

Jonny 45:02 Mm. Uh, so the first thing is like a, a, like a planning consideration, so try and train on the same days of the week at the same time. And try and plan stuff so that you can't, in the rest of your week, so that you can't move the session. So I quite like having the... Like, I, I try to not let myself train less than three times a week. I just ha- it's just this standard of, like, I feel like 16-year-old me would be really disappointed in me if he found out that I trained less than three times in a week. So, I have those slots. And the fact that I ha- this rule of if I'm not gonna train tonight, I'm not doing that session this week is often enough to just get me in the gym. So, and then, I just have this rule of no matter how I feel, I'll go and just do a warmup. I'll go and just, like, do something. And most of the time, that ends up, it ends up happening. Um, and then, like, some of the sessions are happening, stuff like having the... for, for the long-time Life Hacks listeners, they'll know that this is a life hack and they'll all be using it already, but having a sacred playlist that, like, is what you, is what you listen when you warm up or is w- what you listen to when you train really helps. Um, or like even just watching some stuff on YouTube, so like having a time when you finish work, especially if you're working from home and you're like, "Okay, 5:00. Emails go, emails shut. I'm gonna watch some, like, fitness stuff on YouTube. Like, I'm gonna watch CrossFit videos or powerlifting videos or whatever on YouTube to, like, get me in the mood and I'm gonna go to the gym." Um, but this links into my next hack, actually. Just so well planned, isn't it? ?

Narrator 46:34 Fire away.

Jonny 46:36 Um, for people who... so either in that position where you regularly find yourself like, "I can't really be bothered, I don't wanna go," or if you play around with, like, if you have a WHOOP band or an Oura Ring or whatever and you don't know what to do with that information, something I've done with clients in the past is you have your session, so your Monday session, and you split it into three, so you have, like, an A, a B, and a C. So if you're feeling really good or you have loads of time or your WHOOP band gives you a green rating or whatever, you do the full thing. If your WHOOP band or whatever gives you an amber or you're like, "A bit short of time, I can't really be bothered," do A and the B or you just do the A. So you chunk it into, you're, like, auto-regulating based on time, mood, energy, whatever things you track, how much sleep you had last night. But the A section, the smallest bit, should always be something that, like, you can always go and do. It's like Yusuf's version of the 60 kilos for sets of 10. Like, there should always be a minimum that you can tick the box of. Um, and it, it means that if you wanna use something like a WHOOP band, because I think what, what we've all struggled with in the past is you have that and then you're like, "Right."

Chris Williamson 47:40 What the fuck do you do with the information?

Jonny 47:41 Yeah, like, it's red and it's flashing and it's shouting at you like, "Stop being a child and get more sleep," and you just go train anyway. You're like, "Well..." (laughs)

Chris Williamson 47:49 Fuck it.

Jonny 47:49 It's kinda point-

Chris Williamson 47:50 Yeah.

Jonny 47:50 ... kind of pointless, right? Whereas if you can at least scale back your session, at least you're doing something, you're, like, paying some respect to that information, if you, if you choose to believe it. So basically taking your existing training program, chopping each session into three sections, and then you can just adjust depending on how you feel or how much energy or how much time you have.

Chris Williamson 48:08 Mm.

Yusef 48:10 Nice.

Chris Williamson 48:11 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 48:12 The other frame shift for this of just stepping back and big picture, the, you know, the old, like, looking up at the stars and see how insignificant you are, is just saying rather than, "Oh, I have to go and train," is, "I get to go and train." There are people who would love to but aren't able-bodied enough to do it or, or, uh, what we were talking about before, they feel so intimidated by the scary gym environment and all of their internal projections about fat phobia and everything that they can't even make the first step. And, and actually it's a great privilege, a great ability to go and celebrate your body and, and do that, so.

