Devin Lopez: [00:00:00]

So I think working on things like strengthening your lower body through lunge variations. Single leg squats, split squats. You can do things like single leg and bridges and stuff like that for posterior. There's a lot of things you can do to still make sure, especially if you're a runner, you know, keeping the lower body strong
, in terms of core exercises, body, weight exercises, Those are going to be something that are hard to exhaust really, there's going to be a lot that you can benefit from with those exercises.

Kevin Chang: [00:00:30]

hello and welcome to the race mob podcast. This is episode number 29.
I'm Kevin entrepreneur technology and fitness nerd, and the founder of race mob. I'm joined by master motivator, founder of two legit fitness co-chair of the Taji 100, our RRCA certified coach, USA track and field certified official the incomparable Bertrand Newson.
Hey team race, mob. We have a real treat for you today. Devin Lopez is my CrossFit coach. And while you may associate CrossFit with those incredible athletes on TV, most gym goers are friendly everyday people who just want to add a little variety to the routine. And this episode you'll learn how Devin became a coach and his impressive athletic feats, how he assesses beginner athletes and the body weight, strength exercises.
He recommends runners. Try out. Plus we get into a conversation on weight loss and his approach to helping clients. You can find all of the show notes online which include links to crossfit san jose's youtube channel where they demonstrate most of these [email protected] slash podcast.

This episode is brought to you by race, mob, and inclusive community for endurance athletes. If you like our podcast, you'll love our YouTube channel, where we keep you up to date with news for the running world and give you tips that will help you improve your running. Check us out by searching race mob on YouTube and subscribe today.
and without further ado here's our conversation.
One of my personal coaches, Devin Lopez to the race mole podcast. Welcome Devin.

Devin Lopez: [00:02:05]

Good to be here.

Kevin Chang: [00:02:06]

Fantastic. So Devin was one of my CrossFit coaches, even as recently as a couple of months ago and will soon be a, another, uh, coach of mine in, in a couple of months when some shelter and places is over and whatnot.
So wanting to welcome Devin to the podcast, because he has such a wealth of knowledge about. Putting together strength programs, helping beginner athletes get into , CrossFit, cross functional and functional fitness training. Devin. Tell the audience a little bit about your background, how you found fitness.

Devin Lopez: [00:02:37]

My fitness journey, I'd say started pretty far back. I was always into athletics growing up. So I think since like elementary school time, I've been doing things like soccer and baseball, um, playing football as I got older. So that's kind of what definitely, I think nudged me towards this field, in this career path, probably wasn't until like high school time that I actually participated in doing some coaching, helping like youth groups and stuff like that.
With wrestling and football. And then the camp. So we would hold how my high school in Los Gatos. So after that, I eventually started working at a gym, doing some front desk duties, and that's kind of what ultimately like kind of hooked me in there as I was working there, I eventually became a trainer, started teaching CrossFit classes and working with PT clients there.
When I was back in probably like 2009, at least when the PT journey started and the, uh, the group fitness classes started at that point ever since then, it's kind of been a history, but my specialties and kind of where I've put a lot of focuses a little more into like strength, sports. Um, obviously I coached CrossFit by do a lot of work with powerlifters and Olympic lifters, but also train, you know, just your everyday person as well.
I mean, I have clients that are, you know, working for Apple or working for their own, uh, their own house, cleaning business and stuff like that. So kind of spins know across a wide spectrum. Um, so I've had all these opportunity to work with a lot of different people and, you know, see a lot of different issues and hopefully work on fixing a lot of these different things that come with it.
So a lot of runners as well. So we just have some experience with running and, and as someone who has never been a great runner myself, I have tried to put some time to learn a little bit so I can improve my own running abilities. Um, as best as I can think, probably losing some way would probably be the most helpful thing right now,

Kevin Chang: [00:04:27]

bit

Devin Lopez: [00:04:27]

more, uh, size when you're doing the strength stuff.
So it's that give and take, but, but yeah, and then that shell, that's kinda my background. I've always been someone to tenue, to education and continuing to try to learn along the way. I just got certified in nutrition as well through precision nutrition, so, but yeah, that probably sums it up.

Kevin Chang: [00:04:46]

Yeah, . So, I mean, I guess when you were in high school and you started realizing that you had a knack for helping people, coaching people, how has that kind of progression into becoming a coach

Devin Lopez: [00:04:58]

did go to Valley Allie. I was pursuing, um, sports medicine at West Valley college. I will say I didn't end up finishing my college degree. , but I pursued a lot of, um, a lot of classes in the field for sports medicine. My goal is to be more of like an athletic trainer and work with athletes kind of more on the sports medicine side and helping them, you know, heal up and rehab and things like that.
But I think as I started to work, um, with athletes and being an athlete myself, I wanted to work a little more in that side of making people stronger and more fit and performance wise. So not to say that the education journey stopped, you know, at that point. So I've definitely continued to, you know, work on getting more credentials.
And then I'm usually always reading the least one or two books at a time to, you know, continue to work on getting better in that respect to make sure that there is no deficit of knowledge,

Kevin Chang: [00:05:47]

I mean, I think the incredible thing, and you touched on it is you're incredibly knowledgeable in the field of powerlifting Olympic lifting in . So you don't always need to have a degree from a college to become knowledgeable. I mean, so much information can be had online through certification in person through certification.
There's so many different programs where you can get this knowledge. And especially in this field of health, it's always a moving target. Things are coming out. There's always new stuff coming out. And so being on the forefront is oftentimes better than, than just going through, um, a collegiate program or getting a degree.

Devin Lopez: [00:06:20]

I mean, it helped me get to where I am now. So absolutely in this particular situation.

Kevin Chang: [00:06:26]

It's partly knowledge, but also personality and knowing how to get the most out of people. . Talk to us a little bit about, I mean, I know that you've done a lot of powerlifting. You've done a lot of Olympic lifting over time.
Have you competed in these sports? Give us some background into how you got into those sports in particular

Devin Lopez: [00:06:44]

with my background, at least in football, growing up that. Definitely drew us to a powerlifting and Olympic lifting those kind of the backbone of our strength program. So I'd had some, some exposure to those lifts.
There will be a, probably a little bit haphazardly on in terms of coaching for technique and everything like that, but not to get a stronger, but once I started stepping into the PT realm and as I really dove into CrossFit, actually, because of the constant exposure that I get through the barbell work that we're doing CrossFit that highlighted a lot of power lifting, a lot of Olympic lifting that kind of.
Really set me on the path to get better at those exercises. I already kind of had a little bit of a knack for them just being naturally kind of strong and explosive, but it wasn't until CrossFit. I'd say that really kind of started to make me more passionate about wanting to get better, you know?
Cause I could see that my, my strength and my explosiveness was not being utilized effectively. So there's definitely some things that needed to be learned there. And then that kind of set me on the path to pursue more education there, start to get certified within Olympic lifting specifically. I haven't done any power lifting competitions, but I have done a number of Olympic lifting competitions.
Um, I've done done a number of CrossFit competitions as well since that's kind of where the competitiveness started, I would say first, and then as I was. Pursuing, you know, better technique in my lifts. That's when I started also want to dive into the competitive field there, you know, I feel like as a coach, too, you, you know, you really got to immerse yourself in the sport fully to really understand and to kind of be well-rounded.
So, you know, what best way to do that then, and then get in there and compete. So, especially as I was beginning to train athletes in competitions themselves, You know, it's hard to kind of know what to do if you haven't competed in the competition on your own. So that was a big part of it too, but, you know, I definitely fell in love with it, with those sports and weightlifting power lifting is just something, I just really enjoy the programming aspects.
You know, I think there's a lot of science that goes behind getting stronger and, you know, maximizing or optimizing rather that process, you know, for me, it's just a lot of fun and I enjoy that stuff as well. And then obviously the participation aspect is always great too. So trying to get stronger every day.

