Writers note: a reader asked about what a meal train was, regarding a previous post of mine. A meal train is when a collection of people decide amongst themselves to cook and prepare meals for a person, although usually a group, who might need a bit of support. They are common after funerals and births, when cooking food is a lower priority.
I was in the gym today listening to a masterclass on working out Dr Mike Israetel. He’s a weird guy, but unlike 70% of people in the fitness industry, he know what he is talking about.
The one thing that stuck with me was the concept of universal fatigue. The example he gave was doing leg pushes v deadlifts. People who have done a certain amount of training can pump out heaps of the former, but even the most jacked units get completely destroyed by the latter. Why? No one really knows.
As Dr Mike says, there is an element of your soul leaving the body when you do certain exercises, such as squats, deadlifts, or the worst of all, shuttle pushes. A few of those and you’re cooked.
A key take away from me was that while some of these exercises are great, they’re counter productive if they kill your motivation to train.
What does that mean for me? I am not a huge deadlift fan myself, but I include them in my workout, except I do half as many as my other exercises (I do 3×10 of four exercises, and 3×5 of the deadlifts). I imagine if I tried to do more, I’d likely end up doing less overall.
Also, the Masterclass video is worth a listen. It’s very funny