Dietary debauchery.

Accidental calorie overload.

Hand-to-mouth malfunction.

These all fall under the umbrella of Hulking Out, that moment where you throw your metaphorical papers into the air, say to hell with it and go on an unexpected roaring rampage of food.

That time when you ate half the birthday cake (and it wasn’t even your birthday)? That’s Hulking Out.

When you intend to eat just one serving of ice cream, but before you know it your head is stuck in the container because you tried to lick the last drop out of the corner? The Hulk strikes again.

You didn’t mean to, he just came out.

Instead of throwing in the towel and resigning yourself to a lifetime of yo-yo dieting and constant setbacks, it’s time to fight fire with fire and learn what Earth’s mightiest hero himself can teach you about overcoming diet anxiety once and for all.

1. Use A Less Severe Deficit

Let’s face it: when we’re hungry, our proclivity for making food related blunders increases by a bajillion percent. Dieting isn’t something that our bodies necessarily enjoy – we’re tapping into fat stores that it has grown accustomed to having – so the bigger the energy deficit we create, and the longer we do so, the more inclined our bodies are to sound the “FEED ME!” alarm.

This is why crash diets don’t work in the long run. They impose severe calorie restrictions in an all-out blitz on the fluff, with your body using all the tricks in the book to try and get you to eat more. Once the diet is over, the sense of freedom can be overwhelming and the the Hulking Out process begins, often leading right back to where you were (or worse) over the course of uncontrolled weeks or months.

To combat this, more is more.

To start, begin with a conservative deficit of anywhere between 500 and 700 calories, holding this level steady for as long as you can before adjusting variables. When the time comes, think of adding more activity instead of cutting calories further – save that as an option of last resort. When doing so, adjust downward slowly in the neighborhood of 100-150 calories, letting your results dictate when to make this executive decision.

The goal of a diet is to eat as much food as you can while still making sustainable progress, not cutting as many calories as possible in a mad dash for the fat loss finish line. Eating more calories, while still remaining in an overall weekly deficit, leads to more compliance and less Hulking Out, allowing you to enjoy the process as much as possible along the way.

2. Hug It Out

You’re human. You’re going to slip up at some point – let’s just hope your mistake don’t involve busting out of your shirt and causing millions of dollars of damage to an unsuspecting city. It’s not what happens that will define you, but how you respond.

A typical Hulking Out scenario looks something like this:

1. Person eats something they didn’t intend to or a larger quantity of something than planned.
2. Person beats themselves up mentally about it (I knew better, why am I so stupid, it’s always going to be like this, etc)
3. Person punishes themselves physically on top of this, restricting food severely or super charging their activity as a way to try and recover.
4. They can’t sustain this level of restriction and deprivation and the Hulk comes out. The cycle continues, becoming harder to break the more it happens.

So, what’s the answer? Chill out!

I know, it’s hard to do in the moment, especially with so many emotions running through you head at the time. I’ve been there many times myself. Nothing positive comes from wearing yourself out physically and mentally as a form of punishment. In fact, it just increases the likelihood of it occurring again as you constantly reinforce this pattern.

Instead, get in the habit of being more forgiving of yourself. looking to find the lessons in each setback so that you can act differently the next time.

Ok, so you goofed up. You made a minor error on one of the thousands of days that you’ll likely live; a dribble in the bucket of life that won’t mean a thing to your results in the grand scheme of things. This is a lifestyle, baby. Keeping a long term perspective instead of boxing yourself rigid and sometimes unrealistic short-term deadlines will go along way towards keeping the Hulk at bay.

3. Don’t Demonize ANY Food

When we restrict ourselves, putting certain foods onto an untouchable pedestal, it’s only natural for us to want them more than ever before.

Want to ensure that you’ll Hulk Out in a remarkably horrible fashion? Tell yourself that a food you love is completely off or restrict it severely. The naughtier you make the food, the higher the chances of you losing your damn mind when you actually decide to indulge because you’ve hyped it up so much.

