They were back with a live view from the North today. I'm Jay Fidel. This is Stink Tech. Our guest is Ken Rogers. And at the moment, we're going to know more about him. Ken is a business guy. Ken attended NYU Stern School of Business, which he and I went to see six months ago in New York. And it was quite a time. And it was called GBA Graduate Business Administration. Was it back when, when we knew each other in New York? Welcome to the show, Ken. Hello, Jay. So let me, let me start by saying, you know, you and I have both followed the world. I mean, we lived in the world now since, you know, we made many moons, many, many moons. I won't go into the details, but it was actually in the 60s. And in the 60s, though, we're not newspaper headlines about affordable housing and homelessness. And somewhere along the line, it all changed. And now you see problems and headlines about affordable housing every day. You see every legislative governmental body trying to solve that problem unsuccessfully in so many places. And you see homelessness on the streets pretty much everywhere. So if you look at the views of an economist, which you are, what, you know, what do you see happened here? How come? What was the evolution of our global economy so as to have all these people on the street? Well, an awful lot of it relates to government policies worldwide, particularly all of the governments of the world tend to run net mega-sized deficits. In order to finance the deficits, all of the central banks have to increase the money supply for the amount that the government is spending. But in addition, it's become government policy, particularly since Japan had a period of deflation. And everybody thought that was somewhere between leprosy and the plague. And, you know, I don't agree. However, the world reaction was pretty simple. It was just print more money. You know, the Federal Reserve certainly has led the way in having very easy money. But every country like Canada is no different.  They don't worry about it because, you know, the last 25 years have shown they can just keep having deficit every year. Nobody cares. And that the central banks set this target of 2% inflation. Well, if you just take the last 10 or 15 years, certainly since the 2008 crisis, the abundance of cash in the market, let's just call it, central banks printing money. Where did all that money go? You know, now it did filter throughout the economy and have an effect everywhere. However, the major difference was that it went to those people who had capital. You know, and what did they do with it? You know, they had some capital. What did they do with it? Well, you really have two really obvious places. It went into housing and it went into the stock market. You know, you're sitting where the increase in stocks has been very phenomenal. But thank you, Federal Reserve. You know, it's not because somebody was a brilliant picker of stocks. It was really, you could buy anything and it would go up.  And yet, nevertheless, their stocks have gone up over the years.  But you know, the biggest thing for the public at large was that everybody that owned a house became a financial genius because it went up in value.  It didn't take very long before you could sell that condo at a sizable profit. You know, and that gave you the equity to step up to the next level.  Well, you always had, you know, the Canadian dream or the American dream was to own a house in the suburb with a lawn and you could raise your kids in a nice neighborhood where all of the houses near you were similar to yours. There was homogeneity in the neighborhood and you had a school that all the kids could walk to. You had not too far away. You had some recreation center. And life was a dream if you took, you know, most cities in the Western U.S. or the West and most in Canada, almost everywhere. You know, and I think of cities like Salt Lake City or Seattle or Phoenix or that Denver, you know, the way of life is a nice single-family home in the suburb.  You know, just in area, but there's not very many people living in an apartment. You know, there are apartments, but they're virtually all rental. There's not as many condos as there are somewhere. Now, so you get your housing crisis. It's really, it's not a crisis for anybody that's a baby boomer that's, because they're sitting on this upgrade in housing and they're house rich. It's really anybody trying to get into the market, you know, and you've got to start off with, you know, the rentals. You know, what's the matter? Why do we have allegedly an inadequate number of rentals? Well, there's a difference depending where you live. For example, most cities in Canada, such a, you know, large city like Calgary or Edmonton, you know, they're a million and a half people or a, you know, a fast growing smaller city like the one I live in, Kelowna in British Columbia. If you have minimum wage of $15 an hour, you know, that's just between two and two and a half grand a month, what can you afford? Where can you afford to live? Well, a, you know, 50 to 70 year old apartment building with a one bedroom suite that's about five to 600 square feet that is pretty skinny.  So the guy at 15 bucks an hour can't afford it. He would call that a housing crisis. You know, you have to have two people to share that while two people sharing the one bedroom. Gee, maybe you got upgrade to a two bedroom. Well, two people have troubles weaking out the two bedroom unit in those cities in Canada. If you went to cities in the maritime provinces like in New Brunswick, you know, very, very pleasant, lovely city, Moncton or Fredrickton, you know, there are 150,000 people type of scale. You know, you can easily, you know, if you can earn $15 an hour and I put an if there because the problem with those areas is lack of jobs. You know, you can find accommodation. However, if you then tried to say, well, what about Toronto, Montreal or Vancouver?  I mean, you know, a two bedroom condo in anywhere, in a reasonably close in, let's call it almost anywhere in metropolitan Vancouver, it cost you like 2,500 to 3,000 a month. What is government doing about that? I mean, it seems to me it's a, if we can identify it here on Think Tech, if you can talk about it that way, then government should know and government should, you know, consider steps, measures to fix it, alleviate it, you know, but what options are available to government and what has government done for both the federal government and the provincial governments in Canada? Well, the federal government in Canada has done a lot of talking. They said, gee, we have a housing crisis, we're gonna allocate a whole bunch of money and just about like everything, this particular government has done in particular Prime Minister Trudeau is they talk a lot and do nothing. You know, they talked a lot, said they were gonna allocate a huge amount of money to work on the housing crisis, but didn't do anything. You know, you can take a different angle of the housing crisis and your solutions would be day and night different than, you know, the example I was using of somebody who has a low-paying job, they're at the entry level, they're not married yet and they're trying to move up the ladder, you know, and in most cities in Canada, you know, they can achieve a certain level. That is they can certainly pay the rent, but they can't jump to home ownership. They have great trouble jumping, you know, the first step is can they buy an apartment condo?  You know, if they're sitting with 35 or 40% of what they're earning going into paying rent, they're certainly never gonna be able to save enough money for a down payment again, because of the, you know, cash inflation or just the inflation that the governments and central banks have put into the economy in which the biggest beneficiaries are the biggest problems where it was, most of that money went into housing or stock. Well, if you take the other end of the housing crisis, you've got the homeless people. We've talked homeless on your category and there you're sitting where, what can governments do to solve the housing crisis of the homeless?  