Fitness Fiasco
Fitness Fiasco
013 Uncovering Overrated or Underrated Fitness Gems: Protein, Ashwagandha, and Cardio Essentials
Ever wondered if your fitness routine is missing out on some underrated gems? Join us in this episode as we chat with registered dietitian Eric Bustillo, who spills the beans on the often overlooked benefits of protein supplementation, and why it's crucial for reaching your daily goals without falling into disordered eating habits. We dive into the surprising advantages of ashwagandha as an adaptogen, especially when your foundational health practices like sleep, nutrition, and training are already in check. Discover why Pilates might just be the versatile workout you've been missing, and why the rave reviews about apple cider vinegar might not hold up to scrutiny when compared to the fundamental pillars of health.
Think cardio is just for burning calories? Think again! This episode also breaks down the essential role of cardiorespiratory fitness in enhancing your hypertrophy and strength training routines. Eric sheds light on why cardio is more than just a tool for weight loss—it’s a game-changer for endurance and overall performance, especially in high-rep sets. We tackle the pros and cons of congruent training found in popular boot camps and discuss why a balanced fitness plan incorporating both cardio and weight training is the key to achieving your health goals. Don’t miss this episode packed with expert insights and practical tips to elevate your fitness game!
Send us a voice note, check out show notes and more at our site: https://www.fitnessfiasco.com/
Host Mike - https://www.instagram.com/mikeosunafitness/
Host Erik - https://www.instagram.com/erikbustillo/
Host Rob - https://twitter.com/RobStrength
The Fitness Fiasco Podcast provides general information on health, wellness, and fitness and should not be regarded as professional medical advice, treatment, or diagnosis. No doctor/patient relationship is established through this podcast. Listeners are responsible for their use of any information or resources shared in this podcast or associated materials. This podcast's content should not supplant consultations with qualified health care professionals concerning any existing medical conditions. It is crucial for listeners to avoid disregarding or delaying professional medical advice based on the information provided in the podcast. Remember to consult your health care provider for personalized guidance on your health and wellness journey.
We are back here with the Fitness Fiasco podcast. Eric Bustillo is in the house. Registered dietitian. We missed you on the last one.
Speaker 2:I know.
Speaker 1:I wish I could have been with you guys, and now we are missing Rob Silver. Yeah, yeah, yeah, soon enough, we'll get the gang back together.
Speaker 1:This is a dual thing, all right. So you do a really cool Instagram story where you do overrated, right, but most of the time it's mostly nutrition, fitness, type of training, stuff like that. So why don't we go over a couple of your most popular ones? So I'm going to shoot at you overrated, underrated. I'm going to tell you a topic You're going to spit out overrated, underrated and then give me a brief little description. I might add a thing or two. If not, we're going to move on. We're and try to keep this short and sweet. Perfect, cool. That sounds good, all right. So we're going to start off Overrated, underrated protein supplementation.
Speaker 2:Protein supplementation is underrated, an easy way to get an adequate amount of protein, which a lot of people are under-consuming.
Speaker 1:Okay, so any suggestions in order for people to try to hit their daily protein?
Speaker 2:goals A couple of things is using protein shakes as a snack as part of your breakfast at nighttime, right? The one thing, though, that I will say the caveat is I don't want people to like develop disordered eating patterns with it, so it's like if you're super full at the end of the day, don't force yourself to have the protein. I'd rather someone just like have a healthy relationship with food, mostly because in my experience, I've seen people have a horrible relationship with food, so I'd rather them do their best to get as much protein as possible without like forcing themselves. Unless this is the caveat, there's a very specific goal, like. If I'm working with, like an NFL football player and we have a specific weight and performance metric that we have to hit, then it's kind of like all right, we can force ourselves there, because that's their career.
Speaker 1:Okay, Perfect, Got it Next one. Overrated, underrated ashwagandha supplementation.
Speaker 2:So ashwagandha this one I'm going to go with underrated, as long as people have the three fundamentals in check the sleep. The sleep, their nutrition and their training. Because ashwagandha is a pretty effective adaptogen, so it helps people in a stressed state feel like they can handle the stress a little bit better. Um, but I don't like supplementation as like someone trying to fix it, it's like.
