The Biggest Workout Programming Breakthrough We've Seen In 25+ Years | Mind Pump 2850

We've been creating workouts for over 25 years. We're experts in workout programming, strength training in particular. We're gonna talk about the biggest workout programming breakthrough we've seen in the last five years, maybe even the last 10. We're gonna break it down right now, and this applies for most people. Let's get into it. 25 years just hit me hard, dude. I'm so stuck on that right now. Who said that? It's a long time. Jeez, I'm old. A quarter of a century. Somebody made a comment on, I don't know what video you did. It was one of the ones on MindPump Media, and some trainer was criticizing whatever it was that you said, and I just happened to be on there and saw it, so I can't help myself. I click on the profile. Who's this guy? He's 21 years old. He's like, you don't know anything now. I was like, dude, I've been writing programs and helping people out longer than you've been alive. Yeah, I just wanna sit this one out. That's why I didn't even comment back. I was like, I'm not gonna comment back, dude. Stop it, dude. Well, you thought we knew a lot. So I think for people listening, like workout programming is a term that covers everything that goes into making a workout. So the exercises, the sets, the reps, the schedule, the rest periods, that's what programming is. So what good coaches or trainers will do or understand is how to put those all together to create a really effective workout. And there's definitely a lot of science and experience involved. And then you also have to piece in the challenges that most people encounter when it comes to things like consistency, what they tend to do, what they don't tend to do. When you put that all together, there are periods of time that a trainer will start to have these kinds of breakthroughs. Like, oh, you know what? This works better than this for these reasons. Well, there's trends that you notice. And especially what's working best with your clients and where that sweet spot kind of lies or like whatever advice you gave that was so impactful. Like those are the things you really pay attention to. Simplicity, I really feel like figuring out how to simplify for my clients, like distill down to the biggest rocks in regards to nutrition. The biggest rocks in regards to stress. The biggest rocks in regards to exercise. And it's like, of course I could sit down with a client and map out this crazy diet workout routine and plan like that's ideal. And in fact, I was just sitting with my sister-in-law. We're sitting in the sauna and she's asking me like, you know, if you were to lay out like the perfect plan, it's like, okay, well, if I had the perfect, I'm including sauna in there and cold plunge and a little bit of HIIT cardio. All this stuff and I'm just like, but that's not how I ever coached anybody or it certainly isn't as I got better. Maybe early on in my days where someone asked that, I might throw in the whole kitchen sink on them. But what I learned to do, and I think the direction you're going with this is like figured out like what is the least I can get this person to do to elicit the most amount of change? And what's the most effective? Yes. So an example of this is like, is there one exercise that does the work of the next five? This is a good example. Like a barbell squat would be an example of that. It's like such an effective exercise and it would do more for someone's lower body development than a leg extension, a leg curl, a hip abduction, a hip adduction, a low press, all that. So that's just a good example of workout programming. And that's important because we want to maximize the benefit with minimal amount of time because that makes a big difference when it comes to consistency. I think in the last five years, this is very easy for me to pick out what the biggest breakthrough. And by the way, five years ago, we had already had two decades of experience. So we weren't beginners by any stretch of the imagination, but roughly five years, maybe less than five years ago, maybe three years ago, we came out with a 15 minute a day protocol, which breaks up all of the total training and takes it away from let's say two days a week and makes it kind of a daily thing, but with a really short amount of time needed. And this makes sense for a lot of different reasons, but I'm just going to go through what people have experienced with this kind of workout programming, the best results that they've ever had and the best consistency that they've ever had. And there's a lot of different reasons for this, but let's go down to the total amount of, let's start with this. How much strength training do you need to elicit about 80% of the total amount of, or the best possible results you could get or the upper limit of results you get from strength training? Not a lot. Not a lot, about two days a week. About two days a week, maybe three days a week for some people of like training the whole body will give you most of the results you could ever anticipate. Now, what that doesn't mean is that your results will come at 80% of the speed. That's not what I'm talking about. What I mean is you'll get the results with the same speed, but the limit is about 80%. And then beyond that, you might need more than what I'm saying. And for most people, 80% of their potential is more than what they want. I just think it's hard for people to fathom. That's right. That that's really, if you can limit it down to like two times a week, like it just doesn't seem like enough, you know, to really, but it really is substantial. If you put a good compound lift kind of schedule up there and you're effective with your choices and you're hitting all the muscle groups, you'd be surprised. And two, the recovery of it is always overlooked. So the recovery being more of the emphasis and the muscles being able, allotted amount of time to actually grow and change, this is where all the benefits happen. You brought up that we'd already been obviously programming and training people for two decades, you know, we're