welcome this is the uh pre-intra and post-workout nutrition webinar with tiffany and me from sns for for those of you joining live thank you um for those of you who are watching this 50 years in the future when the robots have taken over we appreciate you as well um so this is a q a webinar so we have some questions that have been submitted online mostly through instagram and uh we'll go through those um i also asked tiffany to prepare kind of like her top three um questions that she gets most often um and we'll also take i know there's a couple questions that nikhil has who's in the audience we'll take some questions from whoever's here and whatever kind of um comes in throughout the next i don't know 45 minutes uh so uh yeah welcome maybe we'll start with you tiffany giving me a little overview of uh of your background and your kind of domain specialty sure yeah i'm so happy to be here thanks jordan um so yeah i i can start off with just like a little introduction about myself and then how i got involved with powerlifting where i am present day and kind of what keeps me still in a sport even though i'm not competing anymore so i became a dietician in 2017 i competed in my first powerlifting meet when i was a sophomore in college so i think i was like 20 14 20 20 13 2014. um and at first i like loved it i loved it like getting strong i ran in high school i was super into cardio right as i feel like a lot of people are initially when they start their fitness journey um and then i realized how cool it was to be strong so i couldn't continue to do it and i competed for the first time and after that i just started training um you know training on a powerlifting program uh competed in nationals in 2017. um and i think at that time and i was kind of telling jordan this one we have first like had her our discussion together that i think 2017 was maybe the time where people just started powerlifting um and people tell me that kind of downplayed myself i was able to rank that's my my little like humble brag i was able to rank top five in my weight class and age at the time in the 57 kilo class um so i felt like a big deal to me um and but i feel like now that the sport is it's amazing how how how uh you know popular it's grown and how much people gravitate towards it naturally now um so the competition is definitely there which is really great to witness um but during that time as i was powerlifting i i did notice that you know just like competing um with my friends uh competing like actually on a team um and just being more familiar with the the individuals in the sports system like uh i i really realized that there was a bit of a gap when it came to nutrition um you know i unfortunately you know being a witness to my friends not doing well with their competitions due to like you know not cutting weight properly and using drastic weight of you know measures to get to their to their weight class and not eating properly during their prep um it made me upset right like naturally but but most of all and most importantly it motivated me to want to see better for the people around me right and ultimately to see you know more improvements in the sport in general um because when it comes to nutrition i think that um when it comes to power lifting i think nutrition has such a key role and a lot of people tend to um of course that happens actually where people gravitate towards like lifting and just wanting to you know be consistent with their training and then they get that level of nutrition um or that understanding that okay like how do i take it to the next level and that's where nutrition comes into into play um so i'm happy to continue uh you know being involved being involved in sport as you know not an individual that competes anymore but all my you know serving a population that primarily does um and strength athletes in general so i do have some some individuals to do like weight liftings you know some crossfitters um but my my heart's definitely uh for for my powerful lifters out there um present day i do consulting on the side um but i also work full-time for exos which is a sports performance company if anyone's familiar with it i work in corporate wellness in the midtown location here really great and rewarding job um so i like to do that and then i like to work for um you know myself on the side to make sure that i stay up to date with everything powerlifting by also making sure that i'm improving my counseling practices and whatnot awesome appreciate it you know it's interesting the the questions if you read them all they all kind of have um uh uh simulatory similarity and that they are curious about performance right the people who ask questions they want to know how they can perform better and it's so different than um diet in the traditional sense where people want to lose weight or they want to appear a certain way and you know what's cool about that and you kind of alluded to a little bit is people are always getting better they're always getting stronger the sport of powerlifting has exploded people are getting a lot a lot more skilled and i think diet is one of those places that the average hobby power lifter has not fully optimized right i mean there is no such thing as fully optimized but they haven't put in the effort um that they could to get the outcomes that are significant um and you know you see as the sport gets bigger you know ray williams was the first person to squat a thousand pounds raw as soon as he did that you know a thousand pounds started falling everywhere um you know eddie hall pulled 500 kilos and then thor came and pulled 501 after that and now there's all these races to beat that um an interesting analogy uh i was snorkeling this past weekend and i would dive down like 10 feet and as soon as i dived down 10 feet my ears started to to hurt like you could feel the pressure and i was like all right well i guess yeah it takes practice you got to go you got to snorkel a lot you got to dive a lot to get lower than 10 feet and then i saw a diver a diver with you know oxygen and they were way lower than i am and i thought to myself there's nothing protecting their ears how are they doing it and then within a few moments i thought oh well there must be a way for me to do it oh i think we dropped her well let me finish my my diatribe here um for for those who are listening um i figure there's got to be a way for me to do it and so within a few minutes i i've just figured it out i just got to equalize i'll wait for tiffany to join again huh i seem