Latest / Project StrengthCast / A complete playbook to powerlifting coaching | Ep.9 ft. Norman Cheung
Transcript
- jay: everyone. welcome to episode nine of Project Strengthcast. Today we are joined by Norman Chung, who is the head of Strong Ambitions Coaching. Norman is an expert in the field of powerlifting. He's an amazing educator and he coaches some of the strongest people that I currently follow. Norman is possesses a wealth of knowledge and has immense practical application over years in terms of the sport of powerlifting. The objective today is to kind of translate fundamental ideas to coaches and see how they should, in fact, create a system and move about actually adjusting it when things fall apart. Having personally done Norman's mentorship, I can tell you something. If you can understand the foundations that Norman is going to talk about today, you will have a much better, clearer idea of how to approach powerlifting programming. I have learned a ton from the man, and I hope it's the same for all of you guys. We are very excited for this episode and hope all of you enjoy what we are about to talk about today. Tapas: Yeah. So welcome Norman. Yeah, I'm just gonna give an introduction on today's topic list as you guys can see here. first we're gonna be talking about navigating training doses. We can discuss the whole dose response relationship, the fundamentals, you know, how we actually decide what to program based off of that. then we're gonna be talking about problem solving in powerlifting coaching. for athletes and even coaches. this should help coaches out especially quite a bit. So yeah. we're also going to be discussing how to actually build a training system, what it is and why you should be doing it, and also how you should be doing it. Failure and success in the sport, both as a coach, as an athlete, this is another important topic that we thought needs to be addressed. And we're going to be ending with a topic that a lot of people were excited about when I posted this on Instagram, which is what is lacking in powerlifting education both in India and worldwide, and what can be done to kind of fix it, to work around it. We also will have like a question session at the end. and then we'll just have like little discussion at the end. Yeah. So let's just get into it and let's start. jay: So Norman, I think one of the biggest questions a lot of people wanna understand is what is training those? What is dose response relationship and why is it important to have a fundamental understanding of these topics? Norman Cheung: So, okay, so this is a really big question because we we we talk about this a lot, right? We talk about training dose and dose response. The way I think about the training dose is obviously your training dose is constructed by all the volume, the intensity, and the frequency that you've made in a program, right? So that's what your training dose is. When it comes to the training dose, there's really two terms. That I like to think about, which is the absolute training dose and the relative training dose. Now, there are there are going to be like quite a few different coaches that conceptualize training dose very differently. Like you got the RTS guys who think about training stress and they'll try to quantify it like that. Stress that stressfulness that's been imposed on the athlete. The way I think about it is you've got your relative training dose. So if you think about relative training dose being like your volume and the equivalent intensity that you're working at, and then you've got your absolute training load, which is the load that you're actually lifting. And so when it comes to Navigating the training doses, I think it helps quite a lot for people to be able to distinguish the two. And the reason why it's important to be able to distinguish the two is going to be necessary for you to understand the difference between progress and progression. Right? Because whenever you deal with like a lot of the sort of younger lifters or newer coaches. they'll automatically use a lot of progression. mostly because they're, you know, it's something that you guys mentioned before, right? It's that sort of you know, copy and paste type sort of culture that happens, right? Because you'll you obviously don't have some you you don't you don't have a mental model for being able to make these decisions. And people often conflate the progression of the relative training dose with progress, right? So If you understand that Difference between progress and progression and absolute training dose and relative training dose, then you will understand progressive overload. Does that make sense? so one of the things that I often try to get people to understand whenever they start working with me is you don't necessarily need progression in a relative training dose in order for progress to occur. Right. And that's a that's something that a lot of people have a hard time wrapping their head around. Right. Like, why why would you not increase the RPE? Why would you not increase the intensity? How are you going to get stronger like that? And it it's it's it's a fundamental misunderstanding of what it means for you to be working in a productive training dose. Does it make sense? So those those are, you know, when it comes to like navigating training dose. First thing that I would always say to people, just understand that to begin with, before you start to think about how what sort of periodization models you're going to implement, what sort of progression models that you're going to implement. Like if you don't understand this, you're going to be blindly pushing people like continuously without any sort of awareness. Tapas: More than you need to. Norman Cheung: Yeah, without any sort of awareness of whether they need that progression. Or even have any sort of idea of if you are going to use some sort of progression, where do you need progression to? Right. So those are the sort of things that I think about. Tapas: I know there's gonna be a few people the the difference between progress and progression, we c we kind of wanna discuss that as well. jay: Yeah, i if you Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. jay: could just mention Norman Cheung: Mm-hmm. jay: that. Norman Cheung: Okay, fine. So I define because the problem is that like linguistically, like one word is a derivative of another. Right. And I think that the language can cause a lot of confusion because people use these words interchangeably, right? Progression, progress. We need to progress it. We need use progression. Right. But I find it easier to conceptualize Progress as the increase in performance and progression as the increase in stimulus. Right? So if you understand that. You understand that for a given training dose, there is a potential that this dose can be an overloading stimulus. It jay: Mm. Norman Cheung: is very possible that you can give someone a repeated training dose and for progress to occur, even though there may not necessarily be progression in the actual stimulus or relative stimulus or relative training dose, if you will. And this is like You know, th there's two good examples of this, right? Like if you if you were to give a beginner, you know, fixed volume, fixed RP, it's very likely they'll make a lot of linear progress, right? And there's no Tapas: Mm. Yeah. Norman Cheung: progression in intensity, there's no progression. You may not necessarily need progression in like your reps in reserve, but you can easily be training at a level that will stimulate you and For you to see adaptation occur week after week. And if you look at some of the coaches out there, their systems are predicated around this sort of fixed repeated training dose, right? So, you know, if you if if your audience may or may not be aware of RTS's emerging strategies, their block designs is based on this repeated training dose, right? And And there's a lot of wisdom that comes to that, right? It it it's first of all, it demonstrates that you do not need progression in the stimulus in order for progress to occur. And the idea is to find, you know, making whilst you go through your process of designing an initial microcycle, you let that stimulus repeat itself and for the adaptation to naturally occur. So that you know and and and for people who are unfamiliar with that, that can seem quite alien, but they've obviously developed world-class, you know, highly trained athletes Tapas: At least. Yeah. Norman Cheung: with that system. So Kaushal Sumedh: Mm. Norman Cheung: you know that that that that those are sort of the things to be aware of. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, I think people get really confused with RTS because they have a very static RPE model. Tapas: Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: And then they then they just like think like, then how do you even gain momentum week to week, or like what's the concept behind it? But the whole idea Norman Cheung: Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: is to keep that training dose itself, like that stimulus itself the same. Right? Like you're not looking to increase the RP. You're just keeping the RP the same. But you're Norman Cheung: Mm. Kaushal Sumedh: allowed you're allowing the athlete to adapt every single training day and then seeing how they adjust into that system and then you make changes. That's what RTS does. Tapas: Often the absolute load Norman Cheung: Yeah. Tapas: can also like go up at the same RP, right? So that can also be Yeah, yeah, yeah that's what Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, that that that's the whole thing, right? With RP, it's like your your the dose the the load is not static. It's the RP that's static. The load on the bar changes based Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: off of multiple other external factors or Tapas: Yeah. Exactly, yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: anything else, or whatever other Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: factors there are. But like you're not looking at one specific loading dose. You're looking at RPE being the same and then you're just you're just managing the load according to the RP that you feel is accurate for that day of that training day, right? So week after Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: week you'll have the same static RP top set, and then they'll they'll kind of adjust or titrate stimulus based off of how you are able to adjust and manage, you know, your recovery and how your progress is looking. Like as you said, progress is performance, how your lifts are showing up week to week. And if it is showing up, then we have like a good microcycle dosage for you. And if we don't, then you make adjustments. like to put it in a more simpler like like an example Tapas: Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: sort of way. Tapas: Yeah, yeah. jay: I I I would just say like N Norman, like when when we kind of started working when I started working under you and you you talk telling me about this stuff is that how the second week shows up is a by product of the first week, right? Wha what what what was what was prior to that is what caused us an out. Norman, if you wanna say something there. Norman Cheung: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I was I was going to add, like, loosely speaking, it's it's you can like this is obviously a very simplified model of of interpreting data, right? But like the consequences of what is happening in subsequent weeks is a consequence of what you've done before, right? So jay: Yeah. Norman Cheung: this this obviously relates to you know this SRA curve, which you know, if your audience members want to check out some of what And as I've said in a previous episode, you know, go back to that episode. yeah. jay: No, I I was just saying like like as as rudimentary and basic as this example is if three sets of five at RP six, there's no load attached to that. Right. There is an a a a certain amount of stimulus required of the athlete to kind of train towards. And if that three sets of five the first week for RP six was like, let's say a hundred kilos, if that was enough, like Norman said to overload someone, then you don't need to kind of drive up more progression into that situation. If you make them kind of repeat that thing the second time, because the person that shows up the second week. is a byproduct of the one that did the first week. So they are no longer the same individual. Or they could be if it is like a maintenance dose. But that's where we kind of I suppose we'll kind of get a bit more into detail into that. But essentially Norman Cheung: Mm-hmm. jay: like you don't have to change the stimulus. Sometimes the ch stimulus is sufficient enough to create overload and the athlete changes. I think Norman Norman Cheung: Yeah. Yeah. jay: kind of like hammered this into my head where it's like if you're always changing the stimulus and you're just ramping it mindlessly, you are not sure if you are changing the athlete. Right? Because Tapas: Mm. jay: you are just essentially like Highlighting what the athlete can do, but you are probably not changing them. That's why you wanna kind of have a system that caters to both aspects. Norman Cheung: Yeah. And you know, I I what you know, one of the things that I have definitely integrated within my toolkit is the idea of, you know, creating these training blocks with static microcycles, right? but I wouldn't necessarily, you know, personally in my system I'm I like to think of my system as being like rad radically pragmatic, right? So Is about doing what works and using whatever tool that you need to create success out of the athlete. You know, there are there are still trade-offs when you come to do that, right? Like, even though you may be hey, you know, like let's say you respond really well to these static microcycles, what what are the trade-offs with that? You know, there are obviously going to be trade-offs which You know, assuming that we have buy-in from the athlete, you know, what is you know, what one of the sort of philosophies that I think about when it comes to how you decide what progression models you use is like how much do you care about just pure raw data and doing what works versus what's the athlete experience of going through that process, right? Like How many people actually enjoy the idea of you know doing these static microcycles? Some people, you know, may enjoy having these sort of pulled back, lighter weeks where they are not so you know, where they're not so mentally demanding, and then they can also experience weeks where they can lock in and push more, right? Which is what Which I think is a big reason why I think a lot of people like this sort of ascending RPE into week four type programming, right? Like there are merits to both. And it's just about fitting the profile, you know, the strategy to the profile of the lifter. and ultimately, like there are world champion power lifters who've been on both systems. So You know, i i if if your system is so rigid that you wouldn't even consider it, you may not necessarily end up getting an athlete be able to gel with your programming, right? So that's the way I think about it. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. I think I think the other problem with like some something with very static RP is like you you really need the athlete to be able to you know, like really separate himself from the load or or themselves from the load and only focus on RPE to able to yield results in the first place. 'Cause Jay and I were talking about it a while ago where we were like, Yeah, I don't think that system is is something that you can just apply on any athlete. It's very hard to apply on most athletes because they won't understand that We're not looking to ramp up the r the load every single week. We're not looking for like a five ten kgs plus from last week, last week, right? I mean, i if you're if you're using like a ramping up RP model, in essence you're kind of also ramping up load, assuming all else is equal, right? Even though you still want to go by RP. Let's say like like you did 120 kgs this week at RP six, but next week your sleep and everything was really bad. So even though there's an RP7 program, maybe your 110, you've already hit an RP7, right? So you stay there. You don't push into 130. Usually people do that thing, but they're like, did 120 last week, but then I kind of have to do 130 now. Because like, how else am I going to progress, right? Whereas, like, Tapas: Yeah, that's Kaushal Sumedh: yeah, I mean, regardless of whether you're keeping static RP or not, you Tapas: Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: have to follow the RP for the day. But I think the bigger problem is that when you have static RP models, they just don't see the way that. There is going to be some form of momentum and progress happening. But they don't really see yeah. Gone. Yeah. Norman Cheung: especially yeah and especially if they i i it it's very difficult process to buy into early Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: on especially if you are someone who's impatient because like one Kaushal Sumedh: Yes. Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: if you ever do you know i i did mike t shirts emerging strategies and one of the Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: potential responses is that you just get this flatness for a while before it before jay: Exactly. I was gonna say that, yeah. Norman Cheung: adaptation starts to occur. And it's like and and sometimes you you you may not necessarily land on an initially good microcycle. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: and so it it it's when you have that failure, especially if you have a slightly younger lifter and you know not a lifter who's already massively experienced, it's very hard for you know li younger lifters or newer lifters to buy into that process. you know especially if they do have a lot of misconceptions and preconceptions. So yeah and sometimes you know for for slightly younger lifters e even even if it you know even though you know that using a progressive intensity model isn't the thing that's necessarily driving the progress. Sometimes it's just being able to see the numbers go up is enough for lifters to just like, hey, go with it, you know, and have something to look forward to, look forward to and push. But yeah, I think I think the the psychological component of it is is is important. Even if you haven't quite found, you know, found the right training dose across the miso cycle, like you it still kind of buys you a bit of a a bit more time for you to like adjust the variables to you know manage the pacing and momentum. But yeah, those are those are some of the things we're thinking about. jay: I I would say like I to the degree that maybe l I would love your like guys' input on this as well. Like when you have that ramping system there, you at least you kind of get to start to see different environments in which you are like exposing the athlete to. So that kind of gives you a bit more broad spectrum to then further on narrow down into that area. Like when Norman and I ca like first worked out, like he was saying, like, you know, if you go from intensity seventy, seventy two, seventy four, seventy six, a basic example like that. And you find within a certain environment of that ramp up they perform best, then you can kind of then further narrow this thing down again, right? like you said, the RTS. Tapas: Try to keep them in that range. Yeah. jay: Yeah, exactly. Cause like when Norman says the RTS course, I was gonna mention that because when Mike does talk about that, I think they have three or four types of individuals. Those that are flat and then they peak. Those that are like slightly flat peak then dip and then peak again. Like they have Tapas: Hmm. jay: these kind of different like individuals there, right? And with social Norman Cheung: Yeah. jay: media being a factor, we're all kind of know, especially in India, like guys want to show off what they can do on a week four, even if it costs them the next two blocks. Right. So i I would say like if an athlete can kind of understand that static microcycle b like value, it becomes a very valuable tool in the long run, right? but like Norman says, buy in becomes all the more important, I feel. Norman Cheung: Yeah. Because yeah, and and it really depends on the personality as well. Like you know, we we we talk about models of you know models that we use for training doses, like we can also model people's personalities as well, right? And and use that to inform you. I don't know if you guys have are aware of like put the big five personal personality type Tapas: Yeah. jay: Yeah, yeah, Norman Cheung: model, right? jay: yeah. Norman Cheung: Now that's something that I'm a really big fan of and like once you learn it, you sort of you can't unsee it in people. And so one of the things that I think about is you know, how agreeable or disagreeable is this lifter, right? Because if you've got a lifter who's highly disagreeable, like it's gonna be a very huge uphill battle. not always, sometimes it can be a very you know big uphill battle with trying to convince them of like their own, you know, the errors of their own sort of preconceptions and misconceptions. And I, you know, I've definitely dealt with lifters who are like that. And if you add neuroticism to that as well, like it just becomes a huge like headache. But yeah, like I think, you know, i if you if you are the you know, if you do end up dealing with someone who, let's say, is highly disagreeable, right? And they're very sort of especially if they're also a coach as well. If they're very if they have very strong beliefs about certain things, you're going to need to think about how you're going to navigate training doses, you know, leveraging their own beliefs, right? And I like to think about how I, you know, how to do that as well. because it it's useful. I mean, alternatively, you could decide, you know, if if if you're not willing to if there's a level of boundaries at which you are able to navigate within your system, or like if there's if you have boundaries for what you are willing to do or not do, then obviously like you know i i if if if there is no mutual agreement on how you're going to approach the designing of training plots then the Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: the you know the the relationship's not gonna work and i've definitely had like situations like that where where lifters are also coaches as well and they're also really hell bent on using certain progression models or or you know use certain strategies within the designing of the training block and Know it eventually it just becomes very difficult to work with, but you know, it is what it is. and yeah, so you know, an another thing that I often think about when it comes to navigating training doses is also like you need to use mental models. I think one of you know, the I I I've only ever come across one coach who's ever spoken about mental models or or or the idea of using mental models for coaching judgment, which is actually from an Olympic weightlifting coach actually, called Chris Speed from the UK. I I saw that he mentioned that, but I've not, you know, people talk about models in terms of like periodization models, you know, how we model fitness and fatigue and stuff like that. Those are your sort of scientific models. But how, you know, how do we use mental models In terms of like the ongoing decision making, right? So that's one of the things that I think about as well. and one of the sort of you know, since we're talking about navigating training doses, one of the sort of mental models that I sort of borrowed from medicine actually, which is the idea of titration, right? So you know, if you if you go to the doctor's and you know this this is obviously an example of thinking in analogy, right? Like this is a very similar situation where you're dealing with something that has a variable of doses and there is a dangerous amount of dose, there's also an effective dose. You know, that's very similar. You know, you you Tapas: Hmm. Norman Cheung: have that in medicine, you also have that in in in powerlifting, right? and so I I sort of borrowed that sort of mental model for navigating training doses. and the way I think about navigating training doses is thinking about like if you were to picture the infinite possibilities of where someone needs to be, right? And the person that you have in front of you could be someone who needs like a high training load, like you know, high training volume, like a medium bound training volume, and or lower training volume, right? and you could gamble on them being average, right? So if you if you systematically always start someone at the average level of volume and intensity, you'll probably create success out of 70 to 80 percent, right? But then you probably do a massive disservice upon those people who are on the outliers. So I've been thinking about this a lot because, like, you know, you you, you know, as a coach, you don't want to just settle for having a process that works for the average person. You want to have Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: a process that helps you navigate the training doses that allows you to individualize it for as many people as possible. And without stabbing in the dark. Like how do you come up with a process of being able to navigate that whilst being safe with the prescription of the training line, right? And so that's why that's how I borrowed the idea of titration from medicine, which is to always see whether you can start people off from a low training dose, right? And then monitor the the response and then titrate the training dose upwards. You know, and if it you know, worst case scenario, if it is the case that you end up under training someone, hey, the easy fix is just to dial it back up, right? Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: All right, so you know, not a great experience. you know, you got you detrained a little bit, but you can dial it back up. But you know, if you if you try to go the other way and you injure someone, hey, that injury could last for ages, right? So I Kaushal Sumedh: Yes. Yeah. Norman Cheung: think about you know, the this is what I sort of visualize when I think about ment you know, using mental models to help visualize how you're gonna navigate the process of figuring out the training dose. Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, I was I was gonna say that like the opposite just doesn't work the same. Like if you just start Tapas: Hm. Kaushal Sumedh: low, you always have the opportunity to just go higher and then like you know, see if that works. And if it doesn't, then you can just go even higher after that. But if you start off like super high, as you said, there's a very high chance of just redlining things and then Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: that injury just could just la last for a very long time. You're just gonna set yourself back for a very long time. So it's always better to start off Norman Cheung: Yeah. Yeah. I did yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: like at a at at like an acceptable training dosage. Norman Cheung: Mm. Kaushal Sumedh: And then if that's too low, then of course you can always make adjustments. But the opposite like people yeah, that that's the thing. Like people might make the argument like why not the opposite and then 'cause you know, but that that can always lead to like much si much more severe consequences. Norman Cheung: Yeah, is is you you you you play out every potential possibility and Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: then you weigh up like hey, you know, what's the risk if you go this way and what's the risk if go this way? And then there's Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Yeah. Norman Cheung: also a risk if you go right in the middle, which is you might get mediocre good results. But how Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: like how are you going to navigate which direction you're gonna go down? jay: Exactly. Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: What what signals are you going to use for that? Right? So, you know, and and and this is why obviously, like, you know, if if someone needs a high Training dose, right? Obviously, you know, it's gonna take a long time before you get to where they need to go to if you always start in someone at super low doses, right? And so this is where gathering evidence comes into play when it comes to you know analyzing past training histories, right? and so you know when it comes to You know, one of the things I obviously talk about is you you need to develop a system. And one of the you know subsystem within your coaching system is you need a system for being able to analyze the needs of an athlete, right? Your preliminary needs analysis is going to be an important part of your coaching system. And so within the what's the word within that. You you need to be able to, you know, without go, you know, especially if you're dealing with someone who's had like four, five, six, seven years of training, you're not gonna be able to what's the word analyse every single training week that the athlete has done. And also the relevance of really old training, you know, diminishes over time, right? And so one of the things that I sort of created as like a you know I I use it as a leak magnet is this program analyzer right so for you to be able to quickly plug in sets reps and RPE or sets reps and percentages that you used just to give you a very quick snapshot for you to be able to compare like two blocks of training right Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: and so you know the and I found that to be quite useful for analyzing training history from what do you call it? Analyzing training history of athletes. So, yeah, like and and you you build a picture up of like, hey, when were you when were you last making progress? When did you last stall? And when did you last feel like you were making really good progress? And then you just take a snapshot. just to see like are there any clues. Like you don't use it to d dictate what you do, you use it just to like inform you if there is like big clues. Yeah. Tapas: Understand where you're at. Yeah. Norman Cheung: Right. You know, because if you think about the reasons why athletes go to coaches, it's either they, you know, if they haven't had a coach before and they've just there probably been cookie cutter hop in between like cookie cutter programs, right? Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: or they worked with a coach and they sort of like either plateaued due to like the performance just not changing, or or they've been injured. And regardless of the situation, like you can use this tool just to get a quick snapshot of like, okay, you know, how many reps were you doing here? Where is a lot of the intensity concentrated? and you know, just to help inform like. Is there are there clues to where a good starting point may be, right? Because if you're if you're gonna start everyone at like two to three working sets per week and build them back up, like it might be a very inefficient way of exploring someone's like productive training dose. So, you know, because we don't, you know, we don't want to be too inefficient, we wanna use this needs analysis. Help inform us, like, hey, are there clues to like where a good range of volume may be? Right. And so those are the sort of things that I do within the needs analysis. Call it. jay: I I I think that's where the the the that's where the issue kind of happens, right? I I we'll touch upon this in the education system and like what's missing in terms of powerlifting education. But I feel like my confidence as a coach started to grow not from when I realized what I could do what works, but how to interpret data when something doesn't work and how to tweak from that kind of a situation. 