What's going on is needs Robert Sykes keto, Savage.com. And today I've got special guest Bronson, dance back on the podcast and this was kind of a unique interesting conversation. So basically, he is wanting to do a sudo competition prep. I'm going to try and talk him on stage. What kind of see how it goes? When that time comes. But he wanted to do my protocol for the competition prep.
He is typically much much much higher in protein relative to dietary fat, so he just wants to expand his his You know, experience and knowledge and try this different protocol from a fat loss standpoint. So he hit me up and he's like, hey man, let's do a prep. So that's exactly what we're going to do. So this conversation, basically entails. It's kind of like a client call. Almost, it's kind of like a totally off-the-cuff spur-of-the-moment. Hey, this is a random client
call. These are the questions I asked him how this is, these are the questions that I ask all my clients on our initial conversation and we just kind of went with it. So kind of a unique from a, from
a podcasting. But if you have any interest in a ketogenic competition prep protocol, how I structure it and how that may look for one of my clients, this would be a pretty good illustration of just that I believe we're going to have him come back on the podcast, probably on a bi-monthly basis to kind of, do check-ins and see how things are looking and make all this relatively real time for all of you following along. So, super excited about it, and it's super excited to unveil
what we got cooking. So, without further, Do sit back, relax. Enjoy the podcast with Bronson. Boom. We are live. Bronson, how are you? I'm doing great man. How are you doing? I'm doing wonderful. Well, we've can't you might have the record now for the most podcast with me, I'm not quite sure that is a, that is a blessed place to be, man, I love it.
We have done quite a few. So the last time we spoke, I do remember what our main topic was the last time we spoke was, I don't know, probably three months ago or so. For a podcast, I would guess it might have been. Yeah, it might have been longer than it's probably been longer than that because time flies, man, it definitely does fly. But prior to this conversation, we were talking quite a bit about the, we talk about CrossFit quite a bit.
We dove into that, talk about the mechanics of movement. You had all your pillars that you look for in a well structured training regiment. What do you want to dive into today? We're going to talk a little nutrition. Little little experiment that we have in the work so to speak. Yeah. So we've talked about this in the past, right? We both have very I would say very differing views.
I think it's more about our focus of what we're trying to do in accomplish from the audience of people who talk too great. So you know I tend to talk towards more just quality of life and improving the body's ability to function and you have more of a sport bodybuilding, focus of trying to get people to optimize your body composition. Now that doesn't mean you don't cross the you know, have overlapping crossover things but I think just the difference in how we Well, then our protocols.
There's a, there's a point where I think we're very similar, but then there's a point where you're getting into the specifics of what someone needs to do to get on stage. That is completely outside the realm of anything I ever deal with. Yeah right. So I want to get more information on that and I'm thinking not that I'm going on stage. But I like to see what that process looks like. So I have a better understanding of it and then it will give me something, you know, you know how I am.
And I like to experiment with things understand how it affects me personally, and then I started digging into some mechanics behind it and trying to understand the mechanisms of how these things work. So, totally totally. So, let me ask you this. Let's get some some underlying foundational stuff out of the way for the audience to get some context here. How do you again? I'm 49. I'll be 50 in May 15 may all right? And if we were to, I mean what's
your so? You basically want to do a full-blown competition prep, you said you don't want to step on stage. It's possible. Be said, that's not a guarantee but you basically want to go through this as if you were stepping on stage. Yeah, I just want to go through the process and see if I can actually do it because I know there's going to be a point where there's in some mental stuff in there.
Because I've tried this on my tried, this myself at points off, and on and do Ling with the hunger aspect because there is a point I think and correct me if I'm wrong, maybe I just did it wrong. We're because you're restricting calories to a point. There's going to be times you need to deal with the hunger. Yeah, I'm used to stuffing my face every day, so that's going to be something that I need to figure out a deal with but outside of that.
Yeah, the hunger thing is you interesting because a lot of people, I mean, everybody's like arguing over. What is the most satiating diet out there? But the simple fact of the matter is, if you're doing a competition prep and you're doing it for several, A months and you're in a deficit and you're really low on body fat, you're going to be hungry, no matter what that you're following anyway that says otherwise just doesn't have never gotten to that point in a prep, right?
Right. So yeah that's definitely going to be a factor. You are typically going for more higher protein on the higher protein Spectrum than I I would say yet. You know that I'm kind of following more of this higher dietary fat approach, what in the Old makes you compelled to do a prep with me with a totally different nutritional distribution than you're used to. That's why?
Because it's different. Nice. I don't think, I don't think we grow and expand and learn if we don't, if we do things the same way all the time. Well, that's I respect the hell out of that, man. You know what I mean? I think there's there's something to be said, you can't look at you. You can't look at your clients. You can't look at the people that follow you and do what you do and say that it doesn't work,
hmm? Right. Right. So understanding what that process looks like and understanding how it works is something that I want to try out and see.