Well, you certainly could create the equivalent of hospitals or housing, you know, institutional type housing for mental problems. And a good percentage of the street people have mental problems. Secondly, you've got alcohol and drug treatment and the society does not have adequate provision for treatment and government should invest pretty heavily in those two things or three things. If you take alcohol or drugs as one problem or two, it doesn't matter which, your solutions are somewhat similar, but the mental illness is another and really another aspect of that homeless problem which we discussed in a previous thing was the legal framework where in Canada we have a very simple catch and release program for an endless number of repeat offenders. They may be, you know, a small petty crime in terms of the court thinking, but you know, when the same person has committed, you know, breaking a window for a store, you know, then standing there, wait for the police to come so they can get arrested and get, you know, a couple of days or maybe a month of free meals in the pokey. But that homelessness problem, you know, really has very little to do with the cost of housing the same as the person that's working and trying to, you know, first pay for rent and then upgrade to where they can buy a condo and then hopefully someday dream to own a house in the suburb with the kids in the backyard. Well, I mean, it looks like it's a crisis from both sides. And when I say crisis, I mean, a crisis to the larger community, a crisis to the society, a crisis to the country. And for some reason, lawmakers don't see that. Maybe since it doesn't reach them personally, they say, oh, you know, this is a sort of a right-wing approach to it. It's their fault. If they work harder at up early in the morning, you know, they find a job. If they put the nose to the grindstone, they wouldn't have this problem. It's all on them. And so, legislators, you know, lawmakers don't really take the steps necessary. And what, you know, do you have any thoughts about what motivates their inaction on what is obviously a crisis and increasing crisis on both ends? The, I would say, you know, lack of enough intelligence to figure out what to do. You know, for example, in Vancouver, which has really got a housing price problem. I mean, Vancouver is a pretty compact city. It's got an awful lot of apartments, apartment condos and apartment rentals, as opposed to single-family housing, where most Canadian cities are like Phoenix or Denver or Salt Lake City, where it's predominantly a single-family home city. Well, you know, the province of British Columbia is brilliant solution for housing. Their very first item, brand new premier, who used to be the minister of housing, was to say that all condominiums could no longer have a provision in their strata title or strata rules that precludes rentals. Now, they backed off saying, well, if it is a seniors-only strata, you know, age 55 and over, they can maybe still have rentals or no rentals, you know, but everybody else must have.  I mean, if you have a upscale condo, you know, you certainly don't want a couple of, you know, teeny boppers moving in next door, having wild parties or something. However, you know, your overall government need to increase the supply of housing, but importantly, how do you get the cost of housing down relative to the income of the population? You know, and you've got to, you've got to see, yeah, go ahead. You got to stop printing money. You know, one thing that some people might say is a good thing that may happen in the future. In the past, when we've had technology kicking out a certain type of job, somewhere else in the economy, there have been other jobs created. Well, there's an awful lot of serious economic thinking now that, you know, part of our, you know, current problems of inequality relate to the fact that technology is knocking off higher paying jobs than those that are being, that are developing because the economy is expanding. That is, you know, we have a lower level, and if you look at the accelerating pace of technology, and you're going to hit major areas, like if you just say a self-driving vehicle may be the way of life in less than 10 years. Yeah, but that takes nearly three to 4% of all workers are drivers.   They get pretty good pay.  Now, what are they going to be replaced by? You know, you have an awful lot of other jobs that will get replaced by technology that are high paying. And I don't see where there's going to be jobs spring up in the society that are going to be equal to those that are replaced at high paying numbers. You know, you have an area like healthcare, where there, you know, there's going to be a phenomenal expansion in the number of people employed in the healthcare industry, but most of them are not going to be, you know, the MD at a big income. They're going to be, you know, at lower level healthcare. And- Isn't a solution to that to have the government step in and incentivize training of people who lose their jobs to technology and train them in technology so that they can, you know, sort of circle back and be involved in the tech revolution.  And that way you have innovation at the technology level. And maybe, you know, it's not a zero sum game. You have the whole society moving forward into technology. So the low paying jobs, which aren't available anymore, are in fact replaced by high paying jobs. Well, I don't see that. I really don't see the jobs that are being replaced being at a lower pay than the jobs that are being developed or the ones that come out of the woodwork. Now, there's going to be lots of high paying jobs in the future that don't exist today. But the number of those is going to be way, way, way less the number of jobs that technology kicks out at the lower end of the pay scale. That's my personal opinion, but you know, I believe there's lots of basis for that. However, you know, it's really how does it affect the housing crisis, which was really what we were trying to deal with and what can governments do? Well, you know, how can the government reduce the cost of housing? Well, I'll tell you one way. This may not apply to Canada, but in Hawaii, we don't have housing kits, you know, prefabricated kits. Because the unions oppose it. They don't put as much time into building a house when you import a kit from the Pacific Northwest, you know, and all you have to do is, you know, put it together. So they want to see it come up from the ground. They want to see a lot of labor involved in building a single family house. And the problem there is that they're politically powerful. So they have had their way and kits just don't get imported to Hawaii. But if you had prefabricated, if you had technology, if you had, you know, houses that get printed up, you know, by printing machines, it would be a lot cheaper. And a lot of that is labor. So why can't the government incentivize tax credits, what have you, that kind of housing construction? Well, I certainly believe that you call them prefabricated kits. Well, why don't you have a prefabricated factory in Honolulu that produces, you know, what I could call a mobile home or a prefabricated components for a stick-built house. You know, you're, you know, the advantage of building in a factory is a lot less in Hawaii than it would be in a place where the weather's not as good. And, you know, because you work outside whether it's raining or not, but you can't work outside in 30 or 40 degrees below zero. But if you took a simple example of a mobile home that's pretty common in size because that's what you can ship down a highway, 14 feet wide. And if you just take 58 feet long, you got about a 750 square foot mobile home that there are zillions of excellent floor plans with most all of them are two bedroom units of that exact module. And if you took a factory in Ohio or Pennsylvania or Michigan, you can produce one of those for about $50,000. Now in, you know, that's US dollars.   So you're lucky if you can do it for a hundred grant in Canadian dollars, which would be about 75 US. So it seems to me just focusing on that possibility of prefabricated and, you know, mobile homes, we can alleviate a lot of the housing problem because we can build it cheaper if we don't over-regulate it. If we, you know, make it more of a free market, we let it cross the border, we don't impose, you know, all those obstacles and we could build a lot more of them at the $50,000 range. And then we could give tax breaks on the $50,000. We could put everybody in a home that way, right?  