Speaker 1:Don't use it as a band-aid, use it as a tool in your toolbox got it so they could get the supplementation anywhere Amazon, Thorne any type of nutrition, Any dose that you recommend.
Speaker 2:It really depends on the individual. At first, I would just start with the recommended dose on the actual bottle. That's going to be a good place to start, but then, if anything, we can sit down and have a conversation, um for for specifics, for tweaking, if need be, okay uh, next one, and try not to piss off a whole camp of people here, right?
Speaker 2:so overrated, underrated pilates tread softly on this one. Okay, I'm gonna go with underrated. Oh, wow, yep, I'm going with underrated. Well, for one, I'm not a fan of demonizing or shitting on any type of fitness. But also, I say underrated because I think we get into this pattern of just like doing the same thing all the time. That's what's cool about crossfit, the constantly varied part. But like, for example, when we're working out, we do a lot of things like in this plane of, like front and back, we don't go side to side and sometimes like, let's just say, even in crossfit, we work on like the olympic lifts and that sort of stuff. But what about, like the you know, quote unquote little muscles, which is where, like accessory work would come in. I think something like pilates can be great for a certain population of people and or it could be a really good accessory for people who are doing other things got it.
Speaker 1:Um, I took a pilates class when I was knee deep in crossfit and it was one of our members and she owned a studio here in coconut grove and she downright embarrassed me the things that I was unable to do for sure with pilates. And, uh, she wasn't teasing me the whole time, but she definitely had to be known that this you know strong crossfitter couldn't do some of the basic stuff that these pilates, yeah, uh, practitioners are doing. So very cool, okay, um, I. I smile at this next one because, uh, this is, um, missing the trees to hit the forest. I forget the missing the forest for the tree. Missing the forest for the trees. I've never gotten that down pat, but this is one of them. Okay, so, overrated, underrated apple cider vinegar.
Speaker 2:Definitely overrated. It's just one of those things that it's like you're like another way to put the missing. The forest for the trees is majoring in the minors or like stepping over the $100 bill to pick up a nickel. You know what I mean. It's like no. Can it have an effect on people with like type two diabetes? Maybe, but guess what's going to have a better effect?
Speaker 1:Sleep training and proper nutrition. Yeah, man, and it's so difficult to answer these questions because I you know, I get them as well all the time and my first response is well, are you hitting the three pillars, which is what you said earlier nutrition, training and sleep? So how's that? But that's such a long conversation, and then when I answer, it doesn't matter, Because if you're not, focused on the three pillars.
Speaker 2:None of these things really ever matter. Not at all. Very few things will have enough return on investment. Creatine is one that it's debatable, but you still even something as potentially controversial as hormone replacement therapy therapy. We know that it can be very effective, but just the hormone therapy isn't enough to make sure that you're in a healthy place.
Speaker 2:You still gotta train right, sleep well and eat optimally 100% good stuff all right um overrated, underrated, demonizing sugar and sweeteners oh man, that's super overrated, because now I'm not saying that people should start having a crap ton of sugar and using all of like the non-nutritive sweeteners, but it's a tool in the toolbox, like sugar, we, we, we need that to perform optimally, right, I'm not saying we need sugar in the form of like table sugar and cookies, but people should be able to enjoy that also without feeling guilty and fear around it. Of course, some people might have control issues around those types of foods, but that's a separate problem. If we're demonizing, imagine we already have generations of people who are afraid of carbohydrates. They're afraid of fruits. It's like, are we really in that place? No way.
Speaker 2:And the non-nutritive sweeteners they're a good option for people who have diabetes, for people who are trying to control their weight. Of course, we don't want that to be the majority of what people are consuming. Whole foods is definitely a good way to go about it. But sugar, we don't have to demonize it. We don't have to scare, fear monger people. And the non-nutritive sweeteners can be helpful in certain cases. So definitely overrated to demonize those.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you think we would have learned from that fat-fearing era where they were making potato chips with oleen and everybody was getting diarrhea from it, and then we switched it over to carbs and then fructose, and then sugar, and then sugar, and a lot of people don't understand that if they eat these things in moderation, also based on their other three pillars, they could get away with having this stuff and still live a fit, healthy lifestyle. Absolutely yeah, the fear-mongering is what drives the internet.
