October 31 2024
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Welcome to the True Sports Physical Therapy Podcast with your host, Dr. Yoni Rosenblatt. In this episode, we're joined by fitness coach and personal trainer, Ben Barker, to explore how to stay fit as a fitness professional. Ben shares his insights on balancing personal health with the demands of training clients.Managing energy and staying motivated. If you're a fitness professional aiming to maintain your own health while helping others reach their goals, this episode is filled with valuable advice on creating sustainable routines and preventing burnouts. Let's jump right in. What's up guys. Thank you so much for listening to the true sports physical therapy podcast.Today's guest is Ben Barker. Ben is a fitness coach extraordinaire has an unbelievable following on Instagram. Check him out. Ben Barker fitness on Instagram. He is freaking hilarious. He is well read and studied. This is just a great job of connecting with his audience and producing great engaging content.We covered topics like how to stay fit as a fitness professional or a physical therapist, how to fit that into your very busy schedule, how to influence our families, young or old, and keep them engaged in fitness. As well as must to put in your personal gym, maybe in your private PT practice. Uh, there's so much great knowledge here.Ben is super relatable, great conversationalist. I've really enjoyed my time with him. Share this conversation with everyone. Let us know how we did as always without further ado. Ben Barker, welcome back to the true sports physical therapy podcast. Today we got Ben Barker of Ben Barker fitness. com. Ben, thanks for joining us today, man.Yoni. Thanks for having me. I'm pumped. Um, you are a staple in the Rosenblatt household. My kids love your content. Um, my. My wife loves what you put up in terms of, um, being a health enthusiast and trying to pull health and fitness into our every day. So I'm really excited to dive in. Um, one of the things that, that really jumped out at me while I was preparing for this episode was.One of the quotes you have up on your website, which was I have made so many mistakes and I was naive to think I could just quit my job, leverage my social media following and create a lucrative career in fitness. So I love the transparency there because you, you basically lead with that on your website.Tell me what are some of the mistakes you made when just quitting big box fitness? What would you have done differently? And how did you create this? Revenue stream and massive following. So mistake number one was basically what you just read off there. I started getting a little bit of traction online.I was unhappy at my job, but I mean, you know what it's like in the fitness world, especially early on, you know, you're working like nights, mornings, weekends, and it's really inconvenient if you have a family. And so I was like, well, I'll just leverage my social media following. I basically had no plan other than that.I was going to, uh, I gave my boss like a four week notice in order to kind of help him. Get me out the door and replace me. And then I just quit with, with no plan whatsoever. And I just expected, you know, the universe to favor me. And that did not go well. How, how long did it not go well for? Cause now it's going really well.Yeah, it's going, it was honestly, it was about a year that I was just, and you know, and in fairness, Yoni, I was making money, it just, I wasn't making more than I was before. And so I was basically just paying the bills with no extra. Um, and in the grand scheme of things, I look back, you know, had I kept my job for another year.And built my business on the side, it would have been a totally different outcome. You know, I would have been able to be putting money back and investing money in the business, whereas just quitting, I was not able to do that. Now, what jumped out at me from this statement was you stuck around to replace yourself.So I think, unfortunately, that is a rarity now where I, you know, I'll get noticed from a therapist and they're like, Oh, So yeah, I'm out in two weeks. Like, and then, you know, like true sports is dead to them as if it doesn't matter. Um, what made you care enough to say, I want to replace myself. I want to give four weeks.Where'd that come from? So I genuinely, like the owner, I was at a gym called F 45. And we had opened two studios. I'd helped open them and the owner had really kind of built the business around me and going into it, you know, we were both naive. We, we didn't know like how much work it was going to be. And I knew if we brought in a young guy who wasn't married with no kids, like that schedule would be great for them.You know, they don't mind staying up late. They don't mind working weekends. And so I knew if I could find a guy like that, I could hopefully set my, the owner up for success going forward. And I I'd put my name on it too, locally. And I really knew like, one, you know, looking out for me, even just selfishly, you know, if people are like, well, that's the kind of guy he is to leave a good guy high and dry one that hurt my reputation.And then two, the owner was genuinely a good guy. He was good to me. It just didn't turn out to be what I thought it was going to be. What what was your upbringing like? Because that, that sounds, those sounds like principles that were passed down to you. I would guess. Where do you get those influences? So my dad's a minister and, uh, you know, it's funny, uh, depending on where you are, like in your walk of faith, if you have one or not, you know, I think sometimes that can be a good thing or a bad thing, but my dad was one of the ones who practiced what he preached and just genuinely a good guy and was always big about investing in others.And so I definitely learned that from my dad. Yeah. I mean, that, that really comes through that there was some kind of guiding light and principle that, that is your foundation. Um, I, I think also you make a point that it was selfish that you were doing that. Cause you were worried about your own reputation.And I've definitely seen that, um, in our business where I've had therapists give enough notice, really be helpful on the transition, looking out for their patients, making sure their patients continue care, et cetera. And then, you know, come two, three years later down the road. Turns out we're working together again.Um, sometimes that, that foresight is not necessarily there. You just think you can hop from job to job to job. Maybe it's a generational thing. Um, maybe it's an upbringing thing. Um, but you, you really never know when your paths are going to cross again. And, and by the way, as the employer. I I've hopefully kind of changed my tune on this.It used to be, I would get notice. Um, and it's not like it happens all the time, but every, every once in a while a therapist moves on, I'm like, okay, dead to me next, like, whereas like now it's like, okay, listen, we're, we're going to cross paths again. Um, and let's make sure we're kind of growing together.Cause you never know what's going to happen. So I think there's a lot of foresight there on your part. Um, when you. So, so now let me tell me what has been Barker fitness look like? What have you grown