The government could buy it or already own it. You know, it could take one of the military bases and throw up military and say, we wanna use all this land for inexpensive housing.  Or you have to put in the money for that infrastructure which isn't cheap and requires the government to actually shell out big bucks to make it possible to have the prefabricated or mobile home. But I wanna get to one other thing before we run out of time, Ken, it's this. It's the Charles Dickens, you know, future. You spoke before initially about how we have been printing money, both the US and Canada and other Western countries. And this ultimately leads to the housing crisis. And the housing crisis, you know, at least in large part leads to the homeless crisis which has taken place in relatively recent years. Suppose I reverse that. Suppose I say, we're not gonna print money, we're gonna be really conservative. We are going to stop that. We're gonna treat that as an abuse. So we're gonna stop that.  Sorry, I don't wanna sound like him at all, but if you got conservative about it, and I'm not suggesting this as a solution, I'm merely asking the effect of it, right? So if I get conservative and I say, we're gonna reverse all those processes you were talking about that led to this thing in the first place, you know, the national and say provincial, the state processes that throw money around and print money, that could be a reversal of the problem and over time lead to a better situation. But at the same time, at the end of the day, this is all about money. And suppose the legislature in addition or alternative spent a lot of money on that infrastructure. They built the projects you were talking about. They incentivized construction. You know, they saw this as a true crisis and did everything within their power to alleviate it. On the thought that if we let this go on and let the numbers get worse and worse and worse, it's gonna destabilize our cities. It's gonna create a problem for public safety, for public health. We have really got to stop this process and whatever it takes. So we're gonna take the money and put it on that instead. We're not gonna hold back. If we do that, and this is my big question to you, if we do that, what effect does it have on other parts of the economy, on other parts of fiscal stability? Doesn't it have negative effects in some other way? At the end of the day, it is kind of a zero sum game, isn't it? Well, the inflation as has been occurring is really key to the increase in income inequality. You know, and it's the income inequality that in my mind causes the social unrest. You know, in virtually every city in Canada, there's not a housing crisis that is in any way similar to Toronto or Vancouver. There's no housing crisis in Kelowna if you eliminate the homelessness problem. That you have people striving, but really your question, if you took economically, and said, if we're going to have deflation, you know, in deflation, you're gonna have the value of assets such as a house, a condo, gradually goes down in value, you know, 1% a year or something, and in theory. And you know, that holding cash is better. Well, that didn't work in Japan.  Like Vancouver has a great solution for some of their housing, where as they've extended their railway system or their train system for local commuting, you know, they have required that they will not build a line and a station unless the local area allows for a phenomenal increase in density. Well, you know, Vancouver has been a phenomenal success in that regard. There are zillions of housing units in quantity have been built. They just, you know, cost more than most people can deal with, you know, but your Canada is very heavy on immigration. And most of the people that immigrate to the areas of Canada that I'm most familiar with, they don't have a great problem because what happens is they get two families move in together in an accommodation that no North American thinks is appropriate for me or my children. You know, you've got tons of people in the area around me that have been phenomenally successful, especially Sikhs from the portions of near the border of India and Pakistan.  They moved to our area and, you know, 10 years later they're able to buy, you know, huge orchards and wineries and because they are willing as people to solve the housing problem themselves by just having, you know, 20 people living in a three bedroom house. Well, you know, sacrificed by the immigrant sort of thing, you know, a very strong willed approach to dealing with a new country. But, you know, for a lot of other people, as time goes by, the white picket fence dream disappears. As time goes by, they can't afford to buy a house and they also can't afford to pay the rent and as we move forward, I would say, we're gonna see really draconian things happen in the next, what, 10 or 15 years where more and more people are in the crisis. So, clearly- Well, it's not so much a crisis as a loss of hope or the income inequality is, you know, what was yours and my dream when we came out of college and what was the same for every baby boomer that came along that tomorrow would be a brighter day than today and the day after would be better still and boy, can I look for a rosy future and, you know, some 25 or 35 year old now, you know, they don't have that nice, cozy feeling and the housing is a big part of it, but also the inequality in job income is so dramatic. So, these things are all connected in the sense that when you talk about a lack of vision, a lack of optimism for the future and that goes with that a lack of confidence in the government, the system, the community who, you know, they have hoped would care for them and isn't caring for them. And I suggest to you that, you know, if I were a legislator or you were a legislator, we would see this as a threat, you know, to the future and not only for the individual or the community, you know, but even to other cities that don't have these problems right now, they may have them later. And so, we really have to do something about it. It is existential. And I don't know what that is exactly, but somebody has to roll up their coat sleeves, shirt sleeves, if they have sleeves. Well, certainly, it's certainly not, you know, the American Congress setting the example. They're doing exactly the opposite.  Yeah, the message is clear, they don't care about helping the people, their theoretical... Or any ethics whatsoever. Or any ethics question. They're in it for their own benefit, and that's a corruption. And the problem is that the people out there, millions of them, see this, they understand that they're not on the list of priorities, who knows how far down that list they may be, and they lose confidence in the government, and ultimately, you know, the government is at risk, as in Brazil, as on January 6th. And so, you know, to me, the confidence question is critical. Public confidence, George Washington said it, that's the first order of business. And if we have people on the street homeless, if we have people who can never see a reasonable, you know, life ahead of them in this country, we have a lack of confidence, no? And so, if we were going to list the priorities here, the one thing that we could do, which should be very close to the top of the list, is provide housing. Yeah, well, you've got to provide a better future for people, that's what they're after. I mean, why do people, you know, why are the Venezuelans knocking at the Southern border to the US, or people from Haiti, they want a better future for their kids, as well as themselves, you know, where, you know, to me, a lot of the stupidity of the American public is because they don't see a better future. You know, the government's not doing it for them. Maybe between now and the next time we get together, we'll find at least, you know, some clever, innovative possibility to suggest to them. In the meantime, thank you very much for joining me today. This was a very interesting discussion. Thank you so much for watching Think Tech Hawaii. If you like what we do, please like us and click the subscribe button on YouTube and the follow button on Vimeo. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, and donate to us at thinktechhawaii.com. Mahalo.


