074 Do indirect sets build muscle? Science vs Evidence

Jake (00:00)
Welcome back. Thank you for joining us for another episode. I'm going to jump straight in with a silver era routine. I haven't got to share one with you for the last two weeks. So I'm a little bit edgy on edge of my seat. So here we go. This is Jack Dellinger. Now Jack Dellinger talked about a couple of times. Jack Dellinger, would say, I don't know if you agree with me here Chris, but Jack Dellinger has one of the most developed silver era physiques. Like you look at him and you just like, this guy would fit in.
in the post-anabolic era, just ⁓ a monster of a guy. Now this routine of Jack Dillinger, this is what he called his favorite routine. He said this was the routine he was using when he was winning comps. Now he wrote this, this was written in a magazine, and he wrote this before he won the universe competition, but he had won Mr. America, he'd won...
I think it was like the West Coast America title, then he won the full Mr. America. So he'd been winning comps, this is in late 40s. And then he wrote this routine and a couple of years later he won the Mr. Universe. And this is a really cool routine. There's an exercise in here we've not ever discussed. And it's an exercise which I haven't told you about this Chris, but this is an exercise which is like, it's gained a lot of popularity online.
over the last couple of years and it's like a cutting edge exercise, no one does it. And my jaw hit the floor when I saw this in a magazine 75 years ago. So here we go, this is Jack Dellinger's favorite routine. And we start with set exercise. We start with what he, I think he described it as a backwards raise on a pulley. Now that description doesn't do it justice. Essentially what you do is you're lying flat,
on like a normal cable machine, okay? So lying flat, you've got two handles, so one handle on each hand, and you're effectively doing a lateral raise with these cables while lying flat. Now, in the image I saw of Jack doing this, it was kind of like more scapular plane, so it was, I guess, like halfway between a front raise and a lateral raise, but I only saw one still image, so I'm not sure kind of what sort of.
I guess arm path he used with this. So we've got a cable exercise, early 50s, pretty cool. The next exercise we move on to is a flat triceps curl, or they call it like a reverse, what do they call it? ⁓ Yeah, triceps curl or reverse arm curl, something like that. Essentially we're talking a skull crusher, okay? Then we go to standing barbell curl, and then into a flat barbell bench, and then,
And I'm gonna get your opinion on this. We haven't talked about this before. So Jack then did what they called in the silver era, a dumbbell flying exercise. Now that's a little bit different to what we call flyers today. So a flying exercise, think it like visualize a dumbbell fly in your mind. That's what it is. But the difference is you're actually, instead of having your hands neutral, you're pronating.
They did also do standard flyers, what we would call a flyer. And they call that, I think they call it bent arm laterals. So he's specifically differentiating. He's internally rotating while he's doing this dumbbell fly. So we've got our dumbbell flying motion or exercise. And then we have a sagittal plane. You're gonna love this. We've got a sagittal plane row, a cable row. So it's not a bent over barbell row. I'm sure you're gonna be happy to see. And then we've got our deep knee bend, so our squat.
and another machine, a standing calf raise. So for early 50s, we've got some pretty funky stuff going on here. Now he did do, so full body obviously, did the same workout three times per week, and he did three sets per exercise. And it was like a little bit vague with repetitions. He said like, work up to, you know, when you can get about 15 reps out, add some low, drop the weight back down. Presumably you're dropping back down to about 10, but you he wasn't sort of super specific there.
I quite like this. What do you think of this plan?
Chris (04:12)
So yeah, I mean framework is is fantastic, isn't it? I mean, ⁓ three times a week, full body, three sets ⁓ of each exercise. and it's a pretty good coverage. ⁓ I don't see any hamstrings work in there, which is pretty normal for Silver Era. ⁓ you know I was thinking about that this week and it's
Jake (04:35)
It is pretty normal. You know, I was thinking about that this week and it's funny because obviously we call these full body workouts, but it's like realistically the Silver Arrow guys were like upper body in a squat.
Chris (04:41)
Sure. Yeah, I mean, yeah, you get a call phrase if you're lucky. Yeah. I mean it's yeah, I mean and I mean we've we've covered a couple of ⁓ routines w that have had deadlift variations in them, but they're very rare. i i interesting that yeah. Interesting that it it feels very kind of sort of chest shoulders heavy.
Jake (04:47)
Yeah.
Mm.
Chris (05:10)
⁓ very chest shoulders heavy. Well it is 'cause he's got exercises for both chest and shoulders. Yeah. So ⁓ and you know, kind of just that then makes the kind of the pulling side of it, the back and biceps, look weak by comparison. ⁓ so yeah, my preference would be to balance that out a little bit more, you know, I think. and and you know, ⁓ if I
Jake (05:13)
Well, it is because he's got two exercises for both chest and shoulders.
Hmm.
Chris (05:39)
make too many amendments to it then it'll turn it into something completely different from what it is. But yeah, I mean I think ⁓ for me the fly probably doesn't really add very much in that context. I'd probably kind of have a a lap pull down, you know, wide grip. ⁓ and that would push it in a much better direction for me. I mean I could make other sort of suggestions like I'd want some hamstrings in there, I'd want some you know a shrug in there, but again it's going to turn into something that it's not.
Jake (05:49)
Hmm.
Chris (06:09)
but you know, I think really for me, if you were to say you have to do this program and you can only make minimal amends, then I would definitely swap out the fly for a wide grip ⁓ pull up or pull down. And then for me that would make it more or less workable.
Jake (06:25)
It is interesting that he's got the fly. A lot of the time in these Silver Era plans, I see they tend to either have the flat bench or the fly. So it's interesting he does have both, because normally there'll be like an inclined bench and a fly, for example. And he's moved away from the pullover, which is an interesting observation here. What do you think? So the fact that they've got these flies where they're kind of internally rotating compared to their bent arm naturals, which is in a more neutral position, is there anything
Chris (06:35)
Yeah.
Yeah.
think so the fact that they've got these
Jake (06:55)
sort of meaningfully different between those two.
Chris (07:00)
So I mean, I think anything that's gonna be different is gonna be more kind of the shoulder rather than the peck. So, you know, I mean maybe it maybe it kind of emphasizes a a section of the shoulder that he's not emphasizing elsewhere. But, you know, I mean he's covering shoulders reasonably well in this, although, you know, classically you would have expected a Novad press and there isn't one. you know, so maybe he is kind of
Jake (07:07)
Hmm. Hmm.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Chris (07:29)
Maybe he doesn't like overhead pressing or didn't like overhead pressing and so he was trying to feel like he was capturing everything and those small changes or these odd exercises like the backwards raise on a pulley, maybe that's him kind of trying to feel his way towards a solution that is basically replacing the overhead press. I don't know.
Jake (07:49)
What do think of that exercise? Any thoughts? ⁓
Chris (07:54)
The backwards rays. I mean I'm I'm I mean, it's been a while since I really kind of ranted about the lateral rays. I don't ⁓ I used to rant about it a lot. I used to r the the dumbbell variation or the the cable variation. ⁓ because I don't like the lack of stability. ⁓ I mean the lateral rays machine I think is a fantastic little machine.
But the the Dumbo variation, the standing Dumbo variation I think is horrid because it just is so unstable. And similarly, the cable doesn't really do a lot unless you've got something to brace yourself and you're doing it single, single armed. lying on the ground obviously changes that and pushes you in a direction of much more stability. So I think it's really, really nice idea. the scapula plane, I think, is kind of
Jake (08:32)
Mm.
Chris (08:46)
really where I was going when I was thinking about this being him trying to sort of replace the overhead press 'cause you know, a lot of the time overhead pressing if it's done with a barbell it's gonna be in front of your face unless you're deliberately doing behind the neck presses. But like most of the time then it is gonna be more scapular plane just simply because otherwise you're gonna sort of bash yourself on the nose. So you know I think that that was kind of where I was thinking when I was sort of going with the idea of him replacing looking for ways to replace the overhead press.
Jake (08:51)
Hmm.
Hmm.
Hmm. Hmm. It is an interesting exercise doing it. I don't love doing this version because most cables are going to be limited by like if you're too tall, if your arms are too long, it's just not going to work in a normal cable station. But for someone who's levers work like it's, it's a nice, it does feel stable. It's, it's a nice sort of exercise. This set of exercises feels, it feels different, I think to a lot of the Sylvia exercises we've looked at, you know, we've got a couple of cables in there.
Chris (09:28)
Sure.
Yeah, it does feel like a like a handover period, doesn't it? It almost feels like we're moving in the direction of the the next generation.
Jake (09:46)
Yeah.
Yeah, it does. We don't have the behind the neck. We don't have the bent over row. Like we've lost some of those classic silver exercises. So it is interesting. Okay. Any last words?
Chris (09:59)
But it's I think Yeah, I do actually. I think it's it's interesting that you just keep bringing these routines that are so similar in the sense that we've got the full body three times a week, kind of programme. I think that is such a repeatable feature of cherry picking in bugs. But it's cherry cherry picking that's been going on for over a year now and and it's it's it's starting to look like it can't possibly be cherry picking because it literally is
Jake (10:11)
Mmm.
it's a lot of cherry picking involved. It's very hard to just...
Yeah.
Chris (10:29)
pretty much, you know, kind of you know, every single every single week we get one of these routines. So, you know, unless unless the sheer volume of r of of workouts out there is is vastly bigger than I I really appreciated, then it it just literally can't possibly be cherry picking. So yeah, I I am surprised when people kind of say, no, no, no, ⁓ this expert that I talked to doesn't think that's what silver era routines look like. I'm like, well
Jake (10:42)
Yes, I wish it would make my job easier.
Hmm.
Chris (10:55)
literally done one of these pretty much every week for the last year and a quarter. So, you know, I mean it's it's all out there.
