Shelby Stover is a Strength & Nutrition Coach and the person behind the blog Fitasamamabear.com. As a mom of three young girls and coach for the past ten years, Shelby helps make healthy food and strength training at home easy for busy moms. Her ultimate goal is to help moms increase energy, keep up with their kids, and feel confident in the skin they’re in.
Listen to this episode of The MOVEMENT Movement with Shelby Stover who debunks fitness myths.
Here are some of the beneficial topics covered on this week’s show:
– How you don’t need to go to the gym to get an effective workout.
– Why ditching your shoes can improve ankle and hip mobility.
– How you should try different workout styles to find which ones you enjoy best and will stick with long term.
– Why trainers shouldn’t recommend intense workouts involving exercises like jump squats and burpees.
– How genetics play a significant role when it comes to achieving your health and movement goals.
Connect with Shelby:
Guest Contact Info
Links Mentioned:
Connect with Steven:
Website
Twitter
@XeroShoes
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@xeroshoes
Facebook
facebook.com/xeroshoes
Episode Transcript
Steven Sashen:
What are the top fitness myths that keep you from well, hitting your fitness goals, whether you’re a man or a woman or child, I don’t know. We’re probably not going to talk about children, but who knows where we’re going to go because it’s a conversation and I have no idea where these things go because that’s what happens on the podcast, the Movement Movement. That’s this podcast where we break down the propaganda, the mythology, sometimes the outright lies that you’ve been told about what it takes to run or walk or hike or do yoga, CrossFit, whatever you do. And to do that enjoyably effectively and efficiently.
And if you’re a longtime listener to the podcast, I’ve reversed the order of what I say because the other thing we’re doing is talking about how to have a happy, healthy, strong body. Feet first, you know, those things at the end of the legs that are to the foundation of your body.
I’m Steven Sashen, co-founder, co-CEO of Xero Shoes. Here’s the T-shirt to prove it. And we call this the MOVEMENT Movement podcast because creating a movement and by we that includes you, more about that in a second. About natural movement, letting your body do what it’s made to do. And the part that involves you is really easy. If you want, go to www.jointhemovementmovement.com. There’s no thing you have to join, there’s no secret handshake, no money involved, there’s no song that I make you sing every morning, it’s just that’s the domain that I got.
But it has all the previous episodes, all the ways you can find us on social media, all the places you can find the podcast if you don’t like the one that you use to find it this time. And what you need to do to be part of this is really easy, just spread the word. Tell people that, give us a review, give us a thumbs up and like hit the bell icon on YouTube to be alerted about new episodes. You know the drill, if you want to be part of the tribe, just subscribe. So let’s get started. Shelby, do me a favor. Tell human beings who you are and what you’re doing here.
Shelby Stover:
All right, well I’m Shelby. I run the website fitasmamabear.com. I am a certified strength coach in real life and a super awkward person. It’s so true. I’m a mom of three girls. So with that comes basically all the chaos you can imagine. They join me in the gym every day. And basically my whole goal is to get moms working out and just make the healthy life aspect practical for chaotic lifestyles, which is all of us, let’s be honest.
Steven Sashen:
Yes, to a certain extent, that’s always true and people love to pretend that they aren’t that chaotic. I love when people say, oh, I’m going to sign up for this workout program. It’s a 6-day-a-week program. I go, good luck, I hope you make it to day 3. And some people have that life, not the people that I know. So now, FYI, if you are not a woman or a mom, this is still going to be applicable because we’re going to talk about some myths that affect everybody. And do you want to jump in with your favorite first one? That’s kind of a high pressure thing because I don’t know if you’ve organized these into a top, however many.
Shelby Stover:
I don’t think I’ve organized them. One of my favorite things to chat about though is women and weightlifting and just weightlifting in general. I train at home. So for anyone who does follow me, or if you haven’t, I have a really, really well set up home gym and I am very anti going to the gym because let’s be honest, who has time to go travel… I live in Canada, so there’s winters guys, to go travel to the gym multiple times a week? So go ahead.
Steven Sashen:
Oh wait, hold on, let me pause on that one. I’m so lazy that if I didn’t have my home gym in a place where I have to walk by it every day, I wouldn’t use it.
Shelby Stover:
It saves you. It literally saves your goals. Being able to hit up your workout in your pajamas, whatever you’re wearing, don’t change, it just takes time. And do all-
Steven Sashen:
Hold on. Who wears pajamas?
Shelby Stover:
Okay, fair. But I shoot a lot of videos. It’s otherwise just inappropriate.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, there’s no such thing as TMI in my world. But literally we’re watching TV and I see people in pajamas, like what year is this? Who does that? It’s very confusing to me. So, all right, so myth number one is that you need to go to the gym. But if you’re going to talk about your home gym as well what you’ve got there, what are the essentials for a good home gym?
Shelby Stover:
So full disclosure, I’m super spoiled.
Steven Sashen:
Oh, did I freeze?
Shelby Stover:
We did freeze a little bit there. I think we’re back.
Steven Sashen:
Oh really?
Shelby Stover:
Oh, wait.
Steven Sashen:
We’re having some-
Shelby Stover:
Hang on, we’re freezing.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, I don’t know what’s going on. Internet-
Shelby Stover:
Yeah, hang on.
Steven Sashen:
Things, technology back and complaining they don’t work. All right, I’m going to pretend that things are working now because it seems like they are.
Shelby Stover:
Perfect. I think we’re good. Okay.
Steven Sashen:
Okay, we’re good. So I was going to say, let me try it again. So what are the essentials for a good home gym?
Shelby Stover:
So full disclosure, I’m 100% spoiled. I trained out of the house for 10 years, so I do have a full setup down there, which includes a squat rack and gymnastics ring, some punching bag and all the fancy things you can have. What I recommend is honestly just a set of resistance bands and some dumbbells. You can get some wicked workouts with just those things. You don’t need to be fancy. Actually, the simpler the better because let’s be honest, if you have a million choices, you’re going to freeze and run away. So keep it simple, have a set of dumbbells, work your way up in weights there and call it a day.