Chris Williamson 48:49 Well, one day, on- one day you are going to be-... A to E and in a care home or, you know, unable to lift any heavy weights, and you got-

Yusef 48:58 And be like, "Back in the day I used to do 50 kgs around my- my waist." Strawberry? (laughs)

Chris Williamson 49:01 Strawberry, strawberry, two scoops, first thing in... I am telling you, man.

Yusef 49:07 Th- that'll be old people in 50 years, won't it?

Chris Williamson 49:09 Listen, yeah.

Yusef 49:11 Yeah, (laughs) man.

Chris Williamson 49:12 Honestly-

Jonny 49:13 You're talking about Jack 3D in the care home.

Chris Williamson 49:15 ... bro, that was sick.

Yusef 49:16 "Son, let me tell you."

Chris Williamson 49:18 (laughs)

Yusef 49:18 "We used to have this thing called Tickety Toc." (laughs)

Chris Williamson 49:22 (laughs) Uh, so my one b- you touched on that, Johnny, is I think the obvious solutions are the ones people overlook when they need t- get motivated to go and train. Just find a song that complet- you cannot not get amped for. Like, have your playlist for training-

Yusef 49:40 What's Your Song.

Chris Williamson 49:40 Yeah. Or just a b- there's a few of them, right? That if you put that on, it was your pre-drinking song for uni, or it was whatever, your one rep max song for the gym. If you throw that on, there is... You would be amazed at the state shift before and after that. Three and a half minutes of Let the Bodies Hit the Floor?

Yusef 49:58 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 49:59 Try, try and-

Yusef 50:00 Guaranteed.

Chris Williamson 50:00 ... tell me that you don't want to go and lift the shit out of the gym after that. Like, it's just-

Yusef 50:06 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 50:06 ... it's such a state shift. And it's so obvious. Everyone's got songs that get them amped up. All right, just use that. Use those.

Jonny 50:14 Beartooth Live on YouTube.

Chris Williamson 50:16 That's your one. That's still in the, that's in the first life hacks.

Jonny 50:20 Like, listening to live bands on, on YouTube, man. Or like live DJ sets as well.

Chris Williamson 50:24 Yeah. As well, when you've got the audience in the background.

Jonny 50:26 That, that energy is so good.

Chris Williamson 50:27 Yeah.

Jonny 50:28 Like I just need one of those on and I... The nice thing about them as well, if you get the full set, it can be the whole session.

Chris Williamson 50:33 Yeah.

Jonny 50:33 And like you're finishing the session as they're doing like their encore and coming back on for one final song.

Chris Williamson 50:38 Yeah.

Jonny 50:38 It's brilliant.

Chris Williamson 50:39 Yeah.

Jonny 50:40 Life changing.

Chris Williamson 50:42 Uh, what have I got here? Um, this is just one that I've had. So Tyneside where I train at in Newcastle has just got a, um, seated calf raise machine. So the ones that work as you're sat down, you load the plates on the front, the pad sits on the top of your knees. (coughs) And we've just found that adding that in, in between what e- there is nothing that you're doing that can't have calves added in in between, but no one can ever be bothered to dedicate ending some... All right, maybe if you're doing squats or rear foot elevated lunges or something like that.

Jonny 51:14 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 51:14 But y- y- no one is looking at the calf machine.

Jonny 51:16 Or, or calf raises.

Chris Williamson 51:17 In between calf ra-

Yusef 51:18 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 51:18 Yeah, when you're training calves the other thing that you should really look at is adding calves in in between sets.

Jonny 51:22 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 51:23 But if you're doing like a bench press or if you're doing anything upper body, just get four or five rounds of an easy calf machine or set the, uh, leg press up and do calf raises on the leg press in between.

Yusef 51:37 So someone sent me... I must have tweeted something about calf training or having small calves, and someone tweeted me a bunch of studies that are like, "We compared a group of people over 16 weeks training calves heavy twice a week versus heavy three times a week, or, um, light and heavy, or, um, progressively doing this and, and all of them showed zero muscle growth." (laughs)

Chris Williamson 52:04 No way.