Speaker 2:And the fear-mongering. It frustrates me because I've seen as generations this started with, like people's grandparents and then the parents. It was passed to the parents, and then the parents to the children, and then now the children are the parents, so the parents, those new parents, and it's just like it has to stop somewhere. It's almost like you know how people use generational trauma, right? This is just like generational misinformation that gets passed on and it's like we don't need to fear rice and beans, listen, go to any firehouse and listen to the conversation that these guys have.
Speaker 1:And you have some people that are knee deep into these um, I should say fear mongering one-sided podcast that all they do is go regurgitate it. And then they float into another station and they said just avoid sugar, just avoid fats, or you know, fast for 16 hours. Another station and they said just avoid sugar, just avoid fats, or you know, fast for 16 hours, like Jesus Christ. That's such a difficult, long conversation to have that there's so many moving parts to it, but it's just so easy and simple to go okay, I'm just going to not eat for the first eight hours of the day and then go through that. Or I'm just going to cut out all sugars or whatnot. So, uh, and if it's not sustainable, it's not attainable. You, I'm saying like for sure, they'll do it for a couple of months. And then I see them, you know, two years later, when I float into the station and there's the rebound effect, they've gained a 25 pounds because they've gone off the deep end and they couldn't hold it on.
Speaker 2:For you know, and this is your expertise, so yeah, but that's something that like, and to any firefighter listening or watching, like, bring us in to friggin, talk to your firehouse because there's the, the firefighters dude. I was giving a presentation one time to firefighters down here in the South Florida area and someone kind of tried to quote, unquote, call me out on using Splenda or some sort of non-nutritive sweetener and they're like so you're saying that it's okay to use this carcinogen? Because I was like it's okay to use diet soda from time to time Not a big deal and I was like let's talk about how much alcohol you drink.
Speaker 1:And he was like oh wait, how about the cigars that you smoke?
Speaker 2:legit. Let's ignore that. That's more of a carcinogen, if anything, than the potential that you could get from, and it's not even proven, yeah, so you heard it here firefighters, departments out there, if you want the fitness fiasco podcast, we'll come free of charge.
Speaker 1:come to your station, come to your department. We'll do a live podcast in front of your members. I'd be happy to do that and a Q&A with them. And a Q&A that's most important, boy, we'll get bombarded.
Speaker 2:Oh, I would love it.
Speaker 1:I would love it. You know what? I have seen a shift during the 20 years of my fitness training. I should speak to these new guys coming in, a lot of these new guys. They're up and up when it comes to fitness. They do find time to train and they are somewhat at least conscious of what they're eating and how they're eating.
Speaker 2:For sure, sleep Anyways, let's stick to the subject here, but I will say you bring up a good point, because I've been working with tactical athletes police, fire, military ever since I was a dietician, which is now for well over 10 years, and I've seen that shift the younger generation not to to, you know, poo-poo on any of like the older generation. But, and I'll never forget this, my brother is a city of miami firefighter and we have conversations and him, other friends of mine that are in the, in the, in the fire department, uh, uh, workforce. They say the same thing.
Speaker 1:Firefighters hate two things the way things are and change yeah, 100, it's so difficult and I will give you know, in defense of the older guys as well they didn't have the internet, they didn't have social media, yeah, they didn't have this information readily available to them before.
Speaker 1:I used to come into the station and we'd talk for three hours about nutrition. They'd pick my brain. This is early 2014, 2012 or whatever in that area. Now people are telling me stuff hey, mike, have you heard of this? Hey, mike, what about that? Or hey, mike, which is cool, they're on top of their game, and then with all these fantastic podcasts that are out there. So I have seen that shift. The younger guys are now making a move and those guys are moving up to administration. Administration is putting a priority not only on physical health, but mental health as well, at least in my department.