Kevin Chang: [00:08:55]

Incredible. What are your one rep? Max is

Devin Lopez: [00:08:57]

so like all time. One rep maxes. Yeah. Well, we'll start with the powerless. So all time best. Deadlift right now is five 30, four pounds. I'm done. I'm four 50 for back squat for single bench, three 30 for single. That was probably my most recent one in high school. We never did maxes in high school cause they're always afraid of injury.
We always did like multi maxes. So. You know, it was hard to gauge where I was at then, but it's probably pretty big back then too. Um, I was able to do multiple reps for three 15 when I was in high school. What's Valley training over there. So just never actually maxed it out at the time. Um, and then, uh, let's see for the Olympic lifts, my best snatch is, uh, 280 pounds.
Wow. So battling some injuries along the way, you know, it was kind of. Probably hinder that process. So, but who knows? We're, we're, I'm still hoping that there's a chance. I could PR that even in my older age now, but, um, my best clean and jerk is 332 pounds. And I've cleaned about three 45, 45 before.

Kevin Chang: [00:10:12]

I mean, just for our audience, these numbers are just astronomical.
I mean, these are pretty astounding numbers, especially. I mean, I think for first time, gym goers. We're talking that barbell feels pretty heavy and that's a 45 pound barbell for a lot of these lists. So, um, kudos to you, man. That's insane. That's pretty fantastic. Talk to us a little bit about, I mean, you've trained a number of beginners, new people coming into the gym.
If somebody knew where to come into the gym, what are some of the first things that you try to assess? And what are the first things that you try to teach them or, or get them comfortable with?

Devin Lopez: [00:10:47]

Um, yeah. Good question. So probably one of the biggest things right away is like mobility. Especially if you are going to start stepping into that, like, uh, Olympic lifting around, or even if you're doing CrossFit, I mean, even with powerless, you know, there's going to be a base level of flexibility.
That's needed to perform that stuff both effectively and safely. So usually we'll run through some quick movement tests, like air squats, overhead squats, lunges, do some plank variations and just kind of see where general stability and strength sat in the body. You know, before you start trying to hand someone in any way, you know, that's just kind of like critical parts to make sure they're, they're not going to hurt themselves.
So once, you know, kind of get that out of the way, obviously you're not going to change the flexibility right off the bat, but at least knowing what you're going to start working towards. And getting those areas, uh, better. But after that stability is kind of a big one too. And it's one of those things. I see a lot of people kind of overlook that, especially as you're learning how to do like heavy lifts or something that eventually will be a heavy lift.
So Olympic lifting power lifting really rely heavily on your ability to brace your core. No breathe correctly, brace your core tightly so that you're stiff and rigid through the trunk. So those are actually probably the two areas that we focus on the most. I do like to get people moving on the basic movement patterns with like a dollar and empty barbell, just depending on how they look and what we're working on.
Exactly. You know, it all depends on kind of what they're stepping into strength, sports, and that's where we're going to start. But yeah, I'd say the, the core aspects, um, the flexibility. You know, and then even something like a scapular flexibility, like posture, those kinds of things. So, you know, that's kind of where we would start.
You can certainly put a little bit of time, like I said, drilling and doing some level of the exercises themselves, but working on those things right off the bat is kind of where I'll start my focus, you know, and then just building up the foundational movement patterns, like squatting hinges, pushing, pulling, You know, so it kind of depends if that's someone brand new, you know, that's probably going to be where we're going to start that path because there's some coming in with a little bit of background is in those exercises already know you can certainly skip past some of that stuff, but when it comes down to fundamentals, you know, I think things like just basic flexibility, training, learning how to use your core correctly.
You know, go a long way and to be an efficient mover. So, so that's usually where I'll start.

Kevin Chang: [00:13:07]

It's fantastic. And I think our audience should realize that CrossFit sometimes gets this name of like ultra competitive, really fit people, being, doing the sport, but people of all sorts come into the sport and it's very scalable.
And you and the team at CrossFit San Jose does a fantastic job for people that are not in shape. Out of shape getting the first steps in getting just into the door. And as you talked about, you know, assessing mobility, assessing a stability, getting them just through the movement patterns with dowels and, you know, sticks and broomsticks sometimes what we're doing right now.
Um, and just, just getting them that first step. So that's. Incredible. That's fantastic. Talk to us a little bit about, okay. If a runner. So as somebody who has some running backgrounds, training walks into the gym, you know, we know that from our, from our surveys, that not a lot of runners are actually incorporating strength training, even though strength training has huge benefits to runners, both in injury prevention, in efficiency and in helping them in their runs.
So, I guess, what are maybe a couple of things that you would a try to assess from somebody with a running background and B what are some of the movements or what are some of the exercises maybe that a runner should be incorporating

Devin Lopez: [00:14:21]

had a few new runners, had some people with the marathon backgrounds and triathlon backgrounds.
And you know, a lot of times when those people come in right off the bat, like you said, they don't do a lot of formal strength training. So you can tell there's a lot of muscular imbalances going on there and a lot of instability, you know, which puts you at risk for injury and Jordan injuries. So kind of assessing, you know, again, kind of like roads start.
Like I mentioned before, to some degree it's going to be pretty similar assessing like flexibility. You know, certainly seeing if there's any past injuries going on and checking some movement assessments, probably more particularly within the lower body to see like where they're going to have some muscular imbalances.
I think a lot of times there's also going to be some pretty tight ankles, priests, tight hamstrings that come with it too, you know, so doing a combination of flexibility training and. And strengthening of those areas of the body can be helpful too. Um, a lot of times when you have a tight muscle, it is because it's also a weak link in the chain tends to be like a weaker muscle as well.
So strengthening those muscles can oftentimes be a really good thing to work on. You know, seeing where those things are at first, if there's going to be some sort of movement limitations, and if there's going to be some sort of muscular imbalances and then taking that information. You know, and then kind of creating a prescription to hopefully address both of those things.
But yeah, doing some basic leg strengthening is going to be probably like one of the first things to start working on. So just like some squatting, you know, maybe some basic lunging patterns to give some variation and get some different muscle activation going on, but just by strengthening your legs and hips alone, that will be huge.
And. Increasing output and what they're going to be able to do. So

Kevin Chang: [00:15:57]

you're assessing flexibility. Do you have them on the ground trying to touch their toes or in certain like positions? How are you kind of assessing flexibility, mobility, that sort of thing.

Devin Lopez: [00:16:09]

So I'll have them do certain exercises and overhead squats, kind of a really good one.
You'll see a lot of things like ankle flexibility, hip flexibility. Thoracic and shoulder flexibility. A lot of those things will, will kind of rear their ugly. Yeah. Ahead. When you're doing something like a dowel, overhead squat, and you can even do it. We're just simply having arms above your head and performing, you know, like in squat that way as well, that can be quite telling and also seeing how they work unilaterally between like a forward lunge, reverse lunge sidelines, and kind of noticing what's going on there.
So a certain inflexibility is you're going to see some type of movement compensation. That'll come with it. So for example, like if someone has really tight ankles either, but usually it goes really far back in the squat and then their body kind of hinges forward a lot more since they don't have the range for their knees to pass over their toes a little further.
You know, so things like that, we'll be telling of where there's going to be some issues and where you might need to start right there. A lot of times too, they'll just be like, Hey, like my hamstrings are tight. Like, like I can feel them and they're very tight. So things like that are going to be a little bit more obvious people.
I would say almost a hundred percent of everyone that comes into is going to be suffering from some sort of like postural issues. You know? No one these days typically has. Good posture. You know, we spend a lot of time sitting, so that's almost always a given as well. I usually almost don't even spend too much time, like assessing that unless someone comes in there have like a yoga or maybe like a gymnastics background or something like that, where, you know, flexibility is typically maintained much better.
Um, but yeah, otherwise, like there's going to be a lot of common things that come with it. And especially as it relates to running, you know, there's going to be some very sports specific things that you can kind of expect that are going to come with those athletes. So, you know, so it makes it a little bit easier in that way too, but squatting, uh, patterns, lunging patterns, and even things like, um, Plank variations and stuff.
All those will kind of tell you a little bit about mobility and general strengths.