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We're in the barbell logic channel there and subscribe and We also barbell hyphen logic comm go there and sign up for the Friday 5s We've got an email newsletter that goes out all kinds of freemium content that doesn't cost you anything but an email Yeah, we send special deals out you have discounts to online coaching and online great books and T-shirts and retail stuff and there's lots of great content that only the subscribers of the newsletter gets cool stories like history of weightlifting stories and they feature Coaches and we brag about clients PRs and there's always a really cool feature story Carl shoot just wrote one on Where he compared me to Aristotle, which I mean obviously I'm so angry I mean, I know most people when they meet me. They're like God that guy reminds me Aristotle and It's actually as much as of a narcissist and egomaniac as I am that was probably the most embarrassing article That's ever been written. I don't know. It feels pretty weird. I'll work on top of that Yeah, you probably could you know the stories so go to YouTube and subscribe to our podcast there We'll be putting out more and more content there and we will make it worth your while I promise click on the little bell on the top right corner and ask for notifications So you get notified when we push a new video up. We'll be up in this schedule Yeah, we need to do a quick episode on barbell and Jim safety. Yeah, definitely We think I don't want to do this one, but it needs to be done. Yeah, well, I mean, this is no fun No, especially I need to tell a story. I think at the beginning of this It's gonna I mean I just I just assume at this point I get choked up at least one time every podcast so In July of 14. I had a little cousin 23 year old cousin Kenny Reynolds Who was working out late at night 9 30 10 o'clock at night at at his place of work So he worked at a large corporation, which I certainly won't name and they had an employee Jim and Probably didn't even have bar bills. He was actually on the Smith machine Yeah, he was bench pressing at 175 pounds on the bar bench pressing no spotters totally empty gym, you know people are working the night shift and Somehow he lowered 175 pounds down and couldn't get it back up and don't know if he passed out or you know I know that if had to be on this neck, right? It was on his neck Yeah, so, you know, you're kind of natural inclination is to is to hold that bar lockout at your neck And then of course on that Smith machine it comes straight down so it didn't come down over his chest And I don't if he passed out or it was just too heavy And then he was in a bad position where his elbows were way in front of his wrist or what it was but he couldn't get the thing locked back in and the barbell side on his neck for 17 minutes and security guard walked by 17 minutes later and my little cousin was brain-dead and And so, you know, they took him to the hospital for a couple days and did the best they could keeping alive he wasn't he hadn't passed yet and You know cooled him off and put him in a coma and tried to get brain function back And they couldn't get it back and then take him off life support And so, you know, my family especially his his parents and he had he has five brothers and sisters Some of whom I'm super close to it's as close to some of his it's like my own brothers and sisters And we're obviously asking me a lot of questions.  You know, I don't know how to answer this and I don't exactly know what happened And of course the the corporation certainly wasn't going to turn over the security tapes to us right without being made to do so and so You need to write an article about barbell safety, you know and try to save some lives and help people to do this in a safer manner And so barbells Barbells can be dangerous if used improperly like a firearm. They should be respected the same way that you should respect the firearm But if you follow the rules of safety, just like if you follow the four rules of firearm safety Nobody gets killed and not only does nobody killed in barbell safety. It's in barbell training It's really really rare to even get hurt. Nobody even gets injured. Yeah, all you have to do is follow just a handful of rules And so so I just like to go through the major lifts and talk about how we Perform those lifts correctly safely both if you have a training partner spotter slash spotter And if you don't man, let's do this as quick as we can because nobody wants to hear this They need to hear it. I got a listen. So yeah, we'll start with the easy one the deadlift. Okay, no spotters No spotters. I bet you're more likely to get hurt if you have a spotter Oh, for sure. If you don't you have to especially the spotters more likely get hurt for sure. Yeah, I think barbells on the ground Oh, by the way, this would go for the snatch and the power clean as well Yeah, only you just get more hurt with a get more hurt with a snatch You know a deadlift doesn't get dropped on anybody's head, right a snatch theoretically could It is really rare to drop weight on yourself, right It is not rare to drop weight on someone else I could see somebody crowding the platform and you got lock in your deadlift out and then just dropping it on that other dudes Yeah, sure, right, but it's gonna be silly stuff like that. That's right. Stay away from the deadlifter I think that you know other than somebody getting their shins scuffed up from a nasty knurling on the bar It's pretty safe people get dizzy. I have passed out after putting down a heavy deadlift Yeah, but the weight wasn't in your hands anymore Oh After putting it down, you're right. It wasn't my hands that's when it always let go and then it gets woozy, right? Yeah, there's times you have to go down on your hands and knees and try to Your platform should be clear man Don't put your change weights. Don't put tens on the you know You pull tens off you're training with the training partner you pull some weight off And you just lay them on the platform next to that's a real bad idea You know those dodecahedron plates or bad ideas But in general we don't there's no way to safely spot a deadlift the one last word about the deadlift People do get dizzy when they put the deadlift down. It's my working theory That's because their blood pressure is very very high sure and they unload Too quickly. Yep, and their blood pressure goes to zero and they fall out if you're getting dizzy I think it's because you set the darn thing down too heavy Like if you if you've got a heavy in your hand and you just open your hands right man You might your trouble so set it down a little slower If you're getting dizzy release the pressure a little bit as you probably fix it and then blow your air out slow at the bottom Yeah, that's probably good idea. So those are the easy ones. That's the easy stuff, right next easiest press the press Yep, so let's talk about press. So first. Let's talk about a full-range press. Mm-hmm. So Really the the press is actually similar to the deadlift and that it's been it's very rare That's I've ever seen anybody drop a press on their head super rare. Yeah, I haven't seen anybody drop one on their head So you have a couple options option one is if you press with bumper plates with with rubber plates And really if you've got a decent platform and you don't press with them Please just press with iron and you press outside the rack if something bad happens You can you can kind of control the bar and throw it to the floor without chucking it Yeah, and it doesn't land on your head And you really don't have to teach people that because it's our natural instinct to not let weight They can't get it over the head anyway. They can't get over their midfoot right, right, right? They