The apple pie that was an occasional thought before might as well sprout legs and embark on the epic journey directly for your mouth.

The only foods that are “bad” are those that you can’t tolerate, can’t control once you start, or hate the taste of. Approach your diet with the mindset that there are no off-limit foods and that everything is on the table. Once you know that you can have anything you want, the desire to actually have it diminishes.

Yeah, it’s pretty Zen.

4. Don’t Eat Horrible Food

This belief is deeply embedded in my soul, more a part of me than Wolverine’s Adamantium.

Have you ever wanted to have something but thought it was too unhealthy, fattening or whatever reason you used to justify not smashing it into your face, only to get upset when the lame substitute you settled on left you feeling cold and unsatisfied?

On top of wasting calories on something that sucked, a common response is to end up getting your hand on what you originally wanted in the first place and devouring it with reckless abandon, almost as if to spite your sub par treat. This is called Reverse Hulking Out and it happens to the best of us.

Don’t settle for mediocre food. If you want some chips, then portion them out (the epitome of strength) and have some. Make sure they’re the kind that you really want and enjoy every last bite of it. Don’t try to compromise and choke down some veggie chips because it sounds like a good idea.

As an example, if I’m going to eat a cinnamon roll, you can bet all your money that it’ll be a Cinnabon. I’ve been burned far too many times with other copycats and know that they just won’t compare, so why bother?

Friends don’t let friends waste calories.

5. Have A Release Valve

I call these the “break glass in case of emergency” foods. For some, it’s a single doughnut, a little Skinny Cow ice cream, or a nice glass of wine before bed. Whatever your thing is, the goal is to incorporate it into your diet often enough so that it doesn’t interfere with your results yet helps keep you sane and compliance.

When you feel the Hulk pressure building, have your emergency food. You’ll likely find that this alone takes the edge off to the point where you’re ready to jump back into the game again, often for days or weeks on end without need anything release. You decide the frequency that works best for you.

6. Own It

Owning your decisions fully is empowering and brings a certain sense of calm to you life, fitness or not. Instead of things happening to you, you’re in the driver’s seat. You control how you act and respond to the reality of things, no longer being a victim of your circumstances. The optimal choice may not be available in every scenario, but believing that you’re capable of making the best decision given your situating and trusting yourself to do so is key.

“That’s my secret, Captain, I’m always angry.” – Dr. Banner

The more in control you feel, the less anxiety you’ll potentially have about any situation because you know you have it under control. As you prove this to yourself through your actions, small and Hulk-sized, it will feel less like a cheesy Hallmark feel-good statement and more of an ingrained belief that makes you feel unstoppable.

What are some ways that you keep yourself from Hulking out or help keep diet anxiety to a minimum? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comment section below.

In the land of the chest the bench press is king, and many would rather fight a horde of rabid bears with a spoon before they had to stop benching. Unfortunately for some, the perfect storm of shoulder issues and improper form makes the bench press and some of its variations (i.e. barbell floor press, incline bench press, etc) a no-go.

If this perfectly describes you – I’m also part of the “can’t bench because my shoulders feel like death” club – then have no fear. I’m going to keep this short and sweet like a cinnamon roll and give you three pressing variations that you can use in place of or alongside bench pressing to ensure that your strength and sexy levels don’t plummet precipitously without sacrificing shoulder health.

Weighted Push Up

In terms of strength development, the loaded push up is a mighty tool to have in your arsenal. Most people can do a ton of push ups, but sooner or later loading them in order to keep progressing becomes a huge issue. Weight vests and chains are cool but can become cumbersome or simply aren’t available, but by using a dip belt, something most commercials gyms have, we can side-step this issue completely.

For this variation, make sure that you set the bench far enough away from the bar so that you’re hips aren’t hiked high into the air (I could have pushed the bench back a bit further in this video). As you can see with the booty wiggle, the placement of the belt is important. Try to set it as high as you can on your torso without it interfering with the movement in order to minimize lower back discomfort. The further down the belt is placed on your lower back, the more you risk going into hyper extension which can lead to low back discomfort.

