About Vaclav Gregor

Vaclav is part of the Adonis/Venus Lifestyle team, he writes articles for both sites and also designs new workouts.

You can read his story over at Adonis site here: click here.

Phi-Life Series: The Most Reliable Tool for Tracking Weight Loss that Nobody Uses

Today we bring you another podcast from our phi-life series.

Phi-Life is a series of podcasts where John Barban and Brad Pilon discuss their ideas and concepts on the topics of muscle building, fat loss and health. In a nutshell they are just thinking out loud and recording it for your benefit.

Today’s topic: Money Doesn’t Lie – Tracking Weight Loss not with Calories, but Your Finances

Do you know how much do you spend on food?

Do you know how much do you spend on food?

If you like numbers, you will like today’s podcast. If you hate counting calories,  then this podcast is for you as well.

It’s something most people don’t think about. However, there is a link between how much money you spend and how you spend it AND the amount of fat you are carrying around your belly.

Money doesn’t lie, where you choose to spend your money is a good indicator of  your diet , what results you can expect from it, and even who you are as a person.  Discovering who you really are may be quite shocking, so not everyone is willing to look at this type of data and face the facts.

When you look at someone’s bank account and more specifically the money spent on food, you can get a pretty good indication of how that person eats.

The truth is, money is neither good nor bad. If you are a consumer, it’s a way of obtaining what you desire. If you are an investor or entrepreneur it’s a tool to make your plans become a reality.  Since we live in a society that’s economy-based, you’re a part of the economy whether you like it or not. So you might as well learn how the economy works and how to make it work for you.

While this is not a website about finances, we recognize that money and calories are tied together. There is a fine line between you paying for energy and paying for weight gain. Once your body has what it needs, anything after is money you are investing only to  to gain a return fat.

In the U.S.,  people spend more than 1.6 trillion dollars a year on food alone. That’s a lot of money…and a lot of food.

What’s also interesting is this data indicates that Americans spend most of their money on food in restaurants and prefer to have it prepared rather than going to the grocery store and cooking it themselves. This is the complete opposite of what most Europeans prefer. Could this one decision or habit affect your ability to lose fat?

In this episode of Phi-Life podcasts, Brad and John will share with you several findings on this subject. They will also discuss the national economic food trends in the U.S. and how the analysis of one’s finances can predict weight gain. It’s pretty incredible, but also very logical when you hear it.

You will also learn and discover:

  • How much red meat does the average American consume per year
  • Why (and how) tracking your finances through  your  food budget can help you lose weight and save money
  • How your  eating habits encourage food companies to produce more food and thus contribute to the growing obesity rate
  • The simple truth about your environment and why  you are fighting an uphill battle with your diet
  • Pro’s and con’s of being an average consumer
  • How you maybe setting yourself up for failure and weight gain with your spending habits
  • How to budget for fat loss (finance not calories)
  • Why you should track how much money you spend on food, and more specifically what type of food and where it comes from
  • Why tracking your finances might be simpler than tracking your calories

Listen to the podcast here:

Phi-Life Series: Can Fasting and Training Add 20 Years or More to Your Life Span?

Today we bring you another podcast from our phi-life series.

Today’s topic: Life Extension

Life extension and anti aging products have become very popular in the last few years, a few of these products include: many types of health foods, supplements, workouts, drugs, and even special therapies.

One of the biggest claims actually comes from intermittent fasting when used as a tool for extending one’s life span, some say that it can add decades to your life.

The question is, can it really add that many years to your life? This is what John Barban and Brad Pilon will answer for you today.

What’s the secret to life extension?

Technically, there are only two ways we can approach the anti aging process. First, the obvious one is to create protocols around your diet, workouts, drugs and therapies and wait for the results.  However, the issue with this approach is that you need at least one generation to have valid data and more importantly you can’t tell people what to do for the rest of their lives. The only way this approach can work is to study mice, keep in mind that mice are very different from humans, so not everything that applies to mice will apply to us.

