Bodybuilding Done Correctly with an IFBB Pro

Matt Davis 0:00
I started weight training through the sport of basketball in high school and college. I actually waited till college to start working. I was just way too skinny to play at a collegiate level. So of course, I had coaches and everybody around me. You got to bulk up. You got to bulk up. And I just hated it. Hated the school weight room. I saw no attraction to it whatsoever. But it wasn’t until I went to a traditional gym and was around bodybuilders and around what we would call meatheads that I kind of fell in love with the process of it. So that happened pretty quickly, and the last 30 years is history. You

Ed Jones 0:53
You know, the thing is, there’s a lot of people in what you and I have a passion for that kind of don’t do it super healthy. You understand the importance of the physical body, how the food impacts it, how nutrients impact it. And like I do, of course, and you are so consistent with how you get results. And I know that people come from far and wide for you and your wife’s expertise. And I love having a team. And I talk about creating a team approach in all areas of life, nutrition and health and fitness, but for your fitness, somebody who I think we always need to look for the best of the best that we can in that because, you know, a lot of people don’t give good advice, and you’ve learned the hard way how to do it properly. And you don’t have to be as big as you if you want to be into this, you can be just fit. I think a lot of people today, just having super fitness is their goal. They don’t have to be huge like you. And so you see all kinds, don’t you in this gym? Oh,

Matt Davis 1:51
yeah, absolutely. And I tell everybody, it’s when they come to me, I tell them, I’m just the mechanic to help you tune up your car. You got to drive it, though, and you can drive however you want to drive, you know, if you like short distance, long distance, whatever the case is. So, you know, everything from an athletic setting, where they’re playing traditional sports, or even something like CrossFit, or what I do with bodybuilding, which is mostly all esthetics based. So I try to take on, you know, the best approach to individualize whatever that person’s goal is, but it’s not my job to make the goal for the person. And there’s many, many ways to enjoy a fitness lifestyle. But I think part of the reason our longevity has sustained is back to that fundamental reason that I joined the gym and got hooked was I love being in the gym, and I enjoy it, and it reduces stress, and it just checks a lot of boxes in life. And, you know, just in love with the process, I would never do anything I would hope that would disrupt that feeling. And I think there’s just a lot of people that probably in all walks of fitness that don’t start with a fitness lifestyle, and they want to do a bodybuilding show, or they love the idea of doing a triathlon or a marathon, and they do these really short term endeavors. And when it’s short term, when you’re mentally invested into the short term, I think that’s when you’re most tempted to take the shortcut, and you’re more susceptible to just absolute burnout. And so I really hate it when I see someone that’s going to compete in bodybuilding or any of those other things, and it’s kind of a one and done because and to each their own. But my response to that is, well, all that was for what like if you’re going to dedicate so much time to do one thing, I really don’t understand, not continuing to pursue it and continuing to reap some benefit from it.

Ed Jones 3:55
I love that, because almost any sport can profit by having a program in the gym. And then thirdly, I know you and I are both big fans of Dr Peter Attia. Peter Attia has done something that I’ve seen no other physician actually has done. He’s put together the homework of research of what cognitive and longevity benefits is there in weight training. And you know this 15 years ago, there wasn’t a whole lot that was talked about with medical research, and actually a lot of it was negative. You could have injuries, you could do this. You could hurt your back. Hey, it’s all shifted, as we know. He’s Dr Peter tias talks about going from medicine 2.0 medicine 3.0 weight training is one of the keys to longevity. Now, even if you don’t live longer, it’s about being resilient, strong, holding the grandkids turning 6070, and 80, and being able to perform. You cannot do that by running a track. And I think you would agree you have to be in the gym. I tell Mary Ann at the store, she’s probably 10 years older than me, we got you got to be weight training. Marianne, you got to be weight training. It all the time, and not a lot of old people don’t really know how to get into that. What would you recommend for somebody who’s never been in the gym, maybe middle age or older. How should they start?