Yeah I think that is, I think that's great and I think there's so many people that they get stuck in this you know, Echo chamber of what they think is the right way and they only they only communicate with people that share a similar you know story or a similar outlook on things and in doing that they really just they they cut off their opportunity for growth and I feel like you being willing to do something Side of your wheelhouse with a totally different spectrum and just you
know dive in wholeheartedly is commendable for sure. Yeah, I can't it's one of those things right where we talk about people who are bought into and dogmatic about calories in calories out, like everything in moderation. You know. There are bodybuilders who eat carbs, we need a ton of carbs, you know. But they also do a lot of cardio and they spend three or four hours a day at the gym. They do a lot of things differently and doesn't mean it doesn't work.
Hmm, right. So it's very successful, you Be very successful eating cards, you can be very, I know bodybuilders who do it? Very ketogenic Lee from a pro high-protein perspective. So, you know, I've seen both ends of those of that Spectrum. That's, you know, I figured let's try it from the high-fat perspective, you see what happens there. Yeah, the unique thing is, I mean, people have been stepping on stage and looking like a million bucks with a very low dietary fat, high protein, high
carb approach for years. And that's pretty much the standard of what the most competitors in the bodybuilding industry are doing. So there's no, there's no nobody. Is the right to say that. That doesn't work because it obviously works. So I think you know, people can lose body fat and look great with any type of diets. It's just a matter of figuring out, what is the most sustainable for that individual? And what is ideally the most optimal and efficient at
reaching the goal and doing? So in a healthy as manner as possible, right? And I think, if we, as we go this, because this is an evolving conversation, right? So I think maybe hopefully 10 years, 15 years, 20 years, 50 years from now. Now, people can look at the stuff that you're doing, right? This is and I'm being 100%
serious with this. This is, this is really what it's about for me is I don't see how the the end goal of getting lean for a show can be done multiple different ways, but there is one way in my opinion, right? That is the healthier way to do it from a mindset around food. From a harm to the body from a ability to revert and go back to a more normal way of eating after the show is done. So there's a lot of other aspects of go into it. Beyond just, let's get really lean for a show.
Yeah, and I think when we look at all of those things together, there probably is. And I would say just like just like dr. Barry says there's a proper human diet. I think there is a better than the rest way of doing a contest prep.
Yeah, 100% agree. And like The, if I had this conversation a few weeks back with something on the podcast but you know humans like if we were to look at things from a strictly biological standpoint, there is definitely a proper human diet that should, you know, check all the boxes for the vast vast vast majority of the, the human species. Yes. The the variability comes into
play. When you look at the psychological and emotional relationship, people have with food and social Gatherings and what is sustainable? What they place. M, that's where it all becomes tricky. Because you, that's not a closed loop system where you can just control for the variables in a black-and-white. Fasteners so much of a shade of gray. Yep, absolutely agree. So let's just hope our slaves, man.
I'm we're just kind of going off the cuff here, but I'm going to kind of treat this almost like I would a client call that I have with my clients. I'm going to get some basic information from me. That I'll be able to use in getting your initial macros and everything set up. Normally, I have my all my clients and Go fill out a questionnaire that kind of gives me some Foundation but we'll just kind of start off the top with you here.
So 49 years old, do you have any idea what your current macros and calories have been averaging over the past several months? Yep. I can, we can walk through that real quick if you want. Yeah, so I, averaged around calories per day. I averaged around over and Shadow between 22 and 24, 24, hundred a day. Okay, I'm between 260 to 280 grams of protein a day.
Gotcha. And I can on a high day, I might be at 15 grams of carbs, 15 grams of carbs, how many grams of fat that's if the fat is usually around about 130 to 140? Perfect. And you're, you're pretty satiated that intake. They don't feel hungry or overly stuff to that. Yeah, that's that's good. That's yeah, that's that's fantastic. And you've been at that intake for how long now, roughly several months. Several months.
Yeah. When was the last time you were in a deficit Well, so how are we going to Define deficit? We talk about just to be a maruti, you know, let's let's kind of go as close to the TD as possible. So like if you're if you're maintaining your weight at that 2224 hundred intake, when was the last time you spend any length of time below 2000, for instance, It's been awhile. I don't know. Okay, I really honestly, it's, it's been a long time since I've tried to do a thing like that,
probably pre covid. Okay, perfect. Perfect. And you haven't really gone north of 2400 calories to any extent for any length of time here, recently. Have you not recently? No, I mean, there's been some times where I've tried some and played around with some different things. Like overdoing it on protein, stuff like that, but nothing, that's been long term. Okay, cool. I had guy, had a couple weeks where I was trying to do like 3,500 to 4,000 a day 10. That it was hard.
Yeah, it is. How'd you feel like energy-wise with that? Was it? Would you feel more? Energized? Great. Not that be at that party. I feel great. It was just hard to get it in all the time and how long ago was that? That probably that might have been six months ago. Okay, cool cool, cool. Have you got any recent blood work or anything, down hormone panel, anything like that? Not recently, it's been a couple years.