Steven Sashen:
Bench, no bench?
Shelby Stover:
Optional. A coffee table works, right? The floor works. You don’t need to have an actual bent. If you want one and you want to say that you have a workout bench, go for it. But I wouldn’t say that it’s crucial.
Steven Sashen:
Well, the good news is there are lots of people who bought workout gear that turned into coat racks. And so if you get on Craigslist, you can often find something cheap or free, somebody just trying to get rid of something. So optional bench, some dumbbells. And now I’m a geek this way, I went for adjustable dumbbells, I got power blocks.
Shelby Stover:
How do you like them? Because the adjustments always make my eye twitch a little bit because they take too long.
Steven Sashen:
In fact, I got a ton of newspaper.
Shelby Stover:
Weird.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, well, exactly, I want to be able to adjust really quickly. So back in the days when newspapers had classified ads, somebody was advertising these power blocks for a third of the normal price, and I called and said, “You know, I’d love to get them. Is that the best price you can do?” He goes, “Well, I’m selling these for a friend.” I said, “Well, can you ask your friend?” He goes, “He’s dead.” All right, I’ll give you all the money.
Shelby Stover:
Just take the money. Thanks. I think one of the oldest pieces in my gym are these ghetto, old steel, 12-pound dumbbells that I’ve carried around since I was a teenager that I think I found in a friend’s basement and still have them. They still work. It’s awesome.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah. Well, I’m going to prompt you for a myth because since we’re talking about resistant bands and dumbbells, and I’m going to put words in your mouth, it sounds like one myth that you may agree with is you need to go heavy, you need to have heavy weights.
Shelby Stover:
I don’t agree with it. I prefer heavy weights personally.
Steven Sashen:
I do, too. That’s a question of need. That was why I was going for the,
Shelby Stover:
I think you need progressive overload, but I think that can be done in a variety of ways. So I wouldn’t say that you absolutely have to push heavy. You don’t need to deadlift your body weight. It feels super cool to do it, but it’s not a requirement in terms of boosting your strength, getting lean, looking good, feeling good. You just need to gradually progress your workout. So that can be done using pauses, using more reps, using higher volume, using tempos, a lot of different ways. You don’t have to lift super heavy. It’s just way more fun.
Steven Sashen:
Well, I agree. Sadly, I have a spine problem, so I’m not supposed to, and I really miss doing heavy deadlifts, heavy squats, especially as a sprinter. When I was getting injured a whole lot, there was a coach who said to me, “How much do you need a deadlift?” And at the time, I’d never really done it, so I just went and grabbed some weights. I went, “Well, I just did 250.” He goes, “What do you weigh?” I said, “About 150.” I found that once you get over about double your body weight, that’s when a lot of injuries go away. And it was true.
Once I got over double my body weight, a lot of things went away. Then the first time I pulled 400, which was a big psychological barrier, I had two thoughts right in a row, and I’m glad they happened right in a row. The first was, wow, now I got to go for 500. And the second was, Hey, you’re a moron.
Shelby Stover:
It’s hard though. You feel really, really cool doing it. I always laugh because I love chin-ups and pull-ups. My first chin-up took me a year because I learned everything the wrong way. But once you nail that first chin-up down, all you want is more and more and more because it feels really awesome. Strong is fun.
Steven Sashen:
Agreed. Agreed. Okay, well then I inserted a myth for you that is not a full myth. So do you have another one you want to toss out?
Shelby Stover:
Let’s see, another myth. We covered that you don’t have to go to a gym because home is better, that you don’t need to lift heavy weight, that you don’t need shoes.
Steven Sashen:
Oh, I’m game. Tell me.
Shelby Stover Stover:
That right up your alley for that one?
Steven Sashen:
I know a guy who knows a guy who-
Shelby Stover:
So it’s a funny story. It’s kind of a funny story how I even came to be on this podcast. I’ve been training without shoes for eight years. My daughter’s eight, my oldest, and I’ve never in my life called myself a barefoot trainer. I have a decent Twitter following. We have a great fit fam on there. And when the call out for your podcast came on, a bunch of people sent it my way saying, you have to go on this guy’s podcast. And I was like, “Well, I’m not a barefoot trainer.” And they said, you train barefoot every day. And I was like, “Oh my God, I do.”
I know. But the reason I started doing it wasn’t to quote unquote “see the benefits of training.” I actually just started doing it because I was really lazy when I was pregnant with my first, and I didn’t want to have to put my shoes on all the time in my own house, in my home gym. So I stopped and all these awesome things happen. So now I am pro training barefoot, I just didn’t realize that I was a barefoot trainer.
Steven Sashen:
Well, and another good reason to have a home gym because most gyms, they get mad at you if you try to walk in and say, I’m barefoot. And I’ve had this conversation and I’ve had people report this conversation. They go, “Well, what’s the problem?” They go, “Well, what if you drop something in your foot?” It’s like if I’m wearing a sneaker with a fraction of a millimeter of mesh over my toe, what’s the difference? And of course, logic is not something that goes over very well with people.
Shelby Stover:
No. And that’s the thing, the runners that I would wear were so low cushioned, low everything, nothing’s protecting your foot anyway. Also, just pay attention to what you’re doing. I don’t know when the last time I randomly dropped a weight near my foot was.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah.
Shelby Stover:
I feel-
Steven Sashen:
Well, it’s sort of like when I talk about going around in the world barefoot. They go, what if you step in dog poop? I go, “When’s the last time you stepped in dog poop?” They go, I don’t know, 20 years ago. It’s like, “Well, why are you going to start now?” And besides then I go, “Which is easier to clean dog poop out of the nobby things in your shoes or your foot.”