Speaker 2:And to add to that like and it starts from the top down so chiefs have, like, the say in this right. Like the, the fitness class that I started with one of the local police departments down here in South Florida it was because the chief is a fitness buff I gave a talk up in uh, cause I do a lot of stuff with with my guys over at O2X and we had a talk up like in the Boston area and there's a fire department up there. The chief is like he's all about the wellness component. So if the chief is on and these are two old school guys but they see the return on investment of investing in the health and wellness of your people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, a hundred percent, that's a very good call. I'm so on board with that. All right, last one, let's do it Overrated, underrated, cardio car.
Speaker 2:Oh man, underrated, big time Underrated, yup.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I say under because I feel like, even though you do have the cardio bunnies, so to speak, um, people are still hating on cardio. And I understand with cardio, like if you're trying to get as jacked as possible, maybe cardio is not going to be the best option because of the caloric burning part You're you're trying to get as many calories as you can, so why am I going to burn more on cardio? But it can have positive effects outside of your cardiovascular system yes, heart, lungs, brain. Also it can help with muscle performance, so why not do it to some extent?
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. And you know there's a role of cardio, whether it's HIIT or LIS, inside of a well-designed program for hypertrophy, even strength training. Because if you have some cardiorespiratory endurance now, you're able to lift that 15 to 20 reps if you're in a burner set or if you're doing some hypertrophy work, as opposed to if you didn't have any cardio. So you're leaving actually some muscle gains on the table. It might be minuscule, but you're leaving some on the table by not doing some sort of cardio. Now, when we look at cardio, most people, most novices, do it just assuming that they're going to burn more calories, which is going to put them in a deficit and they're going to lose weight, and I don't think they're really understanding the lack of calories that it actually burns as opposed to focusing on diet. So in all of my programs I have some sort of cardio sessions in there for my athletes Good, but I always got to go back to what is their goal and then I implement how much cardio they're going to actually be doing in relation to their goal itself. One of the conversations that I had not too long ago because I posted on my story was a repost of a scientist downplaying the effects of let's call it ABC boot camp, and I think that we could all kind of relate to what boot camp we're talking about here.
Speaker 1:But these franchise type boot camps have come into the US or started in the US and they do what basically you would label as congruent training. So they're doing some resistance training, so some dumbbell work, maybe some sandbag, maybe some medicine ball work, but then they're doing a lot of cardio and sprinting on a treadmill, rowing on either a concept tube rower or a water rower, the skier. So they're doing what is labeled congruent training. They're doing cardio and weight training. However, it just depends on that person's goal, on whether they want to increase muscle mass and physically change the way they look. Yeah, that stimulus is important for that adaptation. So for any and let's just be clear, in the camps that I'm talking about here, any newbie, let's just call it a 35-year-old female divorcee that hasn't done anything physical since high school, damn why she got to be divorced. Well, because In my experience I've had a lot of new clients that come in that have just gone through a divorce. Yeah, I get it. Now they're back out there, you know, trying to, you know.
Speaker 2:Get on their A game, if you will, exactly yeah.
Speaker 1:So now they decide to lose some weight and they've realized that they've neglected their physical appearance over the course of a couple of years, over the course of the marriage, if you will. So now they're searching for weight loss and those types of people anything they do is going to create some sort of adaptation, right. So hula hooping and burpees, they're going to get adaptation. But any intermediate lifter that enters one of these cardio programs thinking that they're going to change their physique, it's very difficult if they're looking for physique-changing goals. So somebody like you, as physically fit as you are, you walk into abc boot camp. I doubt that you're going to see any strength, any hypertrophy gains. Your vo2 max might change a little bit. Yeah, I mean you already do a crap ton of cardio, yeah, but um, but physically I'll argue that you could do that for 12 months and we won't see any larger biceps or quads or anything like that.