If you really want to go full-blown with this experiment, that would be a worthwhile metric to kind of track. Just get like a like a basic hormone panel, you know, pre deficit pre-cut. And then again, when you get to your leanest and just kind of see how those numbers are affected as you get leaner and leaner. Yeah, it's actually getting a full panel has been on my list of things to do for a while, but I just haven't broken it down to figure out where I should go do that.
Cheapest. Yeah, I've tried a few different places. I've ordered a lot of my Lambs from like direct labs.com and then I'll go into a Quest Diagnostic or LabCorp Center and get the the labs drawn, and then they usually get the results back within 48 hours or so. But there's probably a day Feldman actually started doing it in his own blood work panel company, but I'm not really sure if I think that's live, but I never used it yet. Okay, checking that cool. Thanks.
What about body fat percentage? You know what your body fat percentages around depending on the day, anywhere from 12 to 15 12 to 15. What my in body says, I got to embody that I use every once in a while what kind is it. It was 1820, got you? That's the atom. That's not like the the home way. That's like the commercial grade, right? No, no, that's the consumer product. Very nice, nice. Alright, 2015 percent. Talking about training, man. What is training look like right
now for you the training. Right now is been a little off and on for a while, there still may be a month and a half ago. I was doing heavy strength, training, three to four days a week with maybe once a week with some kind of metabolic conditioning, the last month and a half. Purcell, I've just been getting things in when I can because I've been super busy with other stuff.
So I've been maybe three days a week, four days a week doing whatever I can think to do. When I get there for the day, based on how much time I have and what else is going on, right? So it hasn't been anything in the system, so it's on, on my list of things to do. Best part of this is to get back into a regular string regular Street. Okay, cool. Cool. So you're not doing like a Specific body part, split or anything like that. Then, no, I do it more based off of systems.
So I do more of a conjugate program, so I'll do like, Max effort, lower work on a Monday and I'll do Dynamic effort upper on Tuesday, then I'll do some carries and pushes and slide work on Wednesday, and then Max effort upper on Thursday, and then Dynamic effort lower on Friday. Okay perfect. What about cardi and why? That's my, that's my split and then cardio is kind of mixed in
based on the work sets. It's more about the break in between the sets and things like that then it is specifically doing great. Okay, cool. So I I'm not a fan of cardio so yeah, me neither most people aren't do you have access to like, as your gym like a, you using like a fully equipped gym right now is your gym lockdown? Or what's your status? There? It's a CrossFit gym. We've got a ton of bear.
We don't have any machines, it's all free weights, but I've got, I mean, I've got everything I need to do pretty much everything I need kettlebells dumbbells, plates are Bells, their options for cardio. Probably are what, like a rower and a treadmill. Got a rower. We've got a What are those that true form Runner and that's key herbs and we got are bikes. Okay, cool, cool, cool, cool. All right, and we have a track, we have an indoor track to so
nice. Walk me through a typical day for you, man, what is 24 hours of flight with regards to what time you wake up, what time you eat? What time you sleep? What time you train just kind of. Yes, that's all. That's all changing to. So, gosh, man. So currently I am practicing as starting. Weak at getting up at 4:00 in the morning every morning. Because starting next week I have a personal training client that's going to be three days a week at 5:00 a.m.
So that's new for me. So getting up at 4:00 when my day's going to start have a client and then I start a new job, a new contract in a couple weeks. So from the client I'll be going to work get off of work. I'll probably go to the gym and do my workouts have more clients or coach a class to do something like that, and then go home and do other stuff. How many meals are you? I eat in a day. Few meals. And at least one sometimes, two shakes. All right, and waste on how I feel.
What time are. Those probably going to fall in with your new protocol. This shake the I'll probably have a shake in the morning. When I first get up, so I'm all this stuff happening the same time, right? So, I stopped drinking coffee this week as well, so, it's a replace my, the habit of having some coffee in the morning. I started just having a shake in the morning instead. This is like a protein. Something like just, yeah, just protein. Shake, just a protein shake.
So I usually do a chocolate or strawberry. He quit protein with like a Chuck flavored element packet. Gotcha. Nice. And then what time is your first meal probably going to fall my first nail. I usually eat around like a lemon. Okay. I'm going to unmute and even then sometimes I'm not even hungry. Like, I just, we're getting on this call. It's, you know, our time on this call. It's 2 o'clock my time and I just finished lunch like, an hour ago.
Are you eating pretty much the same thing for lunch every day and you mix it up quite a bit? Yeah, I'm pretty basic. So right now, I'm doing ground beef and lamb. Nice. Mixing the two up ground beef and ground lamb or like lamb chops or some ground beef and ground lamb? Nice! Lots of. I don't like saying, man, I love
lamb lot. People don't like, really, oh my God. It is, I can't say, I stumbled on it, but I saw it in the store, like, two weeks ago, as I got me, try this and I'm like, oh my God, this is amazing. Yeah, it's kind of very distinct flavor, for sure it's tender. It's like, yeah, it's not gay. It's not as But see, I don't like the flavor of grass-fed beef, if I'm being honest. Mmm. Right as much. So I think this is much better. Yeah, it's tight.