five years into this business and then this epiphany happens or we release a program and then we hear this huge, why? Like it wasn't a lack of understanding the research like you just pointed out. You knew that already. We knew that already. What do you think it was that, why it worked so well for so many people and why didn't we come out and why didn't we think of that 10 years ago and it was the first program we did instead of Maps Antibiotic. Why did we not go that route? What's your thought? So I think we were probably stuck in the idea that you had to devote 45 minutes or an hour to a workout. And so once you're kind of in a box and you don't realize you're in a box, it's hard to come out of it. But realizing that there's a few challenges that you have to overcome when it comes to consistency with any workout. And I wanna say this, by the way, strength training is special in the sense that there's two values you get from exercise. One is while you're doing the exercise itself, the activity of it. Movement is good for you. Being active is good for you. Okay, so what I'm not saying is two days a week or 15 minutes a day is all your activity that you're ever gonna do. You're just sitting around the rest of the time. No, no, you should move. You should move throughout the day. Walking is a great way to do this. Walking's great. We've talked about this so many episodes. I won't spend a lot of time here, but people can walk. You don't have to change into workout clothes. People can walk without hurting themselves. It's easy to do. So you should move all day long. So there's the value of movement, but then there's also the value of the adaptation that exercise induces, right? So stretching induces an adaptation where you get more flexible, for example, right? You have a greater range of motion. Strength training induces an adaptation that's building strength and building muscle, which is great because muscle looks good, speeds up your metabolism, improves insulin sensitivity. The metabolism part's really important because now I can eat more and stay leaner. It's very protective. So, and this is the key. You don't need a lot to induce the adaptation. Now, back to what you're saying, Adam. One of the big challenges with any exercise program is consistency, is how do we develop this into a habit and stay consistent? And the big roadblocks to this are time, time and energy. I got to devote all this time to working out. I got to take 45 minutes to an hour. I got to do this whole thing. What I found years ago, which I didn't piece this together, but what I found years ago was it was easier for clients to find 15 minutes a day than it was for them to find 45 minutes twice a week. For this episode, this is what we're doing, something special, buy any MAPS 15 style program. MAPS 15, MAPS 15 Performance, or Muscle Mommy, or MAPS 15 Strong, or Symmetry, or 40 Plus, or Power Lift. Any MAPS 15 version program, get one free. Go to maps15bogo.com to get that. It was just easier for people. Most people can do 15 minutes a day. Carve that out a lot easier. That's right. So in other words, 15 minutes six days a week versus 45 minutes twice a week. Most people can carve that out in a much more consistent way. And if they miss one, it's 15 minutes. If they miss a 45 minute workout, it's a whole workout that they missed. So I think that was the big one, Adam, was getting stuck in that idea that you had to go to the gym and spend this time there for the whole time. You don't need an elaborate setup either. It's like these two simplified exercises that you're focused on. And I think that alleviates a lot of the stress going in. Because sometimes even just the stress of having to get there, having to run through this hour-long workout session can be a deterrent for people on its own. So to have that kind of chunked out throughout the week, and it's just my whole day, I could find that 15 minutes and I could just attack it when I can. Yeah, to give you an example, two strength training workouts a week typically looks like about five exercises each workout. Generally speaking, you're looking at about five exercises each workout. Two exercises a day, five days a week, is the same amount of exercises. It's just spread out. And it takes way less time dedicated. So again, rather than devoting all this time twice a week, it's just, I do two exercises and it just works. So I don't know if I agree. I think we have a better understanding of who our audience is now. I think that, like for example, who would MAPS 15 not be for? Yeah, hardcore, like bodybuilder type. Gym bros. Super consistent, right? See their great results. They're in tip-top shape. They're training. They're working out in the gym four days a week. Higher volume, right. Never miss a day. There's a few. I've seen a few comments here and there. We've lost a few of those people with MAPS 15. Oh, and I've even seen some of the comments. Oh, the guys have gone so this direction with- So low volume. And we've always said kind of like off air to each other. It's like, it's not for you. You know what I'm saying? We have programs for you. Yeah, exactly. We have programs for you. MAPS Aesthetics is that way. MAPS Split is that way. MAPS Anabolic Advanced is that way. We have plenty of programs that serve that community. But I think, yeah, really, if you get crazy, you think that's still not enough, right? But I think what has happened is I think we have a greater understanding of the community that we're serving. I think that, I also think too, something that I became more aware of as the longer we did this was far more people have at-home gyms than I would have guessed when we first started this. At least basic home gyms. Did COVID really kind of change that? And I think that happened. I think COVID obviously played a role in that too. But we have a lot of people. I mean, what's the number one request when a program's released? Do you have an at-home version? Yeah, at-home version. Right, and so we have a very large audience. And I think it splits in the two that really appeal to MAPS 