Kevin Chang: [00:18:10]

The physical therapist said that I don't use my hips enough. I guess I'm like a hip flexor mobility, which I think is probably common if you're sitting, sitting at a desk all day or I'm sitting around all day. So yeah, it's always good to figure these things out.
The mobility thing is quite common. I think. All across the board.

Devin Lopez: [00:18:28]

Yep. For sure. Can't escape. But if you're sitting down for long periods of time,

Bertrand Newson: [00:18:32]

Devin, I've heard from runners who are looking to cross train it specifically with strength training as relates to
CrossFit, the apprehension or anxiety with technique, especially when, you know, with up cumulative poundage.
The importance on, you know, again, somebody's first time into a CrossFit gym and taking through the various lifts, kind of talk to that from a, a novice perspective and the importance on quality techniques.

Devin Lopez: [00:18:59]

You know, I think a lot of times I think people, their expectations of what they're stepping into are probably a little bit more than what's actually gonna happen, you know, on day one, at least the first thing is.
You know, there's going to be some level of assessment and we might run through some basic movement patterns, but usually we're not touching any kind of weight until at least maybe like a week or two into learning the basics of the movement patterns first. So, you know, like I was mentioning the squatting, the hinges and the pushing and the polling and we'll we'll work on basic body weight type exercises.
A lot of those things can be worked on with like a dowel. So you don't necessarily need to do anything with, uh, with a weight right off the bat till we start to gain, you know, the movement patterns, um, to learn the technique for those. So, you know, that's kind of a nice spot. I mean, at least if you have someone that knows what they're doing, you know, it's going to be very different from gym to gym.
But I think when you step into a place where you have trainers that are. Good about the progressions and how you're going to learn that. You're not really sure we're going to see too much resistance being used initially. So like I said, we'll spend at least a couple of weeks kind of working on those basics before I'm ever comfortable with trying to teach someone more complex patterns like Olympic lifts and stuff like that.
I want to make sure that they have proficiency in the basic positions that they're going to be spending time in with those lifts. So. You know, I want to make sure someone can front squat or overhead squat efficiently, or at least professionally before I'm going to have them start trying to do like a clean or a snatch or anything like that.
You know? So I think when you have someone that's doing it correctly and it could be done a number of ways correctly, but there's going to be a logical progression. You know, you're going to start from light to then starting to add weight over time. But those kinds of things, Lisa's where, you know, like our gym, where I work across with San Jose and I've been to other gyms where we've worked as well.
And that's. Typically the process is always going to learn the basics of your kind of foundational movement patterns. More complex patterns will be built on that, you know, and as someone stepping into it with hesitations, you know, I think it's a good thing to know as someone that's like paying for the service to one, you know, always communicate with your trainer.
I think Sometimes there's not enough communication in terms of like, Hey, this makes me feel uncomfortable, you know, or, Hey, this kind of hurts a little bit, things like that. I think when you have a really good line of communication open and both parties know that keeping that line open is good and kind of critical to the process.
That can be helpful too, because. I think people get a little nervous, you know, there's a little bit of pressure to do some things when coaches like, Hey, like this is what you're doing. So, you know, those kinds of things I think are important. And if you're working with a good trainer and you're at a good program, I think there's going to be, you know, they smart, safe, logical progression with that.
If there's issues with like injury or severe like mobility issues, then you can still work on those things. But, you know, dial them down in terms of maybe you're shortening range of motion, making the complexity of the movement a little bit easier. So there's always something that you can do in some way that you can regress that as well.
If there's limitations of going into it in know. So I think no one should hopefully ever have too much hesitation in terms of like, they won't be able to be serviced as long as their coach knows what they're doing. And that's why I keep kind of saying as long as their coach knows what they're doing, because that is a big thing in this industry.
And there can be quite a large spectrum of experience levels with the people that you're going to be dealing with. So, or at least learning from. So hopefully, you know, that can be a little bit of a sigh of relief, you know, as long as you just talk to the people first, you know, make sure they kinda know what they're doing and have some understanding of what you're trying to learn from them.
I think. Kind of easy sometimes to get us a sense of, as someone is full of crap, or if they are truly knowledgeable about the subject

Bertrand Newson: [00:22:42]

separating some myths versus facts, from your perspective, being a strength, training athlete, and overall a wellness athlete, training, multiple body parts, you know, hitting the same body parts with, uh, strength training or varying him, you know, or is there some right way to go about that. Some people say, you know, don't hit the same body part twice within a week. Is there a typical educated school of thought there?

Devin Lopez: [00:23:07]

Yeah, definitely. It's definitely a little bit more complicated than just like, you know, one simple answer. It really does come down to like training age.
How long have you been lifting or how long have you been exercising and also specifically to like resistance training as well? So it can range, you know, depending on, um, if you're like a beginner, you don't really need to do a whole lot of training to get some sort of adaptation from it. Cause you're relatively.
Untrained, your body's very sensitive to any kind of stimulus that it's going to get. So like the amount of training actually doesn't need to be quite as much in order to still see some good progress. It does depend, but maybe a little bit on what you're doing. If you're doing something a little more complex, like Olympic lifting versus like bodybuilding or power lifting.
But yeah, in general, if you're, if you're a beginner, if you're a novice, you don't probably need to train more than, yeah. Maybe like once a week, maybe one or two times a week for some of like your upper body muscle groups, but typically like squatting, dead lifting those lower body muscle groups can, can go probably about once a week.
But as you do get more experienced, your body does need to have greater levels of stimulus in terms of continue that adaptation process and continue to move that lineup. Um, so really does start to depend on like where you're at. So everyone's going to be a little different women. Typically tend to need more volume than men.
If you're a more power, like fast Twitch oriented athlete, you usually need less volume than someone that's a little more like endurance oriented or recovers very quickly. You know, so there's going to be a lot of factors that, and even like life and stress factors that kind of come into play. So it's hard to give like a correct answer, but I'd say for a lot of muscles, they can be trained more than once in a week, for sure.
You know, and a lot of there's a lot of total body programs out there. I think as long as you're. Variating levels of intensity correctly, you know, that's kind of the biggest thing, you know, you can't come into the gym and do squats every day at like maximum intensity and expect not to get injured at some point.
Right. You know, so you got to vary those levels of intensity volumes weights. Being lifted. So those kinds of things are going to start to, you know, make a big difference if you have like a heavy day and then you have a light day where you're hitting the same muscle group right after, you know, that should be okay.
And then maybe you get a rest day after that. Uh, I would say that certain muscle groups are going to be a little more, need a little more time for recovery versus others. So, you know, it's going to depend on that as well, but yeah, definitely not a simple answer, but to be sure you can certainly train the same muscle group multiple times a week.
I think the easiest way to gauge that is just how you feel, right. If you have a training session and the next day you feel great still, there's probably not a big issue with you training again, even if you're working similar patterns or similar muscle groups, but if you're coming in and then you're very sore, something like that, you know, your body will tell you a lot when it comes to those kinds of things as well.
You know, when I do work with athletes and I'm delivering them volume for certain exercises, you know, those are the things I look at through the training, you know, making sure that they're feeling like they're getting worked out from it. And if not, then I can give them a little more volume. If they're feeling a little overworked, maybe we dial that volume back, you know?
So those kinds of things, you kind of like, it's a touching go. You kind of feel it out to a certain extent and you learn. More about yourself, you know, each training cycle and where those limits are going to lie. So I think that's a big miss that people have. Like, you can only train upper body, you know, or your pecs once you're back once.
And, you know, doing that alternating, there's a lot of, uh, ways to train out there, but you certainly don't have to limit it to once a day. You know, one muscle group

Kevin Chang: [00:26:44]

that gets into a little bit into programming. Which I think is something interesting that I'd love to dive into a little bit, you know, CrossFit is kind of known for having programming.
You're kind of coming into the gym, not knowing what to expect, something a little bit different day to day, either, you know, something that's a little bit more high intensity interval training or something that's a little bit longer or a 20 minute or 30 minute type of workout. And I know that you were involved pretty heavily with CrossFit San Jose's programming.
So get us kind of behind the scenes. Like how do you start programming? Workouts. How do you vary the types of workouts? What were the things that you were thinking about when you were coming up with all these workouts?