Jake (11:00)
Yeah, I mean, there's obviously a lot of very clear commonalities between these routines. And, you know, this one is actually more different to most of them than most tend to be. For example, he's only got eight exercises. You know, most of the routines we're looking at, they've got a dozen exercises or more. So but even still, it's like, well, what do they have in common?
Chris (11:07)
Yeah, massively so yeah.
Yeah. Sure.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Jake (11:22)
it's usually going to be one, two, three sets. It's going to be usually one to two exercises per muscle group. Unless you're someone like Steve Rees doing single sets and three exercises. It's full body three times per week. It's like, you know, I've, I've seen a lot of people online over the last few weeks and you know, obviously every time a new study gets released, people are like, I don't know what to believe now I'm at this and what do I think about that? And whatever. And you know, my answer over the last couple of weeks has been like, just do what the Silveira guys did. Like if you're confused, you don't need to be confused. Just look at what these guys did. Like it's,
Chris (11:32)
Yeah.
Jake (11:52)
Pretty clear.
Chris (11:53)
I think that's a really important point because ⁓ I get the same ⁓ kind of type of complaint where people like message me saying I don't know what to believe. ⁓ you know, I see all these kind of competing viewpoints. ⁓ and I'm like, you know, I think your answer there is is is perfect because you know, pre pre nineteen fifties routines had to work. There was there's no way around it. You can't you can't fake it
Jake (12:05)
Mm.
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Chris (12:23)
by, you know, using anabolic steroids. you know, and I guess I should mention that we've got some more news on that coming up soon, but ⁓ we'll be making some very interesting ⁓ content over the next couple of months I think ⁓ to to emphasise that. post nineteen fifty everything absolutely did change. ⁓ you know, so yeah, absolutely. A anybody who is in any doubt about who to believe and I'm not gonna kinda stand here and say, actually I'm sitting down but I'm not gonna
Jake (12:31)
Mm.
Mm.
Chris (12:53)
sit here and say, you know, ⁓ no no no you should just believe me and ignore everybody else. I'm not gonna say that. I'm just gonna say just go back to, you know, pre nineteen fifties, you know, pick any of the routines that we've talked about. ⁓ if you feel like it, make the small adjustments that we've suggested and run with that. And it'll be better than ninety nine point nine percent of anything that you can find online today. I've said that a million times. And you don't have to then ⁓ you know kind of nail your colours to the particular mast of some particular influence so that, you know
may or may not have made a mistake in their reasoning. So yeah, I think that's absolutely the right answer and it's always going to be the right answer no matter what happens after this point.
Jake (13:31)
Mm. Mm. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And final point I want to make is you should make a couple adjustments to these routines, make it fit where your goals are. Something that probably my biggest learning experience with these Silver Era routines as I've looked at them is how they did in fact simply prioritize what mattered to them and they just left out what didn't matter. And I think that that's such a helpful thing for because a lot of people they don't
Chris (13:56)
True.
Jake (14:00)
necessarily want to be a bodybuilder. Like so many people message me and be like, look, I've got, you know, an hour I can spend in the gym. just, want to, I want to look as good as possible, but like, I don't want to get on stage. And now, well, you know, it might be like an hour, two or three times a week. You know, people are conventionally being told, need to be in the gym five or six days a week. You know, like that sounds like nothing compared to what people are being told.
Chris (14:09)
That's loads.
Absolute insanity. But a lot of a lot of the silver air routine silver era routines are doable in under an hour three times a week. A lot of not all of them, not all of them.
Jake (14:25)
Yeah, well actually, I almost came today with one that was a 45 minute routine. Maybe I'll save that for next week. But yes, I mean, especially with the equipment that you have available today. But the point I wanted to make is you don't necessarily need to be in there doing the stuff that Sorin was talking about last week. You don't need to be training your fingers and you don't need to be training every single division of your hamstring if you don't want to. These guys looked amazing and they were usually doing a deadlift or Reg was doing a back extension for his hams.
Chris (14:30)
Yeah. ⁓
Jake (14:54)
You know, like, yes, if you're a bodybuilder, you need to do this stuff really. But you can look amazing with prioritizing what you want to, know, Jack, what did he want to do? Obviously he wanted to focus on chest and shoulders. Yeah. He didn't really care that much about his, his hamstrings. Anyway, you're to get me down a bit of a rant about Silvira. So we need to move on. So what's, what's our second half of today's podcast about?
Chris (15:18)
If it's second half, it's gonna be a very short podcast 'cause it's only fifteen minutes in. The the the kind of the silver era bit seems to get smaller and smaller and smaller and my kind of physiology bit seems to get bigger and bigger and bigger. I think it's not an equal distribution of of work going on here. So, you messaged me earlier in the week about a ⁓
Jake (15:28)
You
Chris (15:42)
study that was being talked about ⁓ and it basically ⁓ was referring to what is widely known as indirect sets. So ⁓ you wanted to talk about the study, I persuaded you not to, and I wanted to talk about the concept rather than ⁓ kind of the study itself. So that's what we're gonna do. If I'm gonna do the line share of the talking then I get to decide what it is what I'm talking about. So basically yeah the concept of an indirect set. So
Jake (16:04)
You get to decide where we go.
Chris (16:12)
Essentially the way the terminology is used is that if an exercise is involving using a muscle, you can't kind of do the exercise without contracting the muscle. But it's not obviously the muscle that is kind of being targeted. so like for example it might be the triceps in the bench press or it might be the biceps in a pull down or you know, kind of might be the calves or I guess maybe even the glutes in a squat. ⁓
You know, essentially all of those ⁓ muscles, ⁓ if you're using one of those exercises, then essentially the idea is that they are being targeted indirectly rather than directly. Little bit of a kind of disingenuous terminology because you know, concept of direct and indirect doesn't really apply here. But essentially what we're saying is that ⁓ they're not getting a maximal stimulus that we would expect another muscle to be getting.
Really, that's the kind of idea. So what I wanted to do ⁓ about this, talking about this topic, is to essentially describe what I think is the evidence based approach to this question, and then describe what I think a science based approach to the question would be. And I think this is an amazing opportunity to illustrate the differences in those two approaches. Once again.
I've done this conversation, I've had this conversation on this podcast a number of times before. The negative feedback that I get when I when I do this ⁓ when I when I compare these two approaches is that the evidence based approach incorporates the science based approach. now this is one of those instances where the person doing the complaining and claiming that the evidence based approach incorporates the science. The person doing the complaining is
using a model of evidence based appro an an evidence based model that only exists in their own mind. It doesn't exist in reality. ⁓ because they're they're they're kind of trying to go, well this is what I think evidence based should be like and I'm like, I agree with you, it should be like that. But it's not. And that's not how it gets done. So what I'm what I'm looking at is the the same way that, you know, you might say, you know, don't don't listen to what people say. Look at what they do.
Jake (18:28)
Hmm.
Chris (18:38)
Well, this is the ca same kind of concept. It's like if you want to understand what evidence based approach is like, don't listen to what people tell you it is about, 'cause they'll always tell you it's the best possible version of it. They'll give you the version that includes everything. Like just listen to you know, just watch what they do. Watch how they construct their own frameworks about things. And what you'll discover is that it actually has a very, very unique characteristic, which is to completely ignore physiology. And yeah.
Jake (18:40)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Chris (19:06)
I've said that a hundred times and every time I say it, people complain and they send me rude messages and they say, No, no, no, no, evidence based shouldn't do that and I agree with you that shouldn't. But it does. That's just how it gets used. ⁓ science based starts with physiology and says if you any point in your description of what's going on you violate fundamental physiological principles that will stop you and say you can't go any further. You've got to kind of go back to principles and show us how it works.
Jake (19:29)
Okay, I've got a question there. does that mean, say, say they, they say the evidence based world say, we think there's something going on, but we haven't identified what that mechanism is yet.
Chris (19:34)
Say say the
Yeah, they say that all the time. They say that all the time. B th it's 'cause they haven't looked. They haven't done the reading. And it's quite simple. They literally haven't done the reading. That this is you the example that you ⁓ or the the e an example of what you've just described is the stretch mediated hypertrophy nonsense that's been perpetrated for the last kind of ten, fifteen years. They've been running around saying, we need to find out what stretch mediated hypertrophy is and there's an entire body of literature literally next door, which is the sarcomerogenesis literature, ⁓ which explains everything.
Jake (19:46)
Mhm.
Hmm.
Chris (20:11)
Perfectly. Literally perfectly. Down to the last kind of you know, kind of ⁓ minute element of their of their discovery. And they won't look at it because they don't do that. They don't look at mechanisms. They don't look at physiology. They literally just start doing studies and then they start making stuff up. And people go, no, no, no, you shouldn't stay there. They make stuff up. I'm like, Metabolic stress. They literally made that up. They literally made it up. It doesn't exist. But they made it up because they wanted to have something that
Jake (20:14)
Hmm.
Chris (20:40)
was theirs, they wanted to have a mechanism that was theirs that they created, rather than just looking at physiology which tells me the answer.
Jake (20:46)
So what would a science-based approach look like if, so let's say the stretch mediated hypertrophy stuff, okay? So let's say they identify, I know this is not what the topic is, but I'm interested. Let's say they identified, hey, we saw these people grow more when they did this long length exercise, blah, blah, blah, we don't know why. What would a science-based approach do there? Would they say, well, we need to know why, we need to find why, and we're going to find that why? Like what happens if you have that observation, but you simply don't have the physiological explanation yet?
Chris (20:49)
say this stretch meated hydrogen stuff. Okay. So let's say that I didn't
Basically.
Well, that means you haven't done the reading. And I'm questioning whether you should be even working in that space if you haven't done the reading, really. You know? I mean, that's kind of if you if you've done a like a degree and like a PhD in the area, you should have done the reading. I mean that's what those periods of times are are for, you know. So you should have done the reading. So you shall work Yeah, I know. but ⁓ basically, yeah, essentially
Jake (21:20)
So you need to be finding the why.
That's what they were for before AI. don't know.
