[William Rohe]

I’ll swap them and give it a try. Close grip is a rather important movement for triceps. Should I move them to another day in which I start with incline or decline bench for starting the workout and monitor or take close grip out completely for the time being and come back to it in a month or two?

[William Rohe]

Welcome back JP! I’ve talked countless times on PED radio/Muscle Minds about expierences with Dr. Scott and Milos when you pushed to 290lbs for the first time and then went to 300lbs. I think it would be cool if you did a video on the site here talking about your mindset going into those experiences, tell us a bit about each, and what you think of it looking back now. Maybe a bit more detail in the aspects of each dieting approach or if you had dieting phases(any mini cuts or balls to the wall to grow?), trianing, drugs, and smaller things like how you felt, digestion with all the food, feeling comfortable/uncomfortable at the different weights, handling water weight, and other interesting things you can think back to during those experiences.

Being a guy with the goal of putting on a lot of size, I always find it very interesting and I’m laser focused to the show when you brought those stories/experiences in the radio shows.

[William Rohe]

I’ve given both barbell and smithmachine a try and run into the same problem sadly. I focus primarily on using the smithmachine now because I’m able to focus on my triceps primarily. I’ve tried multiple different grips widths and different positions as far as where the bar comes down on my chest.

I’ve never tried reverse grip, but that might be worth a try. Re-racking it with reverse grip always had me a bit nervous. As long as the grip doesn’t cause any pain on my tendonitis(ongoing elbow tenonitis on my right elbow), I’ll give it a go. Thanks!

[William Rohe]

Pushing up weight will be from your overall calorie intake. Carbs around your workouts is to maintain higher insulin sensitivity for longer so your body makes good use of the carbs. Insulin resistance will build up the higher your bodyfat levels get. When you’re insulin resistant, your body won’t utilize those carbs as well and are more likely to store as bodyfat the higher resistance you have. JP has some videos on this.

[William Rohe]

Lots of factors will come into play when picking a preworkout. For instance, what kind of caffeine tolerance do you have? Don’t want to recommend something that you cannot handle or something that is too weak for your tolerance.

[William Rohe]

Like you said, this will really come down to your ability to recover and keep performance as high as possible throughout your workout. I’ve recently switched to JP’s style of training and focus on my all out heavy set at max intensity for 1 set of 6-10 reps. Then a back off set in which you’d usually fail in the 12-15 rep range. I’ve seen JP use this method in quite a bit of his videos while I’ve also seen him do just one set at max intensity incorporating rest pause or muscle rounds. It’s really going to be best to try a couple methods and see what works out best for you though.

[William Rohe]

I’ve seen the IG posts on your bent over rows at 5 reps. You might be at the point that you cannot possibly maintain form at such a high weight. Was damn impressive!

And makes sense about less red meat in the offseason. I bet bloating and digestion would get pretty bad sticking to whole foods like that. I’ve been having issues with looking like I’m carrying a food baby and stomach distention with how much cream of rice I had been having in my post workout meal. Looks like I’m joining the kids cereal crew since that should digest MUCH better and faster.

[William Rohe]

Thanks JP! Jumped to your style of training from previously running high volume training and being a high volume fan, did rest-pause work right off the bat. Lifts are going up like crazy but recovery has gotten much more difficult. So I’ll back off to straight sets and utilize rest-pause more if I notice a stall in a lift.

Any change you’ll be coming back to the United States any time soon?

And Q for now…..do you notice you grow better when incorporating more red meats into your diet? I track calories/macros and notice when using steak/beef that I grow at a much faster rate, even using the same calories. Curious if the same works for you?

[William Rohe]

Quick question JP

While you’re in the offseason and pushing for more mass or in the past when you’ve built most of your mass, do you often focus on straight sets during your workouts? Or do you incorporate intensifiers like rest-pause year round? I’m not sure if I should focus on those intensifiers while massing or save them for increasing energy expendature for when the goal would be dropping bodyfat.

[William Rohe]

Local grocery store here carries cream of rice. Usually will find it by the oatmeal section of the store. Cream of wheat works as well but digests a tad slower imo. Both digest very easily though.

[William Rohe]

Thanks for the response Dr. Stevenson! I was listening to an episode of Muscle Minds I saw the notification btw, lol.

From your example, would you consider that goal off adding that much FFM optimal/realistic in one bulking/massing phase or do you think it would be more optimal to focus on that in 2 or more massing phases?

Thanks!

[William Rohe]

You’re over thinking it on the protein + veggies not absorbing as well. You don’t need to move the carbs as long as you’re not over your daily caloric intake(granted you’re cutting). If you move carbs to peri workout and prefer it, then for sure give it a try. But end result won’t matter if you leave them in meal 2 or not.

[William Rohe]

It’s going to be completely different from person to person. Whatever foods digest well for you while giving you proper energy to fuel your workouts.

I often will mix a complex carb with protein. So like oats + whey or brown rice + chicken.

If I’m seriously dragging and need a faster ‘pick me up’ I’ll have cream of rice + whey which digests so fast and gives such an energy kick.

Other people though may prefer and work out better off protein + fats. You’ll have to experiment to see what works best for you.

[William Rohe]

Would take carbs out of meal 2 next and then PWO2 after that. Basically bringing it down to carbs only pre/intra/post for the tail end of your cut. That will take advantage of nutrient timing. However overall calorie intake is more important than carb timing.

[William Rohe]

You just finished your cut. Depending on what your initial increase in calories looks like, burger is perfectly normal after a cut. Those hormones will be very high for hunger. Doesn’t mean you should toss calories back on very quick. Reverse diet slowly so you don’t put on a bunch of bodyfat. Take it slow. Keep veggies in your diet to help with satiety and maybe toss in diet soda to give you that full feeling between meals.