Keep your glutes squeezed mega tight throughout the entire exercise. Make sure that you place the bar high enough so that the weights don’t hit the floor at the bottom of the push up.

I’ve loaded up to 200lbs on this variation without any problem, so needless to say it can be used both for low rep strength sets of 5-8 as well as high rep pump stuff, ranging anywhere from 15-20 and beyond. To increase chest activation, actively try to push the bar together as you push up.

Band Push Up

Bands are a fantastic way to crush your chest and triceps no matter where you are in the world. For a greater challenge, simply use thicker bands.

Band Prayer Press

If you’re in the mood to hate your life while completely scorching your chest and tricepticons in the fires of Hades, this exercise is for you.

High reps sets ranging anywhere from 20-50 work best here. Make sure to keep your hands clasped together the entire time, squeezing your chest together and exploding forcefully outwards with each rep. For an even more sinister pump, control the “lowering” portion of the exercise for 3-5 seconds on each rep. You can also use an incomplete range of motion, pulsing the end range of the exercise and going for a glorious set of 100 reps, although I only recommend doing this if you’ve completed a will and are prepared to lose your life in the pursuit of hypertrophy.

Be warned that it’s impossible to look normal while doing this exercise.

May your chest inspire the hopes and dreams of millions.
May your arm girth frighten the elderly, slow moving adults and very small children.
May your gains be plentiful.
Go forth and prosper.

Sexification Note: For a great band distributor, check out this site. I have no association with them and get no financial kickback. These are the only bands I’ve used and their awesomeness is the only brand that I can attest to.

For light resistance: EFS Pro Mini and Pro  Monster Mini Bands (red and black respectively)

For greater resistance: EFS Pro Light, Average & Strong bands (orange, gray and blue respectively).

Sexification Note: This post won’t be heavy on the science front and will be filled mainly with notes from my personal experience. I’m happy to answer any questions that you have in the comment section, and all I ask is that you keep an open mind while reading this.

If you’re new to fasting in general, I recommend reading this aaaaaand this to quickly educate yourself on what it’s all about before diving in.

After a year of shorter duration daily fasts, I began experimenting with longer fasts, ranging anywhere from 24 to 62 hours (known loosely as Alternate Day Fasting) without eating during my longest stretch, essentially only eating on the days that I strength trained. The details of that experiment can be found here, but a quick summary is that I dropped 7lbs in 2 weeks (losing 4 more over the course of the trial), while either maintaining or increasing my strength.

My results were near effortless and I was able to maintain them with ease. Stepping back from this extreme style of fasting and going back to something more conservative (Leangains styles or simple 24 hours fasts), I want to share with you what some of the benefits were and how you use it in the pursuit of your own fat loss and maintenance goals.

But…..WHY?!

Gigantic benefits such as lack of hunger while dieting, increased focus and improved mood from fasting are all discussed here, but my reasons for experimenting went beyond these reasons and I hope that you can glean something from these experiences.

The main benefit for me was purely psychological. For the majority of my adult life, I’ve struggled with food. If I’m sad, I’m eating a ton of food. If I’m happy, I’m eating a cave full of the delicious nom noms. I wanted to use this an opportunity to explore my own habits and see what I could learn from them.

With actual physical hunger taken out of the equation, I found that I ate primarily when I was under stress, bored or simply looking for a distraction from something that I was supposed to be doing. By setting a hard fasting deadline (i.e. not eating for 24-36 hours) for myself, I was forced to sit with the uncomfortable feeling and resolve it instead of using food as medicine. Sometimes I broke and ate early, but I didn’t beat myself up about it, learned from the experience and simply hopped back on.

On the actual fat loss & maintenance side of things, fasting creates a large deficit with minimal effort. It’s easy to get OCD about dieting and keeping track of your macros, so I used it as a tool to free up my mental real estate to focus on more important things while simultaneously worrying less about the eating side. Plus it allowed me to not have to even worry about stressing at social gatherings, which is a huge plus because I love food & good company.