Devin Lopez: [00:27:23]

CrossFit programming, definitely a tricky one, you know, that can do CrossFit programming and do it well, you know, they got to know a little bit of what they're doing and you know, my hats off to anyone that can do it effectively.
But for me, a lot of what I'm trying to do starts with some sort of like, I want to have a backbone to the program. So we're going to be focusing a little more on strength, then that's going to kind of be the backbone. So I'll typically let that guide where it's going to go and the strength will be the focus.
So I might have more of a strength program in mind. And then I'll start to construct the, the wads, the Metcons kind of based around what that stuff is to make sure that I'm. Not taking away from their ability to improve those strengths numbers. If that's our focus, you know, and throughout the year we might go through phases of more strength, focus.
Maybe it's a little more like Olympic lifting focus. Maybe it's a little more like skill or endurance focus. So we'll kind of like flow through different stages kind of, depending on where we're at in the year. But usually that focus is the backbone of what I'm doing though.

Kevin Chang: [00:28:27]

For our non CrossFit athletes, usually a CrossFit session is broken up into kind of a main session, maybe a strength or technique or skill session where you're getting stronger or working on certain technique.
And then there's a Metcon section or wide section water standing for workout of the day. Metcon. For metric conditioning. So that's more of the anaerobic or the, you know, 10 minutes, a 20 minute kind of workout to get. Right. I don't know how you would put it, but blood flowing or he gets your workout and get those endorphins going and of that piece of the workout going.
So I think what coach Devin was mentioning as backbone focusing on the technique or on the strength portion of it. And then. Tying some metric conditioning that won't tax those muscles that you've already taxed during the, the strength portion

Devin Lopez: [00:29:10]

Well, some cases, if it's like, say we're doing like a back squat day, I might have the workout be still lower body oriented, but there might be a little bit of focus on adding some unilateral lower body exercises, like doing some lunges.
Doing some step ups, you know, maybe even doing some more squats, but at a lighter weight. So you're kind of continuing to at least, and get a little bit more emphasis on that spot than say like the next day it might be a little more like upper body focus and then maybe the workouts, a little more aerobically biased.
So it's not quite as taxing on the body overall. So that way, the next day after that, there'll be a little bit, at least recovered for when we then go back to legs and we do some more lower body training. Maybe it's like deadlifts that time. Or something like that or Olympic lifting. So there's definitely a fluctuation of, of different things that you're hitting on.
So reliably the body will have some level of, um, predictability, you know, with how it's going to recover. When you squat. Typically you're going to want like a day of rest between a squat session. Dead lifting might require like a few days, you know, especially if you're going heavy things like upper body exercises as sometimes can be done, like back to back, you know?
So certain things are going to have a certain amount of recovery time needed before you're then going to want to try to like really re-stimulate it again. So understanding that side of things can be really helpful in terms of like your weekly structuring and making sure you're not overloading one side of the body or the other.
Or one system or the other. So those are the kinds of things that like, I'll look at as a whole, when we're looking at like the weekly overview. So taking that backbone, focus into mind, you know, that lays out that strength skill portion, where we start. And then as we get into that workout metabolic conditioning, or that.
Or just the wad is as everyone calls it, the CrossFit, you know, hopefully that's going to at least compliment what they're doing that day as well. Sometimes those workouts will vary in terms of like how tense I make them as well, because depending on what you're doing for the strength or skill session prior, you're going to have a certain amount of energy then in reserve for that workout that comes after.
So if you do like a super hard deadlift, heavy deadlift session, not going to have a lot of coming in to like a water, right? If you try to do something very explosive and hard, probably going to be very painful and your outfits are actually going to be pretty low. Right. You know, so doing some level of, uh, like having workouts that are going to compliment the strength or skill also is another thing in terms of intensity.
So if you have an intense strength session, Dial back the intensity of the Metcon. If you have like a light strength session, maybe it's more gymnastics movement oriented, which isn't going to be quite as taxing as resistance training, then maybe have like a really hard and fast, intense workout, you know, because you're going to have the energy to really push harder within those efforts.
You know, so those are the kinds of things that you can kind of get, you know, a little bit more smart about and get hopefully better performance out of each of those things that you're doing too, by managing those factors. And that's just scratching the surface

Kevin Chang: [00:32:08]

for those people who haven't done a CrossFit session or cost of workout.
I'm in a highly, highly recommended. These folks have been programming these workouts, you know, and we've been going to the gym for hundreds and hundreds of workouts. And we know what we like, we know what works, we know, you know, how it affects. Our body is crazy. I mean, it's, it's a lot of fun. I think they get the max out of that hour, that you're in the gym, both from a, you know, strength, skill session.
But I mean, you, you end up with a fantastic overall just, you know, sweat, endorphins are running is a really, really fun and great time. Devon, talk to us a little bit about, I mean, with shelter in place happening, I know that, you know, the gym has been shut down for a number of months. But you guys have continued to do a lot of at home programming, a lot of stuff that people can do with minimum equipment.
How did you go about programming some of those workouts and what are maybe some of the things that our audience can take away if they can't make it to a gym? What are some of the types of workouts? That they should be incorporating or thinking about

Devin Lopez: [00:33:09]