it to? So man, it's kind of funny. What has become was not what I set out to do. You know, I set out, I wanted it to be like a workout, um, subscription that people subscribe to monthly.And that is going, it's going well, it's I pro I'm profitable on that every single month. I did not set out to become, I hate the word influencer. That was not what I set out to do. I wanted to leverage social media to build my website. But what's funny now is I'm, I'm making more money as an influencer than I am from my website, which was not what I intended.It's really not the end goal, but it's been great, you know, financially for my family. Um, and so what, what are your plans in the future? What are you going to do with this thing? So my goal still to this day is to leverage social media to To build, you know, my website. And, you know, if anybody's listening, uh, like newsletter, they talk about social media could all burn down tomorrow and it could be gone.And if you have a million followers and they're gone, you can no longer leverage that. And so my ultimate goal is to continue building like my website and my, and to just build a massive newsletter that way, that no matter where I go, those subscribers are always mine to hopefully encourage, and then also to build a business off of.Yeah, I think it's so, it's so common to hear. I never planned on being here. Like invariably that's a success story. That's definitely the case. Um, with, with my business, I never planned to have multiple locations and tons of physical therapists, et cetera. I just wanted to provide great care. And it sounds like you just wanted to help people.Um, and, and that's kind of. Exploded. Um, how many followers did you have when you left F45? Maybe like maybe 10, 000. I'm not sure if I'd hit 10, 000, but back then, like 10, 000 was like a big deal. And like, when I hit 10, 000 followers, I was like, this is it. Like I've made it, you know? Yeah. It's crazy how times have changed.And so that was how long ago? That was about like two and a half, three years ago. Okay. And wow. So that's a rapid growth. One of the things that drew me into your content is I love the humor side of it. I think you bring an awesome flavor to, to the great material and content that you're putting up. That includes your notorious head snap that all of my kids now do.Where did it come from and how much thought do you put into that stuff? So I think when I started out like in fitness, I wanted to be the guy with like the exercise tutorials and just kind of like, you know, here's the barbell. Good morning. You know, you strengthen spinal erectors, the glutes, the hamstrings, you know, so on and so forth.And it just didn't land. I guess I'm just not that guy. And so a couple times I tried a couple of funny things, kind of making light of it. And it just started doing well. And then I realized I was like, Oh, I'm not the science guy. I'm the funny guy. And so, so now as the funny guy, how do you come up with ideas?Uh, it's a day by day thing, but I will tell you that something I've started doing recently. So I've always just kind of flown by the seat of my pants in everything that I do in business relationships, life. Um, it's, it's great to have that ability. But I also have learned like, you know, the, the silly saying, you know, if you don't, uh, plan, you plan to fail.Essentially, if you fail to plan, you plan to fail. Um, I've started recently, just, I heard if you started a YouTube channel that if you don't have 104 YouTube ideas, you're behind. Right. And so I, I've started like every Sunday, um, when I'm drinking an afternoon coffee, I just go through and I write down as many ideas as I can.And my goal is to have like 25 to 30 ideas just on paper. That can be a tweet, it could be a post, a YouTube video, a blog post, etc. Planning ahead, I've just started doing this within like the last month or two. So if any of you are listening and you're struggling with content, just, there's no bad ideas.Just write them all down and then you'll be amazed. You may out of those 25 only get 5 good ones. But just getting the practice of that exercise and a lot of good things will come from that. Who, when you're doing, um, hex bar deadlifts in the middle of your street and it's pouring rain, um, and you got like a kid on one shoulder while you're doing this, and then you're snapping your head at the end, who the hell's filming?Usually me. I've got like an awning on the front of my house, so I've got it like on a tripod. So typically it's me. Okay, so you're doing it. Where is your wife? Uh, probably typically taking care of the little baby. So we've got like a almost two year old and so she's usually wrangling him Sometimes I ask for her help, but she's so busy.We've got four kids. She's so busy I try to let her do the hard work and I handle the filming Yeah. Um, smart. So this, you know, at 230 some odd followers that you're sitting at on Instagram, I'm not a huge Twitter guy, but I'm sure that you got a billion, um, Twitter followers. It's inevitable. You're going to put your foot in your mouth and the masses will respond.And so you recently went through, through this, tell me about. How you handled it, um, and maybe what you would have done differently. Yeah, so, the, the thought behind it, I stand behind. So, you know, the thought behind the post was that men should be strong for our wives and our family. You know, that, that's something I'll never apologize for.You know, I think a man should be able to pick up his wife. You know, I always joke, I make posts all the time that a man should always be able to carry his wife over the threshold. You know, and that might just be a little bit of a personal thing, but I think there's pride in that. And, uh, I think my wife also enjoys that I'm able to pick her up.All that to get to, there was a post, and I didn't even create the post, Yoni. I've seen it posted, like, probably a hundred times. And it's of, after a flood, um, a guy is carrying his wife's shoes. And then a military guy is carrying the guy's wife and the caption was, don't be the guy carrying the shoes. So here's where I went wrong.You know, Helene, Hurricane Helene had just happened and Hurricane Milton had just happened. So one terrible timing on my part, you know, when you're thinking about a lot of people have just been, you know, battered and horrified by a hurricane. So poor timing there. And then also, you know, my ultimate goal is to encourage dads.And you know, I showed a dad in a bad light. I could have gotten the same point across without using a photo of a real person who had just gone through a tragedy. Yup. And so moving forward now, what does this make you do with your future posts? Uh, think about it a little bit more. And two, if you are a married man and have a wife who is wiser than you are, and you have a post that's in question, ask your wife first.Cause once everything, once everything blew up, I mean, people were making YouTube videos about me, like hate videos. People were like subscribing for my email list saying things like creating fake email addresses that said, I hate you. I hope you die at gmail. com. Like still brutal. I know. And I showed my wife, so it blows up and I showed my wife and she was like, yeah, I would have told you not to post that.And I was