Less food prep. Less dishes. Less money spent.

Preparing For Battle

A good relationship with food

I can’t overstate the importance of this step, both from personal experience and from that of my clients.

When I first started fasting, it exposed a major flaw within myself: I was a binger. I LURVE to eat – my mom called me a bottomless pit as a kid – and if I’m not careful I can cause dietary destruction with even the most restrictive feeding window (I went from 16/8 to 20/4 before going back to a conventional style of eating until I got a handle on things).

For some, fasting tends to intensify issues that people have with food and bring them bubbling up to the surface in a big, bad way, especially during longer periods of fasting. It’s extremely difficult to tame the beast while you’re inside it, so if you find yourself running into the same issues over and over again, take a step back and resolve them before writing fasting off completely. If it works for you, cool. If it doesn’t, then that’s cool, too. You learned something new about yourself and you can apply it to whatever you decided to do going forward.

The mindset of a boss

A boss does what needs to be done.

Let me preface this by saying that I know where you’re coming from. Having been a 6-7 (up to 8 if i was feeling particularly sassy) meals a per day dude in the past, I’ve been through periods of ravenous hunger to the point where I would actually get angry if I couldn’t eat my next preciously scheduled meal on time.

You’re the owner of the most adaptable machine in the universe – act accordingly.

You will not die if you don’t eat in the short term. If that were the case, it would’ve been game over for the human race a long time ago. You’re a lot more flexible than you give yourself credit for. Hunger is a real thing, but how we respond to it mentally plays a huge role as well. When we come face to face with hunger, more often than not we give in right away, stomping it out with food (usually way more than we actually need).

While adapting your body to go for longer periods of time without eating, expect hunger. Some will have more than others, but learn what you can from it during your transition. Each successful encounter where you power through those hunger spikes like the boss you are, the more you empower yourself. Hunger doesn’t control you, you control your hunger.

Chill out!

Long fasts can be a big stressor on the body, and when you throw that into the mix of an already stress-filled lifestyle you have  a recipe for disaster. Before giving this an honest go, make sure you’re getting adequate sleep (fasting on little sleep can make fasting extremely difficult) while also doing your best to reduce stress in all other areas of your life – it will make the process a lot easier.

Getting Started

1) Choose your fasting window

For those just starting out in the world of extended fasts, 24 hours (‘ala Brad Pilon’s Eat Stop Eat style) is a good place to start. Depending on your lifestyle, here are some examples of how that would look.

• Finish your last meal at lunch and fast until lunch time the next day.
• Finish your last meal at dinner and fast until dinner time the next day.

For someone with a family, dinner time with them is probably pretty important so dinner to dinner may be the best option. On the other hand, someone who is single and has a large degree of autonomy has more wiggle room. I’ve found that going to bed on a full stomach helps myself & my clients with compliance, but the strategy you choose is completely up to you.

To extend the fast to 36-48 hours, simply adjust and plan accordingly. Here are some examples.

• Finish your last meal at dinner on Monday and fast until breakfast on Wednesday (36 hours).
• Finish your last meal at lunch on Monday and fast until dinner on Wednesday (36 hours).
• Finish your last meal at dinner on Monday and fast until dinner on Wednesday (48 hours)
• Finish your last meal at lunch on Monday and fast until lunch on Wednesday (48 hours)

Fasting for this long is not necessary at all, but can be done and by doing so you afford yourself the opportunity to eat more when you do eat. Depending on your personality, this can be a powerful motivator.

For me, training 3x a week, I only ate on Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and single meal on Friday or Saturday depending on social outings/hunger levels. This allowed me to eat essentially whatever I liked on training days without keeping track of my macros because the the large deficit that I was creating on the other days of the week.

2) Choose your feeding window

This may seem complicated, but it’s actually the easiest, and most delicious, part of the process.

All you do here is decide how long your eating window is going to be (I’ve found 4-8 hours to be best, but this isn’t set in stone by any means) and plan accordingly.