get to their forehead and then it comes down Certainly if you have a tall enough Squat rack like a collegiate type squatter when Rachel I lift in our rogue rack I can't press inside the right just barely but she can and so and we've got one of those real deep rogue racks like four feet Deep and so she'll press inside the rack. I'll press outside the rack No problem there at all and so again of all of the lifts that you spot The chances of getting hurt spotting the press is probably higher than anything else You don't so out of press because weight is overhead. No, what are you gonna do? So if somebody presses so, you know, I've pressed 300 before and you press around 200 pounds It really to 10. Okay. So, okay, so let's even say you're pressing 210. Yeah, and I'm spotting Can I catch the 210 if you throw it on me? Nope. No, even though I can press so it's it's just you don't you don't Yeah, it's a bad idea inside the rack I like to put the on pressing inside the rack You just put the pins you put the catch pins just below your shoulders So that you can put the bar on the shoulders if you need to that's not a problem at all And you know, we see people get lightheaded on the press too sometimes Yeah, it doesn't come on like a lightning strike.  Yeah Yeah, and when does it normally have you seen it? So I've noticed with one of the press movements that it doesn't more often than others. Yeah, well the press lockout Yeah, the lockout it happens and if it happens with a regular press, it's two inches below lockout Correct, it's at the same spot. Yeah, but the press lockout is the one that is going to cause someone to black out more than anything But you're already on the safety arms. You're already on that big a deal That's right.  You may hit the ground a little bit hard You may bump your head, but but I've never really seen that either. It's not a people don't pass out instantly They kind of buckle and catch themselves. Yeah, really just have a blackout event and hit your head Yeah, those aren't that those aren't that big a deal. No, let's let's do squat the squat Because that's that's actually the one that requires probably while not as Dangerous to the lifter as a bench press which we'll end with it's the one that requires probably the most skill as a spotter You bet that fair. It's actually useful to spot You other ones can't that's right. Yeah, so the first lift that we have this useful spot is the squat So let's start with there's really no safe way for one person to spot the squat Nope. Nope. So if you have a single training partner for the squat You should really just pretend you don't have a training partner and squat inside the rack And we'll talk about how to do that here in a second But if you have more than one person, well, let's talk a little bit more if you have one One reason reason why one person can't really spot the squat is because there's no way to get hold of that bar and Help the guy and keep a vertical bar path when somebody fails in the squat 90% of the time It's because this forward of their midfoot anyway Yeah, and then this guy's like Hunching your like thoracic spine and then like pushes the bar forward more and you both die Yeah, you just can't do it to guys You can spot yes So the other problem with one guy is is that you really have to maintain contact with your lifter at all times and try To spot him. So, you know if look If there was a if I was if I was in a gym and some guy was squatting 700 pounds in a real shady rack which he shouldn't do and he asked me would you spot me I probably would just because you want to be the big spoon It doesn't want to be the spoon. Yeah, I hate that.  They don't know if you helped again I mean you get touched by spotter the rep belongs to the spotter not the lifter So it's a bad idea if you're if you're the place is gonna shady racks made out old oil filled equipment And this is like hey, we don't need squat that today. No, yeah So so two spotters Yeah, we and we spot the pikes not the bar, right? Yeah, we well I spot the plates and the bar Well, yeah, I like that better. So if I spot what you'll see most people doing when they spot them for those You guys watching the YouTube channel a lot of a lot of people will interlock their fingers and put it underneath the barbell And you can catch it pretty well there. I've actually it's you can catch it fine. Yeah, maybe maybe not Maybe not I don't see a lot of 50 in this head south. Maybe not the problem is Is that my job as a spotter is to get if things first off if you're a spotter You don't touch the bar or the plates unless something goes horribly wrong, right? You don't help them get it back in the rack ever because you're on one side of the bar Right now if you're a coach and they lift and they stand up and it's really really heavy And you put your hand on their upper back after they've locked out their squat and guide them back into the rack That's fine. No problem with that. But a side spotter. So two guys would spot on there would be a guy spot on each side My job is if something goes bad Is to get the barbell back into the j-hooks only if i'm standing there directly beside The barbell with interlocked fingers and underneath the barbell and I catch the barbell it goes bad I can't see the j-hooks because the plates are in the way and you can't get it high enough either It's a guy's tall you can't get it high enough So instead if I step forward If i'm on the lifters left, I would use my left arm as the primary spotting arm So that I could catch the bar in the crook of my elbow and grab the plates with my hands And then as I start to help put it back in I can see the j-hook So i'm in slightly in front of the the barbell. Well, you're slightly behind the lifter Correct. You're slightly behind the lifter The bar is in the crook of your arm you got hold of the plates and you help guide it back in And so the spotter on the left side uses his left arm is the primary spotting arm And the spotter on the right side of the lifter would use his right arm We'll shoot a three minute video on that Yeah, super easy and you grab the bar and you get it back in you don't make sure you don't lift it up Real fast because if you lift your side up fast the other side goes down You've got to work with your spotter and you've got to be it requires some technique If people haven't spotted before I teach my lifters how to spot At the Like the last warm-up. Yep, because I don't want to struggle at all with I don't want to put any We're going to figure this out while it's light enough and nobody's gonna miss right? We're gonna get the timing figured out so When do they spot? Only when they miss So what is it? How do you how do you know the lifter's missed right so he gets down there goes down The bar goes down It started to come back up and then it went down again Correct So if it's slow we don't spot if it stops we don't spot It's only when it starts heading south again. Yeah, that's right And sometimes people will say if it you know if it moves any direction other than up I don't actually don't agree with that. You know like I would never get my own Float every bar forward four inches north of you know forward to your midfoot So, you know, that's another thing that requires some experience I've had to yell many times as a coach at other spotters Take it who are starting to take it now more often or not.  