like, well noted. And now I know this for the future. Yeah, I, I just, I really appreciated the way you responded to the crap storm that hit you. Um, can you walk me through that post? Yeah. So, um, I really struggled because if I get pushed on something, even if I'm wrong, I want to stand my ground. Um, it's not right, but that's just where I go to immediately.And just in a couple people that I know and trusted messaged me and they're like, Hey man, one here to support you. Maybe consider where other people are coming from. Got your back either way, you know? And so looking at people who responded and I, I, my point with that post was, you know, to cancel culture, you know, I was like, I've posted 3000 times.And if you look at my track record, it's generally funny. It's trying to encourage people and it's family based. But you make one post and cancel culture's like, Oh, this guy's the worst, you know, like we want to ruin your business. Um, whereas other people are just like, Hey man, that probably wasn't wise.Do better next time. So my point is to cancel culture. It's cool. If something needs to be addressed, address it. That's totally fine, but we don't have to work wish people physical harm and financial harm when they've messed up There's no question but but that lesson like that rings true I see it every day where I might see a poor work product and want to take My analysis of that work product and apply it to the person and 10 times.That's the wrong thing to do without a pattern and a history, right? Like you have a pattern and a history of being uplifting, of being positive, of being pro health. Um, and okay, so you make one, one, you step out of bounds. Um, that is not. You and shame on Ben Barker, that is shame on the work product, shame on the output and the content.And, and that's going to change. And so, um, you, I just loved the way you respond to that. I think too often, and we get into this even clinically forget professionally, but clinically where we hitch our wagon to one thought. And we're unwilling to say, you know what? I was wrong about that. Um, uh, and, and here's, here's why I was wrong.And here's how I want to do better next time. Even clinically, I always give you the example. Like when I came out of grad school. I was obsessed with the sacroiliac joint. I thought that was the, the, that was everyone's, um, root of pain. And then like, as I started to learn, I'm like, wait a minute, like, well, you don't know what the hell the SI joint does.We can't really palpate a way, but et cetera. It's a really loose example to say, I was wrong about the way I was treating for years. But you have to say, okay, like. What's my next hundred patients going to be like, or low back pain presentations. Um, I think it's the same thing with you. You also pulled in faith into that post about response.So talk to me, you said your dad's a minister, but talk to me about day to day, where your faith fits into, to your, um, routines. Sure. So the one point I wanted to make, I think when, uh, so I'm a Christian. And I think when a Christian messes up or anybody of faith, it's a great opportunity for people who are not to be like, well, that's how Christians are.But my point with the post was, that's the cool thing about faith is that we're incredibly flawed and imperfect people with a higher purpose. And I mess up every day that day. I just happened to do it on the internet, you know? And that's the, that's the cool thing about faith and forgiveness is, is second chances.That's I mean, as a guy who wears a yarmulke, um, I know that people are always kind of looking at, okay, like this is what Jews do. However, I'm acting. So, um, definitely tries to keep that thought process front and center for me. So I appreciated, um, your outlook on that and your willingness to like, to, to bring that in, did it change?Um, the way you spend your afternoon coffees, like scripting out those ideas moving forward. Definitely, definitely want to err on the side of, you know, the goal is never to bash another dad at the end of all of my YouTube videos. I always say, let's crush some goals and encourage some other dads along the way.And that post didn't hit that mark that day. So going forward, I always look at it through that lens. Is this going to like knock another dad down or is this going to uplift another dad? And your posts are so uplifting. I love your emphasis on sprinting until the day we die. Tell me about where, where that came from and how we should be incorporating that.I'm talking not just to teach your patients, but I see a ton of therapists, just like the fitness professional. We're working insane hours. We're preaching fitness. How do we keep up with our own fitness? Yeah, boy, that's a challenge, any professional with children, huge challenge. In regards to the sprinting, when you just look at adults as they age, I think one of the most common things you see is guys who are like athletes in college.And then they start playing recreational sports after they get kids. And how many times you see a guy pull up with a hamstring, you know, correct. We immediately go back to what we used to do. I think most of us are surprised in your thirties and forties, you can really still perform even if you're not in like great shape in short bursts.But man popping an Achilles or tearing your ACL pulling a hamstring happens all the time. It's because we're out of practice And so, you know My theory is if I used to work at a place called the Little Rock Athletic Club and there's guys in there 7580 who are playing pickleball like four days a week There were swimming a few days a week, they're running and they're lifting one.It's probably because they're retired and they're a little bit bored and they've got the time to do it, but two, you can tell the ones that never stopped. And there's a visible difference just in the way that they look. And there's also like when I watch them perform and in the way they move, it's much easier when you're 75 and 80 to stay in shape than it is to get into shape.Yeah. And so if you can get, no, I think that makes a lot of sense. I think it's like, um, it's not so much that we're unable to do it. It's that we stopped doing it. And then all of a sudden we ramp it up on the weekends and then you're sitting on my table on Monday. Hey guys, quick pause and a quick shout out to this new masterclass that we just launched here at True Sports Physical Therapy.Myself and Dr. Tim Stone put together a masterclass of ACL rehab and we call it from table to table. To turf. And the reason we call it that is because it's going to teach you exactly how to get your athlete all the way from post op day one with the nitty gritty of regaining all of that range of motion with the tips and the tricks that we use here at true sports, physical therapy, that gets our athletes better, faster, and stronger.And that's early. And then how do you progress that athlete all the way onto the field with a ball in their foot or stick in their hands or whatever their sport is and teach them. How to accelerate, how to decel, how to change direction, all the mechanics that go in there, what drills do we use to get our athletes exactly where they need to be back on the field and even better than before injury.And I want you to sign up for that