The number of meals you eat is entirely up to you, but I recommend at 2 to 3 depending on if you’re in fat loss or maintenance mode as the gastric stress from trying to fit an entire day’s worth of calories in one may leave you with a broken toilet and no friends – you have been warned!

3) Fit your training into the equation

You have a couple of options here.

• Fasted training.
• Beginning your feeding window with a small meal prior to training.

For fasted training, consume 10g of Branch Chain Amino Acids 15-30 minutes prior to training. After training, you can begin eating or if that isn’t possible, consume 10g of Branch Chain Amino Acids for every 2 hours that you go without eating until you start your feeding window. Here’s an example of this.

8:30am – 10g BCAAs
9-10am – Train
10am – 10g BCAA
12pm – Begin feeding window

Frequently Asked Questions

How much should I eat ?

That all depends.

For fat loss, I recommend that you start by eating at maintenance on your training days and 10-15% below maintenance on your off days, adjust according to your results.

If you’re following more of a 48 hour fast approach, you can eat at maintenance on training days if you’re a brave soul or 10% more than that to help stave off hunger, letting the deficit created on your off days handle the rest.

For maintaining your physique once you’ve achieved it, you can obviously get away with eating more as long as you make sure to adjust according to your results.

Again, the number of meals you eat is up to you, but I recommend at least 2 meals.

What should I eat?

For most people, the main benefit of fasting is that you can eat larger, satiating meals while dieting or maintaining. Of course this means that some junk food (any eating plan devoid of a Cinnabon now and then has no place in this world) will sneak in there from time to time, but make sure that the majority of your food intake comes from whole, unprocessed foods.

Here are some specifics.

• Protein – Eat between 0.8 – 1 gram of protein protein per pound of body weight (the fluffier you are, the less protein you’ll need to stave off muscle loss) regardless of the day. Bump this number up slightly if you’re having issues with feeling full – I’d rather have you get slightly more protein than too little.
• Carbohydrates – Eat 1 gram per pound of body weight (adjust this number down if you have a significant amount of weight to lose) on training days, and for the sake of simplicity cut them down to as low as you can handle on your off days. Play around with this number and adjust according to your results.
• Fat – Fill the remainder of your calories with this delicious macronutrient. A general rule of thumb to start by is consume less on the days that you train (because of increased carbs) and more on the days that you don’t (because of decreased carbs)

For those following the 48 hour fast, maintain protein levels for sure, but you can be a bit more flexible what you’re taking in, increasing protein, fats and carbs as long as you don’t let your overall caloric intake get out of control.

What about muscle loss?

I haven’t found this to be an issue at all as long as you’re training progressively with a combination of the big lifts (squat, bench variations, chin ups, dips, deadlift variations, overhead press, leg press). Cover your bases with these exercises, training in the 4-8 rep range. Make sure to include some fun pump work as well with your accessory work – lunges, curls, rows, dumbbell bench variations, and machine work has its place, just get your heavy stuff out of the way first.

If you find your strength levels dropping, increase your calories slightly and reassess as necessary.

From a general standpoint, the leaner you are, the more that you have to worry about muscle loss during extended periods of fasting. The more fat you have to lose, the less at risk you are for muscle loss with your fat acting as essentially the sacrificial preferred energy source before the body starts looking to break down lean body mass.

With that said, if you lose a little bit of muscle along the way and you look amazingly awesome as an end result, would you be upset? As long as you’re following the above advice most of the time, muscle loss is a bit over exaggerated and doesn’t happen all at once at any rate. Don’t let optimal stand in the way of good enough.

For more fasting myths, check this in-depth post out.

How do I deal with hunger?