15. One, the people that haven't been really consistent for a really long time and are looking for something that is more realistic for their life so they could do that that you kind of addressed already. Then I think there's an other side of a lot of people that I think I would agree that I even fall into this category, which is when I remember I did the first time we did MAPS 15, I was like, oh ----. I've been doing more than I need to be doing to be seeing incredible results. Well, I'd argue even the high-volume people would have the best results they've ever had. So that's where I'm going. I had a deadlift here, remember? So that's where I'm going with this. And I think then in the other part of the audience is the people that go like, man, maybe I am one of those people that have been overdoing the volume. And then they went and did MAPS 15 and went, holy ----, this was incredible. The only people it missed the mark on are literally the people that are like, I've got my routine, I train five days a week, I've trained a lot of volume, I'm in the greatest shape of my life, I've been consistent for two years. It's like, they don't need to change. You don't want to really mess with somebody who's like that. Right, but it caught everybody else on the edges, I think, and I think that has more to do, because I don't think any of this was revolutionary for us. We knew, the way you started this podcast, when I was training a client, later on, of course, early on, but we all admitted that we weren't the greatest trainers, but I started realizing, man, if I could just get my client to do this and that, it was one or two things, consistently, I'm going to show them incredible change and they'll be bought in. And so, MAPS 15 is that to me. It's that, man, I just want you to do these two exercises a day. That's it. Carve it, get out, get over there. Even if you have to, if you have it at home, Jim, bring it up throughout the day. Go five minutes here, then five minutes there. It falls right in line with our nutrition advice. Yes, exactly, it falls right in line with the, just. It's habit stacking. I mean, you're introducing things very gradually to build up momentum, and what a better momentum builder than just to do a few exercises frequently. And to Sal's point he made earlier is that you will get 80% of the ultimate physique that you can imagine yourself in. Yeah, so you're not going backwards. Yes, which is way beyond anybody, like most clients. Well, the average person, you show them what their potential, what 80% of their potential looks like, and they're like, whoa, that's even better than I would ever imagine. Yeah, when they first sign up with you, they don't even expect that. They'd say, yeah, they go. Yeah, I don't want to lose 10 pounds. Yeah, yeah, it's very, they're like, and you go like, well, we could do whatever you want. I mean, it's like, they're like, oh, come on, I'm 40-something years old, I don't know. Like, no, we could do whatever you want. It's whether you're willing to put the work in or not. So to know that you're like, I can get to 80% of my max potential through training this way is just like. Well, to your point, when we first were coming out with this kind of programming, I experimented with it, and in a very short time, it hit, in my 40s, a deadlift PR, it's one of my strongest lifts, and I deadlifted 605 pounds following a protocol like this, which tells me I'd been doing too much. I'd just been doing too much. It's so funny, a study just came out that compared two groups of people. These were well-trained athletes, so these were experienced lifters. One group included a deload week every cycle. The other group didn't. The deload week group had 29% better gains. Wow, wow. Okay, 29% better gains. Huge difference. And by the way, what we're talking about is we're talking about real strength training because there are. Well, you remember that other study that you've talked about that where the group that skipped a week every week for like. That's the same results. Yeah, because the same results as the people that train every single week consistently. That's what strength training is. That's just how it works. It sends a signal, let your body adapt. Now, you should be active every single day, but when it comes to strength training, you would be shocked. I was shocked when I applied this little bit of training and how well my body responded. And this is another point I want to make is that this is traditional strength training because there are other marketed programs that are like 15-minute workout. Yeah, they're like HIIT. And they're like trying to beat the crap out of you. It's like a circuit. They fit an hour workout in 15 minutes. The reason why it works is because you're dead, but you're killing yourself for 15 minutes. They just brought back P90X. Yeah, exactly. They just brought P90X. And that's what it is. It's like, can you fit an hour? It's like the old way of doing 15 or 20-minute workouts. Go as hard as you can. No, it's literally taking an hour workout and condensing it into 15 to 20 minutes. That's not how it works. No rest period. Supersetting everything, circuit sets, tri-set, like it just. No, no, no. And now here's the deal with strength training. Fatigue is actually the enemy with strength training. I discovered this a long time ago where I took a workout and instead of doing it in an hour, I split it up over a whole day and I found myself stronger and getting better results. What makes strength training strength training is the rest periods. It's this, you do a set and you rest. You do a set and you rest. Otherwise you're just doing cardio with weights is what ends up happening. Yeah, it's the enemy of skill training as well. And so I'm gonna argue this right here. If you did five exercises on Tuesday and five on Thursday, or you split them up over the whole week, everything being equal, I bet you more people would do better. Even if they were consistent with both, they would do better with it split up because fatigue is taken out. I actually don't have much fatigue and I could just focus on sending the signal of building muscle and building strength. And so this was a breakthrough because up until we did that, I had never, I mean, I'd given people advice like this, but I'd never, as a personal trainer, this doesn't work well with personal training. When you hire me, you're gonna see me for an hour. So what am I gonna do, 15 minutes? It's not a real solid business model. No, it doesn't work, right? So I'd never really trained anybody this way. But when we came out with this program, when we experimented with it, and then the reviews that we get and what we're seeing, what it's producing for people, it is incredible. And then it really is very useful when things get busy and when stuff gets tough. Like you just had a kid, job is really tough. How do I stay consistent? 