'Cause I I think a lot of times people make random calls their programming simply because they've taken one shot in the dark. And it stopped working. Now they're like, what do I do from here? What are the dials I need kind of track back? And this is Norman Cheung: Yeah. Yeah. jay: where we kind of come back to like where how do you view training dose in that situation, right? Because you I cause for forgive me, like this is this is a thing that's often spoken about, right? Like if a certain session shows up X, then you do Y in the previous session and that should probably like kind of cause an outcome in terms of what you would want, right? Like like just in terms of that that narrative, right? Like can you expand a bit on that, Norman? Like, you know, if a certain session comes out flat constantly, what do we kind of look at in the prior session? Norman Cheung: So this is assuming that like all else is like covered, like, you know, you're dealing with an athlete with good technique and so on and so forth. so assuming that you're, you know, what one of the things that I think about first is I think about having a low resolution lens of training and a high resolution lens of training, right? a low resolution lens is kind of like, you know, Are are we blatantly training past what we can recover from? And you can easily, you know, like the the way I think about it is you can easily figure that one out by you know assuming like all lifestyle factors are optimized and so on. Because obviously, you know, if you've got lifestyle factors coming into play, then that's another conversation to have. you know, I I I think about like, okay, when was the last time you were making progress? And then you made that quick comparison and be like, you know, did we change the training dose dramatically? You know, did we suddenly start training at like on average five, you know, five percentages higher than before, right? and you know, i if if you're if you're in this constant state of flatness, the way I think about it is you're probably either at training at the maintenance dose. Or the maximal recoverable dose, or the spread of the intensity might not be quite right. So it you know, you you you may have a situation where there's not enough peak intensity, right? So if you think about one of the, you know, if you look at some of the research out there, one of the biggest variables that seems to, you know, that is obviously know one of the biggest factors for strength adaptations is absolute weight on a bar, right? and so sometimes it might be the case that actually, hey, the way you've programmed the the microcycle or mesocycle, there's just not enough higher exposures of intensity. So i if you've if you're in this constant state of flatness, one of the things that you could look at is like, you know, can we just increase our peak intensity exposure a little bit more? Right. and you know, let that play out and see, you know, if we are moving towards The right direction. Does it make sense? and then you could, you know, when it comes to manipulating the training days and stuff like that, that's what I would refer to as like having a higher resolution perspective. Like if if if there's if there's nothing obvious, like in a low resolution lens. Then you can like increase the resolution and start looking at the details of the training days. Like, are certain days? If you just like review the training weeks and you look at each of the sessions, like How are how's the stress of each session playing out? Like are athletes constantly being nerfed going into another session and that is having like a second order effect with subsequent training weeks, right? Or it, you know, we can zoom in even more by looking at like the the volume and intensity protocol that you've prescribed, right? You know, what one of the most like recent, most memorable situations that I had was I had this girl whose bench press was very flat. And I I've made a video about this as well. And all I did for us to like find progress again was we just turned her top set into a fatigue set without changing any sets, reps, and volume. I mean sets, reps, and intensity. And then she started making progress, right? So you know, these are some of the things that I I I think about when it comes to having a higher resolution perspective of of of a training program, right? So looking at you know, the the the prescription protocol, the protocol that's been prescribed. You know, what is the experience of doing, you know, if you are prescribing a top set and backup sets, what is the consequences of that top set's effects on the you know workable load in the backup sets, right? And and looking at how each session is impacting further sessions in terms of fatigue as well. So these are some of the questions that I ask, and these are some of the things that I look at. But I always go from a low resolution lens before looking at a high resolution lens. jay: Could I drop some questions here? 'Cause like when when we use certain terms, I just want people to kind of understand like what does it mean, right? Like for example, when Norman Cheung: Okay, cool. jay: we say that a certain day shows up flat, like w when something shows up flat, what do we mean by that? Right? Norman Cheung: Okay. jay: Yeah. Norman Cheung: So whenever we talk, you know, obviously like we're not just trying to optimize for days to feel stronger, right? We're not trying to minimize the effects of fatigue at all costs because you you end up just like training very little. whenever we talk about a day showing up flat, we're often talking about how a certain training day is always being nerfed because of like you know, a a a a a previous training session. You don't necessarily want every single session to progress equally at the same time all the time. But like if after like two, three training blocks, like there there seems to be, you know, this pattern of just this the performance of these sessions are just not improving, then you may want to look at like what was preceding it. Kaushal Sumedh: Hmm. jay: No, no, w when we Norman Cheung: That makes sense. jay: when we kinda talk about like in like the preceding sessions, right? And we talk about the things that could interfere. if it let's say it was an intensity issue, right? how should someone should they give them something like a top end set there? Or should they push one of the working sets RP a bit higher to get them a bit more intensity, right? Are there like different ways that someone can approach this? For example, can they add a fatigue set so that the working sets aren't like cooked by that introduction of a new top set. So there are different ways. Wha how what do you think are the valuable options coaches can use? Norman Cheung: question. So one of the things that I often look at is what seems to be the general behavior. Like f you know, first of all, before you make this analysis, you always let it run at least like one or two blocks just to get some data, right? Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Yeah. jay: Yep. Yep. Norman Cheung: One of the things that I look at is like what's the behavior of like the working set loads and the top set loads? Because that can often Know you cause because sometimes people can improve performance on you know multi-rep sets, but their top end just isn't coming. And when the top set isn't coming, that's often if you think about you know what that is, that that's that's absolute force production, right? So that often primes me to think about okay, can we can we increase the intensity somewhere, right? You know, if it is the case that like Just general intensification isn't working of the secondary day. Like so, just just driving intensity up on a secondary day isn't working. I may consider like playing around with the ret ranges. So let's say you three sets of five on a secondary day. I might turn that into either four sets of four or five sets of three, just to keep the volume the same, but just continue to intensify and see if that makes a difference. However, if I'm not to, you know, that's quite a dramatic change, right? But if I want to make a slightly more like a smaller change, I may consider just like introducing a fatigue set, right? Because you don't really care about like the absolute performance, you know, of of of your peak intensity exposure on your second days, right? Like. At the end of the day, what you want to do is just feel something relatively heavy. Does that make sense? So, you know, I I may introduce a fatigue single or a like or or just like intensify one of the last sets. so I I I've definitely had situations where I've turned, I don't know, like three sets of four into two sets of four, a triple and a single. So it's almost like a pyramid set. So I've kept the volume relatively the same, but I'm just, you know, because if you start to mess around with volume too much, you know, it can muddy the waters a little bit more. But I I like to keep the changes very obvious with what it is I've done that I'm changing. So I I've definitely done this and like I've you know, people end up doing like a send or not not ascended sets, pyramid sets. which can dramatically give you clues as to whether you're going towards the right direction or not. Yeah. jay: I think that's probably one Norman Cheung: And it? jay: the most no, I th I'd say like that's probably one of the most important things 'cause how do you like I think it's it's gonna come down to the thing you mentioned about if the top sets like on the primary day, let's say the top sets don't show up, but the working sets always move well, right? It it that data needs to be analyzed extremely well, right? 'Cause it kinda tells you that that top end exposure, the top end force production is what's limited. And how do you interpret that? I think that's why I don't know if Norman, do you still have the program analyzer up for people or like i is that still? Norman Cheung: Yeah, yeah. If you go to any of my what's the word? YouTube videos, it's in the description box. You just click it and you you'll get to download it. jay: Yeah. Because because that that that tells us kind of like very important things, right? Like what is the missing link? Because egg again, like we all kind of understand this that top end strength expression and just general movement expression are two different skills, right? They're they are they are overlap one another, but they are different skills inherently, right? And when one of the skill is lacking, Norman Cheung: Mm. Yeah. jay: that's where we wanna kinda start to interpret things, to the most, right? I I I do wanna ask like a personal question here. Like guys, feel free to like in like like cut me down on this, but when you have like 'cause Norman, is it okay if I mention your model like competence, capacity, performance? Right? Norman Cheung: yeah yeah yeah yeah go for it. Yeah yeah go for it. jay: so like it w when you look at somebody who does not have the requisite competence, like they don't know how to move inherently in itself, right? These questions about titrating up intensity and things like that, are they questions that a coach should ask on a client like that or an athlete like that? Norman Cheung: So, all right, let's talk about my model of profiling lifters, right? So, you you know how we have this traditional way of like calling someone a beginner, intermediate, or advanced. I like to think about whether they need to develop competency, capacity, or performance, right? So just you know, this is just like a very this is just another mental model of how I make very quick decisions on like what an athlete needs and what the general nature, what a low resolution. you know, perspective of of what a training program might look like. So if someone is a, you know, if someone's lifts, lift or lifts is at like competency. Basically we're at we're in a position where they don't move the way we want them to move, regardless of the intensity. Capacity is kind of like The person has good technique, but their form breaks down at higher levels of intensity. And then, you know, you've got your performance athletes, which is like, okay, their technique is pretty consistent all the way up to a one by one, a RP10. And so you can just focus on just optimizing volume intensity. When you are dealing with an athlete who is still either establishing movement, so this might be your absolute beginner, or it might be, you know, working on Building their capacity. One of the things that I think about is before I start to think about like the nuances of volume intensity is that the nature of the volume and intensity needs to be able to facilitate you know technique change or movement biomechanical changes, right? Because if you're gonna give someone really high intensity, you know, d this is something that I think Jamie talks about, which is his mo was it called again? sensory motor continuum. Right? You've been through his stuff. And and that that's definitely that's a model that I've like integrated within my coaching model. You know, it you know if you if you want someone to feel and learn a movement, like that intensity needs to be low. It needs to be able to facilitate that. But if the intensity or like the distressfulness of the prescription is so hard that they can't focus on movement and they have to focus on you know force expression then you might not necessarily facilitate the change that you necessarily want to see. So like and that that sort of fundamentally sets the tone of how I may make decisions about how I'm managing you know volume and intensity especially When comes to equivalent percentage of one max and RP as well. Yeah. jay: No, I I I just wanna chuck something up here. one of the r reasons, for example, I like a little bit more like higher volume sets. I I learned from normal, like when we were kinda starting off, is that I kinda trace it back to any other sport you play, right? like for example the dose, right? When you talk about training dose, you can't separate volume and intensity, right? You pick certain Norman Cheung: Mm-hmm. jay: prep ranges, kinda cater someone to certain like intensity zones. What I've kind of realized is it's like repeated technique, right? you want to learn how to jab hard in boxing. I know norman you just start a boxing, if I'm not mistaken. Like you you want to kind of like, shit, my bad. Norman Cheung: Taking a break. jay: My bad, I didn't see to that. but it's like you don't learn how to jab hard by jabbing hard. You learn how to jab Norman Cheung: Yeah. jay: hard by like repeatedly kind of jabbing slow, and then you just get get that crisp technique, right? I I I kind of find the fact that you're giving someone multiple exposures towards a movement pattern at low enough intensities. It just becomes second nature ingrained into them. Norman Cheung: Mm. jay: I I may get like a lot of stick for this thing, but I sometimes think that variations of a lift have to be kind of earned because I always kind of look at things like pause deadlifts, for example. A lot of people do not have the ability to deadlift the competition style itself. So when they kind of give like something like a pause deadlift, I've seen people like just get worse off of something like that because of the adaptation it kind of creates. for people like that kinda wanna understand this thing. Like at lower intensities you learn how to move. And at higher intensities you're expressing how you want how you will move kind of situation, right? Norman Cheung: Well, you know, the one one thing I will say is you're still learning how to move because like the way you jay: Yep, yep. Norman Cheung: I mean this is the sort of nuance, right? You don't suddenly stop doing technique work when you're doing high-intensity exposures. Yeah, because at the end of the day, like I'll I'll give you a really good example, right? How you manage your center of mass in a back squat. Is going to be different if the barbell is 50% of your body weight versus two times your body weight. Right? So you you you you you're not you're you're never not doing technique work when you know when you start doing higher intensities, it's just that the demand for force expression is going to be a lot higher. So your ability to you know. ingrain movement patterns is going to be slightly restricted as well. But you know, Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: these are some of the things that you want to take into consideration. Kaushal Sumedh: Th the the way I like to explain this to people, like to make it as simple as possible, is to think of like the lower load or lower RPE walk is just for you to ingrain things and make it second nature. And then when you get to heavier loads, there is no time for you to just think. You just have to perform. So, like there's gonna be technical breakdown to some degree for you know when you're expressing when you're trying to express maximal strength, but that's okay. What we wanna do is you wanna make it look as similar as your load low RPE or like low load technique. That's the whole point, right? Because you might miss a lift off of technical faults. The the point of having like really good technique ingrained into you and making that second nature is to make sure that that technical breakdown is minimized as much as possible. Because at heavier loads, you're gonna have some kind of breakout breakdown. Right? You you're you can't sit there like going for your third attempt, Tapas: Think, you can't think. Kaushal Sumedh: yeah, third attempt squat or bench or deadlift. You can't just sit there and think like, my coach told me like foot pressure here, big toe down. You you don't want to think there. So when when you're going in, you like all of your practice sessions are practice sessions. it's it's like like I I like to talk about cricket a lot because like it's very some it's something that a lot of Indians can relate to. And like Jay was talking about like boxing, like you want to learn how to jab hard by multiple repeated jabs. So if you've ever been to cricket, if if you want to be a batsman, they make you shadow practice when you're a kid. A lot of like front foot drives, a lot of drills, and then slowly they put you into the nets where like, you know, people are gonna bowl at you, and then you keep practicing in the nets, then you go to ma practice matches, and then you start playing, you know, in the age age limited leagues, like under twelve, under fourteen, under sixteen, whatever it is. And and then slowly eventually you get better, right? So it's it's very similar to that where like you're getting to practice every single day. You have to take Tapas: Mm. Kaushal Sumedh: a look at your training sessions as practice days. Like you're getting ready Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: for a competition, like i in the future, right? Whenever you want to compete. That is that is whenever that is. And depending on that, your training and whatever you're going to target is gonna depend on where how far away from competition you are. Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: So you so you just want to make things as second nature as possible so that you don't think. I mean, if you have y like you don't you don't sit there and think. You see guys like Austin Perkins. Like I I like to take Austin Perkins as an example, because if you've ever watched his training videos that he uploads, on Instagram, of course, Instagram is just a highlight reel. So you only see the good stuff. And then i if you ever watch his YouTube also where he's posting his bomb ups and everything, everything looks the same. His secondary days, tertiary days, his primary, his like highest number, whatever he does. It just looks the same. That's what we're trying to achieve. Like repeated same, you know, execution. A assuming that your technique is n th there there's no major technical bottlenecks, and that's when you just gotta hammer that in. Like you don't want technique Norman Cheung: Mm. Kaushal Sumedh: to drift once it's settled in. Norman Cheung: curiosity like this is this is an interesting one how much variability do you allow lifters to express in their training like is is a little bit of breakdown is enough or do you try to program someone in a way where like they're super consistent with minimal variability? Kaushal Sumedh: Depends on where jay: Thank you. Kaushal Sumedh: that's happening, right? Tapas: Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: Like if if the technical breakdown is enough for you to worry about it, then yes. Like if you take a look at somebody like I have a guy who who might be stronger with a little bit of a rounded back deadlift, but then I notice like that's where his ceiling ends. Like he can't he can't seem to he gets stuck at like that two seventy, two eighty kg deadlift range until we made the change. And only after we made the change was he able to push past that. Because initially, like I think we were talking about this with who who was it with with Anas itself? jay: Yeah. The bottle it's Kaushal Sumedh: When we were talking about how like yeah, bottlenecks and then like any Tapas: Hm. Kaushal Sumedh: technical changes that you might make might not initially just pay off, but it will eventually pay off over time, assuming that the technical change matters. Right? So there there there are cases where some people are just stronger in slightly inefficient technique, of course. But depending on how much of a bottleneck that technique is, then you might allow that variability. Like if it's genuinely a problem, then you might want to make the change. But if it's not that much of an issue, like A small thing here and there, then you're like, Yeah, it's not a big deal. Norman Cheung: Yeah, I think bottlenecks is a really good one when it comes to thinking about problem solving for athletes and thinking about bottlenecks, especially when it comes to technique. So you you guys are obviously, you know, I assuming the audience members have watched the Jamie's one. Did did Jamie talk about Newell's theories of constraint or the constraints-based model? jay: He kinda touched upon it. Yeah. Norman Cheung: Yeah. So For for those who don't know what Newell's theories of constraint constraints, it's basically a model that seeks to explain how people develop in terms of their like how people develop their movement patterns, right? So it it you know, th this was initially used for understanding how like children develop the ability to move a certain way that they do. you know, if if I'm not mistaken, but I think people have also used that model to understand why people present the way they do. and it's a super useful one, right? So if you don't know what it looks like, you you know, you initially have this triangle, and at each corner of these triangles, you have environmental constraints, you have organism organism constraints, and then you also have task constraints, right? And as people interact within these constraints going through the process of perception and decision making you get you know the perception and like action you get people presenting how they present like how people move is what's the word How people move is obviously a manifestation of interacting within these constraints. But in terms of like applying it as a coach and knowing like how to figure out where to go, one of the things that I think can be revised with this model is actually prioritizing like organism constraints and then thinking about environmental constraints and then thinking about task constraints because quite a lot of times the the environment is not something that you can change within the organism constraints you've got two which is cognitive and physical right and one and this is why having a you know effective relationship with your athlete is going to be so important because having that effective relationship allows you to you know, find out certain deeper thoughts that they have about how they think they should move, right? And so when I think about bottlenecks, like that this is the sort of first place that I always come to. Because it doesn't matter like how how many useful exercises that you give someone, how many good cues that you give someone, if they have this really unhelpful you know, idea about what a squat bench of depth should be in their head, which needs to be eliminated, right? So You know, this is why you know, in my system, I actually spend a lot of time prioritizing the initial onboarding process because it helps me prevent any sort of problems develop later on down the line. So I think about okay, what are their beliefs about what an ideal squat is, what an ideal bench is, right? And then thinking about okay, the environment. Is this something that we can change? Obviously, in terms of like physical constraints, that you know, most of the time it's not something that you can change much in the in in the long term. I mean, depending on what type of physical constraints we're we're talking about. and then we think about like environmental constraints, which is you know, where are they training? you know, what sort of you know, what's the environment of their training training week as well. So you know one of the things that I think about is, you know, we, you know, when you come to train, we want to be able to lock in. But if you're a shift worker and you always what's the word? You always train with like loads of brain fog and you're tired all the time. I think about how I can like maximize the success of what I end up describing them as well. which leads me on to the task constraints, which is mostly going to be the decisions made by the coach. So I think about putting that, like this is the equivalent. no, let me say it again. this is kind of like my revised version of Newell's theories of constraint. It's actually putting that pyramid. more in like a column with s like with a certain sequence. But yeah. jay: I think those kind of frameworks are helpful 'cause people then get to think about what to tackle first, right? but more or less Norman Cheung: Yeah. And it helps you, yeah, and it helps you understand what's stopping someone from being able to move. Like one of jay: Yeah. Norman Cheung: the like I'll give you a really good example. And this is a real life example that I had. I had I had this American I have this American lifter. And we you know, for some reason, he would always like hyperextend his back. Like he would always, you know, have that sort of anterior pelvic tilt and hyper extension. And, you know, we went through all the cues that he gives himself, right? He he he he told me he doesn't think about being upright. He doesn't think about like massively retracting his shoulders, like he doesn't think about anything that traditionally would cause overextension. He doesn't think about sitting back. And the thing that turns out to be what's causing that was that he was trying to replicate Lu Xiao Jun. And he did not associate how that was related to trying to be upright. Right? So, you know, and and because because when people look at Olympic weightlifters move, you know. They all move a certain way, right? They they they especially the best ones. They and and people often, you know, compliment how good of a squat it looks, and so on. And so people often like integrating that as their mental model of what an ideal, a technically good squat is, right? Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Squad is supposed to look like, yeah. Norman Cheung: And you can't you can't translate that into words, right? And if you didn't have that relationship with that. lifter you wouldn't have found that out and you would be like forever using traditional like constraints based exercises to try and fix someone and like and you have this like picture in his head that he's trying to replicate Lu Xiao Jun. Right. So you know these are some and this was a really stubborn problem that took us ages to deal with because I could not figure out what was causing to do that. And it turns out he had this mental model of Lu Xiao Jun that he was trying to replicate that he shouldn't have been replicated. So you know It cause then now the question is knowing that it took so long for us to correct that, what would you have asked him to be able to bring that to for for him to reveal that fact to you? Right? Like Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: Does it make sense? Like and and when it comes to like revising your system and dealing with failures, right? Like, I mean you could deal it you you could you could say that this was a failure, you could say that this was a success, that we figured out how to deal with it. you know, we we eventually effectively changed this squat, but it was very inefficient. So then I think about okay, what questions could I ask an athlete earlier on to make sure that that doesn't happen again? Right. So and this is and this feeds into my system for questions that I normally ask lifters very early on. So yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, that that that makes a lot of sense 'cause like there are a lot of lifters like to just copy paste what they see. Cause they're like, yeah, that guy's the best at what he does. So and that's what I think is cause I got a guy who who refuses to low bar squad because John Hack doesn't. yeah. So I I'm just like, yeah, John Hag's John Hack. You're not John Hack. But the guy just refuses Norman Cheung: Does he Kaushal Sumedh: to Norman Cheung: I mean, you know, it it's it's yeah, it it's this Tapas: Bench on his toes. Norman Cheung: it's like Joana Mani, like not wearing a belt and knee sleeves, right? I think more recently she started wearing it. but I I I Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Norman Cheung: can't remember. But you know, and then you do have the occasional people being like, hey, like I I really wanna try and be the best I can without a belt. I'm like If if you don't care about being competitive against others, fine. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Yeah. Norman Cheung: But like if you want to beat other people and you deliberately like have this grandiose idea of you beating other people, then like is this a rule Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Norman Cheung: or is this the exception, you know? But yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah yeah. That that's just one like one out of millions of people, you know, who do who do that. You don't you're you jay: Someone's gonna someone's gonna sign cite Austin Perkins. He doesn't use a belt now, no. I gotta sell. Yeah, yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: on one on deadlift. Yeah. Norman Cheung: Yeah. For incentives. There Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. But that's what I keep telling people. Like this is this is just like it's just a personal preference and they find something that works for them after years and years of trying something out. It's not just like on a whim. It's not random. Norman Cheung: Do you do you guys know why he stopped using it? Because I I I know people have talked about it. I can't remember myself, Kaushal Sumedh: What is it? Norman Cheung: but I have a I have a theory. No, I don't know myself. I I Kaushal Sumedh: you don't okay. Norman Cheung: I just have a theory as to why he may have chosen not to use it. Kaushal Sumedh: I think if if I'm if I'm not wrong, what I think you're thinking about is like he had a sports hernia a long time ago. Is that is that it? Is that what you're thinking? No? Okay. Norman Cheung: Okay. I don't know. I don't know. I I was thinking like, you know, some sometimes people just hinge a little bit better without a belt. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, I have that. I I I have the Norman Cheung: Right, like Kaushal Sumedh: same thing, yeah, yeah. I can just deadlift better without a belt than with a belt. Norman Cheung: Yeah, I I I I honestly think that we you know we we we have this you know, going back to the belt. Going to the belt thing, we have this idea that yeah, like belt means more rigidity, rigidity means like more efficient force transfer, but more rigidity Kaushal Sumedh: Hmm. Norman Cheung: also means less mobility. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. That's usually what Norman Cheung: Right. It's like okay, we which Kaushal Sumedh: I see with like people who have like bigger stomachs when it comes to deadlift. If they've got bigger bellies, they just can't get into position because the belt is like pushing down and then your stomach just spills around the belt, right? So you can't just Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: get into hinge a good hinge position and also Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: use your legs really well. So like people like that usually have a better better like the hinge and setup if they just don't use a belt. Which is what I Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: used to notice whenever I used to gain a lot of weight. But I don't think Austin Perkins has that particular problem. Like it's not a belly problem or anything like that. Because he's pretty lean, right? As far as I know, the guy spoke about this once where he had like a sports hernia and he had to take like two months off because the hernia got pretty bad. So it could be it yeah it it Norman Cheung: yeah, no and that that that might be the case. I don't know. Like I'm I'm I'm I'm curious like whether other people know. Kaushal Sumedh: 'Cause I'm dealing with another lifter like that. one of my guys who deadlifted like three forty for two, three forty kgs for two. he has this thing where When he wears a belt and he braces, like because of the pressure against the belt, that kind of puts a lot of pressure inside, like on his organs, apparently. Because like the abdominal wall just puts a lot of pressure and then he starts having pain in the groin as a result of that. and he got it checked and it was like a little bit of a sports hernia situation again. So the doctor told him like his hernia isn't like out of control kind of a thing where he has to take like, you know, time off. But we kinda changed the way he braced where we stopped thinking about bracing as like You know, taking because he likes to think about bracing as like taking as much pressure as possible. I told him like we want to start changing that towards like just enough. You know, like an like an exhale, engage abs and obliques, and just a little bit, just enough to make sure that you're rigid enough, right? So that kind of made it better. Norman Cheung: Hmm. And also, yeah. Yeah. And also the bench press as well. Like there are Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: like pe people and especially because like there are also loads of options for wrist wraps as well. Like you you jay: Yeah. Norman Cheung: you got some brands that offer three different types of thicknesses with three different types of lengths. And so it's like you you you know you you've also people want to Have a much more stable bench and so they think, okay, I'm gonna have stiffer wrist wraps. But actually Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: you also miss out on that wrist extension, right? Which may make your lockout a lot harder or may also be the reason why you're getting elbow and shoulder issues as well. So yeah, like more more rigidity is not necessarily always better because you end up getting less mobility, sometimes necessary mobility as well. So something to think about there. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, I mean especially when because you brought up the bench part, like even setup wise, Jay was talking to me about this Norman Cheung: Mm-hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: like what what were you saying? The rigidity, pliability part. You wanna say that here? jay: Yeah, I I think like yeah. I think it's I I think it's like a game of I again, I go back to fundamental principles like when rigidity allows more load bearing, but like Norman said, it doesn't allow to get into certain positions because pliability will allow you to do that. So it's like a game of balancing out the two, right? we've kinda talked about in squatting a lot of dudes who use super stiff sleeves, right? they just can't get into good enough positions because they wanna kind of have as much rig rigidity as they can. in terms of benching as well. Sometimes when people just like when you inhale, you're going to kind of get rigid, like you're filling air into a certain space. So you kind of can't change positions. So I noticed one of the guys when he was benching, when he would set up, he would just be so braced. And I'm like, you're never gonna get into position. There's no pliability in your system for that to happen. Because you've reinforced this thing. And the biggest issue that he would have is when he'd unrack the weight and he would set his hip down, he was so fundamentally rigid. Right, you just brace so hard. So it's it's like a Cesaw. Like when you br when you brace, everything kind of becomes rigid in that area, right? So he's a hip dips, the chest's gonna kind of come up along with that kind of a situation. So I again I I I would wanna kinda point towards Norman here when we talked about like your previous mental model on perception, judgment and action, right? like we don't Norman Cheung: yeah. jay: talk yeah, right? 'Cause I asked him, you gave me the example of the squat thing when I when I was like in that class with you, right? Like What is what is your idea of a squad? I asked him the same question. What is your idea of a bench? And he assumed the same thing. It's like he has to be a rock solid rigid. Right? And then I was like, if you you cause you're not gonna be able to get into position. Right? So I again I I I think that's kind of important to kind of understand, just from a a basic biomechanic standpoint, you don't have to kill yourself to get into a position. Right? And there's a time for being rigid, there's a time for being pliable. I I usually say When you wanna get into position, you wanna be a bit more pliable. When you wanna reinforce a position, you wanna be a bit more rigid. One of the ways we can do that is like gonna Norman Cheung: Yeah. jay: be using her up breath, right? Just just largely exhalation, pliability, inhalation, rigidity kind situation. Norman Cheung: Yeah. No, precisely. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. I mean it's a it's like like put it very simple, like to get into the position that you wanna get, you wanna be like flexible and then exhale and then once you're in position you wanna lock it down with a brace. That's that's how I like to tell people to think about it. jay: Cause I think I think that thing you just mentioned that I think a lot of guys don't understand that. Like you said, lock in the brace, right? People think inhalation is the brace. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. jay: Yeah. Norman Cheung: The thing, yeah, I think the i this is one of the things that like I think some people accidentally un like not accidentally, some people know how to brace, but they don't know how to vocalize what it is that they're doing. and some people just don't have a f complete bracing sequence. You know, for those you know, j i in in case your audience members don't know how to create a brace, you're essentially Doing a forced exhalation against closed airways. Like if you're blowing a balloon and you're bracing, they're not similar actions, they're identical actions. The only difference is you're just not letting the air out. So I always often I always get this syringe and I close the top and I try to push the piston out. And that's like that seems to click for a lot of people. But jay: Yeah. Norman Cheung: yeah. jay: Visual learners kind of a situation, but yeah. Go. Norman Cheung: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. jay: So like the n the next thing we want to kind of touch upon is on because we cater to both athletes and coaches in this podcast. We want to bring up both athletes and coaches and a community around that, right? it's often very easy to talk about just success, right? What are the wins? What are the wins? What are the successes, right? but I do wanna kinda touch upon like failures, right? The idea of dealing with failure. And I personally believe that once you have a good enough understanding of fundamental principles, failures can teach you like what doesn't work, which narrows down the path to what will work in the long run. Right. So like when w can you touch upon like coaching failures? Like when you when you look at a coach and when you look at the element of failure, what are failures? What is an opportunity that they present, and how would you move from them? Norman Cheung: So the the I can't remember who said this. there there was a really famous chess player who said that one of the things that you learn about playing chess is that if you lose somewhere along the moves, you made a poor decision. Kaushal Sumedh: Decision. Yeah. Norman Cheung: And you kind of have to own it. Right? So, first things first is you have to own your failures. Like, if you don't own your failures, you're you're you're you don't even look you don't even want to look at a direction of improving it and preventing it from happening again, right? Like failures are almost inevitable. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: The reason why they are inevitable is because no one is born all knowing with. The all the wisdom in the world, like pre-installed in them, right? If I think about every single mentor that I have ever hired who is a powerlifting coach, and if I think about every single athlete, no, every single coach, like big name or like local, like low, only locally famous. I have at least heard. at least one or two athletes who've had a bad experience for them. Or like felt they failed to like continue to bring about progress so so they might have like done well with them and eventually like hit a brick wall right and it happens it happens all the time and the reason why it happens all the time is because we all have blind spots we're not all knowing right the thing about learning from failures is the point in my career where I started to become more comfortable in my own skin with failures was actually when I sort of I actually hired a mental performance coach from a company called Total Mental Performance. And one of the things that they recommend you do, so they they specialize in like mindset and like mental performance for like coaching entrepreneurs, right? And one of the things, one of the really useful tools that they recommend me use. Was kind of like the idea of building your boardroom if you are CEO of a company. So, and I have that for powerlifting coaching. So, in my hypothetical boardroom, Tapas: Hmm. Norman Cheung: I have a biomechanics guy, or I have at least like two biomechanics guys. And the reason why I don't just have one is just because sometimes you you do want a third opinion. Sometimes the second opinion is is like that's kind of their bias, right? So I I have two biomechanics guys who are not necessarily from the same schools, right? And I think that's important. I have a couple like general purpose like powerlifting coaches that I would hire out. I'll be like, hey, mentor, can we can we hop on a mentorship call? Just want your take on this. Kaushal Sumedh: Mm mm. Norman Cheung: And you know, and I have a couple guys who are more like programming biased, right? With again different schools of fours. I have two for like each type of thing. and and the the the the thing that you know, I'm not necessarily perfect with this, but the thing that I always try to cherish. It's a window for you to gain perspective, right? Because sometimes when when you're going through your your your coaching, you're in this constant state of busyness, you sometimes like lose sight of things. And it happens because we're human, right? But the reason why I got The mechanism for which I became more confident in my own sort of abilities or like limits to my abilities is because I have hope that even though I might not necessarily have the answers, I know who I would go to if I wanted to expand my perspective or develop my judgment. Like what is it that I'm missing here? Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: You know, did I make a bad call very early on about something? Or was it like was it a knowledge-based issue? Is it just an issue of like, hey, this is a useful tool, you may not have come across it, it might suit this athlete, right? And the other thing that I always think about is once I figured out what where the bottleneck is, we you know, since we're talking about bottlenecks, is How can you update your system so that if you were to rerun this same case study again, you are either more effective at solving it or more efficient at solving it. And so that's and and you have to, you know, like I I have a, you know, I have at least three or four coaches who I just talk to just about like general coaching stuff, right? And if that's going to help me navigate obstacles and plateaus, Any sort of obstacle is at least likely going to be short-lived, if that makes sense. And I and I find that that to be a really useful tool for helping me like navigate cases cases that I've failed to deal with, if that makes sense. and you gotta you have to be able to do that. and I also want to, you know, I like in my coaching career I I knew two people. Who were like full-time coaches that eventually left coaching. And they they they were ambitious, but they just did not have that ability to navigate those failures. And so, you know, as they slowly lost clients as they were no longer able to solve those problems and they didn't expand their toolkit, they eventually decided that actually coaching wasn't for them anymore. when it was when it was simply the case that they didn't have a mental model for being able to navigate problem solving for themselves as a coach, if that makes sense. And I think like you know, like you know, re recently I I can't remember who I was talking to. I was talking to like a lifter and coach. A coach who's also lifter themselves and they were with a big name coach I won't say who it is because it doesn't matter Kaushal Sumedh: Hm, mm. Norman Cheung: from from from the states and like they ended up like not getting great results. So like even if you are super experienced the the the you know the potential for failures is still going to be possible. So yeah. Tapas: It'll still be there, yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: you need to learn to take the L's and learn like deal with it and not self-sabotage or anything like that. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. I think we were talking about this in one of the previous like very recent podcasts where I said that you know, sometimes even if the coach is really good and even if the athlete is really good, it it just doesn't match sometimes. And that's okay. Like you Norman Cheung: Hmm. Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: you have to kind of figure out, you know, what's best for you and move on from there. It's not Norman Cheung: Mm. Kaushal Sumedh: necessary that you have to stick to one person and Norman Cheung: Yeah. And some sometimes like it's it's like personality type is a thing. Like Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, it is a thing. Norman Cheung: I I think, you know, i if if you're if you're not someone who you know regardless of who it is, right? Like i if you guys just feel very awkward around each other and like for for whatever unknown reason, you both can't seem to understand why you you know Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: you don't open up to each other. it it j it just doesn't work because problem solving just gets like really difficult, right? Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: and you know, like when I think back to like you know, 2018, 2019, like I've definitely coached people who like I never really figured out why, you know, we we weren't getting online. I couldn't say, you know, I couldn't identify as yeah, this this person neurotic. It it just felt like we we just felt so different as people that You know, sometimes you do need a coach that you can identify with, right? So, you know, I think I think th this is why like being authentic on social media is so important. Right. and you know, showing your personality because then you'll if people like your personality, they feel warm at being around you, they're more likely to open up. And that is going to be very important for you know. having a good start with building that relationship. Because at the end of the day, it is a relationship. You're not just paying for programming and feedback, right? You're paying for someone to, you know, be a part of your journey and be a part of your success and like be able to share L's with and and and trust that the other person's going to be able to figure it out, right? So, you know, I I I've worked I have clients who I've worked with for nine plus years now. you know, there were definitely like middle periods where like, hey, we just hit a brick wall with this lift. And because of that rel like if imagine you hit a brick wall with a lift with with with a coach. Like half the time you would just leave them, right? But like they they trusted that like I would eventually develop they Kaushal Sumedh: Hmm, mm. Norman Cheung: they liked the cherished the relationship I had with them and they trusted that I would eventually develop myself to be able to figure it out. And so that's why that relationship is so important. It just it just creates so much longevity and yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. I I see what you're talking about 'cause I have similar situations like that. Like I have a couple of lifters who Like there there are definitely ro roadblocks. It's never like a just a linear linear progression with a coach, right? It's always like there are always gonna be some roadblocks. There's always gonna be some like there's there's gonna be times where your lifter's gonna hit a roadblock and then so are you as a coach because you're like, Well, I've tried what I think works for this person, but something's happening here that's just not allowing him to progress here or her to progress here. So what can we do? And then you just like they just kinda stick with it and they stick with you. Because they know that you're you're you're the type that will put in the effort yourself. So they just Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: stick with you for a little bit longer and then yeah, eventually you will figure it out. A as depending Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: like that that also depends on like how how you know serious or good of a coach you are. Because there are coaches who are just like who who don't seem to care that much. That's also a thing. Which is why I always tell people like th there's no obligation for you to stick with somebody for the rest of your life. You know, Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: just because you have a you like if you ha i th you're a friendly Relationship with the coach or you you're you some some of them actually want to be like really good friends with the person. Like you you don't have to just stay with the coach just because of that. You can always end things on a good note. Like just just don't make it bad. That's it. Just end it on Norman Cheung: Mm. Mm. Mm. Mm. Kaushal Sumedh: a good note if you feel like that's the way to go. And just say that, yeah, you know, I I feel like I want to explore a couple more options. So I'm thinking of like going to this person, or maybe I want to do my own thing for a while. That's okay. Norman Cheung: Hmm. Yeah, and it can. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It can it can get stable. like I I've had like one lifter that I have in my mind who was continuously making progress until they they finished with me, but they just found that it was a bit boring because like It it just became monotonous, even though we were making gains, but Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: the decisions we were making was like, hey, They just want to try a completely different thing. Yeah, very monotonous. Kaushal Sumedh: Very monotonous. Yeah. Norman Cheung: and it's kinda like I mean, this is why personality plays such a big part in it, because some people will have a very high tolerance for boredom in Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Yeah. Norman Cheung: order to achieve success, right? and that sort of applies to a lot of things in life because like mastery requires a lot of repetition. Right? Kaushal Sumedh: I get what you're saying, 'cause like especially with powerlifting training, there's only so many things that you wanna change and even the changes Tapas: Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: that you make are are like gonna be, you know, just just enough minor. Tapas: Minor. Hm. Norman Cheung: Especially if it's not broken. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, especially if it's not broken. Tapas: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: I get that sometimes. So people are like, can we change these, these, these things? Cause I've been doing this for the last couple of blocks. I'll be well, you're still progressing, right? It's not nothing's wrong here. And then and the reason for that is like, Tapas: as long as it stops working. Kaushal Sumedh: yeah, but the but the but the reasoning for that is like, you know, it's just getting very boring for me. Can can we change that? I'm like, okay, fine, we can, but if you if you want like a full complete overhaul. You might want to be ready to not make a little bit of progress that you were making then. You you kinda have to make that trade off. And Tapas: Wouldn't be as optimal. Kaushal Sumedh: yeah, it won't be like because we found something that works really well for you right now. So if we change something right now, and make a complete change, then that then you might have to be okay with the trade off that it might not work as it was, right? So Tapas: Definitely. Kaushal Sumedh: yeah. So like I always tell people like you have to be ready to take a little bit of like that boring work. At least for a while. Like that that's just how it is. If you want to be good at anything, that's how it is. People yeah, that's I think that's a that's a thing. Like people think like every day is supposed to be like something special, something new. But you know, the best best best people are just like very disciplined and they just keep doing the same thing over and over and over again. There's really nothing else that they do. There's no d no real difference or like they're not doing anything crazy. If you just see the Tapas: Nothing special. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, I mean if you see the best powerlifters, like like they they they they have like a I I'm sure they have this routine. Like they wake up at a certain time, they have their first meal, and then they'll have their second meal, they do their work a little bit, and then they have their whatever else, and then they'll make sure that the like their training times are like at the same time every single day, or at least within the one hour, you know, of the same day. Like if you go at two PM every day in the afternoon, 'cause that's how your day is structured, then they'll go either between that one thirty to three thirty, like three o'clock or something like that. They will never exceed those times unless there's an emergency. Right. Which which is again rare because these people are like very meticulous with how they do things. I I believe what is it like who's that? Joe Stanek made a reel recently where he said like powerlift like all the best powerlifters have a bedtime. As boring and Tapas: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: as stupid as that sound, as as childish that as that sounds, right? Like that sounds very childish for a lot of people when they're grown up. They're like, you're bedtime, nine thirty bedtime, you gotta go sleep, bye bye. But Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: that that's how it is. Norman Cheung: Yeah. I I I I I remember having this, you know, athlete who would always chronically sleep around no, they'll always have like five to six hours of sleep. Always. And they don't have like any reasons. They just doom scroll. And it's like and the re and and and the way they rationalize it is yeah, I just need some time to myself. And I'm like, is this something that you're willing to do? It you know, are you are you psychologically avoiding something? Like is there I mean you you never know what goes on behind people's eyes, right? Like yeah, Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Norman Cheung: they they could be dealing with a a lot of shit. And and it was just like they they just could not go to sleep bored. Right? And and and i you know, I I genuinely think that this is probably one of the biggest predictors of success McGiolithin. Yeah. Tapas: Quality of sleep would be much lower as well if he he or she is going to sleep while strolling. Norman Cheung: Yeah. And it's like Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, while scrolling and if you're sl if you're sleeping at like very odd times for sure, you're gonna have like really bad quality of sleep even then. Tapas: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: it's a it's it's a thing like I think especially if you're somebody who has like a very mundane schedule, right? You might be in that situation where you're like, I I don't find any time for myself and I'm not really finding the time to do something like alone time for myself. 'Cause if you're somebody who has like if your whole day is just like go, go, go from the get go, right? Like you wake up and then you just have to get ready, you have to do this, you have to do that, then go to work. And then as soon as you're done with work, then you have to drive to gym and then you get your workout done and then as soon as you're back home, you're gonna make sure you're eating meals and then you're prepping meals and then you do your laundry and other stuff. There's no time for anything else, right? So maybe in that case, like you'll see people like that, but like you have to kind of understand that there's a trade off for that, is that like if you just don't go to sleep and you're not having enough sleep at reasonable time and enough time, then you're just not gonna be able to progress in the gym. It's just not gonna happen. Cause like a lot of people like to talk about like nowadays I think everybody likes to talk about the whole fatigue thing and they're like, you like fatigue maxing is bad, just one set to failure is fine, or or something like Tapas: Mm-hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: that for when it comes to hypertrophy, right? Like you see a lot of hypertrophy this thing. But like the the when it comes to powerlifting, we're not looking for we're not just looking to play like like we're not looking to like minimize fatigue as much as possible. We're we're looking to maximize performance. Well, you're gonna maximize your ability to move the maximum amount of weights that you can. And there is a certain amount of work and work ethic and discipline that is required to be the best. You you can't just like Norman Cheung: Yeah. Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: you know, I think there's this thing where where people like, there is definitely a place where like you want to get out of that comfort zone. Right? Like I Tapas: Yeah. You need to do that to drive adaptations. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, you need to work hard. I think a lot of people are just very confused because when when we keep saying like, you don't have to push to failure. They think it's easy work then. Because people just seem to exist on ends of spectrums. They don't understand that there's a whole spectrum in between. Tapas: Mm. Norman Cheung: Yeah. I I would say there's Kaushal Sumedh: And they just think like, Norman Cheung: probably yeah, there's probably nuance with that. Like I because I I've come across lifters. There there are some lifters that I coach who I mean just for the sake just for the nature of that they're heavyweight lifters. The Kaushal Sumedh: Mm. Norman Cheung: the the amount that they need to train and can tolerate is like very low. Right. And then you do have some lifters who like their bench press will not go up unless you go bench six times a week. you know, with all of the sets hitting RP eight or something that. Right. Like, you know, I I I I've I've come ac you know and though those those people who need to you know for it might be the fact that 'cause they're female or they're highly trained, if they're not able to like keep up with that, with you know, with doing what's required, then they'll eventually like leave the sport, which is unfortunate, but Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: you know, it happens. someone that I mentor was showing me a case study that they were working on and they were showing me this program and they didn't know how to navigate it And they made all of these like complex decisions with protocols and asked them, Well, why did you use that protocol? And then they said, Because it can have this use. Okay, it can have that use. But how do you know it's useful for this person? And then they were like, I if you know, I asked that person once or twice, and then eventually they said, it's because I found it on Powerlift and L. And then I was like, okay. So there's no lack of ideas. There's no lack of like knowledge, right? Because there's a lot of you know, when you when you hop onto I've been to a lot of like mentorships and there's a lot of like knowledge that gets passed. But I think the thing that is really lacking And I think about this particular mentee that I was working with. What is necessary for them to be able to take that information and know how and when to apply it, like from first principles? And I think like there's definitely a you know, in the education space, I definitely think that there's a lack of resource teaching people how to make original decisions and understand why something might work and how they can fit it into their toolkit rather than blindly think this person suggested this could work, I'm going to give it a try. It's like, how can we teach first principles thinking? Right. And I think, and this is why like I decided that I want to go down this route of just like throwing the phrase mental models because mental models is is is the tools for judgment like we like if you think about percep you know the decisions you make is a series of your perception your understanding of reality your judgment of what you think you should do and then the actual execution afterwards there's all this information on the internet about knowledge right And and and if you do pay attention, obviously coaches will, you know, most coaches will generally give you their thought process. But it's Kaushal Sumedh: Mm. Norman Cheung: it, you know, how how do we equip coaches with the ability to make effective and efficient decisions? And I think, you know, on top of that, I definitely think there's probably a space and market for. some sort of educational resource that helps coaches build their systems from scratch rather than being like this is my system this is how it can be useful which seems to be what most mentorship models teach seem to be predicated on so this is something that I'm currently interested in it's like how can we take your beliefs reveal your philosophy and apply the principles that we love and know and build that into a working document of a system that you have. Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: Right. And I and I and I, you know, and and and this is also very much channeled by you know and this is something that I think about a lot when I think about mentoring people and this is like my philosophy of how I mentor people. You know I I I think about there there was a mentorship call that I have I had with one of my mentors and one of the things that really sort of like got my brain turning was he suggested he made a suggestion once and then they said this is what I think but I can't necessarily tell you why I think that and Tapas: Yeah. Norman Cheung: I'm like that wasn't like good enough for me. Like I still cherish them as a c as a men mentor like I still use them to this day. and I think that like when it comes to like me mentoring other coaches, I think about how can I communicate that software and install it into your brain so that you can have your own system and an understanding on how to apply certain things. and what a thought process is, because at the end of the day, though those thought processes what leads to decisions being made, right? So I've been thinking about that a lot. I remember also, do you guys know who Dr. Pat Davidson is? Yeah, like I I've I've I you know I think when the expansion compression model started to become quite big in PowerLivedin, he was also one of the sort of big voices of it. And one of the things that he said on a podcast. is you need to go write out your model. You need to go write out your system. Because when you go through that process, do you see where your blind spots are as well and what you actually think? Because that is going to be the next step that I think newer coaches, new newer coaches should follow through with. If they if you are a coach who seems to do a lot of like copy and pasting of like protocols, right? It's you know, even if it means that like there's nothing written down, you you have a starting point on like building your own system on how to make original decisions. They don't have you know, make making original decisions and making having an original opinion doesn't necessarily mean that every decision you make has to be like unique and different to each other. It just means that it needs, you know, it needs to not have come from a place of thinking and analogy of like, this all coach does this or this all athlete does this, therefore I think they should do this, but more building reasons from first principles. And I think that that's going to be the next wave of powerlifting education. because otherwise like you're going to be forever reliant on throwing shit out of wall and seeing what sticks. You know. So yeah, I think that's that's what I think it's missing in the power of the education space. You know, I think there's good there's there's plenty of good resources out there that teach you programming that teach you What's word? Biomechanics. I think there's plenty of biomechanics. Obviously, like you know, you you've been to Jamie Jamie Smith's mentorship. Like, you know, I know Bill Hartman has his thing. there's you know, there's the pre-script courses as well, which I know you know a few coaches have been on. but yeah, I think there's plenty of like biomechanics stuff. also yeah, and also like Connor Harris and Alex Ephraim. Zach couples and you know them guys, you know, they they they do a lot of good materials out there. but I think in the parallel space, I think definitely something that's a bit more applied will be the next wave. Tapas: I just wanna like throw a point there. so like w whatever you talked about right now, I feel like this is more applicable to the just worldwide, right? would say especially Western countries. Kaushal Sumedh: In mo in more developed areas is what you're talking about. Yeah, yeah. Tapas: Yeah, e exactly. Yeah, yeah. So like where powerlifting is like somewhat more established, you know. I feel with India right now, like that that would be like a next, next, next level. Right now we don't even have we we need to establish like basic places that you can actually go for information. Like, you know, the only place I feel people have right now, at least like most of most guys over here who actually care about getting better is YouTube. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: Do you guys have the Federation supported coaching courses? Because like in British powerlifting we have like level one, level two. Tapas: No no our Fed pheff Our our Federation Kaushal Sumedh: Hello. Tapas: I I Kaushal Sumedh: You have the IPF course this thing that they do promote, but like Tapas: Hm. Kaushal Sumedh: there's nothing like the f that the Federation is does I think they used to do it. I if Norman Cheung: I think yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: I'm not wrong, 'cause they did propose that I would I was the one to head it at one point of time, but they did not like it 'cause I was twenty five and they like, What's a twenty five year old gonna know more than us? So they just didn't want me there, yeah. Norman Cheung: Well, the way I see it is having something is better than having nothing. And it doesn't have to be approved course. Like I think Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: you guys are you know, you know, get something rolling and get something out there. Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah. I I don't think they do it anymore. I don't think they do it anymore though. Because they they had like a coaches camp like at Nationals every year. If I remember correctly, it was like five, six years ago. And like I I remember like one of the guys pr like he proposed my name to handle the whole thing, but they just didn't want somebody who was still young. They wanted somebody who with more experience. So they were like, This guy's just twenty five years old, he shouldn't be there at the moment. So that's what they told me back then. But after that, I don't I don't think they ever did that again. Which which they probably should have some something like that. Cause mo more than anything, I believe like because we had this conversation before when we did our our like separate podcast, that the whole idea behind Indian cow in Indian powerlifting is like just take steroids. I mean I'll I'll tell you, like, the worst case scenario that I've seen is like a guy has rheumatoid arthritis and his coach prescribed him DECA. Because he like, That's the way to go. Yeah. And I was just like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know what I mean? So we need to get out of the idea that steroids is the end all be all and there's something as Tapas: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: training properly and you you can get pretty strong naturally. Of course, genetics matters. Not everybody is gonna get to that level of, you know, those kind of numbers. We all wanna be doing like three hundred, three fifty KG deadlifts and and things like that. Everybody wants to do stuff like that. Something cool that they think is cool. But you know, you never know whether you can actually do it or not if you don't even give it that kind of Tapas: Time and effort. Kaushal Sumedh: You know, that can that that kind of time and effort. And like if you're just not doing it properly for a long period of time, you you can't tell yourself that you've you've done everything possible. Right? Because nowadays there is like that that wave has even gotten better where they're just like, Why would you stay natural? Why why would you just not take stuff? And y yeah, but there Tapas: Yeah, this is a bad Kaushal Sumedh: there are like implications because like as you said, when it comes to steroids, it's a lifelong decision. It's not a short term decision. Once you once you've decided to take it and you've you've been on it for like I'm not talking about just like, you you took it like you injected it like once and then you stopped because you're scared. That's fine. That's still you you're still out of it. But like when you when you're talking about you know, a situation where you're on it for like one cycle, it never stops at one cycle. I've seen this with like multiple people. Cause once you feel s like completely different. You're not gonna want to wanna get back to how you used to feel before that. So you just keep going on and on. It's it's it's a never ending cycle. Tapas: And it's actually like a lack of education that, you know, is driving this. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, that's the main thing. It's a lack of education. Tapas: Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: It's a lack of education that drives this, that people think that you just cannot go to these numbers or win nationals. And I get the idea, because like whenever you're you're a young, impressionable kid or like you're you're very new to powerlifting and the whole thing is very exciting to you when you're new, right? And when you go to a powerlifting competition, you see a lot of syringes around. Tapas: Mm. Kaushal Sumedh: And your first impression at a competition is just, well, if everybody's on it, then what's the point of me not doing it? Like I'm already at an uneven playing field, right? But Tapas: I Kaushal Sumedh: yeah, that that happens a lot in Indian powerlifting. Cause you you the moment you go to the competition, you see that these people are just pinning in open, like completely open. It's not even a secret anymore. They just do it openly. And then you're just sitting there. I I've been in a situation where like we lost, we came second at one point, and the guy who was doing it, like who came first, he literally looked at us in the eye and he's like, I'm gonna take this and I'm gonna beat your national record right now. And he did it. And there's nothing you can do about it. So you you so I get the f I get why people get upset. I get why people want to go that route, 'cause you're just like, what is the reason for me to stay natural when all of these people don't? When they don't follow the rules. Because you you can't you can't be the one voice of reason or moral or ethical this thing when everybody isn't, right? It it's very difficult to stay like that. Because you're you're you're playing against cheaters, so you kinda have to play against Tapas: This is also like an excuse a lot of these people give when they get caught. They're like it's like Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, which is also an excuse which a lot of people give. But you you kind of want to give like you you you need power powerlifting is the only place, I believe, where you have one place that is tested and one that's not. It's open secret in untested. Like you can take whatever you want and just go do it. Everybody's gonna be fine with it. Because everybody's on it already. So just go there. Just don't come and ruin like like the tested side of things. It it could be any reason, like maybe you don't understand it. Right. This is the same way, like people who want to see natural don't understand why you want to get on stuff. The same way you might not understand why no somebody doesn't want to get on stuff. And that's okay. Just go to your side of things. Just don't come to this side of things. There's a there's a huge lack of education, which is why Tapas: Education. Kaushal Sumedh: this thing happens in the first place. Because they believe that it's impossible to get there. And then when you go there, also you see so many other people taking it and stuff like that. But eventually. you have to understand that this is a long-term thing and you can do this naturally for and actually be pretty strong. And for me at least, I take a lot of pride, I would say, in the fact that I can tell people that it it's me who's done it. Right? But when I do something, like when I do something and I'm like, this this is a number I've achieved. Or even if I come back from an injury, right? Even if I'm coming back from an injury, that's like I take a lot of pride in thinking like, yeah, this is my body's ability and my mental toughness that allowed me to get here. Rather than thinking about like I had to take this, this, this, so I could do this, you know, stuff like that. Tapas: Alright, so this was a question that we got. How do I periodize my accessory volume for squat and deadlift? When their neural demand overlaps so heavily, do you use RP based autoregulation or fixed percentage blocks with planned deloads and why? Norman Cheung: I if we if we just ignore the idea of things overlapping in any sort of specific way, well first things first is Are you even fatigued? Like we have these sort of, you know, I find that we often make this assumptions, we we often make this premature decisions about things because we assume that, or we infer the in effect that a certain amount of prescription and a certain combination is going to you know fatigue us. It's like, yeah, there's loads of carryover. If I if I give you know three sets of five and then in your accessories are you got three sets of seven or three sets of six leg press. It's like, okay. Are you fatigued? You know, but when we talk about periodization, the first thing I think about is like, is it is it to the point that you're not able to recover and create positive adaptation? Right? Like just because there's a lot of crossover and carryover between what you do in your accessories and in your main lives does not necessarily mean, right? That you're necessarily going to be fatigued. And one of the sort of things that I learned from one of my SNC coach mentors. So when I used to be an accredited SNC coach, one of the things that my mentor used to tell me is coach what you see, not what you think you see. Like we have this, like we we have this like mental model of you know what we think is going to happen if we do this because maybe because of our own personal experience, right? And we impose, you know, we we we project that onto the athletes like, well, is there evidence of fatigue? Where do we look to see evidence of like excess fatigue? Right? And and then that's gonna come down to like key thing, you key things we're gonna be looking at is like what is the general trend of behavior of the top end performance. So yeah, like in terms of periodizing accessories, you may not necessarily need to like periodise it in any traditional way. But if it's causing you to be so in such a fatigue depth in the start of your subsequent block, then yeah, we could easily have a discussion about reducing the number sets, you know, towards the end. And it's going to be an iterative process, right? Now you don't want to be thinking about what is the correct move now. It's how can we move towards a directionally effective place. So that's what I think about. So yeah, like I i I think, you know, depending on what the purpose is, you know, do I use RPE prescription? That massively depends on what the prescription is for. Like if I'm if I'm dealing with, you know, if I if I'm prescribing a movement with Heavy loads. I might prescribe reps and preserve, but like that's sort of besides the point. Like you can prescribe absolute load, you can also prescribe an auto-regulation with with the accessories. Like at the end of the day, like the question you need to ask yourself is like, does this need to move from a fatigue management standpoint? Like don't periodize for the sake of periodizing jay: Yeah. I suppose that's the most important thing someone should take away from this, right? Like there is a why. Like are you p employing a tactic, then there has to be a why. Just because someone else does it doesn't mean that you have to blindly kind of go. And again we come back to first principles, right? Right. Tapas: Hundred percent, yeah. jay: That's it. Tapas: There's another question, When does a person's genetics and muscle maturity peak? Norman Cheung: I don't know. It's the answer. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. jay: Yeah. Norman Cheung: Like, you're you're you're asking, like, I have a master's lifter who's like 46 and he's he's making like he used to be a bodybuilder back in his day and he's been lifting his whole life, right? And he's making all-time PPs. You know, you know, his name's Rodriguez, right? Like he he's making all-time PPs in his squat and bench, and he's like close to all-time PPs on his deadlift, but not quite yet. so I'm like The magic is finding out by training for long term rather than the short term. Kaushal Sumedh: I you will never know, like, whether you've hit your peak or like was there something that you you could have still done better before or there's something you can, you know, do better Norman Cheung: Also, Kaushal Sumedh: now. Norman Cheung: do you want to know? jay: Exactly. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean that's the thing, like even if you're like ninety eight percent at where you could have been, there's still another two percent for you to hit. And then even after that, there's like another point five percent maybe that you can hit in the next six months. You you don't know that. That that's that that's what I'm saying. Like Tapas: You never know your ceiling for sure. Yeah. jay: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: you yeah, you can't tell for sure. You can't tell for like hundred percent, like this is where I'm ending my career at. This is the max I can ever do. jay: Could I ask you guys like a question about like the kind of I just noticed there's a group of people that don't really think about this, and that's people that had prior athletic experience, like at a decent level. Because I think most people Kaushal Sumedh: Mm-hmm. jay: who've done any form of athletics kind of come with like a sacrifice for the unknown. Like they're fully Tapas: Mm. jay: aware of the fact that, well, we don't know. Right. And the only way you're gonna get there is can I make it happen? Kaushal Sumedh: By yeah. Tapas: Yeah. jay: I I find like people that are more process oriented will always progress, while people that are more outcome oriented will like Stall the first Tapas: Hmm. jay: second that something goes wrong. Kaushal Sumedh: Mm. Norman Cheung: It's like okay, l let's say you did know. It's like, okay, what what does that change? Does that mean that you won't do this for? jay: What do you Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Will you just stop training because you know that you could you like that's your max that you've you're gonna hit? Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: And you know, like you know, do you do you stop living if you know you're not gonna get younger past a certain point? Yeah, do you know what I mean? Like it Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: it's it's it's like those sort of questions. It's you know, the the the whole thing about genetics is like I don't know. You could be genetically gifted and you just don't know it. Like God may have decided Tapas: You wouldn't know it, yeah. jay: Yep. Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, yeah. Norman Cheung: that, hey, you know what, you're you're gonna be the special one in India, right? And then you're Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, yeah. Norman Cheung: you're asking that silly question. and and it's making you think, you know, should I bother or not? Hey, you might be genetically Kaushal Sumedh: I mean I I Norman Cheung: gifted. Kaushal Sumedh: yeah, if you unless you actually give it a try every single day for a very long period of time, you won't know. That you're even Tapas: Arabus India. Kaushal Sumedh: yeah, yeah. There there might be somebody out there who's even more gifted than Austin Perkins who doesn't even know that. Norman Cheung: But do you know what? Like even if you reach even if you're genetically not gifted, you might surpass someone who's genetically gifted because they got injured or b burnt out from the sport. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: Right, that happens. Like I I know, you know, I I've been involved in powerlifting since twenty twelve, twenty thirteen, right? I've seen like really gifted lifters come and go. Right. or they'll move into a different sport like BJJ or something like that. and it's like Tapas: Some people who peak early also kind of they kind of leave, right? Sometimes. Norman Cheung: Yeah, like it's one of those sports where like if you look at a rate of progress once you become highly trained, it's like if you are not on it, it's very easy to just make no progress. Right. If if you're not like just well organized. Like like forget anything else. Just well organized. Right. Like 'cause if your if your life is not very well organized, and I don't necessarily mean like you need to provide, give yourself like 15 hours of training time, but i if you're not well organized in the sense that like you can have some sort of consistent process, like consistent training process happening. Like, yeah, it's gonna be very difficult for you to figure out your you know your long-term genetic potential right Tapas: Potent. Norman Cheung: so that my my my you know what one of my principles is like or mental models, let's say, is inversion thinking. It's like, how can I sabotage myself so that I end up stock power, so I end up not powerlifting anymore. Does it make sense? So it if you you know rather than thinking about how can you be really, really strong, think Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: about how you can avoid getting yourself weaker. jay: Bigger. Norman Cheung: Does it make sense? And that's that's one of the things I think about. And that's like something that I got from yeah Kaushal Sumedh: It's like working backwards from where you don't want to go, right? Norman Cheung: Yeah. Like yeah. Tapas: Yeah, Matt Van had a post about this, right? Visualizing failure. Norman Cheung: Yeah. And I think I think you you know, you you you need to have a mindset and a way of thinking where you don't get swayed by things like a a really good example, and I always use this guy as an example for longevity, right? And and and about starting late in life, because some people were like, I was it too late to stop out of things. I use durance. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: During Kengamu from the UK, right? Like he his first competition was in 27 when he was 27. Which for a lot of people is late. He became world champion Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Yep. Norman Cheung: around 34-35. You know, and he puts up numbers that are like very normal for his body weight when he first started competing. And he was just chipping it away at it, chipping away at it, chipping away at it. You know, and and there was definitely a period of time when he his performance was a bit flat. But he just stuck with it and just kept going until, you know, it became more champion in twenty I wanna say twenty five, twenty twenty five. I can't remember when it was now. Tapas: No, I think it was twenty twenty four, yeah. Yeah. Yeah yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: okay 2024, yeah, yeah yeah. but yeah, and I'm like, hey, that's a great example of like someone who just kept going, right? Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: Go go go go train in a way where you can s enjoy life as well and and and not you jay: Yes. Norman Cheung: know don't make don't make your identity as being a powerlifter. Like, you know, Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: you are more than just a power lifter, right? Like, you know, you're you're probably Tapas: Have other things. Norman Cheung: some yeah, have have other things to do. Go enjoy life. Go enjoy your social life and stuff like that. Don't let it you know, don't sue don't be so extreme in a way where like you know, things don't go well, it throws you off so much that you end up leaving a spall. Tapas: what are fatigue sets and how and when to use them? Norman Cheung: You know what? It's quite normal for me to use fatigue sets before I use top sets. So especially, you know, and and and the very common case that I think about fatigue sets is like Let me let me go introduce. If I want to introduce some higher levels of intensity exposure, I might actually give some fatigue sets before I turn them into top sets. And mostly because I want to see how it influences the rest of the program without interfering too much with the working sets. and I'll run a good block of it. And then I may switch it around. to see like, okay, what's the fatigue ability of this fatigue, this this now top set on the subsequent working sets? And those are some some of the things that I look look for as well. So yeah, fatigue sets are great if you want to just have a minimally disruptive exposure to some top end intensity. Tapas: how to work around a history of injuries in powerlifting? How do you do that? Norman Cheung: So I think one of the things that I often think about when it comes to injury management is One of first first things first, and I I know a lot of coaches say this about node management, Before we think about like how can we recover from this? How can we stop making this worst? Right? And it's like it's very likely that if you're always experiencing ongoing injuries, there's probably something in the program that's keeping it alive. Right? So, and obviously it's gonna vary from case to case, but like the thing that's gonna contribute most to it. maybe different between person and person. You know, for some person some people it might be like too much specificity. For some people it might be, you know, just too much volume and intensity. Right. So you know you gotta see like be able to identify and make notes on like okay what seems to flare this up the most. And that's where I would start. I also like creating constraints. So you know how we have load caps? I like using paint caps. Right. I like using pain caps as a way of like and I'll periodize the pain cap. So hey, this you know, I I think this is something that I learned from my last, the very last powerful coach I ever had, because I was getting like knee pain. And the thing that he said was, you know, the the goal is not necessarily to eliminate pain immediately, but like how can we train with pain but allow it to still recover at a manageable rate? So so then like I I then sort of like wanted to quantify it. So that's when I came up with pain cap. It's like okay next two weeks, most amount of pain I'm gonna allow you to experience is three out of ten. Two weeks after that, Kaushal Sumedh: Mm. Norman Cheung: one to two out ten. And then after that, one out of ten. And then just ignore it and then you'll realize, they've recovered. You know. So that that's that's what I think about. But also it depends on like the type of injuries you get because if obviously you've got some sort of nerve injury, nerve related issue like sciatica or like some sort of upper body neck related issue, that you know, I I know people who've, you know, I think there's a famous coach in the UK who had that with his bench press and it just completely annihilated his ability to bench. So you Kaushal Sumedh: Hm. Norman Cheung: know, those are quite difficult. But if we're talking overuse issues, they can be very difficult to manage because like tendonitis can take a long time to recover from. Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: And I would always say try to get as much help as early as possible. Because some people live in this sort of like gray zone. And it's what I refer to as like. The beta region paradox, which is like the the the suffering you're going through is annoying, but annoy not annoying enough for you to have a sense of urgency with it. And that's Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Norman Cheung: dangerous because you end up just like coping with it for a long period of time. So I would say if you can get like an expert physio working with you as a team, like like that would be great. Like, why wait Kaushal Sumedh: Mm. Norman Cheung: for it to get worse and then see a physio when you could have seen a physio much earlier on? So Tapas: Yeah. Norman Cheung: you know, and and yeah, and just learning to pay attention to its progress without ruminating on it too much. Right. Think about like I think about other ways we can like preserve movement pattern and you know muscular stimulus. Right. and it may be the case that you need to completely start again from scratch in terms of fight going through that titration process of jay: Pressure. Norman Cheung: like finding that optimal training dose again. It's like we've gone right round in circles now. yeah. Tapas: Full circle. Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, w yeah, full set. Norman Cheung: You know, it it's a case of like, okay, you know I you know, what one of you know what one one heavy weight lifter I I I'm working with at the moment. When I started working with him, he started getting loads of back pain, right? from just like too much. I'm like, okay, there's no signal as to where the optimal range needs be. When I say jay: I don't know Norman Cheung: optimal, I don't mean like perfect, I mean just like a productive range, right? Tapas: Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: Hmm. Norman Cheung: yeah, I used two sweats to interchangeably. I'm like, okay, like what's the minimum amount that I can get away with? I was like, okay, let's this squat twice a week with two sets each day with super low RPE, and then we just like build from there. And it turns out like his like A really productive amount of volume was about four to five cents a week max per lift. and so you know, it's like and and that's you know, going back to what I was talking about at the start, it's like how do we spot the anomalies? Like what what sort of process do you need to go through to find what's a safe zone for you for for an athlete? Yeah, and also like fit all sometimes you have to reflect upon like your progression model as well and your periodization philosophy. Because sometimes people are just like very aggressive they're very willing to be very quickly aggressive with experimentation, you know. so yeah, you just gotta be careful with that as well. And some you know, some of the especially if you are dealing with experienced lifters, using something like acute chronic workload ratio is gonna be useful for managing that as well. Tapas: And the last question, the final one, was about accessories before mainlifts. When do you actually program them? If there's any value in that strategy. Norman Cheung: I have used it for people who seem to be psychologically very lazy with the accessories. Like that's like one that I've used before. I have used certain accessories to you know, like I have occasionally done accessories it as as almost as a means to like create movement competency leading into a certain exercise. You know, I have given people rows before, right before they bench, just to help like manage a really severely asymmetrical bench press. Like I've definitely used that before. I've definitely used it the past. if I'm going through a phase of like I may like give some accessories to get them to feel a certain part of their body. Like it might be a certain part of their foot. You know, I might give someone like a a a dump, you know, like a toe elevated RDL right before the squat just to help reinforce them to you know find jay: See the big though. Norman Cheung: you know yeah yeah feel the big toe a bit more or or or or just to keep tension on the cords a little bit more and stuff like that. So I've definitely used it, but like whenever I have done this, I haven't destroyed them, if that makes sense. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. wanted to make that distinction. Like these are more like sensory things that he's talking about, not like axeries, axeries as people might think of. Like not like you do like all bodybuilding work before your SPD kind of a thing. It's not that kind Tapas: Mm. Kaushal Sumedh: of situation. You're not doing like you know, heavy chest supported T bar rows and then like hack squats and leg press and things like that before your S P D. That's not what he's talking about. Just to make that clear distinction. there was one one model like that. One coach was like talking about this model where he was like, well, hypotrophy is your most important factor for muscle mass. And then a bigger muscle means a stronger muscle, or like it has the potential to be stronger. So because of that, you do your hypotrophy work first and then you do your SPD. But like, I don't think there's ever a scenario where your SBD takes precedence over hypertrophy work like that. Unless we're talking about sensory. related drills that you're talking about. I believe that's what they're talking about exactly. That would you ever do like an actual full fledged hypertrophy or like, you know, work towards like close to failure and then you do your S V D. D do you ever see something like that? I don't think I at least I wouldn't do something like that. I couldn't think of a use case scenario ever like that. Like where you do, you know, like heavy sets of leg presses and then you do your S B D or like heavy sets of like heavy lower body hypertrophy work and then you do your S B D or anything like that. I I just don't see why you would do that. jay: I Tapas: Hm. jay: I would say like the the the the outcome of that would be starting to see some amount of technique drift as well, right? Because Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, because motor motor pattern learning is like it changes according to like how fatigued you are, right? So the more fatigued you Tapas: Hmm. Kaushal Sumedh: are from hypertrophy work, the lesser your skill of like your your ability to process that and to be able to maintain technique or to even drive in technical you know, improvement changes. Cause your motor pattern learning is different. So you're just not gonna be able to do it as well. if you do your hypertrophy work before your SBD. Norman Cheung: Yeah. Yeah, I can't I can't think of yeah, I can't think of a reason to do that. Kaushal Sumedh: Because Yeah, yeah. Because what you're saying is like a very nuanced situation where like somebody can't feel something, so then you might give certain warm up sensory drills or something like that. Or like even Norman Cheung: Yeah. Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: certain exercises that might help you feel a little better in order to ex ex execute the S V D better, but you don't really do a full fledged workout before the S V D itself. jay: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. jay: I had another guy a while ago ask me in my DMs as well. And I was just like, might not be a tool that I employ simply because I see certain because accessories, well, you want to push them hard, right? You you do kind of wanna make them like w if you're looking from a hypertrophy standpoint. But then that carryover to like the main work after kind of will disrupt that situation. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. Tapas: That's Norman Cheung: research has shown that like doing exercises earlier on jay: Makes them more effective, mate. Norman Cheung: Yeah, i yeah, especially for strength. Kaushal Sumedh: I mean the order of exercises are always given for a reason for that reason, right? Because you can Tapas: Hm. Norman Cheung: Yeah, yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: go in with the intent of training really well and like because powerlifting is also about force production. Like jay: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: you w force production. So you like when you if you're already very fatigued and tired from hypotrophy work, you just can't do that for S B D in an effective manner. Norman Cheung: The the the other thing is is it's also making the assumption that the strength work that you do with the S V D does not contribute to hypertrophy, which it clearly does. jay: That's yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, yeah, I I th Norman Cheung: No. Kaushal Sumedh: that's the thing. It's just not the most most optimal or efficient thing that you're looking for for a specific, you know, localized tissue that you're looking localized muscle, this thing that you're looking for. But S V D does make you pretty pretty jacked. Tapas: Hm, yeah. Norman Cheung: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: It's a it's just a little bit of everything. It's just not like one specific muscle group. That's it. Yeah, that Tapas: Not isolated as such, yeah yeah. jay: I think I've Kaushal Sumedh: that's all. Like people have it very confused. They think like S V D just just doesn't build any muscle. That's not the case. There are tons of examples of people who are like who got pre jacked before the whole you know the optimization of hypertrophy or whatever you want to call it. Like all all optimization of hypotrophy is just isolate isolation work where you're pushing Tapas: Mm. Kaushal Sumedh: that particular muscle to its maximum capacity. Which which which is useful. I'm not saying it's it's useless, but it is useful. But we've been doing this before as well. It's not some it's not a new concept. It's just like a little bit, it's the same thing again, you know, the same wheel, yeah, jay: Yeah. Tapas: Pre phobist. Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: refurbished this thing. Norman Cheung: Cool. jay: That's I I I wanna I wanna thank Norman for taking out Kaushal Sumedh: He just goofed off. jay: I I wanna thank Norman for taking his time to kind of talk to us about like a whole host of topics. we will have Norman on as many times as Norman can afford to come on. It is always gonna be an inter interesting conversation. like we said all converse like all podcasts, the objective is to bring the best in the game, to give you guys Tapas: Hmm. jay: an objective, right? That is there are many ways to get what the outcome that you desire, right? And we want to find sustainable ones that can give us long term progress. And that is through understanding the fundamentals at play. Right. Norman, from the bottom of my heart, thank you as always, man. guys, Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah. jay: you know. Tapas: Thank you for coming on, Norman. Yeah. Norman Cheung: Thanks for having me. Kaushal Sumedh: Yeah, yeah, my we genuinely appreciate you coming here and doing this with us. Tapas: Yeah. Kaushal Sumedh: always appreciate everything that you do. Yeah. Thank you, thank you. Bye Norman Cheung: Mate. It's been a pleasure. Until next time. Take care. jay: Thank you, Nolan. See you guys, bye bye. Kaushal Sumedh: bye. Tapas: Bye bye. Wait.