• Stay busy. Go for a walk, hang out with friends, dance like a foolish mortal while listening to music. Pretty much do anything you can to distract yourself from a hunger spike. Hunger is like a bully – it pops up and demands your attention momentarily, but if you confront it proactively it goes away quick, fast and in a hurry. They usually last for 15-20 minutes in duration.
• Supplement. Caffeine has an appetite suppressing properties  which goes a long way towards quieting the hunger beast – coffee & tea fiends, rejoice! I’ve also found that 5-10g of BCAAs taken during a hunger spike does a very good job of telling your stomach rumblings to “shhhhhh”.
• Sleep. If you can just make it to bed and go to sleep (or even a nap whenever you can fit one in), it acts as a bit of a reset button for your hunger.
• Eat. Sometimes you’ve just gotta eat, and the good thing is that rarely do you need as much food as your brain may try to convince you in order to take the edge off your hunger and return your sanity. Try to have on hand an “in case of emergency” scenario. This could be a protein bar in your car, a few pieces of fruit, or just a cooked meal waiting in your fridge. If you’e finding that your hunger is mainly from not eating enough prior to ending your fast, experiment with making your last meal of the day the largest and made largely of protein.

What happens if I mess up?

It’s all good! There is no “messing up”. Some days you’ll fast for long periods of time and on other days barely at all. This isn’t something that you have to do on a daily basis, although the longer that you do, the better you get at it, recognizing and dealing with patterns that may act as road blocks.

Don’t put any unnecessary pressure on yourself to extend the fast beyond the point where you feel comfortable, especially if it begins to interfere with your life and defeats the purpose of this being more or less a relaxed way of eating. Remember, at the end of the day fasting is just another tool in your Batman utility belt to get the job done – no more and no less.

Don’t associate any magical properties with fasting or any other protocol. Demystify it as much as possible. If it helps with compliance then use it to your advantage, but the moment it becomes a hindrance to your success, abandon it without a second thought for something more appropriate for your circumstances.

Above all else, I hope that you’re open to experimenting with your body. You’re a lot less fragile than many have convince you to believe.

It all started with a workout created by my friend Leigh Peele designed to crush my body and soul.

Only after I finished the workout and was left wheezing on the ground like an asthmatic Zebra did I realize just how out of shape I was. It was cool, though – my life aspirations and physique doesn’t require me to lift beyond 8 reps, and the only jogging I do is if a strong gust of wind blows some papers out of my hand and I need to chase them down.

Back to regular life I went, until one day it hit me.

While watching my favorite show, The Walking Dead, and seeing all the ridiculousness that they had to go through just to survive, I realized a painful truth: if the zombie apocalypse ever happened in real life, I would be SO dead!

In a feeble attempt to make myself feel better, I started to playback in my head all of the zombie movies and gauge whether I would survive or not, and even that was pitiful.

Dawn of the Dead? Dead.
28 Days Later? Super dead.
Night of the Living Dead? Finished.
Shaun of the Dead? Game over (yes, I’d find a way to die even in a comedy).

Even if I went back to the first zombie movies where they more or less waddled after you, I’d still die. This is when I had an epiphany: If I’m in ok shape and would still end up as zombie bait, what happens to my friends who are in worse shape than me?!

A lot of my best friends don’t train. Hell, my own mom doesn’t even lift – and I love my mom! I can’t be satisfied with my current training plan, which is sure to leave me temporarily friendless and momless right before my weak heart gives out, I trip and fall on some wet leaves and get eaten by zombies.

Enter my homie and partner in zombie slayage, John Romaniello. We present to you, the Zombie Apocalypse Survival Workout

If we’re going to make our mark on the world, then hot damn it’s going to be for preparing as many people as we possibly can for the upcoming zombie apocalypse!

Do you doubt that this is eventually going to happen? As the great sage and philosopher DMX one said – do you think this is a game?! If so, look no further than headlines from the actual news.

• In Maine, an official Zombie Outbreak Response Team vehicle is found upturned with high-powered weaponry on board. Perhaps it was on its way to an actual isolated event?
• Further to that, a sign was altered to let people know of the zombie danger—and quickly changed back. Sounds like a cover-up if ever I heard one.
• In Baltimore, a college student is arrested after murdering his roommate and eating his brains and heart. Let that sink in for a moment – his BRAINS AND HEART!
• And then there’s the infamous Bath Salts incident in Miami, Florida where a man was shot and killed by police after eating a man’s face off on the side of the road as cars whizzed by, offering no help.
• Perhaps most telling—not to mention alarming—the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have issued an official zombie survival preparedness guide, complete with items to stockpile and government protocol in the case of an outbreak.