to have gotten kicked off was it just me or i think it was just you oh no sorry about that we're going for a moment so just to finish up my little um my thought that i had um i was so excited about over the weekend but i was snorkeling i couldn't go within 10 feet i saw a diver like 30 feet down with no ear protection and it just made me realize there is a way to do it better and i just don't know what it was within a few minutes i figured out i could equalize like i do on an airplane and i was able to dive 30 feet right with it with a snowman this i think the same thing applies here powerlifting is reaching new heights people are getting much better when those new heights are reached people figure out there's something that i need to do to improve it's clearly possible and i think a lot of that um a lot of that possibility is in diet and so yeah i'm really excited to have you on answer these questions so yeah stoked to be here and yeah just uh just to conclude with that your little story yeah and how wonderful is that right being able to just be witness to be like okay like wow like how can i improve in this like whoa i'm i'm new and is just a process frustrated wanting to learn and develop and grow right as an athlete as a person um whatever it may be like there's always that room for potential for you know more of a potential and improved growth and that's a wonderful thing right yeah absolutely that's that's my favorite thing about this sport there's always potential for improvement right let's go ahead and get started with um your most common question so what do you think people are dying to learn the most questions that they they really want to get answered yeah um i love that you start off with that because i actually like when i was going through your list of questions i was like some of these like i i had uh like a few questions i had in mind like definitely protein was one of them right just like how much protein in general et cetera um and then i was looking at this list and i was like wow there's like there's a lot of these questions i would consider like they would be like top questions i i get very very often um but protein definitely one of them so maybe we can start there yeah let's dive in so we could do uh here use that the protein question how much protein is good for men and women per pound of body weight at what point is it overkill yeah i i you know i love the protein question just because um there's so much debate and controversy when it comes to protein right um generally like what we know right when it comes to protein recommendations is that the more uh intense our activity is our physical activity your sport is the more physically demanding it is and the more energy um demanding it is so you know we're burning a lot of calories at once the more protein that we'll need right but it's sometimes right not as simple as that um one interesting thing the thing that i like to point out right before even talking about protein when it comes to sport is that the the dietary recommendations for um protein for like the general population is very low are you familiar with that yeah it i've read that before it seems pretty low yeah it's pretty low i want to say i don't i don't even not that this may be like you know like a bad representation of like of exactly like what the guidelines that i go through but i bare i don't even pay attention to it just because they're so low right i think it's anywhere from 0.8 grams per pound of body weight right so that's the general recommendation for americans um and really the reason why i don't pay too much attention to it is because i do not that i don't think that we're in uh you know just average individuals are in a state of not having enough protein but i do think that it's just grossly underestimated right a lot of us are physically active and the the our standard diets are not that protein focused even if we're not physically active a lot of people don't understand the importance of protein um so i like to to follow a few guidelines when it comes to protein and it really um it's just uh thinking about how physically demanding your sport is so as powerlifters um are our sport is physically demanding in the sense that you're working out for a longer period of time um but it's not it's it's not that intense as compared to like a like an endurance trainer right like a triathlete so the needs are actually lower um i would recommend anywhere from 1.1 grams to 2.2 grams uh of protein per kilo of body weight so the reason why there's such a huge gap and that's just for men and women and the reason why there's there's that gap is because it really depends on where you are in your sport right so or where you are in your training um so if you're typically you know on a cut or um you know your your caloric in your on a caloric deficit i would recommend your protein intake to be a bit higher right so if your training is uh you know you're in a hypertrophy phase i would recommend the opportunity to be a bit higher too right um and so those purposes are just to make sure that you're recovering well um and that you're promoting that muscle growth even under conditions that naturally would um you know want you to be in more of a catabolic state and what about the overkill part of the question is there too much protein so there's typically not too much protein unless um you're an individual with some type of kidney malfunction or disease right i think however with that being said that's that's the answer you get you would get from most people um but i would say if reaching your protein goals is taking away from the overall quality of your diet if it's making it hard to hit your macros if it's making it hard to reach your calorie goals and and you feel overexerted by having too much protein then that's where it can be overkill so we're also talking about diet quality not just diet quantity so oftentimes when it comes to having too much protein it can be really daunting right just generally speaking if you're if if you're consuming way too much protein to the point where it's kind of making you um divert from your actual plan right your macronutrient recommendations whatever it may be then that's where i could say okay let's try and see if we can make room for you know some carbs and maybe some fats um and that way the overall diet quality will improve and you're most likely to stay on a consistent eating plan now again i spoke a little bit about this before the the edit that we're going to make to start this video but i come