It's tasty for sure. When is your second, I'm assuming right after you get out of the gym off of work, depending on when I get home. Yeah, it depends on when I get home from the gym working with the class. So I do client see evening, a coach classes in the evening. So usually when I get home from that, so that could be, that's probably 7:00 ish. Catch and my second. And when is that second in between there I may have a shake. So like if I'm On the, on the
way to the gym from work. I may have a shake on the way, depending on how the day is going or whatever. Gotcha. You ever eat anything after your meal around seven? Like a late-night snack, because that's pretty much the last not usually know. Okay, if I give I ever do get a hankering for something after my meal, it might be, I'll make cook up some bacon or I might have some jerky laying around or do something like that, but it doesn't happen a lot. What time do you normally?
Go to sleep? Normally like 12, but I'm trying to now because of my new schedule, trying to start to go to bed by 9:00. Yeah, might be a little bit of an adjustment man going from 12 to 9. That's not that's a lot of adjustment. Yeah. Nice. And when does that, that starts pretty much like effective immediately or when does that start? Yeah, I started doing that beginning of this week. Did you wake up at 4:00 today then? Yep, how you feel with with that and you feel pretty natural wide
width back. So what I'm doing right now Is I'm getting up to get used to getting up and then I'm doing something for the time period that I would normally be with my client and get home. And then I'm going back to bed, nice. So I gotta for, I got up and did some work at work. Through some stuff. Did stuff around the apartment and 6:30. I went back to bed, nice with with this shift happening, your sleeves kind of all jacked up, but generally speaking, do you
sleep pretty good? Like you have a restful night sleep? Wake up feeling And yeah in trouble. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Okay, good. What about water intake, man? I wish that you getting in. Yeah, I do at least three he sometimes four liters of water a day. Okay, perfect. That's that's the easy one. What about electrolytes? I got a SodaStream. I put in the element in every one of those leaders. Okay. Just that one of those packets. Yep.
All right, so you're getting about Four Element packets a day then yeah on average. Are you also salt in your food quite a bit? In addition to the element, packets are now you betcha. All right, so salt should be totally fine. Yeah. Are you configure? I figure. I'm in the five to seven grams a day range. Yeah. Because they have 1,000 milligrams per pack and I'm pretty sure right. And then I think they get 200 milligrams of potassium. Yep. Are you doing anything?
Additionally for potassium or just the element packets. Additionally outside of the meat. No, okay, cool. Yeah, that people don't realize there's quite a bit of potassium in red meat. So if you're eating that much protein, you're probably covering your bases from a potassium standpoint. Yeah, that's it's yeah. I haven't had any issues with any of that, perfect. All right. What about supplements, what are you taking for that?
If I'm so I do beef, liver capsules daily, I think the viral proteins beef liver capsules. Hmm. So there's four of those in the Ring. I do one of the for one serving a day. I do. Whoo, Pew, worry. I don't know how they pronounce it now. Used to be pure Pharma, but they change their name and I don't know how to pronounce it. It's pu Ori, but they have a magnesium zinc, vitamin D fish oil packet that I do every day. Nice. Any creatine or thinner that? Nope.
All right. I've tried creatine in the past and it's never seem to do anything for me. Yeah, create seam is a funny one, man. Like, I've talked to some people and they say they can, they can tell profound difference. When they start taking creatine, I can never feel a difference when I start taking creatine. However, the research is pretty compelling that it is effective.
So all take it? Yeah, daily, like, I'll take five grams extra days just because, but I don't ever anticipate seeing a, you know, tangible difference in the day-to-day, right? I don't have an issue taking it. I know that a few years ago I tried I don't even remember which brand it was but after about two weeks my nipple started hurting that's so I was like okay I'm stopping this under this brand. Yeah and it went away as soon as I stopped taking it went away. It was weird.
Yeah that is really weird man I started using a I bought some from first form and it seems to work pretty good. I mean a good creates him on 100 they're all pretty much the same thing. But the quality you guys matter in the the solubility matters. Like I hate tasting. The The grittiness in my water, but they're there. Creatine seemed to dissolve. Pretty good. I don't get any gritty after flavor or anything but yeah, I got a problem doing it. I just didn't ever really felt
like it did. Yeah, I do know that I keep hearing more and more people talking about all the different benefits and you know, people that I respect, you know, that you and Rob wolf and Rachel Gregory. And I keep hearing people talking about, you need to start taking it whether you think you needed or not, you need it. Yeah, at this is one of those things that it does work. But it's not going to like in high school. You know, you go to the locker rooms and people like, oh, man,
he's on good that creatine. He going to Get Swole, but it's like, you're not gonna not gonna feel any pronounced, crazy difference with creatine. It just kind of more of like a, the compounding effect over time. You know. Right, right. Okay. All right, so you said, you turned 50 in May, right? Yep. All right, how much time do you realistically? Have to dedicate to a legitimate cutting period. I got as much time as we need, man.