Shelby Stover:
And I bet it’d be a lesson learned, you wouldn’t do it again.
Steven Sashen:
Not for another 20 years. So when people come and find you and they see that you’re training barefoot, I imagine that they have some interesting responses. Talk about how you talk to them when they ask you what’s going on or they complain that they don’t think that’s a good idea.
Shelby Stover:
Well, the complainers just get blocked because I don’t have the mental energy to fully… I’m not getting into online debates with you. If you don’t like how I train, don’t watch training. I don’t know, I can’t. When people who are genuinely curious ask me how I got started, again, it was because I was pregnant and then newly postpartum. I really just didn’t want to put on shoes and tie my laces up. That’s what it came down to. But when I started training barefoot, what I noticed was I had to lower my weight on a lot of things. All of a sudden my structure was different.
So for squatting, my shoes were always heel elevated. So all of a sudden that shifts the muscle groups that you use. So I definitely, I had to lower, which worked for me at the time. And then when I noticed was that things like my ankle mobility and my hip mobility and all these things improved by not wearing shoes. So now it feels super awkward if I do have to wear shoes to train when I’m on vacation sometimes if you’re in hotel gyms and whatnot. And I find that because of the increased mobility, other things happen. So you get stronger, which is fantastic, but you have less low back pain because you have a good support system at your base. Those kinds of things that sometimes you just overlook because you really want to lift heavy.
And yes, I could probably lift a little heavier if I threw some shoes on for a couple of exercises, but not overly. And I find I don’t feel as engaged with my muscles when I do have shoes on now. And they just feel really awkward to me to do stuff in because I’m so used to it. Not to mention, sorry, this is a big rant of mine because I realized that last time I had to wear shoes on vacation was doing things like lunges. And normally now I’m so used to my foot stabilizing me and my toes being able to grip and all of those things, having to do that stuff in shoes throws me right off my game. So you are missing a lot of engagement wearing shoes.
Steven Sashen:
We’re actually starting to do some testing showing how just a typical normal cushioned shoe messes with stability because when you hit the ground, just that foam kind of… I’m trying to think of best analogy that popped in my head just now is imagine punching jello. It goes, wobber, wobber, wobber. Same thing happens in your shoe just a little faster, it doesn’t wobble back and forth as much compared to either barefoot or in shoes like ours where it just doesn’t happen like that.
And I have a video clip that I keep handy. It’s a guy from Adidas. He’s asked, “Hey, what’s energy return? Because all you shoe companies talk about energy return.” And the quote is, “Well, energy return is kind of a lie. There’s really just energy loss.” It’s like, oh man, I can’t believe he said that out loud. That was his outside voice and they let him keep his job somehow. I thought that was brilliant.
Shelby Stover:
Fair though.
Steven Sashen:
Okay.
Shelby Stover:
Yeah, I don’t think I could go back to training with shoes now, but…
Steven Sashen:
Well, FYI, I’m going to get you something for when you are on vacation that will give you that same feeling. So we’ll have fun. I know a guy who knows, a guy who knows where they park the truck around here, he’s constantly taking things. If I can only find that guy someday. So we have another myth I’m going to prompt you for this one because it was in our brief conversation before we started this, so I don’t know what number we’re up to, but let’s talk about finding the perfect workout.
Shelby Stover:
There isn’t one. I know everyone wants that answer of do this and you get this automatically, no questions asked. But the truth is, there just isn’t a perfect system. The only perfect system is the one that you’re going to do consistently. So I love lifting heavy weights. It’s my jam. I’m now a runner, which is just a whole other hilarious story of learning that. But-
Steven Sashen:
Well, I’m putting a bookmark there, so we’ll come back to that one.
Shelby Stover:
But that doesn’t mean that the way I train is the perfect way for you to train. Because if you’re only going to follow something half the time, the results are going to suck. So there’s no perfect system. And that’s not even taking into account people’s previous training experience and injuries and all of those fun things. It’s more just from a consistency point. You need to be consistent to see results. So not everyone’s going to have the same workout because a 5-day split that works for me isn’t going to work for the brand new mom who’s never lifted. It doesn’t make sense to train the exact same way as someone else. And again, not even taking into biomechanics and how your body moves and the fact that all of those things can be different as well. So the perfect workout is the one you follow.
Steven Sashen:
So given that humans love to have paint by numbers things instead, how do you work with someone to help them find something that they’re going to be challenged enough to be beneficial and enjoyable enough to have consistency.
Shelby Stover:
It’s a bit of trial and error, which again, a response people hate. I’m really sorry. But I do find if you spend the time making the mistakes and trying different things, it sets you up for the longterm. I think everyone should try strength training in some form. That is my personal opinion because it’s the easiest way to get progressive overload, which is going to set you up for strength down the road. So I always have people start with that. Whether your choice of equipment is dumbbells or kettlebells or bands, what do you prefer? Start with something that you like.
What drives me a little bit bonkers is right now in our world, we’re very much, you have to do all these HIIT workouts to see any kind of results. I know women are bombarded with them, just do this HIIT workout, just do this HIIT workout. But the truth is, I personally hate HIIT workouts. I can’t stand them. I don’t like the breathless death feeling. I’d rather lift super heavy. So again, it comes back to there’s not the perfect workout. Are HIIT workouts effective? Sure, if you will actually do them. But if you hate them after a month, you’re going to start skipping them. You’re not going to do them. So try a couple of different styles, figure out one you like and just stick with it for a bit.
Steven Sashen:
For people who don’t know, HIIT is a high intensity training. There’s lots of ways of doing it. There’s ways that people talk about just on the aerobic side. I have a big pet peeve about it as well because people will say things like, well sprint for 30 seconds, rest for 30 seconds and just do that eight times. To which I say, if you can do that more than twice, you’re not sprinting. You might be running as fast as you can run, but it’s not the same. And I don’t know if this is true, but I have the idea that high intensity intervals like that, they work for people who aren’t sprinters, but sprinters who are already like that, and it just doesn’t have any impact. I talked to one guy and I gave him this complaint, he goes, “Well, I don’t mean you’re going to hit the same time every time. I mean just get up and do your best.” And I said, “I don’t think you get it, man. If I run all out for 30 seconds, I’m done.”