The second approach is to reverse engineer this process and to actually study the people that have lived the longest (over 100 years).

Strangely enough, there is very little they have in common. There is no single workout or diet you can copy and hope to live for as long as them.

There are a few common indicators such as:

  • Low Stress Levels
  • Activity (both mental and physical)
  • Low Bodyfat Percentage

Apart from these three things, each individual lived a different lifestyle. In other words, you can’t guarantee that a low carb diet or powerlifting type of training will help you to live to be a 100.

The even greater question to ask  is will lifestyle changes help you live longer or are you at mercy of your genetics and faith?

If so, what is the  best  approach to take?

This is what John and Brad will attempt to answer for you today in our podcast.

You will also learn and discover:

  • Is it even possible to study anti aging and have any measurable data?
  • Does modern science currently offer anything you could use to delay the aging process?
  • What is your best bet when it comes to living a greater QUANTITY and QUALITY form of life?
  • What’s the magical age that determines you will  have a good chance of living to be a 100?
  • What are some things you can control that will help you improve your life and live longer?
  • Can you make the aging process enjoyable?

Listen to the podcast here:

Is Fasting Bad for Women?

Here’s the next episode of the UNCENSORED Podcasts Season 2.

Today’s topic: Intermittent Fasting, Intermittent Feeding and Gender Differences

Could Fasting Actually be Bad for You?

What are the Benefits of Intermittent Fasting?

Could one benefit be a goal to achieve 0% BF?!

Of course not!  When incorporating fasting into your lifestyle you should know what to expect and understand why you are doing it.  Do you want to create room for extra weekend calories? Or use fasting as a tool to lose one additional  pound each week?

When our friend Eric tried fasting at about 7% body fat before his competition he could hardly push to the 24 hour mark and felt terrible. Was this a surprise? Not really.

If you are already ripped, you can’t expect to fast four times a week for 24 hours.  The less body fat you have the more your body will try to “protect it”.

This is something most people don’t realize and even major fitness articles are wrong when they state “Fasting doesn’t work” or  “Intermittent Fasting is Dead” and so on.

Truth be told, intermittent fasting has become quite popular in 2012.  As the trend follows with everything that receives a lot of attention and popularity, there is always some negative feedback attached as well.

Today, we will analyze a blog post from a woman who tried fasting and misunderstood the effects of dieting on her hormones and blamed fasting for being unhealthy. We will also cover her false conclusion of a famous mice study on fat loss and fasting.

John Barban and Brad Pilon will also show you the difference between intermittent fasting and intermittent feeding and explain which is more useful as a fat loss or bodyfat maintenance tool.

In today’s UNCENSORED training, you will also discover:

  • Different fasting protocols you can follow and how to determine which one will fit you the best
  • How to make (intermittent) fasting sustainable
  • Discover at what point you have to reduce the frequency and length of your fasts
  • How to optimise the whole process of dieting so you get the results, feel good, and don’t burn out
  • Learn whether there any “side effects” of dieting or  intermittent fasting/intermittent feeding
  • What steps to take when you read other blog posts about intermittent fasting and want to remain objective
  • How to take into account your limits when training, dieting and fasting
  • What fundamental questions to ask yourself when you reading an article/journal which quotes a research study
  • The second part of the  Eat Stop Eat lifestyle you can’t forget about
  • What the signals indicate you to stop fasting
  • The difference between intermittent fasting and intermittent feeding and when to use them

 

Phi-Life Series: The Untold Difference of Marketing Fitness Claims in North America

Today we bring you another podcast from our phi-life series.

Today’s topic: Geographic Influence On Claims

If you take a look…You will begin to realize the many different forms of advertising that exist in the marketplace.

Did you know that advertising claims in the health and fitness industry are regulated differently in each country?

For example, in one country a product might claim to help you lose 10 pounds in 30 days, while in another country  that same product  will claim up to 20 pounds of weight loss!