I generally recommend people allocate about four to six months worth of time for dieting down, and then it's going to be a little bit depending upon the individual, but usually about two to three months worth of time to reverse die, back up to a maintenance, and then from there, they would stay at their maintenance or Surplus for, you know, a year or two. Okay, that's typically what I would recommend. So if we started this little experiment.
Now, for instance, that would give us Let's see here, November December, January February, March, April. And you'd pretty much be finishing up your cut and April March, or April, and then coming back up to you. Reverse and back to a somewhat degree of normal life by your birthday. Okay, so That works because the long carputer. I'm speaking of the long, the low-carb, you do cruise in May so let's get ripped for the cruise. I love it. Yeah, you would definitely be ripping for sure.
But treatment I'm going to talk you into freaking doing a competition. Like you're going to put all this work and you're gonna see how you look at the end of it. And you're going to, I feel like I need a lot more mass, man. I just don't feel like, I got enough lean mass, like I meant about 94, 95 pounds of skeletal muscle mass right now. Yeah, but feel like be on stage. I feel like I need a lot more
than that. It just depends what what division you and I mean you would be dangerous on like a physique competitor. You know, if you went physique division, where the war the board shorts and still depends on how you display. That is like you've got a good shape. So like you would be able to be very competitive in a physique class, you may not be as competitive in that can open bodybuilding division, but you got to start somewhere, you know.
Yeah. Plus I mean you would be able to I mean you look like you're freaking 30, not 50. So like you'll be able to just freaking dominate all of the Masters divisions, you got that going for you too. Alright, so this is what we're going to do the thing about competition prep and really trying to optimize for body fat loss is, you know, track and macros getting things dialed in and treating it like a scientific experiment in which you're controlling for as many variables as possible.
So you kind of I mean, you you tend to eat fairly intuitively right? Like, you've been able to just eat till satiety with a higher protein, ample fat, very low carb approach. You haven't probably needed to track macros religiously over the past several months. Yeah, no, that dude. Yeah, because I get to a point. So, I tracked, Mac Pro's, whenever I'm changing something to kind of do a tester experiment, to see where I'm at
with different things. But once I get to what I'm happy with, and I do that for a while, then I kind of know where I'm at. Then I stopped tracking and I'm usually Pretty good, you know? And then I also, because of been doing it for so long. I can get on the embodying, Lego, my body fats going up a little bit. I need to adjust here just there. I can, I can kind of manage on the fly, so, but tracking I'm comfortable with tracking if needed.
Yeah, I'm definitely a huge advocate for tracking win in a prep simply because it has the calories drop. You're not really going to be able to lean on your intuition, to eat properly because you're going to get hungry or so if you start eating until you're satisfied, you just simply never going to Reach the level of a deficit you would need to be to really optimize for losing as much body fat as possible,
right? So yeah, I'm glad we're on the same page here and with regard to the training, you know, you kind of want to standardize, you want to standardize everything,
you can when you're in a prep. Like you don't want to, you know, come out the gate guns blazing doing a ton of cardio because then you don't want to have any room to scale that cardio up. You do want to be pretty consistent with your training and then you want to maintain that degree of Density and, you know, frequency and volume throughout the prep if possible, because as your body dips into a deeper and deeper deficit, your body is going to want to become
catabolic. But one way to combat against that is to continue to subject your muscles to The Strain that you've been subjecting them to thus far and basically give your body reason to maintain that lean mass as the calories continue to drop. So we may have to kind of get some type of you know, split or formulated.
Sure with your training that way you don't have to feel locked into a training protocol but I want to make sure that we've got some benchmarks to training and we can kind of have something solid to intangible to know that we're hitting the right metrics. Yeah I think that's going to be the hardest part of all.
Well besides dealing with the hunger I think that's to be the second hardest part because I tend to Enjoy some flexibility in my program so I don't usually go into a day of workouts with these are the five or six exercises. I'm going to do. These are the set Sansa reps. It's more like I go in with here's the concept of the stimulus. I'm looking for today and then I go in and I get that and I kind of just go with where I do.
What I know I need to do to get where I want to be for the day when I whenever I followed a training program, I usually, after about three weeks, I'm just off. Yeah. And I totally respect that. Like I don't want anybody to feel confined to a very specific training protocol because then they're not going to enjoy it as much and they're going to probably start slacking on it as specially as the calories, get lower in the energy decreases because they don't really love what they're doing.
