Strength Coach: How to Train LESS and Get Way Stronger (Pavel Tsatsouline)

Once one understands this concept, you no longer look at this split or that split or this many reps or that many reps or this volume or that volume. This notion of greasing the groove completely changed my conceptualization of strength training. It's a very easy and very simple way to train. Strength comes very easily and very very unexpectedly. Also that builds muscle as well. It has a tonic effect just for anything that you can do with your brain or with your body, anything. So could you please explain for people what greasing the groove is? Ladies and gentlemen, grease the group, we are talking about uh I attribute you with popularizing, maybe you invented it, but certainly popularizing the term like greasing the groove. This notion of greasing the groove completely changed my conceptualization of strength training. I was so tuned to this notion of training a body part, creating an adaptation, then waiting for the adaptation to occur, and then training the body part again. You know the arguments are all over the internet two times a week, three times a week. And then I came across this concept of greasing the groove which as a neuroscientist felt so intuitively correct and turns out to be correct. You'll explain what it is but the idea that more frequent training or practicing of a movement opens up a tremendous number of opportunities for development of strength of size hypertrophy if one wants and I would say just generally more flexibility over one's total fitness program. Once one understands this concept, you no longer look at this split or that split or this many reps or that many reps or this volume or that volume. Oh, that is important. But you can start to think about it through the lens of the nervous system. And to me, it was like uh water in a desert to finally encounter something that brought together all these different concepts. So could you please explain for people what greasing the groove is? Ladies and gentlemen, grease the groove we are talking about uh let's use an analogy. Let's imagine that you are a bow hunter and you work in your garage and then you walk out of your garage and you shoot an arrow and you just go back to going about your business just working in your garage or let's say you're a kid who practices martial arts and every on every break between classes you just go in the corner and you practice your kata. This is the best way to practice your skill in small portions in a spaced out manner. What's really fascinating is uh traditional education and traditional strength training, it's based on the cramming model. So remember cramming for an exam. So you're studying at night and you somehow squeak by and you pass it. Okay, great. And then a couple of days later you happily forget everything. So in contrast, imagine that you're let's say you're studying a foreign language. You write words on cards and at every opportunity you're standing in line in the bank. So the lesser mortals are fooling around on their phones. You're just going through your deck like, "Oh, can I translate this word?" I go, "Put it back in the deck. Flip it over." Then next time you're in some other place, you do this again. So this is an example of space practice versus the traditional mass practice. And the evidence of the superiority of space practice is just overwhelming. It goes back to the 19th century and there is at least like a more than a thousand papers published on that and still very few people do that which is really sad and uh strength is a skill. If we look at what's going on it's uh the hibian mechanisms. So pretty much every time that you activate a particular connection synaptic connection you know between the neurons that connection becomes uh stronger. So if you do it over and over and over. So the grease the groove is the analogy is that command that's coming in from your brain to your muscles. That's the groove. That's that pathway. And the more you use it pretty much the more grease it becomes. So it's like becomes a superconductor. So in the future you don't have to try as hard to lift the same amount of weight or you can try the same amount and you can lift harder. So we're not we haven't even addressed the neural drive yet. We just pretty much made the motor neurons more respons more responsive to it. It's a very easy and very simple way to train and uh strength comes very easily and very very unexpectedly to make sure that it does happen you have to address uh the issue of specificity. So specificity pretty much means without getting too uh too too much into the weeds to get stronger. First of all, you need to lift weights that are heavy enough. And uh if you're looking about percentages of one rep max, we're looking at like 75 to 85 typically. If you go too light, you don't make the impression on your nervous system. And it's just not specific enough. If you go too heavy very quickly, you're just going to burn yourself out. And uh so pretty much like it's a weight that's heavy enough to respect and light enough not to fear. And the second of all, and this is very surprising, is you only do about half or fewer reps that you possibly could do. So, for example, let's say that you're lifting 80% of your one rep max. And let's say that you're able to do eight reps maximum with it. That's your that we're just fairly fairly common. Well, you're only going to do about three uh three to four reps per set and that's it. And the gym bros at this point go crazy like, where's the intensity? Well, intensity in strength training is just how heavy the weight is. It has nothing to do with the effort. And it's been proven over and over that that's much more important than how hard you're exerting yourself. There are times for that. There are absolutely times for that. But if the weight is heavy enough and if you do half the repetitions that you possibly could