Waffle House Ready

13 lessons in strength and muscle.

Post summary

• We’re chatting with Josh Bryant, a strength savant.

• You’ll learn how to improve you strength, how to structure workouts, exercises to avoid, why psychology is so important to results, how to avoid injuries, what Josh thinks of rucking, what he learned while training from convicts, why Waffle House Ready is a fitness metaphor we should all live by, and more.

Housekeeping

• This post is free to all subscribers. But only Members get full access to all three weekly Two Percent posts and our full archive. Become a Member here:

• ICYMI:

  • On Wednesday, we covered leadership—and what ancient wisdom can tell us about true leadership.

  • On Friday, we ran an AMA and answered questions about rucking, weight vests, losing body fat, my writing process, and more.

• Shoutout to our partners:

  • GOREWEAR. I’ll be using the hell out of GOREWEAR gear on the trails this fall. Especially the Concurve LE3 Jacket. It’s light, weatherproof, and has a bunch of features that make it ideal for all outdoor runs, hikes, rides, and more. Code EASTER gets you 30% off your first GOREWEAR purchase.

  • Pro Compression created the official Two Percent sock for my 850-mile hike. I wear it nearly every day because it’s comfortable and tough as nails. Get 40 percent off with code EASTER.

Audio version

The post

I started my recent 850-mile hike through the desert weighing 182 pounds. When I got home, my scale read 167.

Hiking 20-30 miles a day had sent my endurance through the roof. But my body had responded to all that cardio by downgrading my strength. I decided to spend the summer lifting to gain back strength and muscle.

I’ve found I nearly always get better fitness results if I let someone smarter than me handle the programming.

So I called Josh Bryant. Josh has been training others for three decades, starting at the age of 16. He’s worked with professional athletes, Tier 1 military units, the world’s strongest people, and everyone in between.

And now he could count me—a gangly person who arranges words for a living—as one of his clients.

I spent the summer doing exactly what he told me. Each week, he’d send me new workouts or progressions for our existing workouts. Over four months, I followed his plans to a T.

The result:

• I’m stronger than I’ve ever been (PRs in several exercises).

• I have more muscle than I’ve ever had.

• I never felt burnt out or overworked.

• Most importantly, I learned a lot about training and how to structure exercise programs so we can perform at our best for years to come.

To share Josh’s wisdom with all of you, I recently talked to him about all things strength, muscle, and fitness. Our convo is below.

You can find Josh’s workout programs here. He also works one-on-one with people remotely, like he did with me. Send him a DM here.

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Michael Easter (ME):

I get back from my hike. I’ve withered down to 167 pounds. I call you to help me put on muscle and strength. How did you think about creating my workouts, given that I’m not an elite athlete? I’m active, but at the end of the day, I’m a writer.

Josh Bryant (JB):

Before you contacted me, I’d actually read your books, so I had some insight into your psychology. I knew you liked challenging, hard stuff. I picked up that training is more than just putting on strength and muscle for you—you’re looking at the mental, physical, and spiritual aspects of it as well. That psychology angle is important for everyone.

The key principle of any training plan that works is that compliance is a science—we have to find something you’re actually going to adhere to. It has to fit your lifestyle, not be a fantasy. All results come down to the statistical trend of long-term commitment. It’s not about one crazy workout.

I think that’s where CrossFit and other places have gone wrong—they put too much value on one workout of going all-out versus looking at the long-term statistical trend.

I’ve had problems with that myself when I was younger, placing too much emphasis on one workout or one PR versus what’s happening long term. As you get older and do this longer, you see that’s all that really matters.

ME

The psychology is really interesting. So, for example, if you had a person who wasn’t as interested in training as I was, they might receive a different training plan even if we had the same goals?

JB

I work through a hierarchy of considerations.

I start with broad generalizations, then individualize. For example, women generally recover faster than men, so they can handle more volume or frequency of workouts. Explosive athletes like sprinters make muscle gains easier but don’t recover as fast. These are not absolute laws, but they tell me where to begin.

Then I assess a person’s physical reality. What’s their athletic background and current limitations? Someone with knee problems from running hundreds of 5ks has different constraints than a linebacker who played in the NFL and has wrecked shoulders. I’m not placing limits on people, but I have to be realistic and shape the training around what will work best for them.

Then I consider practical constraints. What equipment do they have access to? How much time can they commit? The more time you invest, the less return you get—like anything else. High-level tactical athletes I work with will invest much more time for one or two percent extra gains, whereas the average person could put in a third of the time and get 80% of the results, which will work better for their overall life.

Then I factor in logistics and flow. Exercise sequencing matters. With you, I needed to know where you were training and what equipment you had access to. Someone who has a well-outfitted home gym is getting a different program than someone who exercises in a crowded gym. If you’re doing bodybuilding training in a packed Manhattan gym, I have to consider the fact that I can’t have you walk back and forth between two separate exercise machines or stations, because someone is going to take your equipment between sets.

