The Mind Muscle Connection

Welcome to the Mind Muscle Connection Podcast! Brandon DaCruz is back for part four of our body recomp series, and this time we’re talking training. We start with why training is what drives the muscle side of a recomp, and why working out and training are not the same thing. From there we go through the principles that matter most, which are progressive overload, training close to failure, getting both quality and enough volume, and tracking your workouts so you know what to beat. Then we ge...

Welcome to the Mind Muscle Connection Podcast! Wanting to be leaner isn’t enough to decide if you should cut, bulk, or maintain. In this episode, I go over the five things I look at with clients before choosing a direction, starting with body composition and muscle growth potential. I break down body fat ranges for men and women, and why someone who has trained for 10 years can still have a lot of room to build muscle. I also cover how recent dieting history and yo-yo dieting affect which dir...

Welcome to the Mind Muscle Connection Podcast! Gaining more weight than you planned during a building phase doesn’t mean you have to jump straight back into a fat loss phase. In part two of my building phase series, I break down what to do if you overshot your build, starting with what I look at with clients before we change anything, including whether the increase is temporary, whether the weight gain is actually a bad thing, and whether you’re trying to stay leaner than your lifestyle and t...

Welcome to the Mind Muscle Connection Podcast! If you feel like you have to be in a fat loss phase all year to stay in shape, your building phases are probably the problem. In this episode, I go over how to run a building phase without unnecessary fat gain, starting with the expectations you need going in and how I set up calories and macros with clients. I also cover the habits that keep fat gain in check, like not saving all your calories for the end of the day, fueling around your workouts...

Welcome to the Mind Muscle Connection Podcast! Aaron Straker, founder of Straker Nutrition Co. and co-host of the Eat Train Prosper Podcast with Bryan Boorstein, is back on for the third time. Aaron recently earned his IFBB Pro card in men’s physique and just moved back to the States after four years in Bali. In this episode, we talk about how he’s running his offseason build and how he’s working to bring up his upper back after his first bodybuilding season. We also get into his low-volume l...