from a long history of trying to gain weight and so it seems to me as well when i've tried to eat a lot of protein it's also like an opportunity cost thing i don't know if that's something that you that you agree with or disagree with i mean protein is satiating right and when i have a lot of sliced turkey for example it's hard for me to eat more of it um you know for me maybe that's taking place of like a more calorically dense you know fatty food right i mean is that something you would agree with yeah yeah great question about that um so yes right so that that that kind of it's it's that's like a blend of like okay like diet quality and like quantity okay so like protein itself is a very fulfilling macronutrient um having too much of it can be you know obviously you're really full and that can affect the ability to just increase your total calories right so if you're someone if you're an individual that wants to gain weight and gaining weight is your primary goal um and you find that you know reaching your protein goals is is a bit overwhelming to and you may miss on the total calorie goal consistently over like a period of time i won't say okay let's see if we could bump that protein down um bring bring your carb and fat macronutrients up and see if that can kind of balance things out a bit yeah that makes sense well yeah i think that answers that question um there's another one for you um and this is i think kind of the highest level i guess most generally appealing question uh what are the main supplements you would recommend for a power lifter yeah yeah that's a good one i love that one so um that kind there's there's another question that's similar to that like are there any contenders for effective supplements besides whey caffeine and creatine so maybe we can kind of combine them both yeah um yeah so generally speaking um i definitely would recommend like a protein powder um definitely would recommend creatine and definitely uh creatine and caffeine um if i had to make a couple other suggestions i think beta alanine can be really helpful and i also think that um some form of electrolytes can be helpful especially if you are on a cut or you're training for um yeah on a cut for like an extended period of time um or you're getting close to getting close to the competition time where you're trading um with higher uh without you know higher load and um uh or even i guess yeah just even in in the beginning so like as an intro workout i really like electrolytes um generally i would recommend it definitely recommend it for those those who are on a caloric deficit awesome and i guess in the vein of the second question um are there any um contenders for effective supplement in the same classes way caffeine or creatine is there anything that you know of maybe in the recent history five ten years that can actually improve performance like maybe directly correlated to improve strength or endurance or things like that i don't i like i would say that there's nothing new that we don't know right um i think if you hit the nail on all three and you're consistent with your intake of having a protein powder you're consistent and able to dose your caffeine properly in order to optimize your workout and you're consistent with your creatine and your uh respondent to creatine um then you're you're pretty much like golden right i recommend like i mentioned beta alanine as a good supplement just because you know when you're training especially if you're training in a hypertrophy phase right beta alanine basically works to to block lac uh lactic acid buildup right so it basically acts as like a precursor it can kind of delay that muscle uh fatigue and so just similar concept thing to creatine but not in a sense that you need that whole loading and phase to actually occur you can it's instantaneous um you know you can kind of delay that fatigue right and obviously if we delay uh muscle fatigue we can probably you know work out more efficiently and push out like a cleaner rough so i would say beta alanine would be like maybe my last my last supplement i had to make a recommendation but there's nothing really that new and exciting in the as far as the supplement world i think those three are amazing as is if you can you know be consistent with the intake of them well that's good to know i have one of those browser plugins that tells me if there's any coupon codes when i check out and if there's not it tells me good now you know that you didn't miss out on any savings right so it's the same thing here no there might not be any new supplements that um improve performance but at least i know i'm not missing out on anything right so you know i here's another one but you know what before i get to this i want to poke on something you mentioned the loading phase for creatine i think it's it's often misunderstood potentially simple potentially not maybe you can kind of go over your opinions on it oh sure so is the loading phase necessary when it comes to creatine supplementation i guess more specifically is it necessary is there a simple version is there a more complex version so it depends i i feel like i started off every and every answer like that well i say it depends because um it really does depend on exactly what you want to use creatine for in your training cycle right so if you are someone that wants to take creatine consistently you may be starting off in a program you generally just want to use it effectively as a you know as a supplement then really i mean loading really isn't necessary we don't really see any benefits with loading however if you're an individual that wants to optimize creatine supplementation during maybe like closer to competition time that can be helpful right and weight making weight isn't an issue that's where treat creatine can actually shine right so you can kind of and if you're on like a time constraint right like let's say you um you get off creatine and then uh you know for whatever reason you're not consistent with it and then you want to use creatine again towards the end of your training that's where it can be helpful right leading into me and making weight isn't an issue so at the end of the day i think if i had to make a recommendation i wouldn't say i would just say you know just supplement creatine as is the loading phase really isn't that necessary unless you're like on a true time constraint but if you can plan things out strategically you really shouldn't be got it and so i think that loading phases to is to increase your blood creatinine