This is true because from a marketing perspective, what might work in one country might not work in other. We actually find this happening quite often.

North America is a prime example.

You can have the same product for both the  U.S. and Canadian market. However, each country will have a completely different claim.

What the companies are able to get away with saying depends on their government’s regulations.  If you live in the U.S., you may be accustomed to hearing certain phrases such as, “Lose 30 pounds in 30 days” or when marketing muscle building products usually to men something like “How to build 20 pounds of lean muscle in the next 4 months.”  These phrases are commonly found in TV ads and  fitness magazines. However, if you tried to marke the same product with this claim in Canada you might lose millions, because people simply wouldn’t believe it to be possible and nobody would buy.

The claims that you’re exposed to on a regular basis in your home country will have an effect on where your “BS radar” is set.

If you showed the U.S. ads to Canadians they would be very skeptical, however for U.S. viewers transformation from fat-average to fitness model in couple of months might not be that thrilling or impressive at all.

What’s even more interesting is how all the media channels tie-in to one another.

Ever thought to yourself, “If everyone keeps saying it, it must be true right?“.

That’s the very moment your judgement becomes clouded by media and your your skeptical eye begins to  diminish.

Today Brad Pilon and John Barban will discuss how claims on print media, video media and product packaging vary in different countries and why that affects your buying decisions.

You will also learn and discover:

  • The difference in what the government allows you to be exposed to and what you then believe is realistic to achieve
  • Why consistency in print, visual, website commercials matters and how it affects your judgement
  • How marketers used a false unsupported claim “U.S. Formula” to boost sales in North America
  • That you are more  of “a product of your own environment”  than you may think
  • That if you can predict the greatest possible claim people will accept, you will make a lot of money
  • If it’s possible to know which claims are true
  • Why the claims can be so different from country to country, but people have the same physiology

Listen to the podcast here:

Phi-Life Series: The Real Story Behind Supplement Packaging

Today we bring you the first of many podcasts from our phi-life series.

Today’s topic: Supplement Packaging

What do you think is the most important thing in supplement development?

If your answer was ingredients, you would be incorrect.

Do you think supplement packing is not important? Do you think that you make your buying decision only based on the ingredients? You might be surprised…

When developing a new product, the supplement developers actually work backwards from packaging.

In reality the package is what will sell the product, not the ingredient. The ingredients are pretty much the same across all the products, so that’s not what sets a specific supplement apart or even what will make you choose one for purchase.

One can hardly imagine how complex the process of just “creating the package” really is.

It’s not only the color of the supplement that matters. It’s the questions of whether you put the ingredients into capsule or powder form? If so, do those contents belong in a  bottle or package?

Packaging is the first impression a customer will have with a product.

The next step of the process is figuring out what to say, what font to use, what colors to use, what fitness model to endorse the product with what particular claim and much more.

You simply cannot sell a supplement without the right package and claim, because that’s what drives sales.

Everything must fit together, the claim has to fit the cover and everything has to be in-sync from a buyer’s perspective.

Packaging is utmost importance for a supplement company. In today’s podcast you will  discover just how much it matters and what really goes into packaging   design.

This is not to tell you that supplements are evil and should be avoided at all costs., Quite the opposite, certain supplements can help you with your fitness goals. However, understanding whats goes behind the scenes will help you pick the supplements you really need and avoid spending money on products that are useless to you, but may look very appealing at first.

Today you have a chance to get inside the heads of previous supplement developers – John Barban and Brad Pilon.

You will also learn and discover:

  • What colors entice you to buy
  • The reason some supplements are on the market (not all supplement are backed by clinical studies)
  • The exact steps that take place before the supplement is put on the shelf
  • [For supplement developers] How to make an impression on your customers and stand out in competition
  • How package size correlates with the magnitude of promised results
  • How supplements can get away with outrageous claims
  • How your thought process as a customer affects package development
  • If it matters whether the supplement cover looks pretty or not

Listen to the podcast here:

Women’s Guide to Eating for Muscle Gain

Here’s the next episode of the UNCENSORED Podcasts Season 2.