definitely when we made the move to virtual, we had to adjust our programming a little bit.
So we started offering some options that are just really minimal equipment, body, weight. I think a lot of people probably underestimate and even just things around their house that they can use for exercise too. You know, you can do a lot with probably. Very little something as simple as a chair can conserve a lot of purpose in terms of like using it as a weight to, to hold and squat with are doing things like elevated push-ups or dips off of it, you know?
So there's a lot of variations of just general movements that we would do in the gym that we can then adapt to a minimalist kind of situation. So can't bench press, you know, you got pushups, you can't overhead press. You got. Handstand pushups, you know, and if you can't do things like hip weighted movements, you got hip thrusts and you know, there's a lot of different things that you can do in place of just the normal resistance.
And I think if you have some guidance along the way, some coaching, you know, with that kind of minimalist environment, Well, you can really get a lot out of it still, you know, and one of the things that we do at our gym is cause we kind of have like a, um, a guided approach with, with our clients now. So we offer a little bit of check-ins monthly check-ins and things where we can kind of help, you know, in that area, if that's what they need and stuff like that.
So, yeah, I mean, I think bodyweight exercises is a great place to start for most people, you can really progress those exercises quite a bit in a way that's going to still be quite challenging. So I think there's, you know, probably a ton of untapped movements, even just in the body weight category alone.
So I think working on things like strengthening your lower body through lunge variations. Single leg squats, split squats. You can do things like single leg and bridges and stuff like that for posterior. There's a lot of things you can do to still make sure, especially if you're a runner, you know, keeping the lower body strong things like step ups as well.
So, I mean, there's quite a bit of things that you can do, you know, there's going to be some things that might be lacking, but in think, in terms of core exercises, body, weight exercises, Those are going to be something that are hard to exhaust really, you know, unless you're a very high level gymnast or something like that, there's still going to be a lot that you can benefit from with those exercises.
You know, and even if you have things like just a light dumbbell or like kettlebells, you can continue to use those weights, make them more difficult by adding things like tempo and pauses with your movement. Stuff like that, you know? So there's a lot of ways isometric holds, you know, there's a lot of, kind of little things you can do to make lightweight, feel a lot heavier, you know?
So if you get clever with it, you can certainly maximize what you can do with the even lightweight. So if you have even something like that, that can certainly go a long way from having nothing. So. There's there's plenty to do out there, but if I was to make a recommendation, you know, especially for your audience, I think doing lots of different ones, variations, single leg squats, split squat variations would be really good.
Hip bridges, hip thrusts, single leg variations of that as well. Um, if they have any kind of weight, single leg, Romanian, deadlifts things like good morning, staggered stance. Good morning. So a lot of these variations will still. Be pretty potent, you know, and strengthening the lower body at probably like higher reps.
And again, adding things like tempo and pauses into there. So at least as a starting point and always strengthen the core to, you know, work on core strengthening, everyone can benefit, even if you're a runner, you know, that will make you more efficient.
###### Kevin Chang: [00:36:33]
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I'll make sure to link to a lot of these workouts, a lot of these types of movements.
On the website I know across the San Jose also has their own YouTube channel. Oftentimes you guys demo some of these workouts and whatnot, so we'll try to make sure that our audience has these resources available to them. Maybe even some example, workouts that they can go through, just so they can realize what a, every minute on the minute type of workout looks like.
What as many reps as possible and AMRAP type of workout looks like these different types of workouts, different types of variations that we can bring people through, even at home. There's a lot of research around low intensity, steady state workouts versus, you know, more high intensity interval training types of workouts as well.
I know within CrossFit, usually the workouts are, you know, confined to within an hour. Maybe even less than that for the majority of the workouts. Have you run across any research that says to favor one over the other, have you taken a look at anything that a lot of our audience might be going for these like longer.
Types of events. Are there any thoughts on kind of those two incorporating those two types of workouts or just general?

Devin Lopez: [00:38:00]

Yeah, absolutely. You know, it kind of just goes back to fluctuating intensities. It's a really important part of keeping you able to like continue progressing over the longterm. There's obviously has been shown to see really good growth within high interval training, like explosive growth.
But when you look at like the body's ability to maintain that kind of training over a long period of time, that's where things start to break down. And that's where there has been some level of research shown that. That it can start to be detrimental. I mean, if you're continued to be smart in terms of how you juggle those things great, but you're not going to do it by doing always high intensity interval training.
If that's 100% of your training base, it's going to have its pitfalls eventually. I mean, Either way, you're going to train some sort of adaptive resistance over time. If you just keep doing the same thing too, you know, so novelty is a big part of like keeping the body guessing, you know, as well. So that does also incorporate like the energy systems that you're training or kind of biasing with your training.
So, yeah, I think, you know, steady state training. Definitely has a place in the greater scheme of things I think for CrossFitters. And I've told this probably to a number of people. I think that there is too much focus on every workout being maximal intensity, because that's a big downside where you will start to see some diminishing returns.
Your performance is going to start to be hindered. You're just not going to be able to give the same amount of effort within your continuing day after data, like go to 100%. Cause I I've been there before. I started learning a lot more about proper programming and recovery and everything that goes with it.
I was a very aggressive CrossFitter with my training, you know, so I wanted to be competitive. I wanted to try to go to regionals and make it to the CrossFit games. So I made it to regionals a couple of times, but never to the CrossFit games. So with our team team effort,

Kevin Chang: [00:39:58]

That's still incredible

Devin Lopez: [00:40:00]

still.
Well, yeah, like when I trained like that, I really had no regard for recovery and all I did was just go as hard as I could every day. And then, you know, sure enough, I started having injuries and things that were setting back my training and making me take more time off than I wanted to and stuff like that.
So again, over that, Long-term that's really where you start to see the bigger difference being made because I made some explosive growth, but then as injuries started to really like, get me, then I started just really lowering her leveling out. And in some cases probably, you know, losing some strength and performance within certain areas.
So that's a big part of it. And I think even CrossFit training running, you know, you're going to incorporate different levels of intensity as a runner. You're going to do some interval training, right? You're going to do some long, low intensity steady state like runs, and you're going to mix it up. You know, it's all the same in terms of managing those things.
So that you're. You know, hitting different energy systems and allowing the body to recover properly, you know, probably even at the same time, developing some level of like mental resiliency to in different ways also by doing that stuff. So I think it does have a place. I read a good book called 80 20, right.

Kevin Chang: [00:41:12]

We just had Matt Fitzgerald. We just talked to him this morning, actually. And. Adam on the podcast. Not too long ago. Yeah. Yeah.

Devin Lopez: [00:41:20]

I read his book 80, 20 running. And that actually really changed a little bit of my opinion too, because that whole premise is, you know, only 20% of your workout should be high intensity.
Right. And then the rest of it is much lower intensity, generally speaking. So I think that's smart. I think people kind of over estimate or overweigh the value of intensity high intensity training. Yeah, I think it needs to be sprinkled in there, but when you go to a hundred percent, you need more time to recover.
Like it's when you do hard intervals, right? If you're doing sprints, you take much longer than the amount of work it takes to finish it to rest. If you're doing like long, low intensity type intervals, maybe you're resting closer to a one-to-one, but it's kind of the same idea when you're looking at the macro as well.
Like when you're going. Like heavy on one day, if you max out your deadlift, you're not going to try to come back and do a heavy deadlift session was in the next, you know, probably six or seven days, most likely if you're smart. So it's very similar. So I think that understanding that is very important, you know?
For both the athlete and the coach, because I think in the CrossFit realm, uh, not enough people probably understand that, unfortunately. And that's one thing that I do try to educate people on whenever they come up to me and they're like, dude, I have no strength. They're like, my numbers are going down.
Like, well, when's the last time you've taken a rest day, you know? So it's simple, but. It's pretty impactful on, on the overall training for sure.

Bertrand Newson: [00:42:43]

Coach D can you speak to cause you, you referenced, um, that you have experienced now from a nutritionist perspective, the importance of diet in specifically with muscle growth, maintaining muscle mass protein to carb ratio, things along those lines.

Devin Lopez: [00:42:59]