class. Now you can find it on our website. You can shoot us a direct. Message and just say, Hey, send me the course it's right now on sale. So make sure you sign up. Now it is fully accredited to get you all of your continuing education hours, sign up for the true sports masterclass ACL from table to turf.Thanks guys. Um, so, so I think that that goes a long way. How do you, how do you program that? How does a, um, 45 year old professional who let's say played college ball or played rec ball, and now they're trying to pick it up in the weekends. When do you start programming that sprint thing? Um, what's a good place to start and how do you progress it?Great question. For me, it's not ideal. Like I think in an ideal world, I would probably sprint a few times a week and it'd be a standalone workout, but for me right now, that's just not realistic. I was, you know, for a year I'd done a goal. Uh, I was trying to squat 500 pounds and run a sub five minute mile on the same day.What do you weigh? Uh, I weigh about one 80. Pretty freaking good, dude. Okay. Thank you. And I did it. Uh, but my wife was not happy with me that year because as you can imagine, um, I was a short sprinter in college, a hundred meter dash. And so the mile is a little bit out of my comfort zone. And so I really had to put in work on the track and it just, I was doing like two workouts a day, a couple of times a week, and just as a family guy, that just wasn't ideal.So currently right now for me, I sprint one day a week. Um, as an actual workout, I typically do my compound lifts on Monday. So it's like. Squat RDLs. I do a Nordic hamstring curls, lunges, calf raises. And then after that, I basically do a short dynamic warmup just to make sure I'm ready to run. And I do 10, 40 yard hill sprints.Okay. And you're doing that once a week, once a week. Okay. And would you, would you recommend guys get into like introducing some of this sprint work back into their lives? Do you start them at very short bouts of a sprint, like a max effort, or do you want to ease into it, go 60, 70 percent one week and then slowly ramp, slowly ramp.Big time. If you haven't, if you've been in a regular practice, it's a totally different conversation, but say you're a guy, you're like, I'm used to be, I used to be an athlete. I was a pretty good sprinter. I think the worst thing you can do is go out and go full tilt day one. Yeah. Um, in track, we would always do in our warmup.We would do our dynamic warmup. So like our skips, a skips, B skips, soldier, march, leg swings, things like that, and then we would go into what we're called buildups and in buildup, so say with that day, we were doing a hundred meter dashes. We would do five reps where the first one you run at 50%. The next one's 60%, the next one's 70%.If you're brand new to sprinting and haven't done it in a while, I wouldn't even hit like 80% on day one. I would do some real slow reps at 50%, and then you kind of gradually build up to like 70, 75%. And do a few weeks of that before you even touch full tilt. Yeah, I think that's, that's really good advice.Um, what about like introing? Cause a lot of guys will live, let's say in the gold's gym model where they're sitting on a knee extension machine, maybe they're doing some leg press, but now, Hey, I want to get back into, um, some more compound movements. What's your intro there to get, um, The father of three at age 45 back into lifting functionally.There's a great program. And I hate to plug somebody other than myself, but it's so, so time, time tested. There's this program called starting strength five by five and it's just like a classic squat. Shoulder press, bent row, deadlift, bench press program. It's like three days per week. And if you start incredibly light on that and just add a little bit of weight each week, and you're going to look at it and you're going to be like, that's not enough.And those are famous last words, fellas. If you haven't been lifting and everybody now, if you're familiar, uh, now it's CBUM, Chris Bumstead is the big bodybuilder used to as Arnold Schwarzenegger. I think guys who haven't worked out at all. They like Google Arnold Schwarzenegger workout, and they try to jump into that.Guys, that's a horrible mistake, right? There's beauty in the basics. Get really good at moving well in the squat, in the hinge, in the press, and you'll set yourself up for success, build a good base, and not get hurt. Yeah, I think that's awesome advice, and they're time tested, and they've been around for that long because they freaking work.This is great for the therapist to hear, like, Hey, let me, let me incorporate that in my lifting, but it's also. Such great information that you can share with patients. I mean, like time and again, we see, um, the 40 year old dad pulls the hammy tears, ACL Achilles, and now we're trying to get them back into lifting.I think sometimes we get too fancy. Um, it's great to kind of recall some of those basics and say, Hey, why don't you try this, we'll keep working on the rehab side, but this is a great intro. Um, so I think there there's great, great stuff there. Um, talk to me about your gym setup. You have like the world's best garage gym.So what. What do you think is a must to put in your garage and how did you kind of map out that space? I've kind of done it a little bit over time, just as kind of like what I've gotten through collaborate rations on social media. Number one thing you need to get, and this depends on the footprint of your garage.It's a squat rack because the squat rack does two things. One, it just gives you a plethora of options for compound exercises, but it also has a pull up bar. And I think pull ups are just a staple exercise for building the back for building posture. And then also it's just a pride exercise as a dad. If you can jump up on a pull up bar and knock out 10 clean pull ups, you're in like the 1%.And it's just a fun thing to be able to do. And I've found pull ups as well. They're just a fun exercise to do with my kids. It's a big deal. Like we'll be out like in the front yard and my son will be like, Hey dad, can you help me do a couple of pull ups? And I lift him up. I put him up on the pull up bar and I help him do, you know, five or six assisted pull ups.Um, and it's just a fun time, but if you've got the squat rack with a pull up bar, that basically gives you a full gym and you can attack every muscle group. It doesn't take up a lot of space and you can basically get it all done right there. Yeah. What else were you super excited to put in your gym? What did you think?Like, Hey, I made it when I put this piece in my gym. Oh man. I recently got a Nordic bench and I saw in the show notes, there was like a question, in something like an exercise you used to love that you don't do as much of now. Um, you know what a glute ham developer is? So I love the glute ham developer like the ghd, right?First of all, I'm offended by that question. That question sounded like the question that I hate more than anything, which is, hey man, do you still work out? Yes, I know, I know what a GHD is, but thank you, Ben, for humbling me. I needed that. Go ahead. It's an obscure piece of gym equipment. Shouldn't be to the sports PT, but fine.Agreed. Agreed. I literally chose a gym in Little Rock initially because