levels or am i getting that right um yeah and so what you're saying is you take it long enough duration those levels will get up there right yeah it basically reaches yeah so it can saturate it up quick like in a quicker time frame but okay with that being said uh creatine loading phases can come with some small side effects right and that's generally why i don't recommend it and like sorry i didn't mention that earlier but those who experience who those who do load with creatine um they they may find that they go through just like you know some like some simple like gi digestive issues right so more like stomach cramps like um you know there could be like more bloating um and that can ultimately interfere with your training right so we're always thinking about like trying to optimize as much as we can and if we if we're running the risk of like having like any gi issues i would say let's stay away from it right let's just avoid that completely um and that can stage food especially those who are not like with their hydration and their water intake that makes a lot of sense in fact i've had some gi issues from the loading phase of creatine so it's kind of a relief to hear that yeah i mean you know it it's i feel like i as you get older supplements they all have some weird impact i mean i don't i don't take away protein anymore for a similar reason um okay yeah i mean i'll i'll have a shake every once in a while but when i do it every day it's almost like my my stomach and so um i treat it more as like uh you know after a really hard workout you know yeah yeah wait wait protein can i mean a lot of people can be intolerant to weight protein in general um right just because it's a liquid and a lot of people are intolerant to dairy so that's where you can run into some issues so i mean you can if you're someone that is intolerant to dairy in general you can always opt for like a soy protein isolate um the amino acid profile is equivalent the bioavailability of the amino acids in there is somewhat equivalent to weight protein so that would be like a second best option very good oh we got a question here that was just submitted what are the main supplements you would suggest for a competitive cyclist it just disappeared on me yeah what are the main supplements i would recommend for competitive cyclists yeah yeah road cyclists under the category and what was that under 23 categories a young road cyclist oh okay so i would say though i mean still sticking to the idea that like those three supplements i mean those three supplements in general are really good for all sports right so like weight caffeine uh creatine um definitely if you're cycling um you'll want to consider having some some form of electrolytes right you're uh sweating at a profuse rate so you want to make sure you replenish your electrolytes so you're you know you're feeling uh optimized and hydrated throughout your workout um we we noticed that if we are at least like even five percent um or five percent sweat loss can even uh impact your performance so definitely having that those electrolytes during your workout can can definitely be helpful and with that being said right um uh maybe um having and this is this is not i don't want to say it's like taboo i think a lot of people are still kind of like coming to it but having um a beet powder in the form of like a juice or just like just the or a powder in general um boost nitric oxide um basically in layman's terms it can kind of just make the blood in your in your body a bit thinner so then your muscles can can work at a more effective rate a more efficient brain so the muscles can kind of flow a bit better and if you supplement with it on a consistent time period um you know you'll get those those effects over time and from what i understand uh and you know correctly i'm wrong here but a lot of people think of creatine and think of strength training or bodybuilding but i believe the most common use case increases cardiovascular conditioning like long endurance running is that correct yeah yeah creatine actually has some really amazing effects if not more for endurance athletes yeah i think the reason why we associate like creatine with strength athletes exclusively is because like creatine is so focused on like muscle building right but other sports are very muscle demanding to you know muscle demanding too um so yeah we actually know that like creatine can be really effective for like runners um like those who who run marathons uh triathletes um cyclists for sure um also creatine has a great effects on general population um can improve like cognitive like health you know memory cognitive function for like older adults uh specifically um so we're learning a lot about creatine more than more so than we than we have known in the past yeah it's fascinating uh and i i don't know where the public perception came from but maybe because you know you're young you start going to the gym and you want to improve you do creatine there's a lot of those people out there because there are very few things in life where the powerlifting perspective or the strength training perspective takes precedence over like a like a perspective because it's the vast majority of the population they choose to run out for exercise um over strength training yeah definitely definitely and i would say like the poor's perception can like you know just be the the misinformation online right uh creates a story i still get that information even from like personal trainers um so it can be tough to kind of dispel that but i i think it also comes from um you know some poor studies that have been that have been uh glorified in the media that pertains like you know those who uh supplemented with creatine they were like not hydrated well enough and then they end up in the hospital so those those tend to get more traction than the actual you know about the actual population that's benefiting from it so but we love creatine here creatine is great great for you um next question uh and this is kind of the same vein as the protein question how many carbs are best for pre-intra and post-workout it's a level of card that's a really good question so um i would say when it comes to exactly paying attention to what those percentages look like um it's most important to consider that you know you're not sacrificing like what your your breakfast looks like right or what your dinner looks like or wherever you may train to just ensure you have the most amount of carbs before and after workout right we want to optimize