This workout guide will be the most important purchase you ever make since it’s the only guide that will get you fit enough to slay the undead, protect your family and survive the end of the world (while looking good doing it).

In the off-chance that the world doesn’t go to zombie hell in a bike basket, you’ll still be rewarded with a truly Sexified physique along with a Liam Neeson in Taken set of skills (we’re talking speed and endurance here, not martial arts and neck snapping).

Dying sucks in general, but dying at the hands of a zombie sucks even more. Since I care about you so much and want you to be ready to dominate the undead with reckless abandon, the Zombie Apocalypse Survival Workout is on sale for 50% until this Friday at midnight

Click here to pick up your copy and join the zombie resistance!

I’m going to keep this one short and sweet like Danny DeVito eating a Cinnabon: one day, in the not too distant future, a human’s worth will not judged by their kindness, achievements or accolades, but by the strength and shape of their glutes. I don’t even want to begin on the social life-killing stigma of being the only one in your peer group NOT able to turn a piece of coal into a diamond with one flex of your butt cheeks.

If you’re looking for specific exercises to add to your arsenal, make sure to check out Bret Contreras’ page. He’s like King Midas of the fanny – everything he touches turns to glutes instead of gold (which will be worth far more in the future, anyway).

I care too much about you to see you suffer booty ostracism.

Rog’s Rump Revival Rules

1. The 40 Year Old Virgin will teach you everything that you need to know about glutes

The great sage Steve Carell once asked the greatest question known in the history of the world: is it true that if you don’t use it, you lose it?

When it comes to the glutes, this is the absolute truth.

For a variety of reasons (constantly sitting on them all day, never really learning how to use them in the first place, etc), most of our backsides are just plain ‘ol weak and inefficient. The problem doesn’t correct itself when we load up the barbell and expect the glutes to get their act together without being properly taught how to. This would be similar to taking  a 6 year old away from their coloring books and snacks and throwing them into an advance physics class – they’re just not ready.

If you don’t use ’em, you will lose ’em. Friend’s don’t let friends lose their glutes.

2. Work your glutes all day every day

The following exercises take less than a minute to do, but will help take your booty development to the next level. You can do them in the morning after you wake up, at night before you go off to dream land, or as part of  warm up before lifting. The more you turn your glutes “on” and actually FEEL them working, the easier it will be to call upon their awesomeness when you need it.

Create that mind-muscle connection and you will be handsomely rewarded.

Do 1-2 sets of 10 reps each side for these exercises.

Now for some real life bonus tips that you can do without throughout the day.

• When you’re walking, focus on extending your hip back and really feeling your glutes squeeze with each step. Think “walk like Robocop”.
• Stand up every now and then and just squeeze your butt together for 10 reps. If you really want to spice it up and feel them working, hold each rep for 5 seconds.
• While sitting, flex each cheek individually, which will rock you from side to side a bit. For added flair and style points, squeeze both glutes together to bounce up and down and your chair. Yes, this does look as hilarious as it sounds.

3. Get ’em strong!

Now that you’ve woken your buns up, it’s time to integrate them into your lifts. Get strong at exercises like the deadlift and squat variations, hip thrusts and lunges. If you’ve been doing these with weak, non-functioning glutes (like I was for years), prepare to have your lifts skyrocket now that you have the strongest muscle in your body on your team. You might even shed a tear or two.

Remember to lock out with your glutes and NOT your lower back on all of the above exercises. Here is a video of how you want to approach it, especially if you have a history of low back pain like I do.

Questions? Concerns? Want some more tush talk? Leave a comment below – I’m more than happy to help you get to the bottom of this.

Remember: If you don’t squeeze it, no one else will.