it was the only gym I could find that had a GHD fair. So, um, all that to get to. Um, I used to love glute ham raises on the glute ham developer and I would do them like with like a weight against my chest, like going super heavy, you know, feeling like I was super hardcore.And then I got introduced, um, to the Nordic Curl on the Nordic bench. Yeah, humble. Oh my goodness. Incredibly humbling. I couldn't physically do it. And so I started doing, you know, eccentric and I would start at the top and just lower myself as slowly as possible and push myself back up and building to be able to do, you know, sets like three sets of eight on that without assistance has been like a big point of pride for me just because I was so terrible at it at first.So the Nordic bench was one of my favorite acquisitions for the garage gym. Um, Okay. Also, I mean, also you make a great clinical point here because standardly in GHD, your knees are an extension. You're working the hamstring around the hip and not around the knee. Everyone knows that it's a two joint muscle.What it allows you to do in the, in the Nordic, um, the Nordic bench is you're really working just that flexion. I mean, it has to hold your hip extension, but you're working knee flexion. So it's a totally different exercise, which is why you sucked at it. To start, um, when you say the pull ups, I'm reminded of this amazing Instagram post where, um, you had a honk for reps where you're sitting outside, probably no shirt on with a sign that says honk for reps.And every time they honked you, you're doing a pull up. How many reps did you do in shooting that and where'd that idea come from? I, a long time ago, I saw a video of a guy doing like bench press by the street. And people were honking. I don't even know that he had a sign. And I was like, that's a great idea.And so periodically I've started doing it with random exercises and you know, Little Rock's a pretty decent sized city and I'm on like a pretty busy street. I did far more pull ups that day than I intended. Um, definitely, I mean, at least a hundred and I did not take chalk, which was mistake number one.It ended up being a great workout and it's lots of fun. If you have any type of gym establishment and want to do some guerrilla marketing for your gym, highly recommend. Yeah. Good. It's a really good idea. Um, please tell me what your neighbors think of you. What's really funny is my street skews like older.So probably if I were guessing like 55 to 60 would be the average age and people kind of just keep to themselves. I haven't made a whole lot of friends on my street and maybe that's because of the style of videos that I film. You make any enemies? No enemies. Most people are just kind of like always wave when people are driving by and they kind of just look the other way.It's really, it's, it's amazing. I encourage everyone as if they haven't, but I encourage everyone to check out your Instagram. It's amazing. Where did the head snap come from? And when did you realize that it's gold? Yoni, that's a great question. And I think I did it. I did it on accident one time. One of the first videos that I filmed joking about being the neighborhood alpha dad, and for some reason, I just flexed at the camera and did the head snap.And people thought it was really funny. And so I just kept going with it. So good. It's it's so good. But that was my first intro to you. Um, I work with possibly the world's best, um, PT specifically as it pertains to ACLs, he's like, dude, you gotta see. This guy's head snap. I'm like, what the hell are you talking about?And you show me a video of you snapping your head at the camera. It's great. Please never end a video without that. So what I mean by that is always put that in your video, even when it doesn't fit. Like a, like a family trip to the pumpkin patch video. And then I snap at the camera. Yes. Yes. for doing that.So, um, along the original line, so. Um, an exercise that you thought was outstanding that you've kind of moved past and, and you were wrong about. This is a tough one. And I won't say I was wrong about it, but in how much, so probably my favorite exercise to do is a barbell snatch. I like to go real heavy on barbell snatch.I'm naturally pretty good at it. Um, I kind of came from a CrossFit background and I think there's certain applications in times when that exercise can make sense for the general population. Uh, I don't think as much, I think there are better uses of time because sometimes I think, you know, trainers or whoever will choose exercises.That are really elaborate and fancy and hard to learn. And we spend a lot of time investing in that when it doesn't necessarily provide the best stimulus for what we're going for. Yeah. And also when you're, when you're not challenging the right, um, energy systems, and this is my take on CrossFit. I just had a conversation with a guy who said.Hey, what do you think about CrossFit, which is such a loaded question because it does so much good and it's gotten so many dudes like you, people in my demographic, it's gotten them fit again and it's brought in competition and it gets their heart pumping way harder than, you know, a seated chest press.But when you're doing things like a snatch, Um, for time, or you're doing it to fatigue. I think people get in so much trouble by doing that. So I think it's, you have to understand the poison you're dealing with and when to apply it. Correct. And, and not everybody knows that. And if you're an Olympic weightlifter, obviously.You need to be training the snatch. But when I look at real world application, just the general population, I don't see it. And even for me as a guy who's, who's moved a little more towards training just for general performance anesthetics, meaning like I want to look good. And I want to be able to perform at a high level.I don't know right now that the snatch necessarily helps me achieve either of those goals. Cause it's so specific. Cause when you, when, if I do, you know, an RDL, that's a great way to train my lower back, my glutes, my hamstrings, and it's pretty practical. Because, you know, I might pick something up off the floor like that.Um, whereas with the snatch, there's not a lot in real life that I'm going to, you know, I'm not going to grab a box and Amazon box off the ground and throw it over my head. Yeah, yeah, no, I think that that makes a lot of sense. And just understanding how you're applying these principles goes a long way.And I think that's where a lot of PTs get themselves in trouble. Oh, I just saw this on Instagram. Let me do this with my patient. Well, what are your patient's goals? What are you trying to really achieve? And you got to think about the functionality, um, behind all those things, um, one of the big things that I think goes missing in the new father, let's call them, um, is nutrition.I think all of a sudden you hit your thirties and forties, and it's so difficult to put on muscle. Like you did when you were in college. Um, what are your, what is your overarching theme there? And what are some, uh, really low hanging fruit that you see? Definitely. First of all, I love the question because this is huge and it's usually the elephant in the room.I was like, I'm working out, you know, six days a week and I'm not seeing results. And you're like, well, what are you doing as far as nutrition? And that's when everything derails. So number one, earlier talking about the starting strength five by five and how simple that workout program is. If you were doing that workout by itself and not addressing nutrition, you know, you're going to see some strength gains.You might gain a little bit of muscle mass. However, if you pair a simple program like that with proper nutrition practices, that's really where the magic's going to happen. So with that being said, Give me those proper nutritional principles. The biggest one for me is prioritizing protein. Um, you know, it's changed over the years, you know, what the recommended daily allowance is right now.It's, it's somewhere between like 0. 