do, you're going to get stronger. It's very safe and you're not going to burn out psychologically and it's also very easy on your body. So also that builds muscle as well purely because you're able to do a very high volume of work. To summarize the grease the groove, you're trying to train moderately heavy as often as possible while staying as staying as fresh as possible. And uh if you decide to do it in the gym, a very simple protocol would be a set every 10 minutes. It sounds really bizarre like why why would you would you rest for so long? This apparently has to do with initial memory consolidation. There's so much is still unknown. So we do know the grease group works great but we speculate that some of it has to do with some of the same phenomena related to uh to learning in other fields. So if you're doing something over and over like like you're saying 2+ 2 is 4, 2 plus 2 is four, you're just using your short-term memory. You're not memorizing anything. But if you say 2+ 2 is four, you go get a coffee, you come back and you try 2+ 2 4. So there's that desirable difficulty that you have in there and you have to process that instead of just go through the groove that uh that apparently helps helps adaptation. So rest for at least 10 minutes. Do sets of about the repetitions of half of what you're possibly able to do. And you know listen to your body. Typically train two three days in a row and then take a day off but listen to your body. Are you doing anything in the um rest periods between these 10 minutes? So is it uh let's say uh bench press um wait 10 minutes till you bench press again but in the meantime you're doing zer squat 5 minutes after the first bench press are that's one of the way to do that you can do up to three exercise three exercises at the same time so let's say I like zer squat and the bench press and maybe a third thing but I'd say those two are enough and uh another option is you can do that you can incorporate this into if you do only one exercise you can squeeze it into your lifestyle or your athletic practice So, for example, in uh let's say you're teaching a track uh track uh practice or martial arts class and every 10 minutes on the clock, you just have the class do drop and do three hard, let's say three one arm push-up, okay? And then get back to the class. So, there's no interference whatsoever. In fact, it's better than no interference. So if you do strength work that's non-exhausting in nature and that's not novel to you it has a tonic effect uh just for anything that you can do with your brain or with your body anything. So what you have is by having this short a very small dose like a nana practice of strength you rejuvenate yourself and your productivity increases so much. I suppose if someone has access to the appropriate equipment at home you could incorporate grease the groove into your entire day. That's ideal. Yes. And obviously it's difficult with some equipment, but what you could do, you could use the heavy duty grippers. You could do uh one- arm push-ups. You could uh uh you could keep a kettle bell under your desk and do press it at at every opportunity. And again, the idea is really just practice. You just try to hit it perfect. [Music] [Music]

You’ve been told you need more sets, more reps, more pain to build strength. But what if real progress came from doing less—smarter? This method challenges everything the fitness industry sells. Subscribe to RESPIRE for more science-based health tips: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCyNaCRf6Aaljcm9ZWARawXw re·spire (verb) – (1) to breathe (2) to recover hope, courage, or strength 🌟🌟🌟 NEW VIDEOS EVERY WEEK 🌟🌟🌟 00:00 – A Different Way to Get Strong Forget what you’ve heard—this flips the script on training. 00:34 – The Origin of “Greasing the Groove” A concept that changed how thousands approach strength. 01:24 – Training Frequency Reimagined Why doing more often, not more volume, actually works. 02:11 – What Schools & Gyms Get Wrong The hidden flaw in how we’ve all been taught to train. 03:16 – Your Brain’s Role in Strength Why it’s not just muscle—it’s neural rewiring. 04:23 – The Power of Submaximal Effort How going easier can make you stronger. 05:06 – A Shocking Rep Recommendation Most lifters won’t believe how little you need to do. 06:00 – Why Rest Might Be the Secret Weapon What long breaks really do to your nervous system. 07:08 – How to Fit This into Daily Life Use this method without a gym—and even during work. 08:07 – Strength That Boosts Everything Else The surprising ripple effects of this minimalist method. This video is a condensed and highly edited version of the full 4 hour and 15 minute podcast from @HubermanLab. For more information, watch the full episode and following the podcast. Pavel Tsatsouline is a globally recognized strength coach, former special forces trainer, and acclaimed author in the field of physical performance. Andrew D. Huberman is an American neuroscientist and tenured associate professor in the department of neurobiology and psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine. Podcast Guest: Pavel Tsatsouline Podcast Host: Andrew Huberman YouTube: @HubermanLab Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3OpxT65fKw&t=3010s&pp=0gcJCR0AztywvtLA Fair Use Disclaimer 1. Under section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, commenting, news reporting, teaching, scholarship and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use. 2. We do not own the rights to all content. They have, in accordance with fair use, been repurposed with the intent of educating and inspiring others. We must state that in no way, shape or form are we intending to infringe rights of the copyright holder. 3. Content used is strictly for research and education, all under the Fair Use law. #strength #strengthtraining #fitness #pullups #exercise #andrewhuberman #hubermanlab #testosterone #healthtips