Yeah had a pr She had it like I've watched her do enough reps and I know she had it. It was slow It was really slow, but she was the first really the first heavy squad of the day first slow the first one that really slowed down Yeah, yeah, and she was first heavy when she was a female north of 300 of the day Sure, and the spotters took it from her and she had it and she will never forgive them Never forgive. She wasn't happy So if you don't have a spotter, which a lot of you don't you look at a squat rack That's why you buy a rack And what you do is on your warm-ups What I do is I would video myself from the side and with the empty bar and the first kind of be oblique That's right. You have to video yourself oblique and make sure that when you are just below parallel in a squat That the catch pins end up another two or three inches below that like one or two holes lower than that One or two holes lower and that depends on the whole spacing of your Of your squat rack and you put the catch pins in there and you get those set when the weight is light And you figure out what hole that is and you either mark it on the rack Or if it's numbered write the number down in your book and that's your hole forever. Yeah, that's right. It works really really well White out the white out, you know brush or white nail polish or a Sharp like a silver silver sharpie or something works great there So yeah, you mark those and and that's where you set it And so then you go down and then you learn like it's it's actually it would be awesome if people never missed reps Right And as a matter of fact, you shouldn't miss reps very often, especially squat reps But sometimes something happens, especially for Intermediate early intermediate lifters As they start to go through really heavy stuff and they haven't they haven't had to grind and also they're kind of the first time They're doing Sets with reps less than five, right? So in threes and twos and singles They get down and they misgroove something. Sometimes it's not even a strength issue They just misgroove it a little bit and it's not coming back up They have to know how to bail quote unquote bail. Yeah, we don't actually bail No, you never throw the bar. You just I say I say think of taking a knee That's right Because most of the time when you miss the bars forward of your midfoot anyway So you just got to go ahead and lean forward a little bit and just set it on the bar squat down a little bit more Yep This is what down if you typically squat an inch below parallel If you'll squat two inches below parallel and lean forward a little bit You got the bar it'll take it nice won't make lots of noise Everything will be smooth.  Yep And rarely is a meat director ballsy enough to throw somebody out of the meat They threw one out of nationals they throw people out all the time and so the very first that may not be true Yeah, maybe the first one the very first strength lifting meat So I think there's one I was lift. Yeah, it was I was lifting at it.  They probably weighed 320 pounds and he was like a high school kid 17 18 years old and he got to his second Squat and and he got none of the bottoms are come back up missed it and just bailed Escort him from the building. That's right.  Could you say something to him? And I try to go encourage. I mean he's a kid, right? But it happens you gotta have a standard and so it is what it is So that's the squat. So if you squat by yourself, you always squat in the rack You always squat with safeties. You make sure the safeties are slightly below Below parallel and uh, and if you have one spotter don't have them do anything Have them coach. Yep. And if you have two spotters they can side spot or it's fine I love two spotters. If you miss one, you don't have to uh, you don't have to unload the bar You know, two spotters is nice too for me when I lift heavy Especially if I have competent spotters because I don't have to worry about it. Right. So even if I'm in a rack, I know how to bail on weight You know, I miss a squat about once a year once or twice a year Saying bail that reinforces. Okay. I'm sorry. You're right. Let's say If I just miss an attempt, right or set it down and I just set it on the pins You know, it's not that we've deal. I've done it before. I just don't like thinking about it Right. And if I have competent spotters two of them, then I don't have to worry I say man, I can push with everything I've got and something goes bad.  And actually if I have competent spotters, I will not squat inside the rack I squat outside the right. Yeah, you know, if you spot for a guy that's quite real heavy Like you do or well, even me at this point, it's not super heavy But somebody that's experienced they almost always will say take it. Yeah, right So you don't have to think yeah, just out there.   Yeah I hope you're enjoying this episode in the technique series of the barbell logic podcast You know at barbell logic, we believe that barbell based strength training is literally for everyone And that the only thing holding most people back from all the incredible benefits that come from it is good technique Inconsistency, then we can help with that too And whether you're just getting started or you've been lifting for a while It's difficult to know if you're performing the lifts correctly Or if there's anything you can do to make your lifting better We have tons of free resources online from basic how-to videos It'll get you lifting safely and efficiently right away The podcasts articles and videos that will help you troubleshoot common errors All you have to do is visit barbell logic.com slash technique To see our best technique focused content in one place And while you're at it, you can sign up for a consultation with a barbell logic coach This is a free form check and a chance to ask an expert all your training related questions There's no reason you should be struggling to get started or to make progress Check out barbell logic.com slash technique for more information and sign up for the barbell logic experience again It's a hundred percent free There's nothing better for your training than knowing you're lifting safely training efficiently and on the right track All right, let's get back to the show So that's the squat last one bench press the guillotine. Yeah, the one that could kill you right This is the only lift that we do where we are actively moving weight Over your face. Yeah in your airway You're not gonna get another story real quick story to tell that we had a kid at our high school that I used to teach at I used to run You know ran the weight program and I would run before and after school weights, but there was a weight lifting class During the during the day and they had like six of those So I didn't teach the weight lifting that that kind of stuff is reserved for like the uh, the football coach and so Last hour of the day basketball coach was in the gym And they were all lifting they were bench pressing and a kid had I think he just had like 155 on the bar But he was an all-state baseball player really good baseball player little guy like, you know five seven five eight I don't know 150 160 pounds Had 155 on the bar, which is not a not a max for him and uh, he asked a guy to spot him And the guy rather than walking, uh, kind of between the weights on the weight storage of the rack Went underneath the bar from the bench and the kid was already laying on the bench And the spotter went underneath the bar and rose up too early And unhooked and unhooked it and bumped the bar and it free fell 155 pounds directly across this kid's face like Just below his nose This was in the fall and the kid had to take the rest of the year off school It was done And that was his junior year high school and he came back his senior year and did not look like the same kid I'm mad about it. He had so much plastic surgery on his face If you'd meet him you'd be like, ah, it looks like a pretty normal looking kid And they did a really good job of plastic surgery.  