Chris (21:41)
you've done the reading, so you know and you've read outside of your little tiny area, so you know that there exists a phenomenon in which stretched muscle produces a particular type of growth, which is sarcomers in series. And because you know that, you then go, Okay, what does that look like? Well in animals, if you have sarcomerogenesis, you had sarcomerasin series, you simultaneously get fascicle length increases. So you go, well we actually have the ability to measure fascicle length increases in humans using ultrasound and that's actually very cheap and easy to do. So
Let's start measuring vesicle lengths in, you know, kind of a r a variety of different scenarios and that is then going to be moving us along in the direction of saying, Okay, well, we're looking at psychomogenesis here. You know, that would be what I would have done in the beginning.
So with the
Jake (22:28)
Okay, so let's apply that to the topic we are talking about today. I want you to actually like sort of signpost, this is where this turns into evidence-based thinking. And this is what a science-based approach would have looked like or could look
Chris (22:35)
This is where this
Sure. So imagine that you've got a study in which you are doing a multi joint exercise and you are relatively confident that the ⁓ the more distal parts of the body, ⁓ triceps, biceps, whatever, ⁓ are experiencing lower levels of stimulus than the more proximal parts of the body. So you know, pressing exercises, pulling exercises, multi joint
And you're like, we're relatively confident, you know, that confidence could come from a variety of sources, but you know, maybe it's coming from EMG. Maybe, you know. So, you know, you kind of establish that you think you've got lower levels of activation, even at muscular failure or you know, in maximal efforts. ⁓ and basically that is because you know, the exercise biomechanics simply just doesn't demand that those muscles use as high levels of ⁓ their you know, relative muscle force or
relative muscle activation and then the more proximal muscles that you're using. So essentially you you kind of you you're looking at this study and you do a bunch of you know kind of training kind of studies or you just do a single training study and at the end of it you report that you've created some increase in muscle size of those more distal segments, the biceps and triceps and in the pressing and the pulling exercises. Now as I say those are being classified at the moment as
being as receiving an indirect stimulus. The purpose of those exercises was not to train those particular muscles. The purpose of the exercises was to train, you know, the more ⁓ proximal parts of the body, therefore, you know, classifying those ⁓ biceps and triceps as being receiving an indirect stimulus. Okay, so
What does the physiologist think when they approach that particular scenario? The physiologist says, Why might I ⁓ require or what might be going on when I'm producing a lower force ⁓ with the ⁓ distal segments of the body rather than the proximal segments? Well, broadly speaking, the contraction velocities probably aren't going to be massively different. Now, you know, you could go into a rabbit hole and you could start looking at that, but
Broadly speaking, they're part of the same pulling motion. I'm not expecting them to be dramatically different, so force velocity is going to be more or less in the same place. So essentially, what I'm expecting is that pretty much all the difference in force production is going to come from activation differences. So that then stacks up with what I was saying earlier, which is that you might have used EMG as your starting point to kind of get comfortable with the fact that you're using the muscles to different extents. Okay, so what does activation
Like especially in the context of like EMG or ⁓ you know, another measurement that you might be using, what is it actually saying? What it's saying is that you're using fewer muscle fibers. That's what it's saying. That's essentially what it's saying. Now, a lot of people get really, really worked up when I say that and they start kind of getting very, very stressed about muscle ⁓ kind of ⁓ about the way that motor unit recruitment works and the way that motor unit firing frequency works. If you actually go and look at the ⁓ kind of situations in which
Motor unit recruitment and firing frequencies are being manipulated across a range of different loads, what you find is that firing frequency changes very, very little when velocity doesn't change. Velocity changes, fire frequency changes enormously, like by a factor of ten. Whereas ⁓ you know, in scenarios where you're just changing ⁓ force production and maintaining a sim s the same velocity or using isometrics or whatever, you find that fire frequencies do not change that much. Recruitment is really what's driving the changes in force production.
that are associated with activation. So that means that you're getting fewer fibers at lower levels of activation and more fibers at higher levels of activation. Okay, so what we're saying physiologically then is that if I have a muscle and I'm classifying it as receiving an indirect stimulus, in other words that I'm using it less, even at muscular failure, then it is actually activating fewer muscle fibers than I would do ⁓
than than the proximal segments of the body are which are the target to the actual exercise itself. Okay. Now, according to Henneman's size principle, and this is something that nobody disagrees with, but according to Hennessman's size principle, the fibers that I'm not activating were going to be at the top end of the sequence because that's how the sequence works. You follow the sequence up from the bottom to the top. So if I miss any fibers off, they've got to come from the top. So they are the fibers that are most likely to grow. They're the ones that are the biggest, they're the ones that are the most sensitive to the growth stimulus. So if I start to
move from a direct if I move from a direct muscle classification to an indirect muscle classification, I am basically not training the topmost fibres of the muscle that are most sim sensitive to gross stimulus, that are the top of Hanneman's size. So that's the physiological way that you would approach the problem. And because hypertrophy essentially is a fibre specific phenomenon, even if you want to argue it's a motor unit specific phenomenon, you can still do that if you want. It doesn't really change anything here. ⁓ ultimately you're gonna end up
With a chunk of fibers that are never going to receive a stimulus. You could literally therefore then spend like five years doing those exercises and your muscles would grow to the point where they left the top fibers untrained, everything else would grow and the fibers at the top end of the muscle would not grow. That's the physiological way of doing it. All makes sense so far?
Jake (28:08)
So the language of indirect in this context indirect is basically synonymous with the top end of the motor unit pool is not being used
Chris (28:20)
Yeah, it's a partial stimulus of the muscle. It's and this is where we have to kind of now compare this viewpoint with with what I think the evidence based community is assuming. Obviously they never state mechanisms because that's kind of one of the principles that underpins the way it works, is that they never actually state mechanisms. As you've pointed out, what they do is they say, We don't know how it works yet. We just know that this is how what is happening. ⁓ these are the results that we see. And that's the focus of evidence based, always the results that we see. It's never
Jake (28:48)
Mm. Mm.
Chris (28:49)
How this works. And the point I'm making when I divide the description and say science is one thing and evidence-based is another is that science is extremely obsessed with finding out how something works. ⁓ and that actually changed the way you look at things. ⁓ if you look at things from an evidence-based perspective, and you can say again, no, no, no, it's supposed to include mechanisms. Yes, I know it's supposed to, but it doesn't. So, you know, basically
Jake (29:10)
you
Chris (29:15)
I'm actually talking when I when I say that I'm actually talking to somebody who I like and respect and talk to quite a lot. It's the one thing that he and I just don't agree on. ⁓ is that he keeps saying to No, no, no, evidence is includes that stuff and I'm like, it doesn't not the way it's used. So basically the way that evidence base gets used is that ⁓ they will say, the stimulus is smaller but it's still there. So they're kind of assuming that like the entire muscle is growing and that's one of the
really big deficiencies in the evidence based framework is that they don't differentiate between a muscle and muscle fibers because they don't think physiologically. They just go, well, muscle is growing. And we measure muscles growing, you know, the muscle grew by five percent. Muscles grown. You know, like so therefore, you know, like okay, maybe the ⁓ the biceps curl grows the biceps more than the lat does, so it's like ten percent growth rather than six percent growth over the same period of time. But they're still both getting a stimulus. And they go, A stimulus, the muscle.
Jake (29:51)
Mm-hmm.
Hmm.
Chris (30:15)
And it's like they've just jumped over a whole enormous chunk of physiology, which is that, you know, the muscle is divided into loads of different fibres. But they because they don't think about the physiology, they literally just ignore it, they don't take it into consideration. They are they find themselves falling into these errors where they go, well, yeah, the muscle's grown by this amount, therefore it's stimulated hypertrophy, therefore the you know, the biceps are growing from that pull down. So I'm like
Jake (30:15)
Mm.
you
Chris (30:42)
Yeah, part of the biceps is growing from that border hands. But, you know, it will plateau a lot earlier than, you know, kind of biceps curls would do because you're not training the top end of the muscle.
Jake (30:53)
Okay, if we go to the science-based view, we're saying that when the language of indirect stimulus is being used, what a science-based thinker is hearing is that there's motor units at the top end of the motor unit pool that are ultimately not being activated or this muscle fibers not being activated. When an evidence-based sort of thinker, I guess, is hearing this, they're hearing a muscle is receiving a stimulus, but the magnitude of that stimulus is less than a direct, okay.
Chris (31:08)
Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, yeah.
Correct. That is exactly how I would characterize it, yeah. That's what I think. And I think it's the the fact that they simply don't drop down a level and go, okay, well what would that look like? You know? You know, it's like the the thing if you ask how is that possible. No, I know. And then you hit the wall and you go, it oils pull up, yeah. But that's why I say evidence based exercise science as it exists at the moment cannot look at mechanisms except in extremely localized scenarios.
Jake (31:31)
Yes, because as soon as you ask, how is that possible? The wheels fall off immediately.
Chris (31:49)
And mostly where they've made them up themselves and there's no other literature. That that is how it works. I mean and if you don't believe me, just go back and look at them. Stretch media typography is literally a made up concept. Metabolic stress, made up concept. Everything that comes up. They're all made up. They're all made up. But they have to be. Yeah, they're made up.
Jake (32:00)
Hmm. That's a really interesting observation. Okay. So these, these, these terminologies, are just explaining, describing the, the observation they're Yeah.
Chris (32:11)
their own data. They're they're literally d making up their they're making up an explanation for their own data. And that rather than going sideways and go, okay, what does physiology actually say? ⁓ they have to make something up because if they went sideways, then physiology would eat the entirety of their set of discoveries. It would eat it alive and it would disappear. and that's ultimately what they object to when they hear me talking about this stuff is that I basically import a section of physiology that explains all of their results perfectly.
Jake (32:27)
Mm. Mm-hmm.
Chris (32:40)
And they've got no where to go.