7 grams to one gram per pound of body weight. Um, I think you can get away with 0. 7. I made a joke recently and I said, you know, The new RDA is 0. 7 grams per pound of body weight, but my mom didn't raise a quitter. I'm going to go for the full gram. Um, with that being said, prioritizing protein guys, if you're really focusing on, you know, eggs and, and Greek yogurt and lean cuts of meat and focusing on, on getting plenty of protein that it just doesn't leave as much time.To eat junk food. If you're really focused, you're tracking your protein. It's just like, I'm like, man, I'd like to eat that zebra cake, but I probably need to eat this protein bar or this tuna or these eggs instead. So I can hit my protein goal. The second one that is not going to be popular right now, but it still works is calories.At the end of the day, if you eat too many calories, you are going to gain weight. And if you eat, you know, less calories, you're going to lose weight. It's really that simple. So I don't count every single day, but if I have a specific goal I'm going for, like there was a time when I really wanted to hit 180 pounds.And so I knew every day I needed to be in a caloric surplus. And so I basically knew I would eyeball most of the time, but then one or two days a week, since I eat pretty similar, I would track just to make sure I was on the right track. And then number three guys, fruits and vegetables, again, probably not going to be popular right now.I'm a big believer in fruits and vegetables. I, I think they're delicious. Um, they grow naturally. Lots of fiber and vitamins. And if you base the majority of your diet, like I still eat, I eat whole grains and I eat carbs and things of that nature, but the majority of my diet is based around like lean protein sources, fruits and vegetables.And it's hard to lose when you live in that realm. Yeah. And then does timing. Of, um, your calorie intake or your protein intake specifically matter to you? It doesn't to me. Um, I am a belief, like one funny thing that I do that I'm a big believer in. Um, I like to snack like later at night and if it were up to me, I'd run to Chick fil A and get a milkshake.Um, but I know like long, long term, that's not going to pay dividends. So every night before bed, I always have a bowl of plain Greek yogurt. And I put a half scoop of protein in it. It's like 35 grams of protein and I mix it up and I eat that before bed. And I find that I sleep better and then I don't eat junk food before bed, and that's a big win for me.Yeah, yeah, that's, that's really difficult. I definitely struggle with, uh, the late night munch through sports. Physical therapy is growing like wildfire. We have 14 locations soon to be more. We are throughout the state of Maryland. We're in Pennsylvania, in Lebanon, in New York, Pennsylvania, as well as in Delaware, in Newark and Wilmington, Delaware, like I said, so many more practices to come and we always need.Outstanding sports, physical therapists. Our treatment style is unique. We are one on one with your athlete for 45 minutes, every single session, you do the entire treatment, you do the entire evaluation, and they are in state of the art facilities where you have room to run, throw, and jump, and really get your athlete all the way back to on the field and better and stronger than they were.We also have outstanding salaries. comp structures, bonus abilities, 401ks, as well as a very strong continuing education offering, including in house continuing education. And we're looking for you. Now is the time as we are growing like crazy. Just shoot your resume over to Yoni, Y O N I at TrueSportsPT or shoot us a DM and we will hit you back.We will get you in for our unique, Tried and true interview process and really make a determination that this is the right place for you to grow your career and get your athletes better than ever. We can't wait to hear from you. So, um, talk to me about supplements. You have to get this question a bunch.What's a staple. Um, and then for guys who are really trying to peak, um, in that, Young family, um, age, what do you think is important to consider? So number, if I could only choose one supplement, hands down creatine monohydrate, um, if somebody tries to give you like creatine, ethyl ester, or a weird strand, don't go with that.Creatine monohydrate is the most researched supplement on the market. And there's even like research now going towards that. It helps. Can potentially ward off Alzheimer's and dementia and things of that nature. And then, you know, this, the more muscle mass we can maintain as we age, you know, just the more likely, uh, longevity will increase alongside that.You it's difficult to get enough creatine just through diet alone. So five grams of creatine monohydrate with a little bit of carbs post workout goes a long way. And then my number two is just whey protein. You can easily get enough protein just through diet alone, but again, busy dads. It's just really nice to be able to get in 25 grams of protein after your workout really conveniently and just kind of bolster your protein numbers for the day.Quick and easy. Yeah. And I think that's great advice. Um, for the young dad. I also think it's great advice post operatively. I have seen a tremendous amount of young athletes. We're talking 15, 16 years old. Their nutrition is in the toilet. They're going through post op and trying to recover from an ACL reconstruction.Um, and they, they just don't either have enough calories, let alone enough protein. I've seen creatine go a long way. I know there are now post surgical supplements that I think is totally worthwhile. So that, you know, you shouldn't be scared to talk about those things with your patients. There's so many tried and true nutritional, um, information out there that you can push towards your patients.It's really makes a difference. goes a long way to decreasing inflammation, giving you the ability to recruit quad and grow your quad after a knee surgery. Um, and it's the same principles that Ben's talking about here. Um, for the young dad, just getting enough of good calories easily can go a long way also post operatively anything else, like what else is in your supplement stack if there is anything?Um, I'm big on another two and these two will have mixed reviews depending on who you ask. I take Omega three capsules. It's just one of those things. I don't probably eat enough fish in my normal diet. Um, When you use omega 3 if you're using fish oil do a little research there's different organizations That certify