Nutrition is obviously a huge factor was any athletics. And you could say that maybe there's certain ways you can optimize your diet depending on like what you're doing and stuff. But, you know, in general, for people that if they're trying to maintain muscle mass, you know, you need to make sure you're getting a base level of protein in your diet.
And probably carbohydrate too. So that's just more for maintenance level, but for people that are trying to really push to gain more muscle mass, you do start to need to get into more of like a caloric surplus to some degree, the protein doesn't have to be emphasized as much as like getting more carbohydrates in the diet, unless you're someone that's in the ketogenic realm, it's going to be a little bit different.
But typically if you're relying on carbohydrates as your main energy source, There's going to be a pretty consistent level of protein, but as you are trying to put on more lean muscle mass gain a little bit more strength that way you are going to have to give yourself a little bit of clerks surplus.
So, and runners burn a lot of calories. So you kind of got to look at like, You know how much you're burning in a day. So that daily caloric expenditure and starting to try to maybe put yourself in like a mine or surplus, you don't want to go crazy with it. Right. Cause with that can come too much body fat on top of it.
So you want to make sure you're kind of managing that well, but if you are in fact trying to gain some level of muscle mass, you know, that's kind of how you do it. I would say, though, for runners, you're probably your goal probably wouldn't be to get like huge though. Right? You're probably going to want to watch the size means a little bit.
So you're not putting on too much extra weight. So doing things that might not emphasize like hypertrophy type training, but also be smart. So if you want to make sure you're maintaining a certain, like. Body weight. I think watching what you're doing in terms of like rep schemes and loading schemes can be important because if you do spend a little more time doing, you know, like the bodybuilder routine where it's a high rep, low volume, or a low weight, that kind of training going gonna will lend itself to putting more muscle mass on the body.
Yeah, there's other ways you can get stronger without muscle mass. If you hit different rep schemes and hit some slightly higher loads, you can get stronger probably without having as much of that excess muscle building that would come with it. But some people might need a little bit of that starting out.
So it all depends on what the initial kind of assessment is. You know, but I know that that's a very probably body weight sensitive sport. So that would be something like, if you put on an extra 10 pounds of muscle, that might be detrimental to your, you know, your 5k or tank eight times, so it could help your sprint.
Yeah, definitely. So that's always the thing, right. There's always a little give and take, you know, depending on what you're trying to do. So understanding what the focus is. You know, and if it is very sport oriented, you just got to make sure you're driving the correct adaptations and not, um, getting yourself too heavy.
You know, if it's, like I said, a more like body weight, sensitive sport

Kevin Chang: [00:45:45]

of what you just mentioned there, I mean, it is all dependent on what your end goal is because yeah. If your end goal is to get stronger, it might be different or different rep scheme than if your end goal was to look good. Right.
You're bodybuilding. A rep scheme is lighter weights, more volume, get more blood to pump through those muscles, try to increase hypertrophy and make sure that you're breaking down muscle fibers so that they can build up to bigger, but not necessarily stronger, whereas stronger. Maybe you're looking at. A longer time descend and explosive contractions of muscles and those types of things.
So super interesting. You know, I think ketogenic, we hear a lot, we hear a lot of slow carb diet. We hear a lot of different types of diets that are become popular paleo as well. , definitely popular with then the CrossFit community getting more popular outside of. You know that community, what are things that you're looking at for people that are trying to lose weight?
, what are you having them do? What are you having them keep track of? What types of macros, what type of things are you asking to get people into the right types of diets for them? , or to help them with weight loss?

Devin Lopez: [00:46:55]

Again, there's no simple answer when it comes to these kinds of things. , I mean, weight loss will follow some general rules.
You know, if you're trying to lose weight, General recommendations. You know, you're going to try to work on lowering caloric intake versus what they're taking in. So energy balance and kind of understanding. That's going to be kind of a, you know, one of the areas that you're going to start, but, and that's kind of where most people will start, but what's starting to happen a little bit more nowadays, as you're seeing a little more focused on like habit training and kind of developing better habits to lead you to that end result.
So it's a little more like action focused rather than like outcome-based focus. So was that, you know, when I have someone new coming in, I'm probably going to see, you know, first thing is like how they're eating. Like what's their eating environment. Like things like that. Cause first habit that we usually try to work on is getting people to be a little bit more slow and mindful.
With their eating at their meals. , a lot of times you kind of lose sense of your hunger and fullness cues. So your ability to tell, like when you're actually full, , a lot of times kind of diminishes with distractions. Like if you're watching TV while you're eating simply eating too fast, also just doesn't give your body's hormonal response enough time to like play catch up.
No, cause there's like a string of hormonal responses that happens. And one of the things that gets released. Controls your appetite and your feeling of satiety. So when you go through that process, it doesn't really kick in until like 20 minutes after you started. So you might not even get to that point yet reach or your meal in like five minutes or less, you know?
So it's kind of like a base starting point is trying to just gain back some level of awareness with those hunger and fullness cues. And then from there, you start trying to add some more complexity to it. So really watching like energy balance. So getting into portion controls, we do like hand sized portion controls is, is probably the easiest place for most people.
So, you know, you're looking at like a Palm sized serving a protein, or like a thumb size serving of fat, or like a cup of vegetables or carbohydrates, things like that, or, or ways that you're going to get people to start to kind of control portions and then hopefully start to get them in that correct energy balance from there.
So kind of like the training though, it's a little bit of a touch and go process. You kind of got to see how people are responding. You know, if they're losing weight, great, you know, you stay on the course. If they're staying static or even gaining weight, then you might adjust those portions accordingly.
You know? So those are going to be kind of some of the basics in terms of what I'm going to emphasize on eating. You know, when you're trying to lose weight proteins, kind of something you want to eat a little more of. It does help you to keep those levels of fullness maintained better. It also is more metabolically active in the process of breaking it down and utilizing it.
So your body actually essentially burns more energy, trying to process protein than it does versus like fat and carbohydrates. So eating cleverly and kind of. Highlighting that a little bit more wholesome foods is also another big one. So, you know, I'm just kind of touching on a lot of things here. And usually it's not going to be a process of throwing this all at someone at once, you know, but starting to systematically go through kind of working on incorporating these things into their diet, more, you know, some more vegetables.
Making sure that you're eating less processed whos and stuff like that. So, you know, but it is a big in big part learning what the client's background is, learning their, their lifestyles and their habits as they are already, and kind of working with them to create a plan for success. Because I could try to say, Hey, like try to take 20 minutes to eat your meal, but maybe their schedule is so tight and crazy.
They only have like a five minute window to do so. You know, so we're going to have to get creative and try to work on strategies to still get what we're trying to, uh, to work on out of it. So, you know, really does come down to those kinds of individual situations, you know, but in general, those are going to be a lot of things that you want to focus on.
You know, also water's kind of big one too, making sure we'll hydrate and stuff like that. But basics of just learning how to slow down your eating can make profound improvements on. Someone, you know, that's trying to lose weight, like right off the bat, you know, that's probably like the lowest hanging fruit from the tree in terms of what you might go to as you're starting to develop some better eating habits, but then the next step would be controlling your portions energy balance and things like that.

Bertrand Newson: [00:51:16]

Coach D we've talked about putting in the work, the physical workout component. We've talked about nutrition and diet. Other subtleties, such as supplementation, if you can speak to that to a certain degree and with, you know, vitamins, fish oils, you know, we talked about proteins to a certain degree, but there is anything else maybe for the novice strength athlete and as they kind of graduate up the scale.

Devin Lopez: [00:51:38]