Jake (32:45)
So with the example you've given here, so let's say there was a study, and there happens to be, where they had people, let's say, lifters.
Chris (32:48)
Say
You're trying to convert this into a discussion about the study.
Jake (32:55)
I'm not, I'm not going to bring up what you know that I want to bring up. so let's say we had train lifters who were doing a multi-joint exercise. So they're doing, let's say benching or pressing, whatever. And you're saying that, let's say the outcome of said study was that train lifters grew in say the triceps or the biceps, but they were just doing pressing or they were just doing lat pulldown.
Chris (33:07)
Sure.
Jake (33:20)
Now the language that can be applied would be indirect sets or indirect stimulus. So someone might say, well, they grew because these muscles were still getting an indirect stimulus. And we've explained that a science-based thinker will hear that and think, okay, there was still some motor units that were being used in those muscles. They could still be growth. So we can get to the end of that study and we can both look at that outcome and we can land in the same area and say, okay, we understand there could have been growth. Maybe there was other stuff that is, you know, affecting that measurement. don't know, but.
we can see that there could have been growth and we're both seeing eye to eye there. But there's a difference because going forwards, now the science-based lift is gonna say, that's got a very different implication for someone wanting to see continued growth than what the evidence-based think is going to say, isn't it?
Chris (33:53)
But ⁓ there's a difference because going forwards, now the science based lift is going to say, Well, that's
Sure. Yeah. Well the science based thinker is going to go, you're going to have a plateau much at a much lower level of total muscle mass, you know, in that particular limb, in that particular muscle group. If that's the only ex if you're only doing lap pull downs for biceps, you're gonna hit a plateau much lower at a much smaller amount of muscle size for that biceps than you would do if you did biceps curls. That's that's what they're gonna practically see as the output, ⁓ because you're not hitting max recruitment.
Therefore you're not activating as many fibers. Therefore you're not training those fibers. You know, and this is where it gets interesting because when you see people who are trying to kind of go between the two camps, so when you see people who are trying to be influencers in both spaces, they're trying to play in this pond and they're trying to play in the other pond as well. And what you notice is they they start making stuff up to try and explain how the ⁓
Jake (34:49)
Mm.
Yeah.
Chris (35:01)
How the physiology should be working in the evidence based model and they come out with absolute nonsense. It's fascinating. So like you get influencers, ⁓ especially ⁓ I'm not saying anything about younger influencers, there's some amazing younger influencers, but they tend not to have maybe seen as much, you know, kind of life as those of us who are kind of pushing fifty. they tend to kind of fall into these traps because they've not seen them before. ⁓ and you know, you see people kind of sort of starting to try and
Jake (35:04)
Mm. Mm.
Chris (35:30)
formulate a ⁓ a kind of physiological explanation of what the evidence based model is. ⁓ and the obviously the classic ⁓ one in this scenario scenario would be, you know, trying to go, well, you know, the evidence based model seems to assume that the muscle is receiving a stimulus, therefore but hang on a minute, multi unit recruitment means that not all the fibers are activated. well, and then
Jake (35:55)
Mm.
Chris (35:56)
you get the Hegelian kind of solution which is well that means that means that fibers that are not activated can be stimulated. And they're like, No, no, no, no, that's nonsense. So but they've they've
Jake (35:58)
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm. So kudos to them because they are actually trying to think of ⁓ some kind of explanation as to why.
Chris (36:12)
But but th yeah, but the problem is that that what they're trying to do is they're trying to blend evidence based with science based into the same model. But by but by doing that they've forced themselves in a position where they've got to find the explanation. It's almost I used to when I did the podcast with Paul, we used to joke all the time about the scene in the Fight Club film where they're the kind of the the the the sort of the the henchmen are trying to make sense of ⁓ the n the narrator's kind of ⁓ explanation.
Jake (36:18)
Yeah.
Chris (36:42)
And the narrator has basically said, you know, you know, kind of ⁓ he has a name. His name is Robert Paulson. And the henchmen are going, Yeah, but but in Project Mayhem nobody has a name. So how how do we recognize how do we reconcile this? This needs a Hegelian kind of solution to this problem. And then one of them goes, I know the answer. It's because in death he has a name. And then they've found the answer and it they've they've they've solved it. And that's what's happening with these poor kind of ⁓ influencers who are stuck in the middle between evidence-based and science-based.
Jake (36:55)
Mm. Mm.
Chris (37:11)
Because they're stuck trying to go, well, you know, the science based community has an explanation for how everything works and it's just drawn from basic physiology. There's nothing, you know, weird about it. It's just like pick up a physiology textbook and it'll tell the answer. ⁓ and the evidence based community just don't talk about mechanisms. They just don't talk about or if they do then they talk about made up mechanisms. and so they're stuck in the middle and they go, ⁓ so I need a mechanism and so they make one up and they they they solve the s they solve the the the the the kind of the the the conflict.
Jake (37:36)
Hmm.
Chris (37:40)
⁓ but it's a nonsense mechanism because it you know, it's not come from anywhere. So
Jake (37:46)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, I guess there might be a feeling when people hear science-based and they hear some of the mechanisms and some of the physiology that gets discussed, I guess maybe they don't know what that's anchored in and maybe just collectively people are like, well, that's just something that someone has conceived of and kind of maybe made up and we can also equally just make up these other physiological mechanisms.
Chris (38:12)
Yeah. But now but now but now you're you're now you're connecting back to the problem that you raised at the very beginning, which is that people kinda go, Well, I don't know what to believe and like, Well the reason you don't know what to believe is because you haven't done the reading and I get hate mail when I say that, because people don't want to hear it.
Jake (38:21)
Hmm.
You don't get hate mail because no one, including me, knows where you live.
Chris (38:31)
I mean I didn't mean like actual physical mail, I meant like electronic mail. But you know, people will suddenly hate hate messages because they don't want to hear the fact that y if you want to know if you want to be able to parse like like whether something is true or not, you actually have to have a foundation somewhere. And that means you have to have priors. That means you have to have done some reading, that means you have to have some confidence in what you've learned previously. If if you're like
Jake (38:36)
Hehehehehe
Mm.
Chris (38:59)
I I literally got a message while I was doing my Instagram questions this week where somebody said, ⁓ I've just seen a new metro analysis and it's it's persuaded me that frequency doesn't matter ⁓ and so now ⁓ or it's persuaded all my friends, I think think was the was the actual comment. All my friends now say that the frequency doesn't matter and I I I need to know, you know, kind of whether frequency matters. I'm like, Well, if if you can literally have your opinion or your friends can have their opinions moved overnight by a metro analysis that just came out that isn't even
Jake (39:14)
You
Chris (39:29)
you know, kind of I didn't think it's even been peer reviewed yet, then, you know, that is probably a sign that you don't have a foundation in the in the material that you're, you know, kind of interested in. ⁓ that that's to me a signal that you might want to kind of go back at the level and and do some reading and get confident with what you you know, you're confident about, you know, what you know, what you think is true. ⁓ because if if a a single study can push you that far in a direction, from like one end to the other, overnight,
Jake (39:56)
Mmm.
Chris (39:58)
⁓ and as I say, probably not even peer reviewed yet. It it's probably a sign that that you you've got a bit of a a lacking in an area of
Jake (40:05)
Well, especially in meta-analysis or a review or something like that. I can understand if we had a new paper, a new study came out.
Chris (40:12)
yeah, sure. I mean like if if somebody published tomorrow a study of like a one year duration strength training study in in like, you know, a hundred trained lifters and it showed, you know, something radically new, then, you know, you'd be relatively kind of persuaded by that, I think. But yeah, no, totally. If it's like a reviewer meta or a or something like that, then you know, definitely and that comes back to the point I was making before about metas, which is that, you know, the evidence based community have done a really good marketing job persuading people that
Jake (40:21)
Yeah.
Chris (40:40)
If you just throw enough studies into the hopper, then whatever comes out the other end is like gospel truth. The reality is if you throw ⁓ multiple different things into the same hopper, then you'll get garbage out. If you've got variance in your data, so like if if you've got multiple studies and they're not actually measuring the same thing, but you treat them as if they're measuring the same thing. For example, if you've got a bunch of studies and there's massive amounts of muscle swelling in them.
Jake (40:44)
Mm.
Mm. Mm.
Chris (41:10)
And you throw those into the same hopper as a bunch of studies that are you know controlling largely for muscle swelling by not having excessive volumes, you throw all of that into the same you're gonna get a garbage answer out in terms of what you think the training variables are doing because half your training variables are gonna be influenced by muscle ⁓ sorry, half of your studies that you're using to establish the effect of training variables are gonna be influenced by muscle swelling and half of them are not. No, that is gonna mean that you get rubbish out. You know, you can't blend data if
Jake (41:13)
Mm.
Mm.
Mm.
Chris (41:40)
the s if the data aren't are actually kind of homogeneous. And the evidence based community makes massive assumptions about the ⁓ homogenousness, which is not a real word of their data sets, you know, when they blend them to produce metas. And then they big up the answer by saying, look, our evidence pyramid has meta at the top, therefore you should believe this. And like, yeah, but
Jake (41:43)
Mm. Mm.
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah.
Chris (42:06)
you actually blended a whole bunch of things that you shouldn't have blended. I gave I've given this example before on on stretch mediated hypertrophy, I hate saying that. ⁓ you know, before because ultimately if you if you were to put trained and untrained subjects in the same meta, you would get garbage answers out because you can't get stretch mediated hypertrophy with a trained subject. It's not possible. So y you're immediately gonna get a nonsense answer out if you put those two in the same category. And they go, no, no no but we do another subgroup analysis afterwards. I'm like, yeah, but
Jake (42:19)
Mm.
Mm-mm.
Chris (42:34)
The whole point is that you started out with two data sets that weren't actually compatible with each other.