Today’s topic: Eating for Muscle Gain and Fat Storage

How much do you need to eat to build muscle?

How Do You Store Fat?

When we eat more calories than our body can use we begin to store those extra calories as fat. Although this process occurs  in  both men and women, the primary locations of fat storage differs betweeen the two genders.  For example, men tend to store fat in the stomach region while women in the hip/thigh region.  This genetic predisposition of fat storage leads to a variety of  body types or shapes: “Apple, Pear, Banana” just to name a few.

As a person begins to exceed the standard Body Mass Index (BMI) range their body shape eventually balloons into a rounded appearance.  Nevertheless, there is a popular belief amongst  people that even if they are below the BMI range known as obese, their body shape  is dictated by their genetic predispositions for fat storage.  However, this is only partially true.

There is no category of body shape that will restrict you from building  muscle only in a certain area.

Once you lose the  fat necessary to achieve the lean, ripped look we begin to look very similar to one another.  What will make the biggest difference is the size of your muscles. Everyone will look different at their ideal numbers of course, but the overall body shape will be the same. Once you lose the fat,  your body’s  fat storage patterns become irrelevant.

So it’s up to you, you can choose whether to let your genetic predispositions  dictate how you store fat or change your physical appearance through strategic training and add more size to your frame.

How Much Do You Need to Build Muscle

The second part of this podcast is about the amount of food/calories you need to consume to build muscle.

We’ve already explained why bulking is a bad idea, hell even Pilon tried bulking up slowly in the last podcast.

So it would seem that overeating doesn’t help. So what’s the answer then, how much do you really need to eat to avoid undereating, but also overeating? What do you have to do?

If you are asking yourself those questions you are missing  two critical  factors to your success.

The two factors that must be taken into consideration are birth and/or training age.

A 20 year old guy or girl who just started training and is still in juvenile muscle growth is a different case compared to somebody who is in his/her late 40s and has been training hard for the last 15 years.

Which is exactly what Brad Pilon and John Barban are going to discuss today. So, if that is something that interests you, just scroll down to log inside the AI cockpit and listen to this episode.

In today’s UNCENSORED training, you will also discover:

  • Whether there is anything you can do to improve your physique besides fat loss and muscle building
  • What  BMI/BF% range you will  need to be under to allow your muscles to dictate your body shape
  • What waist  percentage of your height is still safe for “bulking”
  • Whether there is actually an amount of calories you need to eat to build muscle
  • What determines how much you need to eat to build muscle at the rate you want
  • Learn what  stubborn fat is  and whether it’s any different from the rest of your body fat
  • What it means when people store fat in as opposed to around the muscle
  • What it takes to add more muscle if not bulking
  • What role does birth and/or training age  play in your diet if your goal is building muscle
  • What do you do after you get to your ideal numbers? Do you need to keep training or Is it possible to grow even more?

 

VT6 12-Week Transformation Winners Announced

The VT6 results are in and the transformations our girls made are simply amazing!

Congratulations to everyone who entered and finished!

Here are the winners:

Deanna H – 1st Place

Deanna – 1st Place – Before Photos

Deanna – 1st Place – After Photos

Sheila K – 2nd Place

Sheila – 2nd Place – Before Photos

Sheila – 2nd Place – After Photos

Ioana T – 3rd Place

Ioana – 3rd Place – Before Photos

Ioana – 3rd Place – After Photos

Jessie T – 4th Place

Jessie – 4th Place – Before Photos

Jessie – 4th Place – After Photos

Aima K – 5th Place

Aima – 5th Place – Before Photos

Aima – 5th Place – After Photos

Tina R – 6th Place

Tina – 6th Place – Before Photos

Tina – 6th Place – After Photos

Terry C – 7th Place

Terry  – 7th Place – Before Photos

Terry  – 7th Place – After Photos

Lori A – 8th Place

 

*winner requested pictures removed.