Yusef 52:06 They can't come up. (laughs)

Chris Williamson 52:07 No fucking way.

Yusef 52:08 Across the entire study like any... And it's just basically like, ah, so calf training is just a scam then, is it? Like-

Chris Williamson 52:13 Why is that the case, do you think?

Jonny 52:15 I, it becar- yeah, that can't be true.

Yusef 52:16 It just so hav- so one theory is that they're so heavily genetically determined and that they v- you basically are training them all the time because you're getting so much loading from walking them- walking around with them that they're that kind of muscle that have already hit their limit, um, unless you were to go absolutely ham on them. Like it might just be that to get big calves you need to, you need to do a Chris and like between any set of anything-

Chris Williamson 52:40 Yeah.

Yusef 52:40 ... go and sit on the seated calf raise.

Chris Williamson 52:42 Yeah. Well, it's interesting because obviously the achilles rehab that I did, I went from having a calf that was basically... that didn't exist, total muscle wastage, to now I overshot it and the calf of the leg that I recovered is now bigger than the calf of the leg that I didn't.

Yusef 52:57 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 52:57 (laughs) Which is why I'm thinking about calves a little bit for the first time ever. Um-

Jonny 53:04 The...

Chris Williamson 53:04 What do you say? What, what, what, what?

Jonny 53:05 Just that one of the coaches from 3DMJ, Jeff Alberts, has got a, like a side-by-side comparison of like... I mean, and this is probably 10 years of calf training, but he has legitimately turned very average calves into like a strong body part for him.

Yusef 53:20 So there's an interesting point because Jeff Alberts is all about mind-muscle connection, isn't he? He's Mr. Longevity Bodybuilder. Like he's in his (laughs) like his fifties.

Jonny 53:29 In his 50s and still going, yeah.

Yusef 53:30 Yeah. He's all about like getting the most out of a set of ten as you possibly can.

Jonny 53:35 So, how long was the study for?

Yusef 53:37 16 weeks. So, or like eight weeks.

Jonny 53:38 So the answer is like 16 years then.

Chris Williamson 53:40 Yeah.

Yusef 53:40 Yeah.

Jonny 53:41 We might see some-

Chris Williamson 53:41 Just do it for longer.

Yusef 53:42 (laughs) They're definitely calves-

Jonny 53:44 More-

Chris Williamson 53:44 Calves are certainly one of the hardest muscle parts to train. But also, they're probably the bottom of pretty much everybody's list.

Jonny 53:53 Yeah. Well, they hurt don't they? They, they're-

Chris Williamson 53:54 Who the fuck cares?

Jonny 53:55 They're difficult and it hurts afterwards and it hurts at the time and it's boring.

Chris Williamson 53:59 And it's, yeah, all of the above.

Jonny 54:00 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 54:00 So add it in in between sets and you'll be sweet. I think, I think that's me out of-

Jonny 54:09 Yes. That was a hell of a list though.

Chris Williamson 54:12 That's a fucking good l-

Jonny 54:13 ... for one episode.

Chris Williamson 54:14 ... good list of some training things. Well, why don't we, why don't we finish up with any stuff that

Chris Williamson 54:19 we've watched or seen recently? Any cool stuff?

Jonny 54:22 I got one.

Chris Williamson 54:23 Let us...

Jonny 54:24 Well, I'm watching it at the moment called Dopesick on Disney+. Are you worried that we've already had that, Chris?

Chris Williamson 54:34 No.

Jonny 54:35 No. So it is, um, it's recommended by Dan, Mr. Digital Audio Broadcast. Um, it's about, uh, OxyContin, the sort of the creation and distribution.

Chris Williamson 54:51 Not the... Is it the Wessler family?

Jonny 54:54 ... uh ...

Chris Williamson 54:55 It's the something family, isn't it?

Jonny 54:56 Something family, but yeah, I can't remember the name of it. But yeah, pharmaceutical business produces this, this OxyContin drug, which is, an, an opioid that they claim has, like, slow release and all that sort of stuff, and isn't addictive. Um, and it's about, like, the, um, the consequences of that. And it is bit of a, bit of a slow start, but...