Yeah, definitely supplementation first and foremost, I always like to just preface this kind of conversation with, you know, make sure that what you're supplementing, isn't something to try to like fix diet and is truly more of a supplement too. Cause I think a lot of times people look at supplements is like, A fix for something wrong.
And a lot of times things can probably be refined or maybe even like cured through just better eating. So that's probably always where I'm going to start, but I think there's some basics that people can start with for the strength athlete, doing things like protein supplementation for post-workout I think can be quite helpful.
Um, your body's just very, more receptive at that time to, to take in those nutrients and kind of utilize them right then and there for, for protein synthesis. So there can be some benefit there also carbohydrate supplementation can be pretty helpful as well. So when you go through workouts, you use a lot of glycogen.
You use a lot of the stored energy in your body. , that comes from like, Your skeletal muscle, sometimes a little bit from your liver too, but that stuff also kind of needs to be replenished, you know, not too long after those workouts and your body just does a better job of replenishing those particular energy stores.
When you get the energy back into it, like quickly after the workout. And there is something that's kind of cool to know too, is when your body does finished a workout, most of the carbohydrates that you give it will be stored as glycogen. So you can kind of use that window to almost eat something that's a little bit what you might call bad.
Like a sugary oriented type of food, because your body's going to tend to store what energy it needs as glycogen. Right after that, if there's an excess more of, of stuff that it doesn't need, then that will get stored as fat. So as long as you're watching, you know, what it is and how much you're probably.
Okay. But yeah, carbohydrate replenishment, or you could say supplementation. And typically you want to do that with liquid. So any form of like carbohydrate Gatorade, you can buy powders that are simply like, from like supplement companies that you can add to your, like your protein shakes. They'll give you that carb, um, side of it as well.
So those two things I think are pretty important and that just, again, AIDS in like muscle recovery AIDS and punishing those glycogen stores, which will then. Aid and turn your recovery. So hopefully the next day, you're going to have a little more energy for that workout. You know, you will have recovered muscularly, hopefully a little bit better.
So those are going to be two areas. I would say probably the most basic places to start. If you want to take it a little further, you know, depending on how the diet looks, if you don't get as much fruits and vegetables, things that are a little more rich in vitamins and minerals, doing some multivitamin supplementation can be a good idea.
That's not necessarily going to be needed for everyone. , but that is one of those things. I think a lot of people can probably benefit from. , and then fish oils is another big one too. I think a lot of people can benefit from taking fish oils, the anti-inflammatory properties, and that can be quite helpful for recovery and managing like joint stress and stuff too.
So the one thing I will say, if you are trying to lose weight, Watch how much you take. Cause those capsules still are fat. Right? So you do get a little bit more calories from that. So you just gotta be careful, you know, those are pretty basic things that I've in the past been taking right now. I usually just do like a protein shake for post-workout and I'll do like a Gatorade, you know?
So I try to do what I feel is kind of the bare minimum. The more you start stepping into other products, I just feel like there's more variables to try to keep track of. And the supplement industry is just one of those industries that isn't as well regulated. Right. So if you guys know none of that stuff on the ingredients list or the claims is really being regulated so they can essentially throw in some blinds or maybe omit some things in there.
You know, I think a lot of people have good standards. Practice, but you never know you might get a product that's just not well reviewed. There's not a lot out there and it might not have some, you know, it's not as legitimate as other companies are going to be, you know? So when you do look at supplements, you always want to make sure that they do have kind of a stamp of approval.
There are a number of third party companies that will go through the product to make sure that in fact, what is on the ingredients list. Is what is within that product. So those kinds of things can be helpful, but in general, you know, keep it simple. Don't try to go too crazy. If there was really like some magic product that's going to make you that much better, you know, everyone would be taking it.
So, you know, I think as long as you stick to the basics and just. Get your protein, you know, make sure you're replenishing your carbohydrates effectively. And you know, if you need some supplementation with multivitamins or fish oils, great. But you know, outside of the realm of those things, there's going to be some specific things that maybe you might dabble in for specific reasons, you know, but that's going to be again on a, on a situational basis.

Kevin Chang: [00:56:21]

I do think that, , a couple of supplements that people have often talked about, , more recently, one, I think magnesium is one of those things. People don't get enough magnesium in their diet. I hear. , and then creatine and I I've heard, , a number of studies actually recently, both for weightlifting bodybuilding, as well as running.
Creating might actually have, , pretty powerful effects, both on , ATP storage and the amount of, , energy that you can store in your muscles, but also on recovery as well. So

Devin Lopez: [00:56:49]

you just got to try, right? Everyone's body everyone's physiology is a little different. So the way you're going to respond to these things will, will certainly be different from person to person.
You know, talk to people that have seen really good growth from taking something like creatine. And then I've also talked to people and even myself included, I never felt like I saw an improvement on, on my performance versus what it was before, you know, when I was taking it.

Kevin Chang: [00:57:11]

Yeah, that's true. I think they say like 20% or 30% of people creating has no effect at all.
So. It's definitely. So just depends on the person,

Devin Lopez: [00:57:21]

you know, I think the best thing for that, for anyone that's looking to just dabble, you know, give yourself like a two-week period, you know, try something, keep it consistent, try to, you know, be scientific about it and take some notes and see, you know, what you can learn from it.
And if it works, you know, keep doing it. And then if not, you know, maybe you just move on to something else at that point. But, you know, I think that's the best way to do that kind of stuff too. Um, so anything that sounds good, you know, it's always worth giving a try, as long as it doesn't seem unhealthy, or like there could be some other, you know, potential issues with it.
So, but that's a lot of diet, you know, nutrition is just messing around, just taking careful notes of, of what's happening and just using that information to guide your next decision. You know what you're going to do.

Kevin Chang: [00:58:05]

Also on, as you mentioned, are you talking about instilling good habits for weight loss or for maintaining weight?
A couple of things. We probably haven't gotten to one eliminating snacks and sugary drinks is another big, big area . And then something that's worked fairly well for me in the past has been intermittent fasting or, , controlling the times of the day where.
And when you eat, are those things that you also talk with your clients about, or are there other habits that you like to instill or things that you look at? I know sometimes with our athletes, we have them journal what they have eaten and when they've eaten it. And that's something that we can review with them.
, are there other habits that you kind of take a look at with your athletes who are trying to lose weight?

Devin Lopez: [00:58:48]

Yeah, well, I mean, you, you kind of touched on them. We'll do some journaling. We'll try to just monitor those things a little bit, you know, eliminating sugary drinks, trying to get the processed foods out of the equation is, is always kind of a given, you know, I think just those kinds of things.
Again, it's gotta be a process of elimination. If you try to take it all away at once, you're probably going to be met with a lot of resistance. From whoever it is, you're trying to help. So you kind of got, gotta be careful in terms of what you're trying to take away and when you're trying to take it away.
But I think you absolutely want to try to eliminate those kinds of things out of their diet and replace it with more wholesome foods. Like I was saying before, um, intermittent fasting is one of those things that I personally haven't tried it yet. You know, I've read about it. I've talked to people that have tried it.
A lot of people that I've spoken to have had a lot of success with it. So I think that there is something there. And again, I'm just going to kind of give the same answer. I said just earlier is, you know, it's one of those things that you have to try to play around with. I will say that intermittent fasting.
Is a much more what I would classify as like an advanced kind of skill for people to work on in terms of what you could choose to do to improve your diets. So going back to more fundamental things like regulating your eating, learning about portion control to manage that energy in energy out outbalance.
You know, things like that, just learning to eat better quality foods. You know, these kinds of things will probably be a little more fundamental and that whole process, but intermittent fasting would be something that I would say you would after someone's kind of, you know, mastered or at least has a very good grasp of those basic habits.
Then start to dabble in things like that. So intermittent, fasting, ketogenic diets, you know, things that are just a little more out of the norm and take a little more discipline though, at the same time you could say, you know, so if you try to take someone brand new and have them intermittent fasting, that could be a tough thing to adhere to that, you know, that time span from what you're not supposed to eat anything, you know, but for some people, it actually works really well for their schedule.
Maybe they're at work all day and they have zero time to eat. So they're kind of like just doing it. Naturally already. So why not actually create a little more structure around it and use it to your advantage? So I think it has been shown to be quite effective for some people. So, like I said, just got to try it and see and see how it goes.