Jake (42:38)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. it is odd to to hear someone say they've they've Flipped their belief on something based on a review paper like you I would think that the review paper might help establish like effect size like it might sort of maybe you've given indication potentially to the magnitude of something or like you said there'll be the subgroup analysis and some of that might be interesting to I don't know maybe elucidate something but to walk into a review paper and walk out
thinking I believe X to begin with and now I believe I did a 180 and I believe the opposite. It's like, well, the only way that's possible is you didn't, you hadn't looked at those studies that went into that review. So you held an opinion in the first place.
Chris (43:19)
Yeah, th that's a really good that's a really good point because ultimately a meta shouldn't have anything in it that you haven't already seen. If if you genuinely know this out like, you know, I mean it's one of the things that both of us do when we look at ⁓ a a a new meta or a review is scan our eyes down the list of study titles to see if they missed anything. I mean this goes back to literally a year ago. We were having a conversation, I'm trying to remember, there was a I think I'm gonna like don't ⁓
Jake (43:25)
Yes.
Mm.
Chris (43:47)
kind of quote me on this if I'm if I'm ⁓ mistakenly quote the wrong paper, but I think it was the the network analysis that was done that everyone was raving about. And they were raving about the frequency meta analysis sorry, frequency network analysis that showed that two times was actually better than three times. And I we did a whole podcast explaining what a network an analysis actually is doing or what that particular network analysis was actually doing and why it wasn't the best way of approaching the problem.
Jake (43:57)
Yeah, yep.
Chris (44:16)
And I think from memory, and again, don't send me hate mail about this, but I think they actually mis missed out the Nevis paper in that actual state. I think they did. Or or another one of the three that actually showed a positive effect a few times. So, you know, and that's one of the things
Jake (44:24)
Mmm.
Yeah, okay.
I think there was a ⁓ grad study, I think there was a grad study missed out on that. I think there might have been a couple.
Chris (44:36)
it's th no, it's the you're right. No, it was it was Brad's study, wasn't it? It wasn't the Neves paper, it was Brad Study, you're right. They missed Brad's paper out. And Brad's paper of on frequency is borderline ⁓ beneficial or is beneficial in one of the muscle groups that they tested, I think. ⁓ so yeah, basically missed out a beneficial effect of a higher frequency training group. The point I'm making is that, you know, i if if you look at a meta and it's just completely all new to you, then y you know
Jake (44:42)
Hmm.
Mm-hmm. Mm.
Mm.
Chris (45:03)
you're basically just being persuaded by somebody's kind of viewpoint at that level. you know, and and again, this is where I get myself into trouble because people start getting really upset when I say you you actually have to do the reading if you want to be able to parse this area. Otherwise it's just, I'd like this person better, therefore I'm gonna believe them. Well, yeah, I mean, okay, fine, but I mean human beings have been doing that since the year dot, but you're not gonna get the right answer to it.
Jake (45:27)
Mm.
Okay, so we took a detour down meta-analyses. Where were we before that? we're talking, so I guess the point I wanted to make was we've got a scenario where people can be looking at an outcome in this, seeing that in the same way, agreeing that the outcome was in fact X, but then what they do with that is going to significantly differ.
Chris (45:58)
Yeah. ⁓ and and so maybe let's talk about that. So if someone's looking at enemy
Jake (45:59)
And so maybe let's talk about that. So if someone's looking at an indirect stimulus and they're thinking, it's just, you know, turn down the magnitude of stimulus, but hey, the muscle is still getting the stimulus. Where does that lead one compared to the science-based view?
Chris (46:09)
Sure. Yeah. does that really go? It yeah, exactly. It changes everything, doesn't it? So the science based lifter is gonna go, okay, well, ⁓ the reality is that indirect ⁓ stimuli aren't actually that interesting for me because ⁓ essentially I'm still gonna need direct stimulus if I want to maximise the size of that muscle. You cannot get to a maximum muscle size.
Jake (46:27)
Mm.
Chris (46:35)
⁓ for given muscle group if I'm using an indirect stimulus. It just stops earlier. So and this actually ties back to some important point you made earlier about people focusing on what's important to them. So you know, it may be the case that somebody decides that an indirect stimulus is totally acceptable for calves. So they just kinda do a you know a leg press or whatever and it's like, yeah, enough of a a an indirect stimulus and that's fine.
Jake (46:52)
Mm. Mm.
I have a number of female clients who their arms as developed as they want them to be, they look great and they want an indirect stimulus. Cause here's why, cause they don't want the arms to get bigger, right? Because I am viewing this as a science-based thing.
Chris (47:06)
Exactly. Exactly.
Exactly. There you go. Because I am so they actually understand how it works. That was quite funny. dear. So
Jake (47:20)
But if that were evidence-based thinking, then I would think, hang on, you can't be giving me a lap pull down because my arms are gonna continue to get bigger.
Chris (47:25)
Yeah, they're still growing. Yeah, there wouldn't be a plateau. ⁓ it would it would it would plateau the same place that you know a direct stimulus would plateau. You know, and that's that's the issue. That's that's that's ultimately the practical implication is that the and this is actually tying back perfectly to our podcasts with Sorin because you know, what he's decided to do is take that to an extreme and say, Well, okay, what I'm gonna try and do is have a direct stimulus for every single muscle and even every single region of the muscle.
Jake (47:52)
Mm. Mm-hmm.
Chris (47:54)
that I can possibly identify and even some that probably can't identify by his own admission. And it's like, okay, fine, cool. You know, you know, and that that that is a really interesting model because it's totally in line with how the physiology predicts things will work. You know, but yeah, no, I mean like the the the evidence-based lifter who doesn't and so I'm gonna pause just
Jake (47:57)
Hahaha
Chris (48:20)
briefly and try and explain this in a slightly different way because I keep explaining it in the same way and it just sounds repetitive. so it it's an absence of mechanistic underpinnings is the problem. Problem from our perspective as as science based kind of lifters. Because ⁓ what we see when we look at the evidence based community is just an absence of any mechanistic rationale. I don't
I think that they see it like that.
You know? I don't think that they see an absence of something. I don't I think this is me trying to put myself in the shoes of an evidence based practitioner or evidence based kind of ⁓ information parser. I don't know what you would call them. but like people are trying to use the literature in an evidence based way, you know. ⁓ they simply just don't ask the question. Or if they do, they ask it in that way that you pointed out earlier, which is like, ⁓ we don't know what's going on. Mm
Jake (48:55)
Hmm.
Chris (49:23)
it'd be interesting to learn in the future what's going on. Wouldn't that be cool in the future if we know what's going on? And it's like, well, if you opened your eyes and looked sideways you'd see what was going on. But okay. so it it's very much like an absence of mechanistic from our a mechanistic underpinning from our perspective. But I don't think it looks like that from their perspective. I I don't know what it is that they see, but they they do see things in a very, very different way. It's like, you know, they're they're kind of they're moving forward with with
Jake (49:39)
Hmm.
Hmm.
Chris (49:53)
with a framework that has like big gaps in it and they're comfortable with the existence of those gaps and they're looking to the future to fill those gaps in. It's really, really weird. ⁓ and for some reason they think that reading physiology will not fill those gaps in. I don't know. I don't know why.
Jake (50:01)
You
I a car that you can take the roof off, can take the doors off, can make it basically as a Jeep Wrangler, you can just make it like a shell. And I'm just picturing just driving with no roof, no doors, nothing.
Chris (50:16)
Yeah. Yeah, it's exactly what it's like. It's it's exactly what it's like. It's just driving along with a frame. Like one of those desert desert kind of you know, kind of dune buggies where you can kind of like literally just have a roll cage around you, you know. that's I don't know what it looks like from the inside. I don't. I don't know what the inside of out of an ev evidence based practitioner's head looks like, but it's definitely got
Jake (50:24)
You
Yeah.
Chris (50:45)
sort of gaps where I would s expect like physiological mechanisms. And so they kind of just see this this you know th they see things in a different way. And as I say, it leads to these practical implications that are different and as you were saying, you know, like they are gonna just predict that if they do lap pull downs long enough, they'll get to the same place that they would do with biceps girls. You know, and I think it's it's really important. We were talking about this issue before the podcast and I'm I'm not going to kind of
Jake (51:07)
Mm.
Chris (51:14)
you know, go deep into that conversation. But it does, you know, kind of it is important I think to to to just bear in mind that the rate of growth that an advanced that a trained lifter is going experience is very, very much smaller than the rate of growth an untrained lifter is going to experience by, you know, possibly even an order of magnitude. You know, like where an untrained lifter's going to get ten percent growth, you might expect one percent, two percent in a in a train lifter. I'm just very, very kind of very, very broad broad brush.
Jake (51:30)
Mm-hmm.
Mm.
Mm-hmm.
Chris (51:44)
kind of things. And like the further you go down the road the the smaller that growth. And honestly that isn't that contentious as a concept. You know, I mean that's relatively con relatively relatively kind of, you know, hopefully shouldn't be contentious as a concept. You know, so so realistically, you know, we we we're not expecting to see a lot of growth once we get past that that kind of intermediate plateau or onto that intermediate plateau rather.
Jake (51:54)
It shouldn't be. ⁓
Chris (52:14)
You know, so essentially the the kind of the the lap pull down ⁓ for the biceps or the the bench press or over press for the triceps or whatever else, they are going to be, you know, sort of stopping us at a lower plateau and then that plateau then is just gonna grind very, very, very slowly up from there. Exactly the same thing's gonna happen with direct arm work doing biceps curls or triceps contentions, whatever. It's gonna be gonna push up to a higher plateau this time.
And then grind up very, very slowly from there. So the reality is it's actually gonna make a pretty fundamental difference that it's just gonna stay with that from a science based perspective, stay with that lift forever. Whereas for some reason, you know, the evidence based kind of community of kind of making the assumption that that isn't what's happening, that you can kind of just carry on, you know, kind of and get to the same place.