Yusef 55:15 Is it a documentary or-

Jonny 55:16 No, no, it's a, it's a series. It's a drama series. Um-

Chris Williamson 55:19 Based on, I'm gonna guess-

Jonny 55:21 Well, it must be true, right? 'Cause OxyContin-

Chris Williamson 55:23 Theory or actually based on reality, yeah.

Jonny 55:24 ... is real?

Yusef 55:24 I've had oxycodone. It's a powerful drug.

Jonny 55:27 There's oxycodeine-

Chris Williamson 55:27 What's the difference between oxycodone and OxyContin?

Yusef 55:30 It, I think it's the trade name, 'cause I've never heard OxyContin being used in the UK. It might be-

Jonny 55:36 OxyContin, I think-

Yusef 55:36 ... maybe the re- the slow release or-

Jonny 55:38 I think, yeah.

Yusef 55:39 ... formulation or something.

Jonny 55:40 I think that's it.

Chris Williamson 55:41 What was the one... 'cause they had to change it so that people couldn't snort it anymore. Is that the difference between oxycodone and OxyContin?

Jonny 55:48 So in this OxyContin, they, like, the thing that supposedly slow release is the coating of the tablet. But people put the tablet in their mouth for a bit, take it out, crush it, and snort it.

Chris Williamson 55:59 (laughs)

Jonny 56:01 So (laughs) so... But, like, the pharmaceutical expert thing is just, like, a sugary coating around the edge of the pill. But yeah, so I, I g- I mean, this was a thing, it, like, keeps shooting back between, like, 1995 and present day where there's, like, a lawsuit being, being billed against them. And I haven't finished it yet, but so good.

Chris Williamson 56:20 Yeah, I've heard that before. It was being a... Dopesick was being advertised on the central roundabout in town.

Jonny 56:27 Oh, really?

Chris Williamson 56:27 Yeah. For Disney-

Jonny 56:28 All right.

Chris Williamson 56:28 ... as part of Disney Plus. It looks awesome. There's also a book, um, maybe that the series is based on or perhaps just the same story reported by someone else. I was in Waterstones yesterday and there's a book all about this. So I, I can't wait to watch that. It looks-

Jonny 56:41 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 56:41 ... really, really good.

Jonny 56:42 So good. So good.

Chris Williamson 56:44 Seth, have you seen anything nice?

Yusef 56:46 I have actually. It's, I think it's the only thing I've seen, but it's (laughs) called Midnight Mass on Netflix. And it's fantastic. It's a self-contained seven-part series, and it's based on a Stephen King book. It's roughly about a guy who comes to this little parochial village as a priest, and he's really charismatic and everyone likes him. And, um, it just, it's really nicely written. And there's lots of threads about the weird kind of ego games that religious people play, and how people get drawn into, to things based on their interpretations. And, um, there's a, there's, like, a Muslim sheriff there who, like, doesn't buy any of it, and he's like, "No, I'm not, I'm not getting involved in this." And it, it's very, very culturally accurate in, in some ways and, uh, just really, really good. It's, it's a horror, but it's not, it's not just like jumpy shock stuff all the time.

Chris Williamson 57:46 Was it on Netflix?

Yusef 57:47 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 57:48 Cool.

Jonny 57:49 Really recent as well. I've not seen it, heard of it. ?

Yusef 57:52 Have a look at the trailer. You, I, I think, like-

Chris Williamson 57:55 I'm not good-

Yusef 57:56 It's one of those ones where you-

Chris Williamson 57:57 ... with scary stuff. How s- how jumpy and how scary are we talking?

Yusef 58:01 Not massively jumpy. There's, like, maybe four moments in the whole series that are like, "Boo." But, like, it's not about, it's not one of those things that trying to, like, scare you through shock factor.

Chris Williamson 58:12 Okay.