Matt Davis 5:09
I think a good baseline is what’s challenging for you, standing up and down from one of these benches could be that thing for those persons. So when you say weight training, or you say going to the gym, sometimes you can boil that down to something they can at least start with in their own home and do the simplest of tasks. That’s what I try to really focus on, is teach people how to challenge muscles. Challenge muscles, not necessarily just movements. There’s people that standing up and down off of one of these benches is too much. That’s that’s puts them in a compromised position, that’s that puts them at risk. So they have to scale, scale it down even more and find, okay, what can they do is, could they, could we stack, you know, a higher chair, and maybe they only squat a few inches, but that’s a starting point, and as long as they’re challenging those muscles, and you can apply that to different things through the rest of the body. I remember even the old Jack LaLanne book, which I have one of his originals from, I think, the early 60s, and some of the stuff he talks about, which is more of a body weight, even Pilates style, we have all these terms for things now and these brands that Jack did calisthenics and all this stuff, but he was right on point. And when you read a lot of what he was talking about, what he was talking about was working the muscles, not necessarily just movements, you know, like someone comes in here and says, Hey, I want to start a squat program. Are squats good? It’s hard for me to answer that without knowing the person. They could be great. They can be great. They can be pretty terrible for some people. So finding that scalability for each of us, that’s that’s the big key. Where’s your entry point, and then at that time you can, you can try to be progressive, but, and

Ed Jones 7:02
so you really the word personalizing is probably very important for you. And I know that it takes some discipline, because you have to maintain a protocol, a program. You again, you can look up, you can get up if you need to do it three times a week. Nothing gets in the way of that three times,

Matt Davis 7:18
right? You have to be dedicated to it. And, you know, hopefully that’s if it can resonate with somebody. It’s all about the want to and I’m always challenging people to think about they’ll often say, Well, you know, Matt, I don’t have the discipline to exercise like that, or I don’t have the discipline to eat like that, or I don’t discipline, discipline, discipline, discipline. Or I’m not a disciplined person. And I try to say, Well, what do you what’s something you do regularly? Or they, maybe they watch Netflix. And I ask them, I say, how disciplined do you have to be to watch that? Well, they don’t think about that as discipline, because they really want to do it. Yeah. So somewhere in all of this, I try to challenge them to find the aspect that can kind of get them turned on to where they want to do it, and then that minimizes this discipline, oh, I have to go to the gym. I tell everybody, there’s two kinds of people that wake up in the morning and think, Oh, I’m tired. I’m going to have to go to the gym today. I’m gonna and it’s this, woe is me, and then the other person. The statements can be the same, but it’s how you say them. To, Oh, I get to go to the gym today. Yes, I’m privileged enough to train that I get to do this thing that I enjoy. So the perspective of it, I think, is huge.

Ed Jones 8:38
I love that. And I say to, I’m very blessed in so many levels. I say, most of the days I get to go to work, but I go back to how discipline do you have to be to brush your teeth every morning a little bit. But you know what? You’ve accepted the fact that this is what you do. So you get up, you brush your teeth in the morning, you brush your teeth at night. We never question that. That’s the story in our head. I wake up in the morning, I say, did I work out yesterday? And if the answer is no, today has to be the day. If the answer is yes, it gives me an option. I could wait till tomorrow, or I can go do another day today. And so just don’t leave anything open where you it’s non negotiable. It’s what I’m saying. Let’s talk just a tiny bit about protein. I know Dr Peter Tia and myself and you really believe in the fact that a lot of people don’t eat enough protein. And I believe, as he does, and I think you that we need about about one gram per pound of body weight. I weigh 180 now. And you know, Adam, our coach at nutrition world, helped me a lot during this previous contest at the Chattanooga fitness contest, because I have never done one gram of protein per pound of body weight, and I did it for four or five or actually, since January, until the contest in June. And I know it benefited me. I could feel the difference. I didn’t lose muscle this time, and I stayed stronger. So what are your feelings on protein? And it can be for healthy drinks or food.