Shelby Stover:
Dead.
Steven Sashen:
That’s it. And finally at one point, and this is a guy who was half my age, I said, “Just a quick question. When you go all out for 30 seconds, how far do you go?” And he said, “About 150 meters.” And he was really proud of that. I said, “Dude, I go 250.” And he was just dumbstruck. So it’s just a different thing. And on the weightlifting side, doing high intensity stuff, yeah, now my joke there is I sometimes, as much as I love lifting heavy, I also like doing high intensity stuff sometimes because I’m lazy and I just want to be done fast.
Shelby Stover:
Fair. Which again, embrace that because at least you’re doing something, right? But I think my issue with high intensity interval training is, it is great for experienced people, for people who have worked out, for people who have a base level of strength. But asking someone who has never worked out to go do jump squats and burpees, it’s terrible. It causes me rage. I’m sorry. Because they’re going to end up in pain with injuries, frustrated that they couldn’t do the workout or that it hit them this hard. So I think giving general recommendations like that, it doesn’t work. Don’t just spew out the words you know. Okay. Take into consideration these things. Like sprinting. Sprinting is amazing unless you have terrible hip mobility or ankle mobility or can’t land.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah. If you’ve got bad form, you’re going to mess yourself up.
Shelby Stover:
Terribly. So telling someone they should just go sprint for 30 seconds is terrible advice.
Steven Sashen:
I concur. Well, even back to the ideal workout, even though if you have the idea that… because I know that a lot of people think that there’s this ideal workout because if they find the right workout, they’re going to get the body that they want. And I’m going to add this in as my own myth because we’re talking about myths, but my favorite thing about this one is I saw a video, just stumbled on it from Doug, who’s a doctor who… he was the guy, he wrote a book called Body by Science, and it was all about super slow training, which I tried it for a while, not my thing. It felt like I got hit by 2x4s, but it wasn’t enjoyable. But he says, “Look, I’ve tried every different kind of workout there is, and I can tell you they’re all the same because what’s the limiting factor is going to be your genetics and again, what you want to do.”
And he goes, “And here’s the thing about genetics.” He was involved in the bodybuilding community. There’s a guy who was well-known as having the best calves in bodybuilding. The guy happened to have a twin brother who never lifted weights in his life, better calves. And there’s another bodybuilder who was known for having the best biceps, but he had no calves and he worked his calves harder than he ever worked his biceps, and they just didn’t grow. So, even within one body, there are seemingly genetic differences.
So, everyone just has this idea. It’s like you see a new workout, it’s like, ooh, that’s going to be the thing. Again, back to consistency. But I just wanted to highlight that because that idea that there’s the right one to give you some output that you think is going to be ideal, that’s 99% mythology.
Shelby Stover:
For the most part, yeah. I think genetics, it’s tricky. I don’t think you can fully go outside your genetics, but I think some genetics predispose you towards certain types of training.
Steven Sashen:
Absolutely.
Shelby Stover:
So if you nail that down, you’re golden, to be perfectly honest. But I think you can overcome quite a bit. It depends on your goals. If your goals are to go from looking very basic to completely lean figure competitor, that’s a pretty hefty thing to overcome. And it depends a lot on your structure as to, you’re never going to go from a size 8 structure down to a size 0. You do have bones, right? You can look super lean, you can be super strong, you can look amazing, but you do have to factor in some genetics and your basic shape too.
Steven Sashen:
And I think that’s a good one to come to grips with. And I say it that way because I’m 61 years old and it’s only been occurring to me recently. Some of the body shape stuff that I have, it’s from my dad. We have the same torso, that’s just the way it is. And that’s good for some things and bad for other things. And so be it. There’s another weird genetic thing. I know a bunch of bodybuilders and they go, yeah, the amount of steroids we take, it’s actually lower than any normal gym bro, because we’re just hyper responsive. So genetically we’re really responsive to these things. We’re not taking a whole lot. But yes, oh yeah, we’re taking a whole bunch of crap, just not as much as you think.
Shelby Stover:
Well, but even if you look at a pushup, so genetically, if I have super long arms, that’s going to suck for me to do. I can do them, don’t get me wrong, but my range of motion is so much higher than someone who has shorter arms. So if we’re in a pushup contest, if that’s my goal and I’m trying to beat someone and they have shorter arms, they’re already at an advantage. That’s the same for the deadlift, that’s the same. You have to factor in those things when you’re choosing very specific goals. For the person who has average goals to look better, feel better, lose some weight, I wouldn’t say that genetics is your biggest factor there, but for very specific things, then yeah, you need to acknowledge them.
Steven Sashen:
But to your point, the genetic part of what you might have a predisposition for is a thing. Because again, there’s a guy named Ralph Mann who wrote… I think he won the silver medal in the 400-meter hurdles in Munich, if I’m remembering correctly. And he became a biomechanical engineer and wrote a great book on sprinting. And he goes, “What makes a sprinter is eight factors. Seven of them are genetic, and the eighth is how well you maximize your genetics.”
Shelby Stover:
Yeah. That’s come up a lot in sports when you look at pro football players and stuff and how early they showed an aptitude for it. But I don’t remember what one of my training books, one of my strength books it was in, was that there are people who just have that 1% that they were made to do this. And if you can bring that out, that’s where you get pro players and Olympus and all of those things and you are genetically-
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, there’s a running coach here in town. We were at a panel discussion and someone said, “You have such a great team. How do you train these people to make such a great team?” He goes, “No, no, no. I just go to the elementary school and I find the fastest kid in fifth grade. Then I work with him like.” Like, Oh, got it. All right. Any other myths coming to mind?