15 minutes a day, I could do that. I could go out in the garage and do two lifts or use a suspension trainer, which is another option, and do a couple exercises and then be done. Next thing you know, you're relatively consistent. Maybe you miss one or two. Cool, I did four of these workouts in the week, which is more than I would have done otherwise. And by the way, I'm getting results. Like this is absolutely wild. No, I think it's giving people that permission that you can go do an exercise or two in a day and that's it, and still see incredible results. Now this episode is brought to you by our sponsor, Element. So Element is an electrolyte powder. By the way, electrolytes can help prevent things like headaches, muscle cramps, fatigue. They can help with sleeplessness. They can help with other common symptoms of electrolyte imbalances. I get better exercise performance, better pumps. I always drink Element when I'm in the sauna so I don't get a headache afterwards. They're very valuable for people who work in the sun, people who work out hard, and especially if you have a low-carb diet. Low-carb dieters need more sodium. Element has 1,000 milligrams per serving. There's no artificial sweeteners, no sugar. Go check them out. Go to drinklement.com forward slash mindpump. You can get a free sample pack of their most popular drink mix flavors with any purchase. Here comes a show. I think if the average person, if the average person did one or two lifts a day, they would get all the benefits they'd ever wanted from strength training just by doing that. Stay active otherwise, but then just do that. I think that's a total paradigm shift. I think the idea is I gotta spend an hour in the gym in order to make this useful, but that's just not the case. The data on strength training is wild. The amount of strength training that's required just to prevent muscle loss, this one blows me away. Every time I see the data on this. It's every two weeks. Yeah, you lose a certain percentage of muscle every decade after the age of 30, okay? This is just a consistent thing. The only way to offset it is by strength training, okay? The amount of strength training needed just to stop the muscle loss, not even to build muscle, just to stop it, it's like one workout every two weeks or every two and a half weeks. That's like nothing. That's just to prevent. So it's so powerful if you employ it the right way. And again, I wanna make this clear. It's not about intensity. Intensity is a factor with all exercise, but what we're not saying is because you're only working out for 15 minutes, we need to ramp up the intensity so much to make up the difference. That's not how strength training works. It's still traditional strength training. You do your three sets. Each set, there's a two-minute rest in between. You're training at a moderate to high intensity, so it's heavy. You're still lifting weights, and then you're done. And then here's what happens. You get stronger. Week over week, you get stronger. So long as it's programmed. It'll ship you out. It is an absolute trip. And so when we did this, this is quickly turned into our most popular style of programming. And it's both, like to Justin's point, I think one of you guys made this point, even for advanced lifters are now going to it and adding cycle. Well, that's, I mean, I really think that's the other part of our audience, right? So we have the one part of our audience that can relate to the busy, not a lot of time, hard being consistent for an entire year, and so something like this. And then you have the other side of the fitness addict, who- Be grinding their gears. Yes. Doing all the things. Yeah, five hours a week plus of strength training, consistently, but just over-trained. And then significantly reduces their volume and then sees PRs, see body changes, and goes, oh my God. So I definitely think that it hit a majority of our audience. And again, that's how I attribute it more to really honing in to who we are serving. And I think we just figured that out better. So here's what we did. So here's what happened, right? So since we launched the first MAPS 15, it was so popular, so much great reviews, people were getting such great results, is we created a bunch more. So we have the original MAPS 15, and we have MAPS 15 Performance, which has an athletic bent. We have MAPS 15 Muscle Mommy. This is based off of our popular Muscle Mommy program. We have MAPS 15 Strong. There's a strong man element. MAPS 15 Symmetry. So a lot of unilateral, like one arm, one leg type of work for balance. MAPS 15 40 Plus. So the exercises and programming geared to the 40 plus audience. And then MAPS 15 Power Lift for people that want to get really, really strong at bench press, deadlift, and squat. And the average MAPS 15 customer owns three to four of these and rotates them, and are finding that they're doing them nonstop. So here's what we did. We're going to do a buy one, get one free. We took the least expensive MAPS 15 program, which is $107. You get one, so you can pick any one of them, and you get another one for free. So buy one, get one free. It's happening right now. You go to maps15bogo, B-O-G-O, .com. Pick one, get another one for free. You can do this as many times as you want. Go check it out. Collect them all.