And there's a story from a few years ago We say a few years ago It's been 10 years ago now and the kid had was one of those issues where he had you know 250 pounds 260 pounds Not that much and brought it down and couldn't get it back up And rolled it down his belly to the roll of shame and rolled it down his belly and rolled it onto his lap And finally got out from under it And uh, you know went took a nap And woke up dead, right? Yeah, and uh, yeah, you know tour a bleeder an internal bleeder and bled out Internally from this thing. Yeah, you're rolling It's a you know one inch bar with 250 pounds on it You're gonna squish all these soft tissues and yes, no So let's talk about the right way to do it Well, so there's a couple ways to handle this number one is how do we lift? Well one We never move a bar as a lifter Horizontally over our face without our elbows being locked right so the first thing we do You'll see people a lot of times they take the bar out of the j-hook with bent elbows. No We lock out our elbows while the bar is still over the j-hooks And then move the bar horizontally over our shoulder joint over our glenohumeral joint so that you know That you've got better control of the barbell and then as you break at the elbows and start to lower the bar The bar is over your chest not over your face, right? So that's number one is a lifter that's really important same thing happens when you lock it out It actually happens more often when they try to lock it out You get somebody to start to struggle with a bench press struggle struggle struggle struggle and they try to throw it back in The j-hook that's a terrible idea. It's a good way to get killed So as a lifter we never move the bar horizontally over our face either from the rack to the chest or from the chest to the rack Without our elbows being locked.  Don't touch the bar, right? Don't touch the bar, but If you don't have a spotter your first option should be to not bench press your second option Which shouldn't be bench pressing but if you bench press and you don't listen to what I'm saying You never call her the bar never call it the bar. Yeah, you never call in fact I prefer not callering the bar even with spotters I prefer yeah, well, yeah, you never ever call her the bar even with spotters. I prefer not callering. I prefer no safeties actually To using safeties with the bench press. Okay, but no collars but no collars Yeah, so that you can bail so if you don't have collars think about it if you first off They're often called the safety collars, right?  I want to be clear This is not the best option No, the best option is a spotter and if you don't have a spotter the second best option is to not bench press We don't need to bench press that bad But if you're going to bench press and you are so we're going to talk about how to do it In a safe of a way Even though we've already recognized that you're not going to be that safe And you call it anyway you can still rock it over and put a half of those plates on the floor Yeah, you probably could that's probably the best option and then you can still get out from under it Definitely do not call it and don't roll it down your you're across your guts. That's right. That's a terrible idea Your last option on a bench press is to actually put the safety pins in the rack bench inside the rack You know, we teach to have a fairly good arch not a giant Russian powerlifter arch, you know where there's only two inches range of motion bridge So we don't super bridge but we we want a nice big high chest and we want to we want to sort of pull our Nipples as high as we can get our chest up over our glenohumeral joints So we have less horizontal movement and so you could set the pins Essentially between below where the the top of your chest is But above where your neck is right so that if you get it down on your chest And you're in an arch you could relax that arch and the bar would sit on the pins And not rest on your chest and never end up on your neck So even a worst-case scenario you relax and it's still kind of on your chest You could kind of roll it up towards your neck and by the time it gets to your neck It's not on your neck. It's on the pins. And so again, not a very clean way of doing it But it will save your life and nobody dies. Yeah, so that's barbell safety. That's all you do Man, just be careful one more bench press safety thing Your spotter needs to do an alternate grip when they hand off So the alternate grip you have one hand supine the other prone And oops one hand prone the other supine And you reach off and you put it over the the lifters shoulder joint and then you Carefully open your hands at the same rate and step back and get away and get away and get out of their peripheral If you if you have both hands overhand and you set that bar out there when you let it go You can impart a little rotation on the bar and spin it out of the guy's hands Not only that you don't have great leverage to pick up heavy weight But for me The very first thing I watch is does the person know how to lift off on the bench press? Yeah, so you need to you need to have a little talk if you if you say, hey, can you spot me?  Have a little talk with them go over and show them how you want them to hold the bar And tell them I'm not when I'm ready you count to three on three We pick it up together right and then you can tell them just step back Yeah, then get out of the way. So I had that happen to me in in mexico I was just done at the resort you told us to go to barcelo down at Riviera Maya And they had a really super nice thing there barcelo barcelo. Sorry barcelo Uh, and I was bench pressing and that little trainer guy. You didn't speak good spanish That's right. I didn't speak good spanish. And uh, and so I asked him to come spot me at 315 on the bar I was trying to tell him like hey, I think I'm going to do seven or eight reps at 315 Uh, just spot me. Don't touch the bar. Just save me if I die, you know He's like, okay, got it. And so he lifted off with one hand Right in the middle of the barbell and then kept that hand clenched as hard as he could on the barbell The entire time which means his knuckles touched my chest not the barbell. I bench press 315 for 12, right? Yeah, short range of motion. He's helping me the whole time. So then I got that set done And that's a pr. No, it's not quite but it's so then I went and there was another guy that had been there Every morning was like a maybe a 50 year old american guy and pretty good size and I walked over and said Hey, how are you at spotting bench presses? And he said good. No problem. I said, okay, listen I just had the trainer spot me and he kept his hand on the bar the whole time.  Don't lean plates up. They fall over they fall over on What I got a good one. I tell this all the time almost nobody. Oh, this is gonna be so good if you stuck around for this whole thing Right people put the weight plates on the wrong way iron plates on the wrong way. Okay, right. Oh, yeah 45 and 25 pound plates and theoretically all the plates But I don't really care what you do with the little plates. It's not that big a deal But 45 and 25 pound iron plates that have lips on them Go on the bar facing in. Yep, not facing out and not and not don't worry You know the ipf and powerlifting meets they face them all in and face the last one out. That's for photographs We don't care about photograph and they have spotters for they don't have big lips on those plates either Correct. They're yeah, they're right for the steel. So for normal iron plates Heavy 45 and 25 pound plates face in Why nobody ever knows and by the way, I didn't know for a long time. Right. Yeah, you told me Yeah, so So here's why if a lip faces in for those of you guys on youtube that can't watch I can put eight fingers I have I have all four fingers on my right hand and all four fingers on my left hand On the lip and my thumbs steadying the back the flat end of the