Shelby Stover:
You know what, I had one and now I’m trying… ooh, I do remember what it is. I should write things down. I’m a pen and paper person. Otherwise, I’m just frazzled.
Steven Sashen:
I’m a write things down and then forget where I wrote that down because I will put it in some random place and it gets lost.
Shelby Stover:
That’s fair. That’s fair. I’m a big yellow sticky note person. They’re all over. But the worst part is my kids have started writing to-do lists on sticky notes and I was like, oh my God, what have I created? I’m so sorry.
Steven Sashen:
It’s okay. Someday they will look back and go, what have you created as well? You’ll agree with each other.
Shelby Stover:
But my big myth is twofold in this one is that it’s not always that you are lazier, unmotivated or et cetera, it’s that until you switch your mindset, you are not going to get anywhere. So your mindset is normally the limiting factor for most people because it’s not motivation that keeps you going to your goals. I train at 5:45, 6 in the morning with three kids in the gym with me. I do not wake up at 5:20 and I’m like, I’m so excited to go overhead press. It’s going to be great. It’s pitch black and -10 outside, sweet. It’s not motivation that gets me anywhere regarding goals, it’s just sheer dedication. So I think if people learn to make that little switch in their minds, you achieve a lot more.
Steven Sashen:
That’s a good one. The habitness of it is a big deal. It’s like someone said it really well, I can’t remember. It had to do with drinking or some sort of addiction. It’s like you just have to become someone who just doesn’t do that. It’s not that you’re resisting it, you’re just not the person who does that. And that’s something that just happens over time. For me, it’s actually easier, but I don’t have the time to do it right now. It’s easier if I work out six days a week because the habit of that.
Shelby Stover:
You just go.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, because if I take time off, it’s easier for me to go, ah, I’m too tired. Oh, I got to make pizza dough this morning which I do every Saturday morning. Oh, whatever it is.
Shelby Stover:
Can I come over?
Steven Sashen:
Oh, I make killer pizza. You’re more than welcome. So dough on Saturday. Well, so the New York style pizza dough starts on Thursday night. The Neapolitan starts on Saturday morning for Pizza Sunday. So just FYI.
Shelby Stover:
Yeah, this is the best thing ever.
Steven Sashen:
I will confess, it’s really good. And I only say that because we’ve had so many people over who say, oh man, this is the best pizza I’ve ever had.
Shelby Stover:
Homemade pizza’s the best. It’s just delicious.
Steven Sashen:
I bought an expensive pizza oven because one of the guys who works for us, our lead developer is a big pizza head. And I saw this oven and he goes, “Oh, it’ll change your life. You have to get it.” I said, “Dude, it’s like 800 bucks.” He goes, “It’ll change your life.” So my birthday was coming up, so I did and it changed my life. It’s that much better.
Shelby Stover:
I’ve said that about all the fitness equipment I asked my husband for Christmas every year. I’m like this rope, I swear it’s just, it’s going to change the game on things. And every year it’s magnificent, which for the record, climbing that rope did change my life because it made me feel awesome.
Steven Sashen:
I have a rope in my backyard for the same reason. But it was also when I was a gymnast and a pole vaulter, we did a lot of rope climbing and I like to pretend that I’m not 61. But I’ve only got one thing left that I might buy from my home gym. And there’s a bunch of variations. I don’t have a cable machine. I don’t have a big arm cable machine.
Shelby Stover:
So I don’t have a cable machine either. And I go back and forth between that or a rower because I think rowing would be kind of fun to be perfectly honest. It’s fun when I do it.
Steven Sashen:
Wait, those are so different, why is there a choice?
Shelby Stover:
They’re super different because apparently there’s only so much space in the third floor of the house to put things.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, you’re just not creative enough.
Shelby Stover:
I debate on the cable thing, but then I do a lot of weird hacks with bands.
Steven Sashen:
Right.
Shelby Stover:
I get hooked to all sorts of things. I’ve come up with some pretty decent hacks there. So a cable machine just isn’t high on the priority list.
Steven Sashen:
Well, I did my ghetto cable machine because I have a squat rack as well. And so I got on Amazon and just found… it’s basically just a cable pulleys and hooks and I just bought three of them so I could attach them in all these weird ways on my squat rack and-
Shelby Stover:
See, it can be done.
Steven Sashen:
It’s close.
Shelby Stover:
So I’m sure you’ve heard of his landmine training where you have the barbell hooked down. Okay. So I like landmine training. It’s fun every so often for a switch up.
Steven Sashen:
Pause, pause, pause. So explain what a landmine is for humans, unlike us who don’t know.
Shelby Stover:
So it is true, when you have the barbell anchored to the floor on one end and you are training with the other end of the barbell, is basically what it’s now. There are specific floor anchors you can buy. You drill them in, you push the barbell in and it sticks. I don’t have one. So everyone kept asking how I was doing this. And all I had done was wedged it between two kettlebells against the wall with a gym mat behind.
Steven Sashen:
That’s good. The one I’ve seen is just stick a towel on the corner and stick the end of the barbell on the towel. That’ll work too.
Shelby Stover:
Yeah, you can do it in a corner too. My gym’s set up so I can’t get to the corner because the squat rack’s kind of there. So I made the corner with two kettlebells. But so before you go buy really expensive gym equipment, just think outside the box because I’ve managed to come up with some pretty decent hacks over the years as to how to work out at home.
Steven Sashen:
So the row versus cable, that’s a really… boy, that’s a tricky one. Some of the rowing ERGs, they fold up against the wall.
Shelby Stover:
I’ve seen ones that fold really, really small kind of under your bed. But I would want one of the bigger traditional ones to be perfectly honest, if that was the way I was going to go with it. Yeah, it’s been on the list, I’m not going to lie. But last year I got my rope and then I got rings the year before.