 

Jenna W – 9th Place

Jenna – 9th Place – Before Photos

Jenna  – 9th Place – After Photos

 

Lisa S – 10th Place

Lisa – 10th Place – Before Photos

Lisa – 10th Place – After Photos

DEXA Results from Slow Bulking and Muscle Imbalance Correction Training

Here’s the next episode of the UNCENSORED Podcasts Season 2.

Today’s topics: Body Composition Analysis – DEXA Results

You can use DEXA scan to track down effectiveness of your training and diet.

From season one of uncensored podcasts you already know how you can use DEXA to track your progress.

But did you know that it’s also a very useful tool for experimenting with your body?

Check out how John and Brad used DEXA scan to measure effectiveness of the things they were trying in the last couple of weeks. Each of them tried a different thing.

John’s Experiment – Muscle Imbalance Correction Training

As you may already know know John can’t do barbell bench press, because off his shoulder issue. The last time he got his DEXA the results were astonishing, on his right side there was almost 2 pounds less lean mass (shoulder and arm). That’s a pretty big difference, it was obvious that the right side was significantly weaker and less developed.

Because of this, he decided to try to bring the right side back to normal, so both of his shoulders and arms would be balanced.

Now this is tricky, because if you just do barbell based exercises, one arm will work harder than the other and you will only make the problem worse.

So how would you go about it?

And how do you track such is small difference?

You can’t even go just by feeling and strength, you need to get another DEXA done to confirm the results.

John decided to create a specialized plan for himself and get another DEXA scan done at the end of this test to see what he could do about this.

As it turned out, you really can affect one side of your body and bring your lagging part back to normal to balance them out.

Surprisingly the answer wasn’t more weight, but more work and better muscle activation – as John shares in today’s episode, he had to take more time to warm up the right side to achieve the same activation throughout his regular workout.

Listen to the podcast for more information on this experiment.

Brad’s Experiment – Slow Bulking

As Brad confesses in today’s episode, he really wanted for bulking to work and I mean who doesn’t, eating more for more muscles? Sounds like a bodybuilder’s dream.

Well, the reality is different and rather boring.

In the past Brad has tried every way you could think of (and more) to make bulking work. He tried the standard 6 meals a day, 300 grams of protein, cheat days and even cheat weeks with 10 000 calorie intake and no result at all…well he did gain fat, but that’s not what he was really after.

So, it’s safe to say that bulking doesn’t work.

Then a couple months ago he thought about another way of trying bulking. He realized that each time he would try it, it would be a very quick process, never slow. So he decided to go about bulking up slowly, just a couple hundred calories here and there, he didn’t change his workouts, recorded everything and did a DEXA scan after the experiment was after.

If you wanna find out about the whole process and more importantly the results, go down and listen to the podcast.

In today’s UNCENSORED training, you will also discover:

  • How to prepare the muscles that you have hard time activating for the workout
  • How can you bring up a lagging part back up to balance it with the rest of the body if lifting heavier doesn’t help
  • What is slow bulking  and whether it can work for you
  • How you can get your goals hijacked with focusing on strength gains
  • Why it’s important to stop chasing weight at some point and what’s more important when the goal is muscle growth
  • How if you are not careful “body building” can turn into weight lifting and power lifting and why this is dangerous to your physique goals
  • Is there a relationship between being well trained at a certain movement/exercise and looking good? (The answer to this might surprise you)
  • How DEXA can help you see clearly through fitness disbeliefs and help you discover what truly works for your body and what’s just BS you should avoid

 

Warning: Bulking Leads to Less Fab and More Flab

Here’s the next episode of the UNCENSORED Podcasts Season 2.

Today’s topic: Bulking

What is bulking?

In a nutshell,  bulking occurs when eating at a caloric surplus to gain muscle mass. However, in reality it’s just overeating resulting in fat gain.