them you need to make sure you get a good one because the supplement field can be sketchy And especially fish especially fish oil like you you need to know where it's coming from And is it is it certified so look for those two things on the bottle Um, but being on omega three, I've always heard, I work with a supplement company called SFH and one thing that they always say, it's like big with working out, you need to do two things.You basically need to support muscle growth and hopefully decrease inflammation. And so in theory, hopefully omega three is helping decrease inflammation. Um, and then I really like, I'm a big believer for men specifically zinc and magnesium. Uh, the majority of Americans are, are low in zinc and magnesium.I don't have anybody to plug on this supplement. I just take a simple ZMA supplement. You can get it on Amazon again, do a little research to find it. But, um, there's also a lot of good research on zinc and magnesium helping with muscle relaxing and aiding and sleep. And I'm not naturally a good sleeper.And so always take zinc and magnesium prior to going to bed. And so, so I just had this conversation with a football player. Um, and we were talking about supplements and this guy has tried everything under the sun and journals about it and is really detailed about what some of the outcomes he's experiencing from different supplements, he always says.And I think this is a great point. Why are you even talking about supplements? If you haven't nailed down diet, which is why I wanted to get to that with you first and sleep. So you say you're a bad sleeper. I promise you I'm worse. What are some of your tricks of, of making sure you're getting enough sleep?And what is enough sleep for you? This is not going to be a popular answer either. A lot of unpopular answers, man. I probably average six hours of sleep a night. Um, it's a problem and it's been worse. Uh, I have worked to get to a consistent six. Uh, I'm working to get to a consistent seven, like lots of times.And you know this, if you have a business, lots of times I'll just be enjoying hanging out with my wife and then we go to bed. And as soon as I lay down, I start thinking about like who I didn't email. Um, I forgot to text this person back. I need to order this and that tomorrow. Um, so I've had a hard time kind of quieting my mind down when I go to sleep.Um, I did hear something a while back that did help me. It's the three, two, one rule. Um, I never hit the three, but it's, you know, you quit eating or you quit eating three hours before bed. You quit drinking water two hours before bed and you quit screen time one hour before bed. And specifically decreasing screen time one hour before bed has been a big help to me.Um, I bought a pair of blue blocker glasses. The block out blue light. I put those on as soon as the sun goes down. Um, I cut down eating and drinking water as bedtime approaches. And then about an hour before bed, I try to cut down on screen time and just kind of hang out with my wife or read. And that's really helped me kind of wind down and start getting better about sleeping.You get in bed. Put your head on the pillow. What do you do? I close my eyes and pray to the Lord above that I fall asleep. Okay. And wake up. Don't forget. You want to ask to wake up as well. This is true. In the right time. Okay. Do you read right before you go to sleep? No. Uh, I typically like read and then it's like I brush my teeth and then I get in bed and I just try to close my eyes and go to sleep.Dude. That's why you can't fall asleep. I could never do. I don't know, dude. Like you're looking at a guy that doesn't sleep, but the, um, I tried to read before I go to sleep. That, that puts me out though. What's a disaster is dude. I could say all night watching TV. Like when you're in front of a screen or you're on your phone.Um, I just think we, we don't shut down. That brings me to my favorite question. What are you reading? So, um, notoriously not a great reader. Okay.I have a, uh, an audiobook system. My library is called Hoopla. It's H O O P L A. So Hoopla, probably. And I can download audiobooks for free. And I'm probably doing like a book a week right now. And it's great. I'm reading, uh, I'll even pull it up right now. I just got done with the richest man in Babylon.Yeah. It's awesome. Awesome. A classic greatly read. Um, and I'm basically trying to go through and find all of like the classics that I've missed seven habits of highly effective people. How to win friends and influence people. I've been crushing all those. Right now I'm reading Expert Secrets by Russell Brunson.Okay, I'll put that on my list because that one I haven't gotten to. Expert Secrets? Yep, Expert Secrets. Okay, love it. We should do a book club on that. Um, that is awesome. I was reading Richard, you know, I was, when I read richest man in Babylon, I read about seven years ago. Um, and I'm a big reader. I also, I listen, um, to audio books, like when I'm working out or traveling or whatever, but I love the ability to just read, um, an actual book.I just feel like my retention is much better. Um, I went with the Israeli national lacrosse team and we were competing in England and so, because, uh, for security reasons, they put any time team Israel travels, they put them like in the middle of nowhere, away from like the athletes village. So there are thousands of athletes, um, just outside London, I want to say, and they put us like, On the countryside.So we're like 45 minutes away. Um, and I'm sitting there reading richest man in Babylon on a Saturday, thinking like we're totally safe. Cause they hit us all the way up here. The mosque. Open finished services at like noon. And I am surrounded by possibly every single Muslim in this entire city. Just walking by.I'm like, who thought this, who thought this one, but that's the way I was reading richest man in Babylon. Um, Nicest people in the world. Those, those leaving that mosque at that time, but that that's why I was reading that. Um, okay. Now, another thing that I love about Ben Barker fitness is you passing on your love of health and fitness to your kids as a dad of three girls who aren't, they don't love exercise.How do I instill into them a love of fitness and the import of fitness? This is something I've struggled with Yoni because I want them to have the love so badly, but I also, I don't know if you guys ever seen the movie. There's a movie called Friday night lights. And there's like a dad who wants his son to be good at football so bad.And he fumbles the ball and the dad like tapes the football to his hands and yells at him for dropping the ball. None of us want to be that dad don't, don't ever become that dad. So my goal has to make it as simple as possible, but also to show them that it's something that we do regardless of how we feel.And so my template right now is I purposefully have them exercise two days a week. Okay. I have them do, it's a, it's like a nine to 12 minute workout. It's typically three to four exercises and we just rotate through them doing, you know, 45 seconds of exercise, 15 seconds of rest. And I've basically tried to choose the most simple exercises, you know, like squats, pushups, and I'll have them do inverted rows typically.And it's just one of those things that most of the time they really enjoy it. Every once in a while, one of them like, dad, I don't want to do this. And I'll be like, listen, here's the deal. You don't have to. And, and you can go if you want, it's a okay, but hear me out. This is one of those things that one day you're going to be, you're going to want to pursue some sport or you're going to appreciate the way you look or what you're capable of doing.And you're like, man, I'm glad I didn't skip that workout. Yeah. And that's the way I've tried to play it. And so far so good. And I've also found, and this is a lesson for everybody. Most of the time when they don't want to do it initially. And then they end up doing it. They have a great time. And I always remind them of that.They'll be like laughing and giggling, doing the exercises. And I'm like, Hey, remember a few minutes ago when you were grumpy about this and now you're happy there's, there's something about that. Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. I think it's an awesome lesson also in delayed gratification, like You don't, you might feel better the, you know, right after your exercise, which is a media gratification, but you're not going to see changes.You're not going to see massive gains unless you're super consistent. And the ability to delay that gratification, um, is such an awesome lesson. I got to talk to my kids about that, dude. Um, that's, that's a good piece of advice. Um, okay. So let's wrap up with the following. Ready? Little lightning round for Ben Barker.Ready? Okay. Don't overthink these, please. One thing people don't know about you, but you wish they did. Um, I play bass in the band at church and I'm like, I'm a pretty like semi decent. I'm not great, but semi decent. Um, how long have you been playing bass? I've been playing guitar since I was like, so like 15, 20 years.I picked up bass because more people need bass players and I've been doing that five or six years. Um, that's awesome. Okay. One thing people don't know about you that you're thrilled that they don't know this about you. Um, that's a great question. Uh, one time I was running out to a track event and a lady was trying to yell to stop me.And I was in a hurry because I was trying to make it, you know, to get, get my lane number. Right. Which is important. And she kept yelling at me. Then I was finally like, what? And she said, you have some toilet paper hanging out of the back of your pants. I love that. How thankful were you that she told you that?I was very grateful, but there was, it was in a big crowd of people, so it still wasn't great. Yeah. Wasn't great, but would have been worse if you would have run that race with toilet paper hanging out of your ass. Right. Accurate, which the lesson there. So we just read this book, radical candor. Um, and we did a book club on it.It's awesome. Did you read that? I have not, but I've heard of it. Yeah, it's all, it's awesome. Um, because it's something that we were struggling with as an organization and they use, I don't know if they use the example of spinach in the teeth of your fly open, but when. One of those two things happen. You feel like a dumb ass, by the way, when you tell the person, you feel like a dumb ass when you hear it, but you're actually doing them a disservice if you ignore that.And that's what they called ruinous empathy. Um, there's a lot of gold in that book. That's one thing that stuck, you know, like you have an employee, by the way, you have a patient or you have a client that. Their actions should be called out and you say, nah, I don't want to embarrass them or I don't, I don't want to create some type of strife.You're actually doing them a massive disservice and yourself a disservice because either the, um, the habit or the action proliferates and continues, or dude, they're going to walk through an entire networking event with spinach. And that's either going to be like that freaking Dick Yoni never, he knew, and he didn't tell me.So don't be ruinously empathetic. Um, But I digress. Okay. A workout trend you hope sticks around and one you hope fades away. A workout trend I hope sticks around is, is how important compound lifts are. It's big right now. All the gyms locally are really investing in like a bunch of power racks. In the gyms.And I think it's a beautiful thing and one gym locally, and this isn't like a statement it is though, had a women's room, a women's only room, and they replaced the women's only room with a room for compound lifts and I see a lot of women going in there and doing the compound lifts and I think that's a powerful thing.Yeah. And I think we've come such a long ways in society in terms of women lifting women, being strong, how important that is, um, later in life with osteoporosis with. Even cognitive decline, things like that. Uh, we've come so far. So I agree with you. I hope that continues. What do you hope fades? What are those places called where you put on like the wetsuit and you do a 15 minute workout and it's like EMS, like shocking your muscles.Have you heard of this? Um, I, I feel like I've seen those suits. Um, I didn't know that that's a major fad, but maybe There is a franchise. Um, I won't call it. I kid you not. It's a franchise and you go in and like, and the big thing there, how they advertise is, is like, you know, only 15 minutes and you get like the equivalent of doing, you know, like a three hour workout.Um, and so you go in like a room and you put on a wetsuit and it like, Shocks your muscles while you're doing curls and I would dude that reminds me I'm gonna be embarrassed to share this but that reminds me of the ab belt that I used to wear Oh, yeah in college that would shock the f out of my abs And I would just like use it to keep me awake late at night writing papers Dude, okay.I don't want to get into the specifics of that, but It was nothing good. Um Okay, ben you have been a goddamn pleasure. So You Thank you so much for making time. I knew you would have so much to share. Um, give everyone your elevator pitch as to why they need to go to benbarkerfitness. com. I think there's beauty in simplicity.Um, I always tell people, you know, I don't have the fanciest workout program. And honestly, there's a lot of great workout programs out there, and I wouldn't just encourage you to find one. And stick to it, get your nutrition, right? I'd like it to be my program, but if it's not pick something, stick with it and you'll get results.I love it. I love it. Everyone. Make sure you go check out Ben Barker at Ben Barker fitness. com. Please look at his Instagram. Cause it cracks me up, Ben. Thank you for being an Instagram. in the Rosenblatt household and in the Stone household. Uh, Tim Stone is the guy who introduced me to, to your content. Um, thank you.I just love the way you've handled adversity. I love how transparent you are. I love the way you talk about your faith, Ben, keep it up. We'll do this again soon, man. Thank you so much. Yoni, great to connect, bro. You're a great host. I appreciate you. Yeah, absolutely. All right, guys. Thanks so much for listening.Check out Ben Barker, check out true sports PT on Instagram. Shoot us a DM. Let me know how I did and what I could do better. Look forward to hearing from everyone. Bye bye. Bye bye.
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