Steven Sashen:
Rowing is super fun. And in fact for my 45th birthday maybe somewhere around there, my wife got me crew lessons. And so I’m getting up at 4 in the morning to go out on the river. And the unfortunate thing is, the other people who were getting lessons were, and I’m not trying to be rude when I say this, but here it goes, a bunch of really uncoordinated middle-aged women. And so there’s a woman in front of me in this 8-seat boat and I keep hitting her in the back with my ore and she goes, “Why do you keep hitting me?” I said, “Because you’re not getting out of the way. This is the rhythm of it and you’re just not doing it right and I’m not going to… I can’t sit”-
Shelby Stover:
Because you’re wrong.
Steven Sashen:
Well, it’s like if we want this boat to keep going, someone’s got to be doing it correctly. And so get the hint. And then after I bumped her a few times, she kind of got in the rhythm and we had five strokes where everybody was in sync and it was just magic. But I was thinking, I’ve really got to go and just get in a skull. So it’s just me.
Shelby Stover:
I was going to say you need the individual one. Team thing sometimes just…
Steven Sashen:
But the problem still is the best time on the water is like 5:00 AM and I’m just not that guy.
Shelby Stover:
I know. I struggle with that. I can get up early, it’s just so dark. And in Canada, eight months of the year are really freaking cold in the morning. And so-
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, no, definitely not. But I had a water rower for quite a while that I really loved. Except that you can’t adjust the… I love that it makes a good swishy sound like you’re actually in the water, but you can’t adjust the tension. And so the only thing you need-
Shelby Stover:
I thought you-
Steven Sashen:
Not on a water rower, it’s basically add or remove water. The one that I had, there was no way to do it. But what does happen is the faster you’re pulling, the more resistance you’re getting just because of what it takes to get through the water.
Shelby Stover:
Yeah.
Steven Sashen:
But the one thing I’m going to say this, for anyone who does have a rowing machine, get online and look at a lesson because the one thing that most people do wrong is that when they’re recovering, when they’re putting the ore in front of them again, basically they tend to bend their knees too early instead of… basically, the pattern is extend your arms, then bend your knees, and then you’re sort of reversing that on the way back. So people are doing it in a way that’s actually mechanically bad because what you naturally think to do is just not the thing that’s optimal for rowing. This is my public service announcement. Go watch a video for proper form because otherwise, you’re going to get hurt doing that and you won’t have as much fun.
Shelby Stover:
Fair. That’s fair. You don’t need a rower.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, I’ve actually thought about it because I have an air bike that I like, but I don’t like it as much as rowing.
Shelby Stover:
Way back in the day I was a certified spin instructor, cycling instructor and it wasn’t good. First of all, I’m just not that peppy person in that environment. I’m more of a just go do it. I’m not a rah-rah.
Steven Sashen:
Well wait, hold on.
Shelby Stover:
A very good person on that.
Steven Sashen:
Wait, I got to pick that one apart because you are about as rah-rah as they get. So where’s the line between rah-rah that you are naturally and what you have to do to be a spin instructor?
Shelby Stover:
The line is apparently when I’m half dying breathless on this spin, that’s apparently the line. I didn’t particularly want the certification, but way back when I was working for a gym and they were paying for it. They wanted me to get it. It was not good. It was not my calling, that’s for sure. So a bike I could never get, a treadmill I couldn’t get. I run outside. I like that it’s outside and I can see things. I can’t treadmill run well.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, I’m the same.
Shelby Stover:
Otherwise, I just won’t run. I’m outside or I’m not running. So the rower’s like the in-between good cardio option if I were to do it inside. That’s why. Medicine ball slams. I like slams.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, that’s fun too. Oh, the thing that I’ve been thinking is I’ve got to find something that’s super quiet because frankly I’ll do more if I can have it in front of the TV or more accurately if my wife and I could be watching TV at the same time and I could be doing something, that’s-
Shelby Stover:
That’s quality time.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, that’s the holy grail. So that’s what I’m working on. I’m not working on it very hard because I haven’t thought about buying anything for quite a while. But actually, wait, I bought something. I’m going to see if you have one of these and if you don’t, you’re going to want one. Glute ham roller. Do you know it?
Shelby Stover:
No, I don’t have one.
Steven Sashen:
You know what it is?
Shelby Stover:
I do. I think I do, what I’m picturing in my head.
Steven Sashen:
Okay. So for people who don’t, just imagine a plank of wood that’s like 12-inches wide and 24 inches long and then put wheels on each corner. They’re all facing the same way. So basically it’s like taking two roller skates and splitting them up with a piece of wood in between. And so you can do a million different things with it. So you can do glute bridges and hamstring curls. You can do single leg squats. You can do pushups. If you look up glute ham roller, you’ll find a whole bunch of things. It’s really inexpensive. It takes up no space and it opens you up to a whole bunch of really, really cool upper and lower body exercises.
Shelby Stover:
That does sound fun. I have TRX straps, so I do a lot of feet in straps type. If I can get them away from my 2-year old who loves swinging on them. She’s very mean about using her straps. She’s not nice. You kind of have to barter with her if you’re going to use them that day. It’s kind of a thing. But I do a lot of that with straps. That would be really fun though.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah.
Shelby Stover:
You can hack it if you took the wheels off the skateboard and turned them the other way.
Steven Sashen:
Well that’s basically what it is. Well kind of, but having that, ah, wait, could you do that? Yeah.
Shelby Stover:
If you switch the way of the wheels then, right, instead of the same way as the board on the opposite.
Steven Sashen:
Well actually no, because the problem with the skateboard is that the trucks that hold the wheels are made to move in every direction.
Shelby Stover:
Oh, okay.