plate So there's less chance of dropping on my toes if it faces out only my thumbs are on the lips I only have two Fingers two thumbs on the lip of the plate Boy, I've seen a lot of people with weight facing out Slide a 45 pound plate off and it slides off of their thumb and drops down My brother broke his broke his toe during that one day now The opposite is true On the weight tree on a weight tree they face out because I can actually position myself To go down and grab the plates with my fingers if you face them all in Then I've actually got to kind of grab and wiggle it off of the next plate And you get a blood blister and you get a blood blister and if you've used up the entire bar of the tree There's nowhere for it to go So you'll start to pull it off and it'll fall down and fall on your foot as well So on a weight tree the plates face out And on a barbell the plates face in and if you have bumper plates It doesn't matter because they're all the same and you should have bumper plates and you should have bumper plates No, I you know, I think so. I love iron plates. I love it. I love the rattle You know, I love it But you know if I got a gym and I have people that I don't know that come there Man, the competition bumpers are safer safety noise me too like I lift in my house And so I have bumpers because they're quieter, right? If I'm going to lift it early in the morning or train a client early in the morning My family's upstairs sleeping like bumper plates are a lot quieter You drop a bumper 45 pound bumper on your foot.  They fall over. Yep, uh, carl shoot Taught me this he was uh, he was bench pressing heavy as he always does because he yeah, he's a good bench And uh, he unracked the bar by himself And he hadn't lubed up the sleeves the bushings and the plates wouldn't spin and it spun it out of his hand Oh, wow It was it was uh, it was medium heavy. I mean it was like listening to his garage and so yeah It was the high god hundreds. I think humidity got in there and Rusted it up a little bit and tightened up that sleeve. Yeah, you know, I think he set it down And I think he was coming up and it wasn't very high and it spun it out of his hand So make sure those bearings are and bushings are turning and lubed in those bars It's yeah, well that used to be a struggle I remember when I was in strongman We would we would axle press a lot and an axle is basically just a solid stiff barbell. They're arm sleeves And uh, it changes You really get you've got to get good at pushing that barbell straight up and not letting it bend at all Not letting the if the weights start to spin you're in trouble. Right. Yeah. I think that's it. Yeah, that's how to be safe Man, that's a pretty good start. Yeah, so go to itunes and subscribe Email us if you have any questions you can go to barbell logic podcast at gmail.com. We'll fix that eventually Yeah, youtube Yep subscribing youtube most of the stuff is on youtube now looks better. Look how good looking we are right there No, I don't know about that.  It's amazing. Thanks for listening


It's called God and the New Atheism by John Hott, H-A-U-G-H-T. It makes a good point. He says, atheists believe everything can be explained with one answer. He calls it explanatory monism. But all you need is the intellect. The intellect can answer everything. Just use your intellect. You can figure everything out. Very simplistic way. This is their method.  See, what are you doing? She says, I'm boiling water. See, that's great. But what are you doing? I'm separating molecules. Beautiful. But what are you doing? I'm making tea. Why? For you. Why? Because I love you. Right? This is what you can't get from science. This is what you can't get from atheism. Why? Why the universe?


One of the most difficult things about the frog to handstand is that transition. So we've got a great little exercise who's going to help you to learn that without having to manage your whole body weight. That's a really difficult thing. So using the band for some assistance is going to help you to pull through that shape. So one, you can learn the movement patterning and develop that new almost going to control. But it also means that by using progressively lighter bands, we can develop the strength and so you don't need a band at all and you're going to fly solo. So Jaco is going to grab the band. He's going to pull it around his hips and sort of just make a little cradle for it. He's then going to put his hands on the ground, but just slightly behind where the line of the band is. So he wants to be just behind the rig. The reason being that is when he comes through into that transition, we want the band to assist to pull the hips on top of the shoulders. So he puts his hands on the floor, goes into his frog stand, and this is just exactly the same cues as what we've done before. When he's ready now, he can take one leg off. And this is going to be the starting point of start of building that strength in these positions. So he can put the one leg off with the band assist and then pop it back on. He comes back down and he's the option then to start to move through onto the opposite side again. So the band just provides some support as you start to make these bridges as we work on this transition. So from your frog stand, if you need a little bit of assistance to get into that one leg position, you can use a band for some support and then we can scale that through with it. So to support each stage as we get into that full transition.


Sexual hormones play a key role in determining the risk of developing certain cancers. Studies have shown that young women are less likely to develop some types of cancer compared to men due to their higher levels of estrogen and other female hormones. These hormones help protect against oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction, which are two factors that contribute to the development of many types of cancer. Additionally, these hormones influence the activity of antioxidant enzymes and mitochondria, which can affect the progression and outcome of various cancers. Understanding the mechanisms behind these gender-related discrepancies could lead to more effective treatments for both genders. This article was authored by Alessandro Allegra, Santino Cazerta, Sara Genovese and others.


It was fun. I mean, you know, I feel like I can barely even get from the dugout to the field in time. He's ready to go.  It almost reminded me of a former teammate of mine, Mark Burley.  And you know, we were making some plays behind him, which was nice. What point of time would you know, hey, he has his best stuff again. He's going to be able to get deep into this game. I mean, early on, I mean, you could kind of see it in his body language and how he was going about it. You know, you could tell he was feeling it. He wasn't taking any breaks. In between, there was no indecision. He was, you know, him and Trevor, they were right on the same page. It seemed like all day long. Josh, he kind of hit her. What would you say Cortez? Just that, you know, he's forcing you from pitch one to get in there. He's got to change his speed. He's got movement to both sides. He's got some deception with the heater that really gets on. Godly keeps the pressure on you as a hitter. That was kind of a marriage last year, and it stands out to you more. I remember facing him last year. I mean, it was what I just described. That's what I felt. You know, I felt like he was ready to go. He wasn't, you know, afraid of anybody that was in the box. He was, you know, throwing strikes, sinking it, cutting it, changing it up, elevating the heater, just doing a lot of, you know, really good things. And then he'll hit you with a hezzie every now and again, which, you know, it's tough. It's a tough amount.