Then I consider the learning curve. The joke is, you don’t hand calculus to a kindergartner. Most people just want some strength adaptations. I’ll choose exercises that anyone can do with just 30 seconds of quick instruction, rather than technical ones.

ME

What’s the main thing that holds people back from making progress?

JB

Let’s assume that the person is training consistently. That’s always number one.

Once a person is committed and works out regularly, I would say the answer is that people either go too slow or too fast.

On the slow end, people often lack progressive overload—they do the same exercises with the same weights and reps every workout. It’s amazing how many people do the same thing for years.

On the opposite side are people who go way too fast. They add too much weight too fast or just do way too much. That tends to lead to burnout and injuries.

You want to find a balance. I think about it as walking towards the goal, not running towards it. I look at adding weight slowly. Or adding reps with the same weight. Or increasing the density, which is less time between sets. Or altering the exercises.

ME

That was one thing I loved the most about your programming. I sometimes felt like I wasn’t “doing enough.” But I never felt burned out, never got any pains, and the progress I made spoke for itself. I may not have felt like I was doing enough, but I got the best results.

JB

It worked because you followed it. It’s all about steady progression.

Not to pick on CrossFit again—because I like it overall and there are plenty of worse, more bizarre things out there—but one of its downfalls is that people work out just to get burnt out. It’s random and intense, and you walk out sweaty, but you’re not really forcing much adaptation.

I call this “the parking lot effect.” You walked out to your car in the parking lot hammered, but nothing was accomplished long-term.

ME

Why did my workouts have an RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion) scale? For context for the readers, RPE is a subjective measure of how hard a person feels they are working during exercise. You had me select weights based on my perception of how hard they felt.

JB

If I use RPE scale with somebody, that’s actually a compliment. It means I think you’re not emotionally driven.

RPE is a measurement of daily readiness—it allows you to adapt your training based on your circumstances. If I were just to give someone a weight figure to lift, it might be too little if they’d been relaxing all weekend and slept ten hours. But it might be too much if they’d had a crazy, hectic work week and were low on sleep.

The weight you lift with an RPE of six, seven, or eight will be different based on how you feel. It allows us to train harder when we’re more ready, and back off a bit if we’re worn down—and that tends to result in more progress over the long haul. If someone’s mature enough to handle it, it works very well.

ME

You had me ruck two days a week for endurance. Did you select that for me just because you know I like rucking, or is rucking something you program often?

JB

I try to encourage more people to ruck. I like it because people don’t have to adapt to new movement patterns.

Walking is already ingrained—everyone knows how to walk. Whereas, for example, running is a technical movement with high force on your Achilles. There’s some adaptation to run.

With rucking, there isn’t a significant adaptation that’s going to cost you energy or cause injuries. If someone has good running technique, fine. But how many 45-year-olds have great running technique? So why would I have someone run when we could get a pretty similar training effect with rucking?

With rucking, I also feel like you get less interference with strength gains, and it’s easier to scale. When I was focused on rucking last year, it never really felt harder. I just knew how hard I was working—RPE seven to eight—and I got faster and went further without it ever feeling like torture.

ME

With that in mind, what’s the point of doing cardio when your overall goal is strength and muscle gain?

JB

There are several benefits, but it basically improves recovery—regeneration between workouts and stress management in general.

It improves your work capacity, so you’re able to do more work in the gym. You’ll train harder and longer, recover faster between sets, workouts, and training days.

This isn’t just my opinion—it’s why the Soviet Union and similar programs had strength athletes you wouldn’t typically expect to do aerobic work actually doing it. It wasn’t some doctor saying everyone needs to run—it was recognizing that you recover better and get more strength work done this way. Plus, health benefits.

ME

Related to that, how do you balance studies and medical advice with what you see works in the field? My sense has always been that experts like you who are in the field are trying things, they’re noticing what works, and then scientists go, oh, well, maybe we should study that, but they’re often doing that 10 or 15 years behind the curve.

JB

Research is usually so far behind what we’re already doing.

My truthful answer is that half the time I’m cherry-picking from studies—I already have an idea and am noticing what works, then I find something to validate it. That’s actually not a joke, it’s true. Take rucking, for example. I was already doing it and knew it worked, but now we have science to back it up and get more people to buy in. The science helps the average person buy in.

I think it was Joe DeFranco who said evidence is the teacher and science is the teacher’s aide. That’s a good way to look at it.

I do read journals and keep up with data because sometimes it sparks ideas. But when you read further into studies, you find inconsistencies. For example, you might find that a technique works best with elite athletes and that it doesn’t apply to the average person, or vice versa.

That’s the unfortunate thing about a lot of techniques—there’s a big difference between elites and average people. Many techniques that look cool on social media only work at higher levels. If you’re not elite, it doesn’t spark the same way.

My general training philosophy is to meet people where they are. If someone really wants to do a specific exercise and there’s no reason not to, I’d still program it as long as it does no harm. They’ll probably get some benefit anyway.

ME

Are there any popular exercises you feel like most people should avoid?

JB

I think it comes down to individual anatomy. What training effect are you after? Why are you after it? Look at the risk versus the benefit of any exercise. What’s the best and safest way to get the desired effect?