Warning Bulking Leads to Less Fab and More Flab

Once you start thinking about bulking, you will realize that anyone who chooses to follow this approach is basically throwing away logic in the name of impatience.

We are naturally impatient so the idea of eating like it’s your job for the sake of gaining more muscle is tempting, especially if you have a low Basal Metabolic Rate, but goes against the reality of how your body really builds muscle.

And today it’s not something that just men fall for, but as lots of women realize that fat loss is not enough and that they also need to build some muscles to look fit, a lot of them also fall for this myth as well.

So why do so many people try to bulk up if it doesn’t work? And why is it still presented as the standard way of building muscle by conventional fitness media?

The answer is quite simple, because this concept is highly profitable to certain companies’ and individuals.  It’s impossible to bulk up by yourself.  You will need a trainer to tell you exactly what to eat and supplements to take… and the rest of the story is self-explanatory.

In today’s episode John Barban and Brad Pilon talk about the conspiracy supporting the concept of bulking.

They will expose the fitness industry and show you that almost everyone is working against you and why it’s important to be aware of the truth if you hope to ever get in shape and build your ideal hourglass body.

In today’s UNCENSORED training, you will also discover:

  • You will find out 3 reasons why there is something we call a “bulking conspiracy” that keeps this myth alive
  • You will understand how the people you meet every day in the gym are making it easy for your to fall for this myth
  • You will get your final answer on whether excess calories help you build more muscle or not (hint: there is a big difference in “make” vs “allow”).
  • You will know what happens to testosterone and growth hormone when you eat a lot of calories and whether it’s different for women
  • You will discover whether you can build muscle while “cutting”?

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Age Well Into Your Golden Years with the Venus Index

Here’s the first part of this month’s UNCENSORED Podcasts Season 2.

Today’s topic: Aging.

This is a follow-up to this month earlier podcast about Silo Science, if you haven’t heard it yet, you can listen to it here: The Truth about Silo Science and Research Misinterpretation You See Online

Everyone ages, but the question is how WELL will YOU age?

Today John Barban and Brad Pilon discuss why Venus Index is the only metric you really need to pay attention throughout your life.

It answers the fundamental questions “How do I know I’m doing okay?“.

You don’t have to worry about healthy foods, cardio or any sort of the conventional stuff and just hoping it will make you healthier and help you live longer.

When we age, most of us experience  a decline in testosterone production. And since testosterone is linked to vitality, it’s something we definitely need to pay attention (and yes this applies to women too, testosterone isn’t just men’s hormone).

Several benefits of testosterone include positive impact on depression, joint health, bone density and it also works as a prevention for certain diseases.

Testosterone plays a key role in our lives, in both men and women. If you have a feeling like your life sucks right now, it can actually be that you have low testosterone, so it might be worth getting it checked and if necessary getting a therapy.

Today we will be discussing how big of a role this hormone plays in your body and how much it affects your day to day life.

We will also talk about how famous research studies’ are often misquoted in fitness media. Lastly, we will answer the question of whether testosterone has to naturally decline or can it be prevented?

After listening to the podcast you will have a clear view of the role testosterone plays in your body, you will have metrics for measuring how well you age and you will also be able to answer these questions:

  • Data from the studies come from a small group of people [yes or no]
  • How well we age is not in fact related to testosterone [yes or no]
  • Leanness and muscle mass in combination is great sign of aging well  [yes or no]
  • Large volume of food at one sitting decreases testosterone  [yes or no]
  • Weight training doesn’t help maintain testosterone levels  [yes or no]
  • There are more things besides training, eating less and maintaining the ideal shape that can help you age well [yes or no]
  • Caring extra fat is just a matter of not looking your best, it’s not dangerous [yes or no]
  • Bulking can work for everyone [yes or no]
  • Testosterone is a healthy thing to inject into your body[yes or no]
  • Anyone can get back in shape [yes or no]
  • Drop in testosterone is directly causing depression and the lack of the youthful feeling [yes or no]

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