Steven Sashen:
They’ll eventually be going off in some direction or another that you don’t intend to. And having the extra width… the way these things are typically made, there’s like a groove that you can either put your heel or your toe in to get a better grip or you flip it upside down, put your hand on because you’re a better grip. But again, they’re like 80 bucks and it’s my favorite thing to use lately. Because there’s so many things to do with it. Especially I’ll do a front foot elevated… let’s call it a lunge for lack of a better term, but it’s really a single leg squat where rather than a lunge where you’re just trying to go kind of straight down, I’m going where my knee is way over my toes and my hamstring is on my calf and I’m basically using my back leg for balance.
Shelby Stover:
Kind of like an A to G split squat. Yeah.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, like that.
Shelby Stover:
Similar.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, similar to that. Except because you’re-
Shelby Stover:
A lot more stability though with your foot elevated and on wheels there. That’d be fun.
Steven Sashen:
Well, no, elevated foot is on something stable. The rear foot is on wheels so that I’m really only with the front leg.
Shelby Stover:
Nice.
Steven Sashen:
It’s a good one.
Shelby Stover:
That’d be fun.
Steven Sashen:
I feel really, really butch when I do that. I don’t think I actually feel butch, that’s just the word that came out. I don’t know what that would mean.
Shelby Stover:
I love this tangent we’ve gotten on.
Steven Sashen:
Yes. Let’s see if we can find anything else in our bag of myths. Is there anything else that you can think of?
Shelby Stover:
I think I’m out of myths for the time being. Unless you want me to get in my rant about how you’re not going to get too bulky by starting to lift weights, but continue.
Steven Sashen:
No, that’s a good one. Do it.
Shelby Stover:
I know it’s been floating around forever, so I’m sure you’ve heard it. But for any females listening, please lift the weights for the love of God. Lift the weights. The benefits outweigh anything you think is going to happen. Which, funny story and makes me look terrible, but when I first started strength training 12, 13 years ago, I remember telling my mom, “You know, I’m not going to take it too far because I don’t don’t want to look too crazy, right?” I’m like the smallest person ever. I train five days a week and I’m super small.
Here’s the thing, people who have very large muscles work really hard for them. This is not going to happen on your three, four, day, 45 minutes workout session where you eat regular things. People who grow muscles like that are training so consistently, so hard and their macros are so on point that it’s their whole life. It does not happen accidentally. I can’t remember what the phrase was that really turned it into something hilarious for me. But it’s similar to saying you don’t want to learn to drive because you may become a race car driver.
Steven Sashen:
That’s great.
Shelby Stover:
Okay. It’s the same thing. That stuff takes so much effort. So if you are on the fence with strength training or weightlifting and whatever style you choose, you’re good. Okay? Don’t let that be a limiting factor.
Steven Sashen:
And again, that goes back to the genetic thing. Well, to a certain extent. And someone made a point that I really love, he goes, “Building muscle, your body doesn’t want to do it. You’re making it happen. By forcing it, your body is trying to avoid it at all costs.” Now there’s benefits to it of course, but it’s not like it’s a guarantee or a done deal that it’s going to happen because your body is going to fight you against doing-
Shelby Stover:
Every step of the way. Again, genetically, some people are going to build a little bit easier than others.
Steven Sashen:
Absolutely.
Shelby Stover:
But not to the extremes that you picture in your mind when you’re scared of quote, unquote “getting bulky.” It’s not-
Steven Sashen:
Or the other way around. If you think you are going to get bulky and totally swoll, the odds are not very high unless you just have that weird genetic thing. There was a guy on our high school gymnastics team, I don’t know this for sure, but it seemed, and I can’t check because again, unfortunately died in his 20s, but it seemed that he had a disease that a couple of bodybuilders have had where they don’t produce myostatin. And myostatin is a compound that basically keeps your muscles from getting too big. So if you have a lot of myostatin, you’ll never grow muscle. I had a friend like that, he was 6’5, 160 pounds, he was a twig.
Shelby Stover:
Whoa.
Steven Sashen:
But we’d go to the gym together and he would lift more than everybody in the gym. He just was skinny as rail.
Shelby Stover:
He couldn’t convert it.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. This guy on my gymnastics team, we used to tease him, we didn’t know any better, but we’d say, what’d you do for your biceps today? And he goes, “Cheerios.” And he just got bigger every day. It was just crazy. And in fact, part of the proof or part of the evidence that I used thinking that he might have had this disease where he doesn’t produce myostatin is he died from something that is common for people who have this very rare disease. So who knows? But again, I think it’s such an American thing that we all think that we can become whatever we think we can become.
Shelby Stover:
Well, you’re drilled in that you can achieve your dreams and you can… right, you’re drilled in that from the youngest age ever. Is anything’s possible?
Steven Sashen:
Yeah. This one bodybuilder that I know says, look, I look like this because I’m a genetic freak. You’ll never look like this. As a dude if you can get to 15% body fat, just shut up, you’re fine. As a woman, if you get to 20%, just shut up, you’re fine.
Shelby Stover:
And that’s the thing, scale it. For the majority of people, you don’t need to be the extreme of the extreme. You just want to look good, feel good, perform good.
Steven Sashen:
Yeah.
Shelby Stover:
So scale it down. Yeah.
Steven Sashen:
So back to our myths, because you brought up a word that is really full of mythology. Here we go. Well, the word you used was macros. So let’s talk diet, shall we?
Shelby Stover:
Oh, that’s a big one. That’s a big one. I don’t even know what myths to start with, with diet. That’s the thing.
Steven Sashen:
I’ll give it to you.
Shelby Stover:
Okay.
Steven Sashen:
It’s just like there is no perfect workout, there is no perfect diet.
Shelby Stover:
There isn’t. I hate using the word diet in some ways because you know that half the people associate that with eating less. I want to just phrase that we’re not talking about eating less, we’re talking about what you eat in general, your diet in general. Okay. So just to preface that going forward. There’s no perfect way to eat at all. It’s the exact same thing as training. You need to trial and error what works for your body, whether that is eating more protein or cutting out dairy or eating less often or eating more often. There are so many freaking variables when it comes to eating that you have to play around with it. Otherwise, it just sucks not to know.