So I'd much rather you continue to love your training style. I just want to make sure we have some type of, you know, benchmark in that training. So that we can ensure that we're not losing any intensity or volume or frequency for the Stimulus that you're subjecting your muscles to. Okay. So we can kind of play that by
ear. And kind of see how your body responds as we go there with regard to Foods, you're pretty much doing like a carnival approach, like you're not doing a whole lot of veggies or anything like that, right? Yeah man. I'm too lazy for all that stuff. Yeah, totally get that totally get that. You're gonna love your micronutrient. Needs it, right? Like you're not missing anything. You know, blatantly obvious thing there. Okay. Nope. Perfect.
All right. So as far as the nutrition goes, just kind of give you a high level view of what you can expect going forward, if we take the next five months, for instance, to cut, I'm going to start your calories, probably at about said you go up no higher than 2400 on average here lately, right? Yeah. 24. Maybe 25 one a day, but I'm usually not that much higher than that. Okay, cool. I'm probably going to start you right at 2500 and we'll just
start there. But I'm going to start you at a higher fat protocol considerably higher than you're currently doing as high as, probably 80 percent of your calories coming from fat which is going to be a significant drop in protein than what you are currently consuming. However, don't let that don't let that shock you because I'm going to increase your protein and drop your fat week after week as we go throughout this this protocol. So we'll start you off the low protein that may cause some
initial GID. Grass may cause some initial just adjustment and finding the types of foods that hit those numbers, but worry, not because I guarantee we're going to start increasing the protein and simultaneously dropping the fat to figure out what your protein threshold is. So to speak. All that, while your total calories are going to be dropping, and then I'm going to start once once we reach that threshold on your protein, I'm gonna start dropping your protein as well, so they can.
The total caloric intake will continue to decrease All the while your body fat will be dropping and we will get you pretty lean when I found. This is kind of super high level for people at listening is that, you know when you're when you're starting a prep, I find it's very conducive to start with a higher fat protocol at the onset, which is basically going to ramp up your fat metabolism. And a lot of people have made post and showcased Research indicates that.
Hey, If you eat more fat, you burn more fat, but you're also more likely to store more fat and all that is true. However, within the context of these very acute changes that we're making it such a finite period of time. That's not necessarily going to be playing Us by any means. So we'll start with the higher fat protocol and then immediately start increasing protein thereafter.
And then, once the protein starts to decrease later on into this prep, you're basically going to prefer the higher fat ratio from a muscle preservation stem. A point. And from a hormonal hormonal standpoint, you know, standpoint. Because when your body fat gets really like, when you start getting sub five percent body fat, you know, you're not taking in. If you're doing a whole bunch of high protein, and this is what most body builders are doing.
This is kind of my issue with a lot of the traditional protocols. These guys that are doing very, very high protein with the intention of preserving as much lean mass as possible because protein is muscle sparing. Absolutely. But if you don't have hardly any diet, anybody fats on you two, To work with. Anyways, you'll harm hormones are going to tank and I mean satiety is all screwed up style is going to be screwed up.
Anyways, because you going to be hungry, but it really makes muzzle preservation harder in the context of the lower calories. If you have very little body fat to begin with and you're not taking it hardly any dietary fat. So keeping that variable right? As high as feasibly possible, seems to bode pretty well for competitors following a ketogenic prep protocol, okay.
Cool. That was a little bit of a mouthful here, you'll understand a lot more as we get into this but No, it makes sense because whenever I've done low protein, I've got down to just doing a high-protein low-fat. I've gotten down to like eight percent. And I stopped because it lid, I just got to a point where I was tired like, no matter what I did, I was just exhausted all the time. Hmm. You know? And I was like, okay, this is got to just be because I just have no fuel in my system.
Unless I start eating more fat, it was just like, you know, by 1:00 in the afternoon. Every day as I just want to take a nap. This is ridiculous. Mmm, Yeah. And honestly, man, like, when you're, I mean, you've got, you've got protein as an amino acid, you've got protein, as a, as a building block, for, for recovering, from your training, from for building, more muscle tissue. But when you're in a deficit, when you're in a competition prep, you're not really trying
to build more muscle tissue. The focus then becomes to preserve as much, lean muscle tissue as possible that you've built up to that point Brandon. There's several different ways to do. That. So, you know, Simply Having more calories is very muscle sparing. Like if you're in a caloric Surplus your likelihood of losing muscle is significantly decreased, but since that's not going to be the case, what other variables do? We have to pull one of which is simply continued resistance
training. So if you continue to subject the body and the muscles to the resistance, that you've been training at thus far, you're going to, you know, convince your by that needs that lean mass and preserve it accordingly. Another factor is to try and keep your Testosterone as high as possible in the context of a very low, calorie diet and low body fat. And one great way of doing that, in the context of low body fat
is to take in more dietary fat. So having that variable a little bit higher is going to help with the muscle preservation and overall energy as well. So kind of optimizing for these variables as we go through and see how your body individually responds to it, all is going to be. That's what that's what it's all about, man.