carbohydrates before and after workout um and during workout um if it's necessary if we deem it necessary but we certainly don't want to uh you know let that override the factor that we want to make sure that we have filling meals throughout um but i would say as a general rule of thumb at least like 20 as a pre-workout 10 inch workout 20 post workout the same um keeps things nice and simple allows us to stay more consistent um and they're well-rounded numbers um so you know you you know people typically have a better vision of exactly how you know how many grams they should be aiming for so anywhere from the 20 would be like you know in that that last mini meal or snack right the 20 to 10 can come from um during the intro work i can come from some form of uh carbohydrate drink or gummies things like that and then post-workout um you know keeping it the same at 20 and so that's percentage of your total daily intake of carbs correct uh yes so that's what you're suggesting is half of your carbs either between before and after your workout i know it sounds more dramatic um right when you think about it when you look at it that way um but certainly the reason why it's so important especially for powerlifting is because we're training for a long period of time right like uh similar not similar to like the general population like you know training for maybe 30 minutes an hour you're in the gym for at least you know three hours uh you know at most um and then you have to think about digestion and things like that so just making sure that you know you stay within those numbers can can help you um probably optimize your workout the most or the most efficient way yeah you know and it sounds like a lot but when you think about it let's say you have 150 grams of carbs in a day 75 grams of carbs from the meal you have before your workout to whatever you consume during your workout in the meal you have after that makes a lot of sense i mean in fact to have 75 grams of carbs outside of that um it seems like kind of a lot so the more you think about it the more it starts to make sense um yeah okay i think that settles the the how many carbs question uh the next question this is a uh a poop related question which you know book is important for diet nutrition right um so is poop a reliable indicator of fiber intake or is it more complex than that yeah that's that was one of my favorite questions so yeah i would say my number two favorite question [Music] um i would say i wouldn't say it should be the only a reliable indicator right because everyone's bowel movements are really different right um especially if you're someone that has some form of gastrointestinal condition right if you have ibs or you have you know crohn's ulcerative colitis things like that pooping and like the amount of times that you poop and use the bathroom um will look different right and and that may not be slowly rely just uh solely relied on the amount of fiber you're having right so for the normal individual average healthy individual who maybe you know maybe doesn't have any type of gi condition it can be a good indicator okay am i having enough protein um but definitely making sure that you review other things over time as you get older would allow you to to make sure that your uh your fiber intake is high enough right so one thing that fiber intake you know can really do is actually improve like a cholesterol and our um and our blood pressure so a lot of us don't know that because i've you know not said a lot of us don't know that but it's not the primary uh thing that we're looking for whenever we think about fiber right but there is a lot of research that says that it can improve your cholesterol and your blood pressure um and it definitely stabilize your blood sugar levels so that's those are things to look at over time and if you have an adequate adequate amount of fiber throughout the day those those numbers tend to typically look pretty good and what about fiber supplementation for strength athletes like is there um a certain level that you recommend or is it is it a supplement that you think is useful for strength athletes particularly when it comes to fiber intake yeah fiber intake so uh generally i would i've never actually recommended a fiber supplement to individuals it's very rare that i do because there's so many benefits that comes from getting fiber from whole foods that we may you know we don't want to miss the ball on right fiber fiber rich foods you know tend to be fruits vegetables are primarily fruits vegetables legumes our nuts our seeds grains things like that and they can provide us so many more nutrients than a supplement right if a supplement if it's really really hard to get that variety in your diet right then a supplement can be helpful i would just make sure that you're paying attention to what your micronutrient intake looks like too right because we're getting vitamins and we're getting minerals in in those other whole foods um in addition you know we're getting that fiber intake so if we can you know get the best of both worlds try to aim for the whole food sources um and really it's it's all about following gentle guidelines right two to three servings of fruit a day four to five servings of vegetables a day which i know can seem like a lot but you can double up or you can start off early in your day um and then just consistently aiming for snacks that can be that are rich in fiber throughout the day can really help yeah okay that makes sense and and i guess you know would you suggest um a certain amount of just general fiber intake for strength athletes or i guess not a specific amount but it is reaching a certain level of fiber intake beneficial for a strength athlete is there a level where if you're below it um you could have additional effects to your strength training yeah that's really like a question and i don't know of any research that that um points towards to either direction like having too much fiber like to less fiber um what we do know is that you know if you're not if you're someone that doesn't get enough fiber in your diet your diet your overall diet quality can be pretty low right so um that that can you know show up in so many other ways but i i haven't heard specifically that um you know like the correlation between fiber intake and and strength athlete um is there something that that that you've heard of or maybe something that you're thinking of no i mean i i was seeing if there was any more detail to this question but you know i guess if i was was