The Correct Way to Build Strength, Endurance & Flexibility at Any Age | Pavel Tsatsouline

Pavel Tsatsouline: strength is the mother of all fitness, and you don't need hypertrophy to get it

You can get exceptionally strong at any age through bodyweight and free weights without chasing muscle size.

"I do think that pursuing strength as its own thing, independent of muscle growth, right, which we hear so much about these days, everyone wants hypertrophy, grow muscle, this and that, pursuing strength as its own thing is a tremendously valuable endeavor. Today, you're going to learn how from the world's premier expert in this topic. You're in for a very special episode with Pavel Satsulin. He is truly in a class all his own when it comes to fitness and strength training. Before we begin, I'd like to emphasize that this podcast is separate from my teaching and research roles at Stanford. It is however, part of my desire and effort to bring zero cost to consumer information about science and science related tools to the general public. In keeping with that theme, this episode does include sponsors. And now for my discussion with Pavel Satsulin. Pavel Satsulin, welcome. Andrew, a pleasure to be on your podcast. I respect your work a lot. Thank you, likewise. Thank you. I will say that you and perhaps one other person have truly changed the way that I think about fitness, the way that I train, and I'm super excited to talk to you today. So I'm withholding excitement."

Pursuing strength as its own skill, separate from hypertrophy, changes everything

A growing number of people are training in lower rep ranges for strength rather than chasing muscle size, especially for health and longevity.

"I'm trying to stay in the lower rep range today. A growing number of people, both men and women, are starting to do weight training for strength."

Kettlebell mile: carry 30% bodyweight in a suitcase carry while running to build endurance without joint damage

Run with a kettlebell at 30% bodyweight, switching hands freely. Builds endurance without the joint stress of heavy rucking.

"Dr. Mike Prevost, who used to work with the U.S. Marine Corps and Navy, he developed this very interesting protocol and a test he called the Kettlebell Mile, where you take a kettlebell that's approximately 30% of your body weight, and he has good reasons why it has to be that way."

Concentric-only lifting builds strength without adding muscle mass -- ideal for weight-class athletes

Barry Ross coached 17-year-old Allyson Felix to a 200m world title using concentric-only deadlifts to build strength without extra muscle mass.

"The case for concentric only is if you're trying to minimize muscle growth and minimize soreness. Allyson Felix became the fastest in the world."

Greasing the groove: frequent low-rep practice throughout the day builds strength like a skill

Spread sets throughout the day at submaximal effort instead of cramming. Strength improves with practice frequency like any skill.

"Based on what you just told us about Franco's training and the rest, seems that shorter training cycles might be advantageous, even just conceptually and practically. Like I've tended to break up my year into 12 to 16 week training cycles. I've been doing that for a long time. And now that I'm 49, this is the year that I decided I was going to start modifying my training a bit because certain little things aren't working for me as well. You might laugh. I'm actually curious whether or not you'll laugh or approve. I switched at some point to using the belt squat, these belt squat platforms. I just feel like that- You may want to explain that. Yeah. The belt squat is essentially you stand on a platform. So you're on, uh, unfortunately you're on display for everybody there, but that's not why I do it. You step up onto a platform. Sometimes it's called a pit shark rogue makes a belt, a belt squat. There are other ones, of course, I have no relation to any of those companies and you wear a big, thick, um, lifting belt, but it's kind of sagging in the front. And then you, uh, as if you were going to attach a weight to it but you attach yourself to usually it's a cable or a lever between your legs sounds scary but that lever or cable can drop below the level of the platform you're standing on and you can load up quite a bit of weight on this what i love about it is you can get very vertical if you want or just a little bit of forward tilt because you can place your fingers on the on the handles you can grip them if you want, or just a little bit of forward tilt, cause you can place your fingers on the, on the handles. You can grip them if you like. The point being, there's a lot of degrees of freedom in terms of stance. And I like that you're not loading the shoulders. Sure. I, I, you know, I don't want to sound like a wuss, but I'll do it. You know, I, I moved from standard squats, back squats to front squats, then to hack squats. And then now I've been playing around a lot with the belt squat and really enjoying it. Cause you can go really deep. You can blast out of the bottom position. You can load up lots of plates on there if you have the strength to do so without the feeling that you're just compressing your whole spine or worrying about dropping the weight. So I'm enjoying working with it. I love your thoughts on belt squats. True. But in general, I am hearing you and I'm thinking that moving away from this 12 to 16 week cycles is going to be advantageous because and I'm thinking that moving away from this 12 to 16-week cycles is going to be advantageous because what I'm finding is that it's hard to account for life events in that way and planned training and travel and all this. But four weeks is kind of a manageable thing. This month, this is what I'm going to do. And of course, the months work together. The body doesn't know the difference between February and March, as it were. Well, in California, it doesn't. It does, right? It does, right? Exactly some other places, it does. It does, right, exactly. The seasonal cycles are real elsewhere."

Intensity in strength training means weight on the bar, not effort or exhaustion

Do half the reps you could with heavy weight. You get stronger safely without psychological burnout, and volume accumulates over frequent sessions.

"Well, intensity in strength training is just how heavy the weight is. It has nothing to do with the effort."

Paul Anderson reinvented modern strength training by spacing sets throughout the day decades ago

One of the greatest weightlifters ever used spacing and contextual interference -- a set of squats, then a walk, then presses later.

"Then he would wander around, drink some milk, half an hour later do a set of presses."

Bodybuilding culture distorted how most people think about resistance training

The Soviet tradition focused on strength as the foundation. Bodybuilding culture shifted the focus to hypertrophy, which skewed public understanding.

"And here why things are just so different in how we conceptualize resistance training. And I'll just go out on a limb and say what I believe and have thought for a long time, which is that what screwed up everything in terms of people's conceptualization about how to use resistance is bodybuilding."

Heavy kettlebell snatches for 30 seconds build muscle, endurance, and cardio simultaneously

30-second hard kettlebell sets promote muscle growth, peripheral endurance, and cardiovascular fitness at the same time -- a rare combination.

"This particular load, while promoting peripheral and central endurance, also does promote muscle growth. What sort of exercise? Kettlebell swings, for instance."

Block training: alternate 2-month strength phases with 2-month hypertrophy phases for best results

A 1970s Soviet study on throwers showed strength-first then hypertrophy blocks produced the best results. Train one quality at a time.

"Simultaneously training in parallel everything only is good for young kids when they're developing because, you know, you've got to try everything."

Do heavy neural work fresh, save hypertrophy for when fatigued -- timing matters for interference

If strength is the priority, lift heavy when fresh and do endurance later. If hypertrophy is the goal, it matters less if you come in tired.

"It doesn't matter as much what happens afterwards, which means that you could do some heavy deadlifts, and then a few hours later you can go for a hike. On the other hand, if your lifting is more hypertrophy oriented, it's less important if you come in tired. It's okay even if you just hiked in the morning and then you went, did your curls. But afterwards, for 36, 48 hours, it's ideally to restrict endurance exercise."

Bodyweight training is accessible anywhere but harder to learn -- progressions from wall push-ups to handstand push-ups

Bodyweight progressions from wall push-ups to handstand push-ups make advanced feats achievable. Grease the groove anywhere.

"I got that book initially because in the early days of starting my laboratory, I was traveling a ton, and I didn't always have access to gyms. And I wanted to try and grease the groove when I arrived in my room in the middle of the night in Germany or whatever. So I still have not succeeded in doing pistol squats on both legs. So one is I have some dominant and weakness as it were. But I, without any natural strength ability to speak of, was able to learn one-arm push-ups, one-arm pull-ups. I'm not there now. I have to return to that level of upper body strength."