Jonny 58:12 Does it fill you with dread? Is there any sense of dread?

Yusef 58:16 No sense of dread. (laughs)

Jonny 58:19 (laughs)

Yusef 58:19 A bit of doom.

Jonny 58:21 Some doom. Any, like, nihilism at the end?

Yusef 58:24 A little bit.

Jonny 58:25 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 58:25 Okay. Sounds perfect. Sounds, it sounds exactly perfect.

Yusef 58:28 'Cause I'm like, you know those three words at the top of it, and it's like romantic, zany, zingy.

Jonny 58:35 Laughter ]

Chris Williamson 58:35 Doom, dread-

Jonny 58:35 Nihilism, doom, and some uh.

Chris Williamson 58:38 Ready armed trouble. (laughs)

Jonny 58:43 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 58:44 So, uh, I am a huge fan of Netflix's colorized World War II documentary series, and they've had two already that were up, and a third one has just gone live, which is World War II Road to Victory. So they've gone back through particular, uh, elements of World War II, so the invasion of North Africa, the Battle for the Atlantic, the Battle for Dunkirk, whatever. And they've colorized the entire set of footage, uh, so you get to see World War II in full color. It's n- they've tried to HD stuff as much as they can. They get really, really good expert testimony. They get... there's never... I, I'm always a little bit conflicted when you watch war documentaries and they get the veterans that were there on, 'cause I quite like it. But because everyone's inevitably quite old, it does slow the pace of it down a little bit. Whereas when they rely on the experts and they've got such and such from Brunel University, this guy from King's College London, whatever, whatever, uh, and all of the historians are shit hot, they're really, really good, um, it's just great. Like, this... I think the new series has got 12 episodes in it, World War II Road to Victory, like, just easy watching. And you get to... it's much more engaging to watch stuff just shows how overstimulated we are, the fact that going from black and white to color means that I'm more likely to learn about something that's interesting to do with history.

Jonny 1:00:10 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 1:00:11 The episodes are a good length. I think they may be a full hour long, uh, but yeah, highly, highly, highly recommended.

Jonny 1:00:17 Cool.

Chris Williamson 1:00:18 You watched anything else, Johnny?

Jonny 1:00:20 Um... I'm try- I've tried watching something called The Tourist. I don't know whether you, you-

Chris Williamson 1:00:29 Oh, dude, I didn't even get through the first episode.

Jonny 1:00:31 Yeah. Shame, that, isn't it?

Chris Williamson 1:00:33 Yeah, with, what's his face? Who was the guy that was in-

Jonny 1:00:36 Christine Gray.

Chris Williamson 1:00:37 Yeah, from Fifty Shades of Gray. Fuck...

Jonny 1:00:40 Yeah, really, really struggled with it.

Chris Williamson 1:00:42 Shite. I just didn't think it was very good. Uh, what was the, what was the one, I think we said this a little while ago, with the dude that plays Loki from the Marvel comics.

Jonny 1:00:52 Oh, uh, The Night Manager.

Chris Williamson 1:00:54 Yeah, The Night Manager, with Tom Hiddlesworth.

Jonny 1:00:57 Something. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:00:58 Uh, Hiddleston.Fucking hell. What an- Yeah. Awesome, awesome... Yeah, Hugh Laurie's in it. Have you seen that, Yosef? Did we tell you that one?

Jonny 1:01:05 No.

Chris Williamson 1:01:05 Oh, The Night Manager, fucking really good.

Yusef 1:01:08 So it's worth, worth watching?

Chris Williamson 1:01:09 Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Should be going on the list.

Jonny 1:01:11 I, it's off the back of that that I think he should be the new James Bond.

Chris Williamson 1:01:14 Ooh.

Yusef 1:01:16 Right.

Chris Williamson 1:01:17 Mm-hmm.

Yusef 1:01:17 Gonna add these two.

Chris Williamson 1:01:18 How would you feel about... 'Cause I would be completely down for Idris Elba to be-

Yusef 1:01:22 Me too. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:01:22 ... the new James Bond. Idris Elba would be good.