Speaker 1:It's just not. That's not what it's designed for. It's designed for general fitness, for sure. So the stimulus is important. So it just depends on what type of cardio the person is doing and the reason that they're doing it for Cardiovascular fitness or cardiovascular health. That's why I do it. I also do short bouts of high-intensity cardio for jiu-jitsu, yeah. So I find it funny that you say it is underrated because of how much hate it's gotten. I would call it in the bro-lifting world, right In that gym bro world, where everybody's like, oh, we're not doing cardio. Cardio takes a lot of time, especially no steady-state cardio. But I think the female demographic is still heavy on the cardio. Um, but I think the female demographic is still heavy on the cardio. I've had to pull back some of my females from as much cardio as they do and have them just weight training sessions and doing cardio in a different session only so they'd see the physical goals that they're looking for For sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the reason I say that it's underrated is mostly because of the hate. When I see people hating on something, I'm like I'm prone to go against that Right. Like if someone is going to hate on, uh, whatever form of fitness, I'm just like like why, what's the point? So I think that it's important to acknowledge, like what you're trying to accomplish. Because, like you said, if I were to go do like the ABC bootcamp, like I would potentially just maintain my fitness but would I get bigger, stronger, faster? You know, potentially not right, but if we're trying to maintain, not bad. Like maintenance is is good, especially in the long run, but if we want to improve, then we're definitely gonna have to put in work. It's gonna be.
Speaker 2:You have to push yourself to get comfortable with being uncomfortable and pursuing that, because doing like the hit short bouts of hit Tabata on an echo bike, that sucks but it can drive some form of stimulus or adaptation that we're trying to accomplish. So it depends on what we want, but I just I can't stand when people like hate on. Like the cardio thing and now thankfully women are starting to get more of the message of lifting is good. I just hate polarizing and demonizing things. So I'm just kind of like do everything if you can right. Do the cardio, do the lifting, lift, heavy lift, light lift, a mix of things. Go for low intensity, steady state, go for short bouts of sprints, do? The answer is yes, basically.
Speaker 1:You know it's funny that you said that about women and their physical appearance. I I'm old enough to come from that era where women wanted to look like runway models. Yeah, you know, my sister was a runway model and she was 5 10, just a little bit over 5 10, and she weighed 125, very super thin. And that's what most of the women wanted victoria seeker models. That's the look that they were going for.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but there's been a shift and now when I go to a global gym, outside of my gym, even here, it's sometimes hard to find a squat rack because you may have men but also women squatting and their squats aren't actually good. They're deadlifting, they're doing RDLs, they're pressing Women on bench press. They join my program and they're doing bench press and they're like what is this type of thing? But that used to be um, an explanation. Now it's just like okay, I got benched. Today it's not a big deal anymore. So I love the fact that there's been a shift, because that's I enjoy lifting. I'm a lifter. So seeing the shift from women wanting to be tall, skinny, scrawny, thin to like I want to build my glutes and I want nice round shoulders and how do I get my tricep head going and I want my a little waist and you know it's like, okay, cool, I can work with this. You know this. And not only that, but also we know that skeletal muscle mass adds longevity, so there's health benefits as well.
Speaker 2:When it comes to their physical appearance, and I think that that this could be a good like lead into maybe the next podcast or one that we do in the future, because I think it's important to talk about two things there the societal aspects of of it like for years women were told skinny skinny is sexy, and so on, when in reality it should have been strong is sexy, strong in whatever which way right that's this is my opinion and I have some thoughts on that things like longevity and osteoporosis and whatever else women lifting in their relationship with their bodies and whatnot. But then we also have the aspect of longevity and supporting muscle mass for longevity, which I define it as living as well as you can for as long as you can. And, like I said, I think those could be either one big podcast or like two separate topics to discuss, because there's a lot to kind of jump in on that.
Speaker 1:Let's do it, let's make it happen, let's get raw back in here, heck yeah, and let's just get together and knock this one out. So thanks, eric, appreciate it. Overrated and narrated. I think people will like this series and we should come back to it. Yeah, thanks, man, all righty.
Speaker 3:Thank you for listening to this episode of the Fitness Fiasco Podcast. You can find more information about the topics covered today and in any other episode on our hosts. You can reach Eric on Instagram at Eric Bustillo, that's E-R-I-K-B-U-S-T-I-L-L-O. Mike on Instagram at Mike Osuna Fitness that's M-I-K-E-O-S-U-N-A-F-I-T-N-E-S-S. And Rob on Twitter at Rob Strength.