Jake (53:03)
Well, that's and I'm trying to wonder I'm trying to think is this is this a pattern we see with other evidence-based versus science-based sort of you know differences because here it seems like evidence-based thinking will just take this outcome and just extend it into perpetuity and like we can just fit exactly and Even if like what you said there, even if we're looking at a single joint exercise like a biceps curl
Chris (53:08)
Is this a
Yeah it seems like evidence based
Future forever, yeah.
Jake (53:30)
a science-based thinker will look at that and be like, well, at some point there is going to be a plateau, right?
Chris (53:34)
It's funny it's funny that you you've pointed this out because if you simply just change the the variable that you're manipulating here, you'll get an answer immediately. Because you're you're talking about time and changing time. This literally was like five years ago this was being debated regarding volume. So for a while, like evidence based practitioners were like, You can increase volume infinitely and it will just carry on producing more muscle growth and they actually had to rein themselves in because
Jake (53:53)
Hmm.
Yeah. Yeah.
Chris (54:05)
I remember them doing it. They actually had to rein themselves in because it was getting silly and people were kinda sort of going, you know, hang on a minute, this is this is not sensible. But they were like, you know, is muscle growth infinite ceiling yet. Yeah, they they still kinda test the waters. Occasionally somebody will kind of again, it's like the the like the kind of the influencers I was talking about, they were kind of doing the Hegelian dialectic problem. You know, occasionally an influencer or a a a a
Jake (54:12)
But that's still the belief, is it not? That there's not a ceiling yet.
Chris (54:31)
a pr a researcher in the evidence based community will break ranks and kinda go, maybe it is inf maybe it is infinite. Maybe you could just carry on doing more and more sets and get more and more growth. ⁓ and like then the c the rest of them kinda just pull him back in and go you know, kinda calm down, son. You know, it just calm down a bit. It's you you're out of line here. Because it's it's lunacy. It's absolute lunacy. But they keep doing it and they keep doing it. You know, and it it's a really interesting kind of tendency that they've got of like just as you say, extrapolating to
Jake (54:50)
You
Chris (55:01)
to infinity, if they can't like because they they don't have the framework, the physiological framework that we've got, and say, Well clearly you're gonna get an inverted U shape because you've got all these fatigue mechanisms and you've got these limiting factors and you're gonna end up creating more problems than you're actually, you know, creating hypertrophy. So you're gonna end up coming back down again. And they look at it and they No, no, no, we we can't see one. I'm like, Well that's probably muscle swelling, but that's a separate conversation that you don't like having.
Jake (55:29)
Hmm. Yeah, I'm running through different topics in my mind now like stretch mediated hypertrophy is the same thing, right? Because they're like, well we Yeah, we will see this in experience lifters. And then what do you see trend list? I'm getting but now and I actually say you one of these studies and we might talk about I don't know but there's I the evidence-based sort of language is now I don't even know how they're how they're sort of synthesizing this but it's like it's not always better
Chris (55:37)
They thought they could get that forever, yeah. Yeah, we we'll see this experience of just C transition now.
Jake (55:57)
It's not every muscle indiscriminately benefits from, know, length and partials or whatever. So.
Chris (56:02)
Yeah. But their their absolute dedication to loathing me will lead them to avoid the actual explanation until long after all of this is irrelevant. But yeah.
Jake (56:12)
Yes.
I mean, have they accepted yet that it's like the differences in trained versus untrained? is that, I don't even know if that's sort of.
Chris (56:20)
I don't know. I I don't really track it that closely. ⁓ I just find the sociological phenomenon really, really fascinating because ⁓ well, not yeah, not to go into even more insane amounts of detail about why I think it's happening, but yeah, it it is I think your observation is really interesting here that ⁓ the the extrapolation to infinity happens, you know, in time in multiple scenarios with like the stretch media hypertrophy idea with the
the indirect versus direct sets thing that we started with. And as I pointed out, it happens with volume as well. It's not just limited to time being the extrapolation. It can be a a volume extrapolation as well.
Jake (56:57)
Mm. Mm.
It's almost like there's no boundary condition until the data gives you one. Yes.
Chris (57:03)
Like this.
Because they've got no p th because they've got no physiology to kind of sort of rein you in. ⁓ I mean in incidentally it also flips the other way. so or does it flip the other way? Actually, I'm now second guessing myself. No, it doesn't I don't think it does flip the other way. I think it yeah, it's it's it's it's only when the actual
data set that you've got gives you a boundary condition, that they accept the existence of a boundary condition. I think that's probably a safer way of of saying it. So the what I was just thinking about was do they 'cause one of the one of the things we were joking about in our in the in one of the educational groups that we we have is that frequency ⁓ is generally regarded by the evidence based community to not matter. And this has been kind of blowing up recently as people have been, you know, trying to tear down the idea of maintenance ⁓ studies.
Jake (57:35)
Yeah. Yeah.
Chris (58:02)
Which, you know, pretty difficult to tear down. but the because the data set only studies frequency across a training week, the evidence based community only talk about training frequency as if it exists in a training week. But we were joking in this group about like, well, where's the limit? I mean, would you say that you could train like, you know, forty sets once a month or something and that would be the same as training, you know, kind of, you know
Jake (58:16)
Mm.
Mm. Mm.
Hmm. Well, well, you know, the extension of that would be that maintenance study where they train once every two weeks, right? And then
Chris (58:32)
Whatever it is, ⁓ kind of five sets twice a week.
Yeah well that that does actually show that you don't it doesn't really work. But yeah, I mean so that's a boundary condition.
Jake (58:45)
But that now becomes a ⁓ boundary condition because there's a data set, right? But if that didn't exist, then there probably wouldn't be one.
Chris (58:49)
Yeah yeah yeah. But if they're right. Yeah, and they would probably go, no, no, you could train once a year, you just have to do three thousand sets. And that but that's that's what happens when you don't have a physiological framework to bound to bound your ⁓ kind of extrapolations. You're literally just working with math. ⁓ and I think that's probably what I'm objecting to again with the whole meta analysis thing, that they just throw all the studies in and then accept whatever pops out the other end as being the answer, even if
Jake (58:55)
Exactly, exactly.
Mm. Mm.
Chris (59:19)
logically you would never blend those things together you know, kind of from a from a from a biological point of view.
Jake (59:23)
So what do you think the value of a meta-analysis, like do you think there's value in meta-analysis? What can they offer?
Chris (59:31)
So what what I do when I see a meta is I I go and look at what studies they've dropped in. And then I look at what outcomes they're trying to test for and and understand. And if I think that all of the studies that they've dropped in the top of the hopper actually do, you know, kind of represent the s same kind of thing for what they're measuring, then yeah, it's a really interesting output because it gives you statistical power that you didn't have before.
Jake (59:42)
Hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Chris (1:00:00)
for that same kind of underlying variable that you're trying to measure in e each of the individual studies. I would say that actually happens relatively frequently.
Jake (1:00:07)
So that's important. So you're saying like it's a statistical thing, right? Like it allows one to find statistical significance.
Chris (1:00:13)
The benefit you get as a statistical thing, it allows you to find statistical significance where you might not have found it previously. ⁓ maybe it allows you to see trends. Yeah. I don't think I've ever seen a meta that's told me something I didn't already know.
Jake (1:00:19)
Yeah. But you may have that you were trending in those directions. Yeah. So again, it brings me
But why would it? I don't get why it would.
Chris (1:00:30)
Exactly, exactly. And actually a long time ago when when metas first started to become popular in the exercise science community, in the strength training part of the exercise science community, metas first started to become popular. ⁓ people did actually debate them, you know, kind of whether it was reasonable to have a meta that gave you an answer that you hadn't already got. So really, really important debate that happened tw
Jake (1:00:55)
Yeah.
Chris (1:01:00)
twenty years ago, probably fifteen years ago. ⁓ people were actually sort of saying, Look, if your meta tells you something new, rather than just reinforcing what you're kind of seeing in the data already, then it probably is got a problem with it. It is probably something not quite right. ⁓ you can't you can't use a meta to justify an answer that your underlying data set doesn't already justify. No, it shouldn't be. No, no. No. And that again, that's that what I think's happening. No.
Jake (1:01:12)
Yeah.
Search shouldn't be changing one's mind.
Chris (1:01:28)
Again, what I think's happening is that the evidence based community have got themselves a new toy and they're playing with it. You know. They've got themselves a new toy that they can use, ⁓ and and it's at the top of their evidence pyramid and they're drama they're they're hugely incentivized therefore to use that toy because it sits at the top of the pyramid. So it can be used to influence opinion very, very effectively. So they're now playing with that toy 'cause it is a very powerful weapon. ⁓ but
Jake (1:01:47)
Mm. Mm.
Chris (1:01:56)
you know, fundamentally it isn't going to get them where they want no, I it may get them where they want to go if th I don't know what they want. But you know, it's not going to get them to an answer that's right. I think the subgroup analysis stuff is interesting. I haven't of like spent it up
Jake (1:02:05)
I the subgroup analysis stuff is interesting. I haven't spent enough time thinking about that and what that could potentially do. I'm not through my statistics book yet, so I...
Chris (1:02:16)
It's it's the same but it's the same concept as a miniature. So like i if your subgroup analysis tells you something that again your data set is not telling you, then it's wrong. Or at least it's extremely suspicious. Yeah, I mean but again it has to be pointing in the same direction. So like if i i if if if again, if if all your studies are telling you one thing and your meta tells you a different thing, then the the meta is suspicious. I'm not okay, maybe it's not wrong straight away, but it's suspicious in the sense that
Jake (1:02:26)
Yeah, all it's doing is applying a filter to the data set essentially,
Yeah. Yeah.
Chris (1:02:45)
Maybe there's a mistake, maybe there's some confounding factor, you need to investigate, not just take the output as gospel. The same thing applies to subgroup analysis. So if your subgroup analysis pops out like some trend or like idea that you haven't seen in the data, again it's like it's it deserves investigation. It's it's like but if somebody starts like spreading it like, no, this is now the answer, then that's that's suspicious. That's like no no
Jake (1:03:11)
Yeah, so it should refocus if you go back to the source material and be like, well, yeah.