to to to think about it you know there was a time where um you know a group of people at the gym were hopping on the fiber train and i think it was more about people who are trying to gain weight just modify their weight um trying to correct for you know dietary imbalances right um and i guess that could be and that that could you know we're all friends here um that could present itself in accidents happening maybe during heavy lifting which people talk about um all the time and i don't know there's some sort of correlation there you know somebody's having an issue with that and people have all kinds of private issues that they maybe don't want to submit questions about um sure other supplementation could be helpful for strength athlete in that regard yeah i mean i love i i love the correlation there there's i mean there's a relationship there right there's a relationship there so yeah um i would say when it comes to fiber intake in general right um only 10 of americans are getting enough and this is data that's been for like maybe like 20 years in the last 20 years we've noticed that americans just do are not getting enough fiber and that's just because a lot of our foods generally don't contain too much of it um we're eating a lot of refined grains uh we're not eating enough fruits and vegetables um and so you know we're not typically getting enough fiber throughout the day um so i think everyone can benefit from from just paying attention to their fiber more it's not something a lot of a lot of people do not you know especially not a lot of like powerlifting athletes you know not stereotype but you know a lot of us are worried about macronutrients right not micronutrients um and a lot of our fiber-rich foods have have all those micronutrients that are really important to pay attention to um the only thing when it comes to like fiber intake right for any for any um athlete is just to make sure that you're not getting too much before you're training and you know maybe not having too much after right and like i don't want to say like give specific amounts because really it varies from individual to individual um but you know just generally speaking and having a bit of fiber before training can you know cause your stomach to bloat maybe obviously fiber-rich foods will make it harder to digest um so it can delay gastric emptying so maybe not having too much fiber-rich foods prior to you know in that meal or snack prior to training is will be important um and also after right because after we're training what we want to do is making sure is to make sure that we're optimizing our nutrition and not really delaying that gastric emptying so we're recovering as fast as we can with the foods that we're eating so for prioritizing a bit of fiber after our our training um it can just you know make things run a bit slower but it's you know it's all relative and i would say when it comes down to it i would worry more about making sure that you get enough fiber throughout the day makes sense i think they'd set on fiber so this question that um that came up in the pre-top so i'm curious this is a question for me your take on water loading just my generalized uh opinion about water loading oh yeah i'll let you kind of go where you want with it just what's your take on it do you like it do you not like it do you have a protocol or whatever yeah yeah so water loading right is obviously i think the gold standard for any a weight based sport right um it is the technique and um technique that most of most people will use to make sure that they can train at you know at their most optimal way right to still be strong during training and then go into their competition without feeling overly depleted right but what what happens often is that um there's a lot of room forever when it comes to water loading right um and i think that it's one of those things that's like hey it's high risk high reward um if you're and naturally there are people who may not respond to water loads as effectively right it really depends on the individual and it really takes a lot of trial and error i like it like i mentioned um to you earlier i would definitely use water loading as one of the last resorts um when it comes to making weight right um if you're an individual that doesn't you know maybe you've water loaded in the past um and it was a hard it was hard for for you know just the the whole process was maybe just more grilling than then then um than you intended to be maybe you know i would say the next time you think about competition they can't think about other methods if you haven't used them right so uh it's effective if you are close to close to weight um but also if you're you know anywhere like five pounds up right generally speaking when it comes to making weight i would always suggest to be really realistic with exactly how much weight you can lose in an effective manner without overly depleting yourself to the point where you know complete competition will be just uh mentally and physically exhausting um so i tend to do a combination of gut manipulation um before anything right gut manipulation uh just generally reviewing what liquids look like and what your food intake looks like the actual bulk of your foods and then use water load as a as a last resort after water loading would probably be like sweating but uh we try not to get there i want to ask more about gut manipulation that's not something i'm familiar with but before we do that maybe we should mention um maybe what water loading is in the first place and a quick protocol to get whoever might be listening on board with with what we're talking about i probably should have prefaced that in the beginning sure yeah so water loading would be considered an acute way to lose weight effectively right so basically what you're doing is that uh ideally you're consuming on average a pretty consistent amount of water so that's for before you even start a load um and the water load process basically starts off with just increasing the amount of water that you're drinking over two it really depends on exactly how how much weight you are trying to cut effectively or you know water weight you're trying to cut effectively but you're drinking a copious amount of water um to increase certain hormones in your body to then cut off water dramatically and then those hormones continue reproducing urine so you're urinating um even when you stop uh water intake and so what happens is when you urinate you will you know lose your water weight um and you're able to make