Jonny 1:01:26 Tom Hardy?

Chris Williamson 1:01:26 Tom, Tom Hardy or Tom Hiddleston. It's got to be-

Jonny 1:01:29 One of those three.

Chris Williamson 1:01:30 Yeah. If you don't know-

Jonny 1:01:31 I think they've all got the, they've all got the required attitudes to it. And then they'd all play a slightly different Bond, but would all do well.

Chris Williamson 1:01:39 What would you choose if you had to choose out of Hiddleston, Elba, and Hardy?

Jonny 1:01:47 Oh, God.

Chris Williamson 1:01:47 Who would you choose?

Jonny 1:01:54 (sighs) I wanna say Tom Hardy, just because I like him in everything that he does. That's, that, there's... Here's a recommendation, actually. Locke. Have you seen that?

Chris Williamson 1:02:03 Oh, where he's the Welsh guy and it's filmed in the car?

Jonny 1:02:06 The whole thing's in the car.

Chris Williamson 1:02:06 Unbelievable. My housemate was watching it last night. I've watched it a bunch of times, but my housemate was watching it last night.

Jonny 1:02:11 How, like, how to make just a man in a car for what must be an hour and a half completely, like, edge-of-your-seat watcher the whole time.

Chris Williamson 1:02:19 Yeah.

Jonny 1:02:19 So good.

Yusef 1:02:20 Similar to Phone Booth is the concept, then (laughs) .

Jonny 1:02:22 Yes (laughs) . Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:02:23 Yeah, but even less, even more tuned down. It's, it's even less exciting than Ryan Reynolds in Buried. Have you seen that?

Jonny 1:02:32 Oh, I, I, yeah, I have seen that. Where he's literally just buried for-

Chris Williamson 1:02:34 For the whole time, yeah.

Jonny 1:02:34 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:02:34 It's one scene for the whole time. I, I can't remember what it is, but if, if someone's interested in finding out about it, if you Google how much Locke cost and how long it took to film, the whole thing was shot in a couple of weeks and it cost, like, 500 grand. It cost nothing to film.

Jonny 1:02:51 Even that's surprising, to be honest, 'cause it's just Tom Hardy in a car.

Chris Williamson 1:02:54 Yeah.

Jonny 1:02:55 I feel like if someone had given me, like, a-

Yusef 1:02:56 I could've done it for 500 quid with an iPhone, to be honest.

Jonny 1:02:57 Yeah, a decent camera-

Chris Williamson 1:02:58 (laughs)

Jonny 1:02:59 ... and two hours of Tom Hardy, I think we could've got it over the line.

Chris Williamson 1:03:01 Yeah.

Yusef 1:03:02 No, just give me a ring light and an iPhone, 500 quid.

Jonny 1:03:04 (laughs)

Chris Williamson 1:03:04 Try it out, no worries. Uh, yeah, Locke is unbelievable.

Jonny 1:03:08 Tell me-

Chris Williamson 1:03:08 Have you got... Do you know who Tom Hiddleston, Tom Hardy, and Idris Elba are, Yosef? Do you have any-

Yusef 1:03:13 No. I think Idris Elba is the guy who was in... The show. Ugh, I can't-

Jonny 1:03:18 He plays, plays center midfield for England.

Chris Williamson 1:03:21 (laughs)

Yusef 1:03:21 (laughs) With, with Johnny Wilkinson.

Chris Williamson 1:03:23 (laughs)

Jonny 1:03:23 That's it.

Yusef 1:03:24 Um, the one who is in...

Jonny 1:03:27 Luther.

Yusef 1:03:28 He's the main character in some kind of... He's a detective. He's like a-

Jonny 1:03:30 Luther.

Chris Williamson 1:03:31 Luther.

Yusef 1:03:31 Luther. Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:03:32 Yeah. I haven't, I've never watched that.

Jonny 1:03:34 What?