Chris (1:03:14)
A dramatic difference from the source material should focus you on what you've done, first of all.
Jake (1:03:20)
Sure, but if a subgroup analysis is found like in this group, we're seeing this whatever effect, and you hadn't thought about it before, then you can go back to those actual studies of yeah.
Chris (1:03:25)
And go and look at it, yeah. And you hadn't thought about it before. Yeah, go and look at it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And and to be honest, yeah, I mean like ⁓ I mean I do pattern recognition for a living, that's what I do. So like I see the fact that untrained lifters are getting this thing that they call stretch mediated hypertrophy un and trained lifters are not, and I look at that and I go, Pattern recognition, well that's psychomanogenesis stopping because that's what psychomanogenesis literally does. So ⁓ I just connect those dots and straight away I've got the answer.
Okay, maybe they haven't done the reading, they can't do that, but they can do a subgroup analysis and they can pop out the answer that trained lifters don't get, you know, ⁓ and they can then go and say, that's interesting, let's go and investigate that. look, that pushes me towards, you know, this explanation, you know.
Jake (1:04:09)
Yeah, yeah. So to play devil's advocate that like people who are messaging you saying, hey, you know, I've looked at this, this volume, sorry, frequency meta analysis that's, you know, available and it's changed my opinion or change the opinion of all these people I know who've read it. Then I would wonder what was their opinion based on in the first place.
Chris (1:04:30)
That's the point I was making. So like it it was it's very much like ⁓ just back to you know, kind of tribal ⁓ affiliations. And it's like, well, you know, somebody makes a big enough noise and ⁓ influences enough people then they pull people across to them and then somebody else does it the other way and pulls people back across to them. And it it's just this never ending kind of social media ⁓ silly game. But, you know, I I've always been the in this for th solving
Jake (1:04:51)
Yeah, well it is that. I mean that's the simple answer, yeah.
Chris (1:04:59)
problems that I set for myself. I want to know what the answer is and that's what I do. And I think people who recognise that tend to gravitate towards the explanations that I provide because they know I'm not trying to influence people, you know, kind of say, I'm I want you all to believe the same as me. I actually don't care what you believe. You know, I'm doing this for me.
Jake (1:05:21)
Yeah, and that can get annoying. like why we
Chris (1:05:21)
Yeah, and that can get annoying. I am really annoying. I know that. I know people find me really, really frustrating. I know that. Because I don't play the game. So it's like, you know, okay fine. Don't if you don't want to believe what I say, don't just go and believe whatever you want to believe. I I literally don't care. It makes no difference to me whatsoever. ⁓ you know, I I've tried to figure out the answer 'cause I was interested in it. if that helps people, fantastic. If it doesn't, then go and listen to someone else.
Jake (1:05:35)
Hehehehehe
Okay, so to go back to the direct and indirect sets. So I think we've identified a few interesting things here. So one is, I think that this idea, this evidence-based thinking pattern will take an observation and it will just say, hey, this kind of applies forever unless our data imposes a boundary. And we're saying that a science-based thinker will look at that and be like, well, how long will this apply? Where do I run into a physiological boundary as opposed to just a boundary in that data?
Chris (1:05:50)
So to to go back to the direct and indirect circle so I think we've identified a few interesting things here. So one is I I think that this idea, this evidence based thinking pattern will take a of an observation.
I think that's probably fair.
Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly.
Jake (1:06:19)
In the context of direct and indirect sets, I mean, that's fairly obvious. You've just explained, well, you're to hit that plateau a lot sooner. Therefore, okay, a beginner or an untrained individual, they are going to benefit a lot more from these multi-joint exercises in the biceps and triceps than an experienced lifter.
Chris (1:06:35)
You can get exactly the same thing with stability. So they will have the same conversation about stability. They will go, ⁓ no, no, no, no. there's no data showing that unstable exercises produce less muscle growth than stable exercises, therefore they are the same. And the kind of the size baselifter will go, We've literally got studies showing that recruitment drops when
Jake (1:06:51)
Hmm.
Chris (1:06:57)
stability demands increase, therefore you cannot possibly be training the same muscle fibers or number of muscle fibers. So any short term studies that are showing no differences are just like within the noise. So that's why you're not detecting them because the it's too noisy. So like but there will be a difference because physiologically there must be. You know, you can't get around that. You know, and the same thing for like ⁓ amount of muscle mass. So people go, no no no no, there's no limit on central mode command.
Jake (1:07:18)
Hmm.
Chris (1:07:26)
there literally is a limit on central medical and we've got whole bunch of studies showing that there is. ⁓ and then they're like, okay well, so I can I can do an overhead press and a lateral raise and they'll be exactly the same. I'm like, well, over a short period of time, yeah, sure. But if you do them long enough, you're gonna get higher recruitment, lateral raise, you're gonna get more growth. I mean it it's you're gonna hit your plateau later. So there is going to be difference. But again, it's like evidence based thinking, no boundary condition, therefore it doesn't exist. Like science, mm yeah, we think there's probably a difference there.
Jake (1:07:57)
So I think another space, another area with this, this will then diverge will be the language people use. So obviously, you know, in this context, people use the indirect, direct sets, blah, blah, blah. But when someone, so I saw a meme today, I mentioned the meme to you and there's this idea that science based lifters are saying someone should only do one or two sets and they're evidence based, hardcore people are saying that's so weak. But this is my, this is exactly my point. This is exactly my point.
Chris (1:08:21)
Sorin's doing like sixty seven, so he I mean that's wrong straight away, isn't it?
Jake (1:08:27)
So evidence-based people are thinking, science-based people are saying do one or two sets and they're so weak and then they're not hardcore enough and bravado. And in reality, what we're saying as science-based thinkers is, yeah, one or two direct sets per muscle. And I say direct meaning we're picking an exercise to maximize recruitment in that muscle. That is, if we're designing a program, how many total exercises is that going to be?
where as science-based thinkers, we're not thinking about this indirect kind of measure of exercise that evidence-based thinkers are thinking about. So they're saying, well, you know, well, you know, we're doing 20 sets, you know, in a workout and there's six sets there for chest or whatever because of deltoids or whatever because we've got, you know, we're applying this as a half set for this and this is a half set for that. And in reality, the two workouts are probably looking somewhat similar, but
Chris (1:08:56)
Science thinking.
Well you know.
sets you know in a in a workout and there's six sets there for chess or whatever because of
And in reality the two ways.
But science based thinking is the same thing.
Jake (1:09:25)
As science-based thinkers, we're saying, well, no, there's only like a couple of actual exercises that are actually training that muscle, right? And so we're just speaking past each other.
Chris (1:09:33)
Absolutely. And that's and that's bef well no, I think we understand exactly what they say.
I think but they're just ignoring what we're Yeah. ⁓ but then equally we could turn around and go, Well, you know, i you know, you're you're you guys are accusing us of being lazy 'cause we we don't do, you know, kind of you know, a thousand sets of squats in a single session. But, you know, you guys only train like once a week. I mean, each exercise I think it's once a week. You know, the frequency on the science based side is is is generally higher, you know, and lower on the evidence side. You know, and I think you know, that I don't think that's just like
Jake (1:09:40)
One of us is speaking for us the other.
You
Chris (1:10:09)
I don't think that's just pure kind of ⁓ ethos that's doing that. I think that the science based community tends to be younger. I think they tend to be younger and they tend to drift in a direction of therefore training, ⁓ being happier training at higher frequency. I think that as you get older you do tend to kind of ⁓ want to train less frequently. ⁓ so I think there's probably a bit of a ⁓ a bias there in terms a confounding factor there in terms of age.
Jake (1:10:19)
Mm.
Chris (1:10:36)
And I also don't see an enormous amount of steroid use, visible steroid use in the science based community. Not visible.
Jake (1:10:44)
Mm.
Chris (1:10:45)
So I think again, and then that's gonna push people in a in a in a more in a l lower frequency kind of direction as well. So I think, you know, broadly speaking, I think there are confounding factors there on on frequency that probably aren't literally just ethos. I think there's probably personal preferences because of either you know, gear use or age, you know, are gonna push you in the direction of lower frequency. You know, whereas, you know, kind of youth and enthusiasm and kind of a lack of a a natural kind of status is gonna push you in the direction of higher frequency.
Jake (1:10:57)
Hmm.
Hmm.
Hmm. Yeah. Yeah, I guess it is. It's sort of inventing a metric as to what is hardcore training or whatever and then just
Chris (1:11:25)
I mean obviously it's just social media pantomime and them trying to win points. I mean like which is a game I'm not playing, you know. ⁓
Jake (1:11:29)
Yeah.
I mean ironically when I post about Silver Era guys who were squatting three times a week then I...
Chris (1:11:36)
They get really upset, I know, I know, I know, they do. They get really upset 'cause that nobody can possibly squat three times a week. And it's like, Well, okay. ⁓ that tells me a little bit about you.
Jake (1:11:45)
You
Chris (1:11:52)
I think this will probably go down in in history as our most hated episode. I think I think people get really upset about this. 'Cause I I and and and genuinely, ⁓ people who ⁓ I like and trust and talk to d disagree with me about this. They don't like the point that I make. They don't like the division that I make between evidence based and science based. ⁓ they want to try and kind of squash it into a single thing.
Jake (1:12:19)
So why does it matter? Why like why are you making this division?
Chris (1:12:23)
Why am I making the difference? 'Cause exists and I describe things that exist. ⁓ that's how my brain is wired. I describe things that I see that exist. so and ultimately, ⁓ pretty much all of the ⁓ kind of hate that I th the the really targeted hate that I get online, pretty much all of that comes from people who are are very much what I would describe in this solid centre of the evidence based community. So I feel the need to make sure that I
Jake (1:12:25)
Yeah. Yeah.