That is what it's all about. So a couple other things that I would encourage you to do. So just to kind of give you an idea of what to expect on my end, I'm going to make this and then I do this, I do this for all my clients, I'm going to make you a Google spreadsheet and it spreadsheets going to have your Macros, which I'll adjust on a weekly basis typically. I adjust those Max, okay, awesome. Friday for the coming week. So you'll see those every every Friday or Saturday get updated.
For the coming week because we'll be changing macros every single week. Basically, with the intention of applying a steady consistent pressure over the course of the entire prep. And so you just take those numbers, those gold, macros plug that into your macro tracker and then try and get within about 5 grams of those goal, macros every single day, every single week as we go forward. Okay? Sounds good. I'll send you a sample meal plan as well.
That matches your first weeks macros, but don't feel like you're obligated. Gated to stick to a sample meal plan by any means as long as you're hitting the numbers and it's all coming from good quality sources. I'm happy, right? And then you said, you have access to an embodies that at the gym. Is that at your house that sits at home? Okay. Perm. About, do you weigh yourself pretty regularly or no?
Not reused. Again most of the data Gathering that I do is more when I'm trying to change or experiment. Something so honored regular basis, I don't I can, but when I'm curious about what's happening because I made a change or something like that, they don't have on there so I can hop on there and then we can get a baseline set of numbers and go from there. Okay, perfect, perfect. So yeah, there's a column in that spreadsheet with your
Macros for your daily weight. So as you step on the scale, you know, first thing in the morning, just throw that number in that spreadsheet. Call them as well. Graduates going to fluctuate like it's going to go up. It's gonna go down. You can do a heavy leg day, it's going to go up the next day. From water retention if you're traveling, or if you don't sleep. Good. It's going to go up from water retention so don't let that that weight, fluctuation.
I mean, you know, this still not that that dress is your head or anything. But it's good information for me to have because I can kind of see, you know, how how the different factors from a macro standpoint or responding with your body and then we can make better adjustments for you going forward. All let's see, what else? What else? Yeah man. I mean that's pretty much all the information I need to get started. I'll build That this spreadsheet, I'll get your initial macros.
I'll get all that sent to you and then we can just freaking hit the ground running and and awesome. How do you deal with? Because I'm expecting, if I get, you know, one of the things from an aesthetic clinic view that you that I hear a lot people, that lose a lot of weight, is, what do you do about loose skin? Chances are that I will pray will be something that I'll probably deal with two degree
getting this low. Because I know just the way that I've lost over the past few years, I still have Some some bagginess I've never been able to get rid of what do you tell people when it comes to you know they get really lean or they lose a lot of weight. They've got this extra skin what do they do with it? Yes I'm in. A lot of people honestly just kind of view that extra skin. It's like a badge of honor and I can totally respect that
mentality. There's not really any like supplement or you know cream or lotion that's going to, you know, make it disappear by any means. Honestly, the best thing you can do is just continue to build more. Muscle over time and that will help fill out that skin. Yeah, I've even got some loose skin. Every time I do a competition prep because I used to be 20 or 30 pounds at one point. So I've got some loose skin from that.
Now as you do get into a deficit like it will shrink up a bent for sure but it's not going to be like stretch super tight because you know skin is not as malleable and that regard over a very short, prep protocol period, right? So I would just kind of, you know, take it as it comes and And just embrace it when it does get there. Cool sounds good? Yeah, I'm excited, man. It's gonna be cool to see see what happens to I'm curious to see, like, a lot of people with bodybuilding and with like,
competition, perhaps on stuff. Like there's not really any magic or Miracle or quickfix cure total, it's just simply the the consistency and the discipline Illustrated out over you know weeks and months without for you.
And a lot of times people, man, they are Rock Solid for weeks and then maybe even a month or two and then all of a sudden they have to go to a party and something happened and they wind up totally going off the rails and eating everything in sight, which all kind of plays into that sustainability Factor. You know, you got to find, you got to dig deep to find that motivation as to why you're doing this in the first place.
So for me, having actual show date on the calendar that says hey look, I'm going to be stepping on stage in front of all these people come hell or high water on this date, no matter what. Is always in the back of my mind and ensures that I don't ever deviate. Yeah. So like I don't know what your grounding, you know, pillar is going to be but definitely have something that's going to keep you accountable so that you don't start straying as things start to get right monotonous,
right? Yeah. No. I think honestly, I think the, the cruise is what's comes up to comes in my mind first awesome. Just thinking about just think about the cruise and thinking about that being the Showcase. This is gonna be the Savage protocol showcase, man. There you go man. There you go. Well, if you if you nail my macros and I know I mean I know you know what you're doing with regard to the training. I know, you know how to move.
I don't know how to train. I know you had, I don't know how to do all these things. So if you do my macros and you do so over the next several months, I can 100% guarantee. You you're gonna look freaking shredded on that cruise. All right, let's do it. Awesome, man. I'm not going to say. I'm not little scared. Hey, don't be scared. Don't be scared.