Yusef 1:03:34 It's very, very good.

Chris Williamson 1:03:35 Is it?

Yusef 1:03:36 I've cor- I've started writing down now the recommendations you guys have said with your names in brackets 'cause, as we know, that's-

Jonny 1:03:43 So it's accountability.

Chris Williamson 1:03:43 Yeah, there's accountability if they're shit.

Jonny 1:03:44 Chris, seriously, Lu- Luther should be, should go top of the list. He's fantastic.

Chris Williamson 1:03:48 Well, I've... Dude, The Wire, never seen it. Sopranos, never seen it.

Jonny 1:03:51 Doesn't bother... Definitely bother with... You've never seen The Sopranos?

Chris Williamson 1:03:53 No, no.

Jonny 1:03:54 I wouldn't bother with The Wire.

Chris Williamson 1:03:56 Really?

Jonny 1:03:56 Controversial. Yeah. Wouldn't bother.

Chris Williamson 1:03:58 Yeah. Uh,

Chris Williamson 1:03:59 I think, on balance, Tom Hardy makes for... You remember when, you remember when it went from being Pierce Brosnan and everyone couldn't believe that you were gonna have this, like, hard guy, it was gritty, Daniel Craig was running off the side of buildings, he was coming out of the water, he was, like, jacked? And now think, 'cause that was... I think he first became Bond in 2006 or something.

Jonny 1:04:23 Yeah, that's exactly right, yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:04:24 Um, so think about the fact that from then until now, looking at Daniel Craig and comparing him with the potential of Tom Hardy and thinking, hang on, Daniel Craig was, like, the hard, aggressive dude.

Jonny 1:04:40 Mm-hmm.

Chris Williamson 1:04:40 And then you see just how much more extreme, uh, movies have got. Like, the standard's really been raised. But I think to go, to lean into it would be a better way. But I also think that it would be quite cool to ha-... I think having a Black Bond would be pretty cool. That would be like-

Jonny 1:04:56 Yeah, Idris would smash it as well. Would be a certain -

Chris Williamson 1:04:58 Yeah. He's a sick guy.

Jonny 1:04:59 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:04:59 He's got an awesome voice.

Jonny 1:05:01 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:05:01 Um...

Yusef 1:05:02 I do know who Tom Hardy is 'cause he, he played-

Jonny 1:05:05 Yeah.

Yusef 1:05:05 ... Bro... Uh, Charles Bronson.

Chris Williamson 1:05:08 Yes.

Jonny 1:05:08 Yeah, he did.

Yusef 1:05:09 Which-

Chris Williamson 1:05:09 He did, yeah.

Yusef 1:05:10 Which in itself, like, if you're having Bronson and it's now Bond, that's...

Chris Williamson 1:05:14 He's got a real, uh, repertoire. He plays the Jewish gangster in Peaky Blinders.

Jonny 1:05:21 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:05:22 He's got the Welsh accent. He's done all sorts.

Jonny 1:05:24 He's the Kray twins.

Chris Williamson 1:05:26 Yeah. He's both of them.

Jonny 1:05:28 Yeah.

Chris Williamson 1:05:28 (laughs) Uh ...

Jonny 1:05:30 He's Wayne Bane in the, in The Batmans. The Batman.

Chris Williamson 1:05:34 Serious guy. Serious, serious guy. Uh, gentlemen, thank you. We made it. Where should people go

Chris Williamson 1:05:41 if they want to check out what it is that you guys do?

Jonny 1:05:45 I think if you just wanna run any online business, propainfitness.com/modernwisdom. We show you how to do it for free. If you want macros and calories, propainfitness.com/calculator. (instrumental music)

Chris Williamson 1:05:57 We made it.

Jonny 1:05:58 That's it.

Chris Williamson 1:05:58 Peace. What's happening, people? Thank you very much for tuning in. If you enjoyed that episode, then press here for a selection of the best clips from the podcast over the last few weeks. And don't forget to subscribe. Peace.