Chris (1:12:52)
describe exactly what they are doing and you know how they operate. Not not operate in terms of attacking me, that's irrelevant. But like the way that they approach the subject and make it clear why it's different from the way I approach the subject. And that that ultimately is why there is so much disagreement. 'Cause I think sometimes ⁓ the audience that we have sometimes they're especially around the fringes, they tend to assume that we're all in the same community or doing the same thing or with the same approach as we have different opinions.
Jake (1:12:55)
Hmm.
Chris (1:13:22)
And actually no, we have a fundamentally different approach to this entire concept. We are starting with existing physiology and then trying to understand strength training in the light of that physiology. Evidence based is starting with the strength training studies and then inventing their own mechanisms where they where they can, where they can get away with it, ⁓ before somebody like me comes along and points it out and then they get really angry about it. ⁓
Jake (1:13:26)
Mm.
Chris (1:13:48)
that's that's their they're completely different approach. They're not starting from physiology, they're starting from strength training data and then ⁓ kind of trying to ⁓ explain what's going on by making up physiology. And as I say, my two examples are stretched mediated hypertrophy and metabolic stress. ⁓ if somebody believes that those two things are real, like, then fight me because they're not.
Jake (1:14:10)
Hmm.
So for the average listener and average gym goer, what do they do with this? what's... I mean, this is where I landed at the start.
Chris (1:14:20)
Well th they're coming back to the very starting point, which is like, you know, all of this stuff is just a gigantic ⁓ kind of ⁓ social media influence war where people are trying to gain followers and win influence and and become more self important. And you know, at the end of the day, if you actually want a training program or you want training programs that work for your clients, then and in your bodybuilding hypothetical focus, then just go back to silver era stuff
Find a com ⁓ a set of programs that you like, modify them according to what you want, what your clients want, and just use that. And all of this kind of argument and debate that happens, you know, is is is entertainment really. And again, I got into trouble last time I talked about the fact that it's entertainment rather than information, you know, ⁓ or education is not it's a very long way from education.
Jake (1:15:12)
Hmm.
Chris (1:15:12)
The idea that you could sit on TikTok or or Instagram and actually learn anything these days is just insane. You know, you're not gonna learn anything. You're just gonna have people pulling you backwards and forwards from one idea to another idea and y there's no learning gonna take place. And again, I got in horrible amounts of trouble last time I said that, but I'm gonna say it again 'cause it's true.
Jake (1:15:33)
Yeah, it's a funny world. The online world is an interesting space.
So, mean, I can't think of any better advice to give people. Like honestly, if you're in this because this is your career and your obsession and whatever else, and by all means, you're going to need to dig into all the research that's there. Like you keep saying, you're gonna have to do the reading, you're gonna have to spend an insane amount of time doing this. If you're just a punter who wants to know,
Should I be doing direct sets for my biceps or should I be doing 20 sets in a workout or should I be dividing it across workouts or whatever, then I think the reality is no one can tell you that because we're telling you, yeah.
Chris (1:16:25)
Well, everybody is going to tell you that. Everybody is going to have their own opinion. They're all gonna be you're gonna be surrounded by thousands of people all telling you different things at the same time. And you you do you do not have a starting point, a firm kind of foundation in order to base an analysis of those different voices on. You can't you can't separate them out and go, This one's true, this one's not true. You you don't have anything, no tools are available to you
Jake (1:16:32)
Yeah. Yeah.
Chris (1:16:55)
to differentiate between those voices. ⁓ I mean like y if you haven't done the basic physiological reading then you're not going to be able to parse any of this stuff. so you are literally just going to be going, I like that influencer because he's got nice hair. I mean that's what you're going to be stuck with doing.
Jake (1:16:57)
Yeah.
I get so much hate about my hair. It's probably the, it's probably the single source of people I have to block. Cause I just get, just like off the wall insults. It's unbelievable. And it tells me a lot. like, okay, great. Your only critique of my content is that you're going to like comment on my hair.
Chris (1:17:18)
You get hate about your hair.
I didn't realise that
Jake (1:17:39)
Anyway, so I guess where that lands us is what we said a couple of times like, hey, look at what these guys were doing before any of this became confusing. And even like, I mean, I put out a post this week where, you know, I had said something along the lines of like, if you don't know what to believe, like just do what they did in the silver era. And honestly, I think in some ways, I think that there's the evidence quote unquote that we've got.
Chris (1:17:43)
Guess where that was?
Yeah, I know. I know. I know, I know, I know.
Exactly. Honestly, I think in some ways I think that there's the evidence quote unquote that we
Jake (1:18:10)
I think it's, I question whether it's doing like a net positive and net negative. Like I look at a lot of, and you know, again, this is not a conversation we're having now, but some of the results in some of the studies and I question how accurate those measurements and those results are. And I think that when we just present this stuff to the world and say, go with it, I think there's a genuine probability, possibility that people are going to actually end up doing what is counterproductive for them.
Chris (1:18:11)
It's I I I question whether it's it's doing like a net
Dent is stuff.
Jake (1:18:38)
compared to just looking at what these guys were doing 75 years ago before we had this mountain of quote unquote evidence.
Chris (1:18:46)
Hundred percent. And and again, I think the the single biggest damaging factor in that regard has been the volume conversation, you know, because ⁓ i it
Jake (1:18:56)
Hmm.
Chris (1:19:02)
with, you know, the can sort of potential confounding factors like muscle swelling that are going on, you know, the ev evidence based community is presenting, as I say, volume as being one of those things that's unbounded. They they have to keep kind of restraining themselves from basically telling people to do infinite sets every single workout. and
Jake (1:19:17)
You
Chris (1:19:27)
And that is that is extremely harmful, you know, because ⁓ but also the problem is it it is perpetuated by the influencers who want to characterize themselves as having achieved their kind of achievements through hard work when the reality is most, you know, kind of the people sort of making a fuss probably haven't achieved it through hard work, they've probably achieved it through something else. and
Jake (1:19:47)
Yeah.
Hmm.
Chris (1:19:57)
The issue then is that they've got two forces pushing that in the same direction. You've got a big chunk of the evidence based kind of community pushing it volume as being the answer to everything. And you've got the steroid infused influencers also pushing volume as being the answer. And if you just worked harder you could look like them. You know, and the confluence of those two forces pushing the kind of volume in the same direction means that anybody who comes across the fitness industry for the first time is going to be told that they have to do
you know, an insane amount of work to get anywhere. And the reality is they could literally do, you know, one set of five or six exercises twice a week and they would get somewhere meaningful. You know, if they did it three times a week and did eight or nine exercises, they'd get further. Add an extra set, maybe get a little bit further. I mean like but you can absolutely get a long way with one set for five or six exercises twice a week. We've talked about that as a base program before. You know and that
Jake (1:20:28)
Hmm.
Mm.
Hmm.
Mm.
Chris (1:20:55)
that if you I think there's probably a lot of influencers that would have an aneurysm if you said to them, you know, No, no, no, actually we think that, you know, one set, five, six exercises twice a week is is a really solid programme they're probably going, No, no, you can't grow on that. Like, absolutely can. You know.
Jake (1:21:08)
⁓ Maybe as a future episode, know we kind of do a mini version of this each week, but maybe we could talk about like exactly how to construct a silly error program and
Chris (1:21:27)
Maybe that's something we could start incorporating as a back 'cause at the moment we're only spending like fifteen, twenty minutes talking about your programs. So, you know, like maybe we can just start installing a little bit more analysis and discussion. Maybe maybe, you know, like I've been trying to do in a number of the episodes that we've done, I've been trying to kinda go, Well, I would change this and then that would kinda work for me or like on the rare occasions I've gone, No, no, no, no, I cannot I cannot make this program work for
Jake (1:21:33)
Hmm.
Hmm.
Unsalvageable.
Chris (1:21:53)
To be fair, that's a golden era kind of issue. Unself is my favourite word when it's a golden era program, I at it and go, You couldn't you couldn't change this program and make it work for me unless you literally wrote rewrote it from the ground up. You know. But like if you like with the silver era programs, it's almost always, well, they could just change this, this and this and actually it'd be fine for me, you know, and almost always it's like I need a hamstring exercise and I a a lap pull down. you know, but yeah, I mean like ⁓
Jake (1:22:09)
Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
Chris (1:22:20)
it would be interesting maybe to push that further and, you know, get your same kind of take on it. ⁓ although you're much more Catholic in your kind of approach to kind of programs, you'll do anything. And I I'm a very much more kind of like, no no no, I need it to work like this. ⁓ but also I think maybe it would be useful to discuss how a program might change over time. You know? So like if the program already has a lot of exercises in it, maybe talk about how
Jake (1:22:43)
Mm. Mm.
Chris (1:22:50)
an earlier version of the program might contain fewer, ⁓ or conversely, if a program has fewer exercises in it, talk about how a program might develop and, you know, increase the number of exercises over time or, you know, talk you know, I think this there's this there's scenarios in which you could say, Well, the program would change in this direction if you were, you know, if this was happening, or it might change in that direction if something else was happening.
Jake (1:22:52)
Hmm.
Mm.
I mean, look, we can include that in these episodes, we can even do a whole topic of like planning out a silver era progression of workouts over your lifting journey. What would that look like as a beginner? What would it look like as an intermediate?
Chris (1:23:21)
Hm. I'm I guess I'm just saying like it'd be cool to do this with every single one, ⁓ just as a like an add on because ⁓ again I would have to talk less.
Jake (1:23:25)
Yeah.
Well, if we're landing in a place where saying do what these guys did then we need to be telling people how to do what these guys did. Okay, I think that's it for us today. Thank you guys for joining in. We'll be back next week with another topic.
Chris (1:23:31)
Well we're landing at a place where saying do what these guys did that's probably true. Yeah, I think that's probably true. Okay. I think that's it for us today. Thank you guys.