Kevin Chang: [01:01:04]

Yeah. It's super interesting. There's so many of these advanced techniques or advanced things. Especially for endurance athletes. I know, again, we kind of touched on ketogenic and at some point down the road in the future, maybe we revisit it, but I've, I've seen some studies where a ketogenic or a low carb diet has worked really well with endurance athletes because.
It trains the body to use fat and fat as fuel and be able to go longer distance. So I've seen a number of ultra athletes really start moving in that direction as well

Devin Lopez: [01:01:35]

here. Genic, diet's kind of an interesting one because I'm actually doing a little bit of research right now and taking a course on like metabolic health.
And they're talking a little bit about the ketogenic diet. Trying to like dispel some myths in terms of, if it, in fact, like helps you to be a better endurance athlete. So with the studies that have come out, there are some studies that do support that it did show an increase, but within some of those same studies, there also was people though that also saw decrease, you know, in the other direction in terms of like performance.
So it is again, One of those things where some people's body and their physiology might very well work well off of that and be more optimized, but it kind of depends in theory, you know, when you are on a ketogenic diet, you should be able to stay using like fat for energy at higher intensity levels, you know, which obviously you have much more energy stored in fat.
So there are benefits to that. And. And over like long endurance races, if you can minimize the amount of refueling breaks that you take, you know, that can be potentially helpful. Cause if you're carbohydrate based, you're going to have to stop and refuel a little bit more since carbohydrates just aren't as energy dense as fats are, you know?
So that is something to consider, but it just, it's interesting because the research does kind of go both ways. There's some research that shows it being pretty. You know, equal in terms of like the performance on either or, , diets. So, and then there's some that supported more for the carbohydrate, like high diet and then some that is supported more for the, , for the ketogenic diet.
So again, from everything that I've read, the more I've learned, it's like, you just. It's so hard to just say like, it's just this way, like, this is what you do. This is going to be the outcome. Like it's how it goes for everyone, but it really isn't, you know, but in theory, yeah, there are some things that should support that.
, the interesting thing that I did read though, is that your body has to consume more oxygen in order to break down the fat versus how much oxygen it needs. To break down in order to like use carbohydrate for energy. So I guess those was saying you, you kind of have to labor a little harder when you're more like, kenogenic, it's hard to say if that's like a downside, but I just thought that was kind of an interesting piece of information.
And there as well. So, but yeah, it's, it is kind of an interesting area to get into because some people I've talked to on ketogenic. Like they love it. They're like my body feels great. Other people just had a hard time even getting into ketosis, you know? So it does depend. So just give it a shot, see how it goes.

Kevin Chang: [01:04:09]

And so much of it depends on genetics. And there are different forms of what people call like strict, strict keto, or kind of a dual fuel, like ketogenic for most of the day. But some carbo refeeds either throughout the week or one carbo refeed either at night. So there's really definitely something complicated.
Yeah, it gets super complicated. And as Devon said, it, sometimes it depends on your goals, what you want to get out of it, as well as your genetic and what has worked well for you and what works for your lifestyle too. You know, like some people can work great with acute photogenic diets, you know, you're giving up a lot of.
You know, going out to parties, what you can eat quite, you can share meals wise, a lot of the, you know, the other social aspects of lifestyle things. So I think that's incredibly interesting. Super interesting. So coach Devin, anything else that you want our audience to know? Anything else? That you think that we should share with our audience?

Devin Lopez: [01:05:02]

I mean, I think something, uh, like touching on topic of sleep, you know, might be worth just a quick moment. Cause we're talking a lot about things that do contribute to better performance and better recovery. You know, one of those things I think is probably far under utilized is just getting good quality sleep.
And especially with the busy professional unsure that's tough. Or if you live. Know, if you have a family or if you have young kids and stuff like that, that can be a challenge, but you know, anyone that can try to optimize their sleep and the sleep quality and the amount of sleep that they're getting, you know, if you're trying to be in better shape, and if you're trying to maximize the amount of adaptations you're getting from each training session, sleep is going to be, you know, profoundly huge in how allowing you to do that.
Poor sleep can definitely kill performance a lot and it can make those gains just a very slow process of getting better or increasing them. Um, so I think that's one of those things, you know, without taking too much more time, like building better sleep habits, you know, really, um, trying to value what it can do for you a little bit more because sometimes just fixing sleep alone can help people lose weight.
Perform better feel better. Like there's a lot of benefits that just simply sleeping better can do for you. Lower stress levels. Like, you know, the list goes on. So, you know, and that's one of the silent killers is when you don't get good quality sleep and raises things like stress levels, blood pressure.
You know, hypertension and all that . So, you know, super important.

Kevin Chang: [01:06:30]

Yeah. It probably could be a whole episode in and of itself. We probably should just have you on it's a chat about it. I know that

Devin Lopez: [01:06:37]

I do have a lot of strategies that someone who's tried to sleep better

Kevin Chang: [01:06:41]

or a rings and, and HRV variability and, uh, you know, all sorts of things that you can.
Yeah, that's right. Yeah. UPD oils and everything. Yeah. Yeah. Chiller, chiller pads, and, uh, and weighted blankets and all those

Devin Lopez: [01:06:57]

strategies therapy for sure.

Bertrand Newson: [01:06:59]

One that I know that our listeners want. And you, you touched on it early on in our conversation. If here were three to four exercises geared towards runners, if they were to do something that is going to benefit them most, either the core form, lower trunk overall cardio, from your perspective.
What would they be? You know, three or four coach DS recommended exercises for runners.

Devin Lopez: [01:07:23]

Let's see. Think doing walking lunges, like weighted walking lunges, or step-ups kind of be, could go both ways with those be quite helpful. And those kind of have a nice functional carry over in terms of. Just general movement pattern.
, but strengthening things like your hamstrings and hips. So those will help actually, something like a hip thruster, like a way that hip thrusters strengthen your hips is very, , having strong glutes. Having strong hips is very important for just athletic performance in general, but specifically like running too.
So, you know, between those two exercises, you'll get some good hip and hamstring. Strengthening out of it. , and I think to even kind of address some of that, , like core stuff, you can get kind of fancy and do some offset weights where you're holding like weight on one side of the body versus the other will perform in something like a lunge or a step up, you know, that also does add some good.
Core development at the same time. , but honestly, like for people that haven't done much just sticking with basic planks can go a long way. You know? So developing your core strength through static holds I think is much more beneficial than doing something like a flection type sit-up or something like that, you know?
So it's also going to have much better carry over to other things and hopefully make you more. Efficient mover as well. So let's see, we've got lunges have thrust. I would say squats, but I still feel like posterior chain exercises are going to be a little bit better to emphasize for the runners and also lunges.
We'll hit the quads to some degree too, but still kind of biasing those other muscles. I do think it's good to throw in like some posture exercises because even as a runner, having good posture still allows you to move fish only. Especially like upper body running mechanics. So something as simple as like a prone swimmer.
I'm not sure if you guys are familiar with that one, but it's just a very simple scapular exercises that you do while you lie, face down easily to like Google that and find, uh, a reference for that in terms of video. So now we'll kind of work on posture. You could say some upper body stuff, but I think that focusing more on the lower body is going to give you, you know, a little more bang for your buck.
So if I'm just going to choose for, let's say lunges, hip thrust, plank variations, and, um, Probably doing some like single legged, bounding drills, basic plyometric, bounding drills. So specifically like single, it can definitely go a long way in developing some of the, those propulsive mechanics that you're going to need for, for running.
Especially if you're trying to be like a fast runner. You know, and I think everyone needs to dabble a little bit in some fast running if they're trying to improve their overall running as well. So that's kind of where I first those recommendations out there is a good starting point. And then you can definitely take that quite far in terms of how you progressed those exercises.
So hopefully that's helpful.

Bertrand Newson: [01:10:15]

That's great. Thank you very much.

Kevin Chang: [01:10:17]

Thank you so much, Devin. Really appreciate it. Where can people find you online?

Devin Lopez: [01:10:22]

If they want to check out my Instagram, it's a CF Devon Lopez. They want to check out our gym and kind of see where I work and see what that's all about. They can find a set, a CrossFit, sj.com.
But otherwise, , most on LinkedIn, Devon Lopez on LinkedIn. So find me there, feel free to ask questions as well.

Kevin Chang: [01:10:42]

Awesome. Incredible. Thank you so much again, and we'll have all the links online.
We really, really appreciate it, man.
Well, I hope you enjoyed this episode of the race mob podcast. Check out all of the show notes or find a running buddy [email protected]. Please subscribe to us on Apple, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to your podcasts and leave us a review until next time. Keep on moving.