Just you're gonna do. Just he's just gonna be so different from what you're used to, because you're so much higher protein then and there's gonna be a time in this prep, where the fat is dropping in the protein is rising.
So, there might be a time where your Macros, in the this protocol are not too different from what, your Macros are currently, probably different lower calories, obviously, but probably pretty similar ratio, but it's honestly, just a simply simply a matter of getting to that point when it comes, you know, right? Okay. Yeah, so I actually just ordered, I think I would like a
month supply of Peter brick. So I got that coming in shortly and then I guess we'll just go. And so I'm assuming I'm going to be eating one of those, a day at least, right? I wanted a, I never. I never, you know, say that people have to eat bricks to follow this protocol because that's certainly not a requirement, they're so good. Well, I'm pretty, I'm pretty fond of.
I mean, honestly, that this is the reason the bricks are even a thing because of my competition prep It economy, they just right for me to get my Pro card and get freaking shredded. And it provides like if you don't eat carbs and you don't need a lot of veggies. I love me just as much as the next person. But every once in a while, it's kind of nice to have a different taste or Texture.
And the brick satisfy that craving of mine, you know, perfectly so I don't ever feel like that missing anything. Yeah. Yeah, awesome, Aunt. Well, I'll start getting this spreadsheet built out. I'll start getting this sample meal plan built out of get all your Macros to you. Um, I'm going to basically treat you. Like, I do all my other clients, so there's a software. Appreciate it Slack. Are you familiar with slack? Yes, perfect, perfect.
So, that's what I use for my daily client communication. So, I'll send you an invite to my slack Channel. And then anytime you have any questions about, you know, a certain ingredient or certain foods or how things are affecting your digestion, or what your training is doing, like anything at all. By all means, just shoot me a message in slack and I'll get you answered man. Awesome dude. Appreciate it. This is going to be interesting. Yeah I'm excited.
Oh one more thing try and take bi-weekly and by that I mean every other week progress pictures under similar lighting and background you know try and find us a consistent spot in your house or Jam or something where you can take just, you know, front side back pictures every two weeks just as so that we can see how things are changing independent of, what the Awaits doing okay sure. Okay. What are some of the end? We don't need to go into this now, but there's going to be a point.
I can guarantee you where I'm going to need some Mental, some mental tools added to my toolbox to deal with the challenges that the hunger is going to be the biggest thing for me.
Mhm. Yeah. So that's, that's something I need to will need to talk about 100% minutes and that's why I that's one of the reasons why I always view this sport, the sport of bodybuilding as a mental support more so than a physical one, I mean this you're going to learn more about who you are at the freaking core of your being over the next five months than you. Lies or that's not ominous at all. It's good though, man. That's good. It's a gift of adversity right there, brother, right?
Okay. Cool man. Appreciate it. Well, I think I'm ready to go if you got anything else. What are we going to adders? We good, we good man. Go ahead and try and take those initial progress, pictures and shoot those over to me. That way, I can kind of have those as I'm building out your
Macros, your initial macros. Yes. And you have that data, that you have handy, just shoot that over to me. I'll get all your Macros builds up and I'll send all that spreadsheet, slack, invite Etc, and everything to you through there, and then for the purpose of documenting, all this on this podcast and just going forward, we had to do like a, you know, every two months or something updated podcast, interviewing. You kind of tell us how things are going. We can go over this, do that
stuff like that. Okay, the other thing too, I'm thinking this is just popping, my head is. What if we did? I mean I Is my channel but what if there was a hashtag, I'll just hash tag The Savage protocol Ketone cutout star trap, or something like that. So again, Dukey do contest prep you do contest prep. Yeah, you know, a ketogenic bodybuilding or any of that stuff. I mean that would harm test prep hashtag. Okay? And I will start documenting what I'm doing.
And shouting you out on, on the social medias awesome. And I'm excited to roll up my sleeves and see what we can do with this. Damn show though, man, you're going to be doing that. That 50-plus Masters Division, and you're going to be just taking names and kicking but we'll see, we'll see, I'm not going to say no, but I don't don't, don't be surprised. It never happens. All right, we'll just see where that, where that when that time comes. Alright man.
Thank you very much. You bet, man, for anybody, that's listening to this and doesn't know about you or where to find you. Where's what's your platform? Oh, for me. So if you go to the Apex Training, system.com, you'll find my website. If you go to Facebook and look, forward, Apex health and fitness that is the group that I support people. And on YouTube, my YouTube channel is get fit with Coach, Bronson. Awesome, man, I'll be turning Lincoln to those platforms as well.
And yeah, man. Just if definitely keep in touch. You'll get all that stuff through. Slack, I'll send you an invite through your email and then we'll just keep Keep on rockin and Rollin, brother whom I appreciate it. Take care Bronson. I was a pleasure. Ma'am, thanks a lot. See you?