weight effectively so water load process usually would be you know anywhere from it could be like three three to like five days you know some people may do longer some people may do shorter but it really depends on exactly what the timeline of like competition looks like for you and then usually on the day before competition at a certain time you cut off your water intake um and then you just continue to urinate throughout the day your hormone is still on it's triggered and you know by the time you're able to make weight like you should be able to effectively have lost the amount of water you've consumed and more so back to the gut manipulation so this is a technique of manipulating body weight correct so explain that more i don't think i've heard of that okay okay sure yeah so gut manipulation is really thinking about the the amount of uh food weight um that's in your body right so when we consume foods we we ideally obviously digest it right over like two starting from like two to four hours and fully are able to digest foods but there is bulk right in our stomachs there's it doesn't just dissipate into nothingness right there is weight that comes with it even if it's metabolized so when we are able to make sure that our food the amount of food weight um is decreased um in our in our stomachs then we tend to actually carry less water in general so you're carrying less water there's less food weight in your stomachs and you're able to get closer to your competition weight so it really is just a method of typically decreasing your fiber intake to anywhere from like five grams two or three days before um and then also considering the fact that you want to gravitate towards more liquid meals um you know one day out before competition at most yeah i think intuitively uh you know i have a background in wrestling before powerlifting so i've done a lot of weight manipulation so intuitively you think to yourself i'm not going to have a stake you know the day before let me you know but i think the idea taking that concept further and thinking how can i manipulate my gut so i have less as you say bulk um when i go step on a scale it's fascinating um and i wish we could talk a little bit more about it but we're going to come up on a time limit soon and we have a few more questions i know nikhil has been hanging back uh wanting to ask a question so let's get that one in yeah so uh my question was about reverse dieting and kind of where it could be useful or like how one would do it just whatever i think reverse dieting and powerlifting i guess is my question yeah that's a great question nikki um am i pronouncing that right nikki nikhill yeah okay wonderful name yeah okay so reverse dieting can be effective it can be an effective tool for any athlete right but definitely for athletes um that are in a weight-based sport so really their approach to reverse dieting is making sure that um or the primary goal is making sure that you're staying at maintenance weight for a long extended period of time or as much as you possibly can while still while increasing your calories in a gradual manner and really the goal there is to make sure that you're eating often enough if not more to optimize your training feeling good from your workouts recovering properly while um you know you're able to stay at somewhat of a relative similar weight from when you had started that initial uh reverse um there's so many great benefits of reverse it teaches um your body to get adjusted to calorie to an increase of calories in a gradual manner so we keep the body fat low and we we are able to stabilize or increase your lean body mass right so there's benefits by by just making sure that those things are stabilized but also you know it can it can help teach you just overall discipline in general right there's a lot of times where we'll come back from a cut um and it becomes very easy to just increase calories and eat and flux the calories and then uh gain weight and in a manner that's not gradual right so um you know doing in a gradual manner allows you to stabilize a few things um but also it really optimizes opens your the window for you being able to eat obviously a lot more food than you typically would um and that way that you know obviously enhances your training and also enhances your overall health um lots of benefits the only the only heart the hardest part about reverse dieting is just sticking to it and being consistent with it thank you yeah that means hi um sorry just one question on top of that um so i was wondering like after a reverse diet does that mean um your main maintenance calories are increased how does that work like does it help like change your metabolism or what yeah that's a really good question so i feel like we want that answer to be yes right um if if done in a gradual and very like like a very gradual and sustainable manner like yeah that can definitely mean that um you're able to maintain a weight with higher calories and that can just overall mean you know obviously that's that's good news for everybody right but it's oftentimes not as easy as that because unfortunately everyone's metabolism is different um and a lot of us have um uh experience with with dieting in the past which can kind of you know that can have an imp uh a role in how exactly fast our metabolism is or how effective it is but really primarily it comes down to genetics how well we respond right and how able how much we're able to maintain eating enough cow or eating a lot of influx of calories and being able to maintain the same weight if you're able to control the other variables such as you know obviously you're training your stress your sleep etc um then you should be able to you know at least um find some benefits from reverse dieting and be able to still maintain you know a relatively same weight um by you know with eating a lot more calories than you're used to okay cool that makes sense thank you you're welcome well um we have a few more questions here and i want to leave a few minutes for more questions from those who listen here um so maybe we'll do like a lightning round that sound good yeah let's do it and i unfortunately left some of the more complex questions the last so it's going to be a highly complex lighting at least from my perspective so this one may be a quick one any continuing myths about time frames with meals any continuing myths um i guess yes and no nutrient timing is important right but it still only plays you know maybe a 10 10 percent role in our overall diet quality if you're