Take barbell back squats. They don’t work as well for taller people. Why do you need to barbell back squat? What’s so special about it? Really nothing, unless you’re powerlifting. You’re just after the training effect, so pick the right tool for the job.

I know people hate hearing “it depends,” but that’s the truth. It depends on you and your anatomy.

The same goes for your injury history. If you have bad elbows or a bad back, you need to choose exercises that aren’t going to make your problems worse. Hopefully you know what those are or have a trainer who does.

ME

How did you get into the world of exercise? As a writer, I’m big on stories, and I think your trajectory and who you’ve learned from is a great story.

JB

When I was 16, I walked into this hardcore gym in Arlington. It was all bodybuilders and powerlifters, and you had to get approved by the owner to train there. For some reason, they let me in, and I was by far the youngest person there.

There was this guy there named Steve Hall, who everyone thought was really smart, but he wasn’t nice to most people. For some reason, he was always nice to me, and he taught me everything. People would ask me what he was doing because in this little world, he was like God, and I was the priest you had to go through to get to him.

Then all these bouncers from strip clubs started coming to the gym, and I started training them. Suddenly, I’m 16, 17 years old and training the most badass, huge bouncers in town. I’d tell people at school, “I train these guys,” and they’d say, “No you don’t.” I’d say, “Come to the gym and watch”—and I’d be putting them through workouts.

I had to learn fast. I didn’t go from training Mrs. Jones, who’s overweight and wants to lose three pounds on the treadmill. I was thrown to the lions with advanced people who needed results fast. It was sink or swim, and I was able to swim.

I’m 44 now, closer to 45, and I’ve been doing this since I was 16. My path wasn’t like I got bored with medical sales and decided to become a trainer. Training is all I’ve ever done, all I know. I wanted to find mastery in one path. If you follow your passion and the market changes, there’s going to be some way to make money at it if you’re passionate enough.

ME

You also competed, right?

JB

Yes. I was the youngest person to bench press 600 pounds raw, I won the Strongest Man in America in 2005, and totaled 2,294 pounds at a powerlifting competition. I also played football in college and did track.

When I was competing, I had a different mindset. I wanted excellence in one thing. Being the strongest person was fine with me, even if it meant being a total waste of space for society. Like, I’d use those rascal things to get food at Walmart because I didn’t want to walk for squats that day.

I was doing my own thing. I had my family and friends, and with everybody else, I’d be nice and say hello, but the focus was my training.

But then I stopped competing, and my focus shifted. I wanted to serve people, so I got more into business and training others. That’s been a big change in my mindset.

ME

How did you develop your jailhouse strong material? I’m asking this because I think it shows how you pull from a fascinating range of examples to develop your training philosophies.

JB

When I was training at that gym in high school, my friend Adam Benshea and I began observing how the ex-cons at the gym trained.

They weren’t doing powerlifting, where you go heavy, go home, and can’t move. They did the heavy stuff, then bodybuilding work at higher reps, then finished with bodyweight exercises. I thought, “This is badass”—they were making the most of what they had with what was available.

They’d do things like mechanical advantage drop sets: start with dumbbells at a high incline to failure, drop to mid-level incline to failure, then go down to flat and continue the set. When I talked to them about it, playing psychologist, I realized they did that because there were no other benches available in prison. If they walked away, someone would take their bench. They had to get creative—necessity is the mother of invention. They didn’t read books about this stuff; they just had to figure it out. And it worked.

I loved that style of training and the attitude that went with it. Basic barbell movements, bodybuilding accessory work, and then bodyweight finishers covered it all.

None of these guys were competitive athletes. A lot of the guys would lay drywall all day, smoke cigarettes out front, then come in and bust out a workout. But they were some of the fittest people in the gym. It was interesting and cool.

ME

This feels like it relates to your line “Waffle House Ready.” When I saw that tagline, I got it immediately. It’s hilarious, but it’s also such a great metaphor for the fitness for the average person.

JB

It’s about being ready for anything. That’s the idea—why are you training? My philosophy is to be ready for anything.

The primary example is Waffle House at 3 a.m. You can walk in, and it might be a bunch of nice people—maybe Mormon missionaries finishing up late, just sitting there eating.

But you could also walk in, and there are strippers pouring syrup on themselves, dancing. True story—that happened at the one in Nashville off Trinity Lane. It’s shut down now because they had too many problems. You could see a fight break out, a drug deal, anything.

So Waffle House Ready is literally the metaphor for “stay ready so you don’t have to get ready.” That’s why you train—unless you’re preparing for a powerlifting meet or something specific, you’re training to be ready for life.

What does that mean? You’re probably not going to run 26 miles, but can you go whatever distance fast enough? Can you go long enough to outlast whatever comes up? Can you produce enough strength quickly when you need to? Can you sprint and move fast?

You don’t need to be Delta Force, you don’t need to run a three-hour marathon, but you need to be pretty good at a lot of different things for life.

Have fun, don’t die, be Waffle House Ready,

Michael