So take the six, seven months to trial and error, A, what you enjoy, what your body responds to, and stop looking at just what your body responds to looks wise. But look at your energy and your sleep and how you’re performing. Because all those are things that come… getting tongue-tied… all those have to do with your diet also. So it’s a very encompassing thing, but there’s no one perfect solution. So stop listening to the person that tells you that this is the only way to eat because there isn’t one.
Steven Sashen:
I got to tell you, I was at the first paleo conference, this is like 12 years ago, and there were a couple of very interesting moments. One, this is at the University of Texas in the Fieldhouse, and they have museum level exhibits of various kinds. And it just so happened the one they had then was for physical culture over the years. So it was strength training, bodybuilding, weight lifting, powerlifting. These different things are from people from the 1800s all the way till now.
And one of the rooms was all photos about a guy named Clarence Bass, who he was often referred to as the world’s most muscular man. Not because he was the biggest or anything, but he was always really lean. And he was a lawyer who got into bodybuilding in his 30s and just was always just ripped. And wrote books about what he was doing every five years or so to a whopping 10% body fat. And anyway, there’s all these pictures of Clarence over the years, just like shredded, ripped, huge, strong, just amazing.
I’m standing with these two very well-known paleo bloggers. Each one was about 40 pounds overweight. And I said, “I know Clarence, and he’s on the anti paleo diet.” And they said, “What do you mean?” I said, “His diet is anti paleo .” And there’s a, “Wow, I wonder what he’d look like if he was”… Oh man, I just froze. I don’t know if it went through, I’m going to say it again. So just in case. So we’re looking at all these pictures of Clarence looking, just ripped, ripped, ripped for 40 years. And these two paleo bloggers that I’m with who are about 40 pounds overweight each, I said, “I know Clarence, I know what he eats. He’s eating like 55, 60% carbs and then splitting the rest between protein and fat.” And one of these people, “I wonder what he’d looked like if he went paleo.” It’s like, “You got to be kidding. Holy smoke.” So that was-
Shelby Stover:
That was not the point at all.
Steven Sashen:
No. And he wouldn’t look better because he couldn’t look better. And the other was, there was a big panel discussion with the top 10 paleo experts at the time. Each one had a different definition of what paleo was. And half of the people on that stage were still like 40 or 50 pounds overweight. And it was talking about how they had their blood work done and it was not good. People tell you what to do. There’s a lot more going on that you probably don’t know.
Shelby Stover:
Well, and again, it comes back to that individuality in some ways, everyone’s body is going to digest, breakdown and use in a different way. You’re going to respond in different ways. So I think there’s a lot of great diets, and I think we can agree that reducing processed foods should be a main focus. But outside of that, there’s so many different ways to eat and so many ways to achieve your goals. So it also depends if you are looking to gain muscle, if you’re looking to just get super lean, if you’re trying for health purposes. So all of those come into play as to your food choices too. So don’t tell yourself that there’s only one thing you have to do because there’s not, there never is. There’s always multiple paths to the same goal. So again…
Steven Sashen:
And much to my chagrin, yeah, that’s one of the things that I’ve been noticing lately is things that I used to have no problem with at all. Now, they don’t work for me at this age.
Shelby Stover:
Yeah, it changes. Your body shifts, right? It’s just age. Your body does shift and you can counter a lot of things, but it’s easier to work with your body than against it. So it comes back to a bit of trial and error on whatever stage of life you’re in as to, A, what your goals are, what you enjoy eating, and what’s actually giving you that kind of ROI. Right?
Steven Sashen:
Yeah. We are having more connectivity issues. I don’t know what it is, maybe it’s something at the bottom of the hour. Because this started when we started almost an hour ago. Well then given that, just to make people not suffer through our connectivity problems, let’s wrap this up. First of all, this has been an absolute pleasure. And secondly, if people want to get in touch with you and find out what you’re up to and find out what they can learn from you, which is clearly quite a bit, how can they do that?
Shelby Stover:
So I am at fitasamamabear.com is my blog. That’s across all-
Steven Sashen:
Wait, spell it out for humans who are not hearing as fast as you’re talking.
Shelby Stover:
So it’s fit as a mama bear. So F-I-T-A-S-A-M-A-M… Now I can’t even spell my own thing when I’m trying to say it in my mind.
Steven Sashen:
Do it one at a time. So fit, F-I-T- as-
Shelby Stover:
As, A-S, a, A-, mama, M-A-M-A. We’re overlapping each other here. This is priceless.
Steven Sashen:
Okay. Fitasamamabear.com. Between the two of us, we should have gotten it.
Shelby Stover:
Okay, fitasamamabear.com. So you have F-I-T-A-S-A-M-A-M-A-B-E-A-R.com. And that’s across all social media. My Twitter is probably the one that I post the most too, just because I have a really wicked fit fam over there and they get to see all of my crazy kid shenanigans when I’m trying to work out with three kids in a gym every morning. So that just provides solid entertainment to pick up your morning, to be honest.
Steven Sashen:
I love it. Well, Shelly, again, this has been a total treat. I do hope people check you out and I want to hear from you all if you do, whether you’re a man or woman, it doesn’t really matter. There’s a lot to be gained as you can tell. And so for everyone else, just a reminder, head over to www.jointhemovementmovement.com to find previous episodes, some that don’t have the technical problems that we just had. And you’ll find all the previous episodes, ways that you can find us in social media. Again, give us reviews and thumbs up and likes and hit the bell icon on YouTube, you know the drill on that one. And also, if you have any questions, comments, recommendations, if there’s anyone you think should be on the show, drop me a line. I’m at move, M-O-V-E @jointhemovementmovement.com. But most importantly, go out, have fun and live life feet first.