thinking about um losing weight gaining weight et cetera i would say pay attention to overall calories then and then thinking about timing um still important right when it comes to training but um it's not as important maybe as we think it is yeah right so like i guess in the thinking of any continuing myths you would say that most of the myths that are continuing or most of the the thoughts around the relevance of um nutrient timing is myth would you agree yeah i mean i wouldn't say they're myths but are they over are are they over exaggerated maybe yeah yeah cool calories in calories out seems to be pretty straightforward for weight loss is it similarly straightforward for weight gain great question um yes right to keep it simple yes um and a lot of it a lot of that just has to do with genetics right for prime you know if you're someone that has the slower metabolism um it's going to be harder for waking in general um if that's the case definitely pay attention to making sure you're consistently hitting a caloric surplus and really making sure that the the activity that comes outside of your physical training is is is evaluated as well right um so there's definitely more cons i think there's you know there's obviously a few more considerations to be made to make sure that you're saying that consistent caloric surplus um but generally speaking yeah calories in calories that would be the same all right uh last question here in the lightning round if i'm cutting how many grams of fat per pound of body weight should i aim for for maintaining hormone function yeah that's a good question um so i generally go off uh just total calorie intake right um at maintenance and then kind of working from there so uh anyway i think i feel like a lot of people tend to really like low-fat diets or follow a low-fat diet better but um i find that power lifters that have at least 25 to 30 percent do pretty well following their diet regimen in general um but to maintain hormone function if we're talking primarily about hormone function it's more important for women to prioritize their fat intake to have more a bit more men can get away with anywhere from you know maybe like 20s to 25 but definitely for women definitely leaning on the 25 to 30 percent would be would be uh much more um recommended so that would be like a floor you would recommend somewhere around 25 to 30 for women yeah all right well that was easy these were not complex for you at all it seems these are questions i get very very often um and i enjoyed i enjoyed answering them all yeah so any more questions from those who are listening here nikhil any more questions about um reverse dieting that you might have after uh some of tiffany's answers i think there might be a no it was a great question indeed though it was great well if there are no more questions from the audience then we could go ahead and wrap it up any parting thoughts anything any takeaways anything you'd like to highlight from what we've talked about i honestly think that we covered like a good amount of attraction right um i guess really the main thing is you know like prioritize nutrition be intentional with it try it out if it's something that you you know want to try and manipulate or take advantage of when it comes to your nutrition or with your training try try being intentional with your nutrition just for maybe a month's time right see how you're feeling with that month's time and then go from there because i think a lot of people um can certainly benefit with just paying more attention to the nutrition um optimizing what their intake looks like you know prior to training after during training after um and that really can go a long way so definitely it can be hard to change eating habits right because eating is you know we eat every couple hours every few hours um and you know we're really only just training like one period of our day right so you know making the right choices can always be hard um but it doesn't have to be perfect it just there there just needs to be a bit more intention with it i think they'll go a long way got it and if we're to challenge those who are listening to be intentional with their eating for a month what would that look like tracking macros or something something else maybe a little bit less you know i don't know tracking oriented yeah yeah that's that's i love that um so not necessarily you don't have to track right um really depends on what your goal is right um i love to encourage anybody regardless of what your goal is to just aim for a few basics right and doesn't have to be powerlifting oriented but it could just be overall health oriented right like okay are you drinking enough water are you well hydrated how often are you actually drinking enough water throughout the week right um okay are you getting protein with each meal um are you getting enough fiber right fruits and vegetables um are you eating every few hours so those are just like a few simple basics that people can try to be more intentional with um i i know even just you know being able to achieve all those three or four that listed can be quite tough to stay consistent with so i would encourage you know people to start off from there and then um you know delve and dive into the more complicated stuff when it comes to nutrition awesome and we'll be sharing this um this talk online we'll be emailing it out to our members into people who might be members in the future and so how could these people have a reliable place to reach you what's your favorite place for people to dm you or email you or whatever where should they go yeah so i would say instagram instagram is my most um most used social media platform um you guys can follow me at tiffany ma underscore rdn um or you can you know find me on my website if you really want to contact me that's tiffanyma rdn.com or you can also email me and that's teema tiffanymawrdn.com but instagram is definitely uh the most effective form of communication for me instagram is king as usual yeah yeah taking place these days yeah hasn't changed for a while now all right great well this was awesome i learned a lot and uh yeah but i'm a diet schlub so hopefully that means everybody else learned a lot as well i love it thank you so much jordan um i had a great time um and i look forward to you know maybe me potentially having more discussions like this in the future absolutely great thanks for coming and thanks for talking to us thank you thanks for having me this will be hi thank you thank you take care guys thank you