Matt Davis 9:59
Yeah. Yes, I agree with everything you just said. And you know, to highlight the research part of that, we don’t have to go back too long ago to look at the mainstream recommendations of, oh, that’s going to be terrible for you. That’s going to be terrible for your kidneys. This is all bad. Nobody needs that much protein. And it’s really been a complete 180 on that topic. So much data now that reinforces everything you just said, and I’ve seen many that, you know, depending on the goal. And like I said, not everybody wants to be a bodybuilder, but as I’ve gotten older, and it’ll be 49 this year, I could absolutely tell I benefit from a little bit more. You know, I weigh around 250 so I try to keep it between at least that, but sometimes as high as 300 there again, that’s something I’ve pushed a little more the past year to be closer to that 300 absolutely can tell that has a greater effect. And I’ve I’ve done that before in my youth and when I was younger, and I honestly don’t know that I saw a benefit then. So I see a benefit now, and what I’m feeling correlates with some of the data I’ve seen where as we get older, we do lose some efficiency in how we utilize nutrients and protein. So it makes sense that as we get older, not only do we require the necessary protein. We may require a little bit more.

Ed Jones 11:24
Again, efficiency, what we digested at 20 years old is not going to be the same at 49 especially at 67 and the thing is, cognitive benefits are now absolutely confirmed exercise and adequate protein maintains cognitive benefits even if you don’t really care about your bicep or how you look, then we know all care about our brain. We all want to think clearly, not have brain fog. And you mentioned Jack LaLanne earlier and years ago, about 2020, years ago, nutritional brought Jack LaLanne in with Memorial Hospital, and it was amazing two days that I spent with him. And here’s the thing that I always remember. We were sitting at Acropolis restaurant, and I said he was telling about his workout program. He worked out every single day his entire adult life. I said, How much do you look forward to getting up working out in the mornings? He said, I hate it. He said, I hate most of the days. But it’s non negotiable. It is what has to happen. So even a guy like Jack LaLanne, who was world famous, had all those TV shows, those two German Shepherds, he looked like he loved it, he did not. Now, I love it. You love it. Most people can love it. But here’s a guy who didn’t, and he still did it still. And he was 92 when he came to nutrition world, so it was pretty, pretty darn

Matt Davis 12:37
I just saw a recent interview with Arnold Schwarzenegger. And the interviewer said, Arnold, you know, it’s been close to 50 years since you they were in Gold’s Gym. It’s been close to 50 years since you last competed in the Mr. Olympia, but yet you’re in here every day, still going at it. What drives you? And he said, Well, I come to the gym every day, for the same reason that I brush my teeth every day, for the same reason that I eat breakfast every day, and for the same reason I try to go to bed on time every day, because that’s what needs to be done to maintain my health and longevity. And to me, it’s always been about that first and foremost, because you take that away, and we’ve both been around long enough to see the temporary kind of shooting stars that come and go, come and go, come and go, and you know, maybe as I’m getting older, the more I see, but that just doesn’t appeal to me. It’s like a bright, shining star. It’s more about how long can you sustain it, and the only way you can sustain it is with as close to optimal health as you can. You know.

Ed Jones 13:51
Well, the thing is, the gifts of optimal health and optimal thinking should be enough for most people to get up in that morning and go it is hard. Sometimes, if you I just want to look a little better. Sometimes, not the best motivation, but whatever it takes, whatever it takes, and it has to be regularly installed into your daily program. And to me, you know, mornings are the only time, yes, I have to get up earlier, but then I never have to worry about my scheduling and being too tired in the evening. And it’s one of those mathematical equations. It’s, it’s, you put out some energy, but it gives you back double what you put out, so you always win. And I told my friend Brian Connell, and worked out with him off and on for 50 years back in college. We would sometimes, like all people, I don’t really feel like going the gym, and I would say this same thing to him multiple times. I tell you what, Brian, let’s go the gym. Let’s do two sets of bench press. And if you still feel that way, and I still feel that way, we’re going to get up and go back to our campus at MTSU. Not one time did we go back. All we needed was those two sets to get us going. I

Matt Davis 14:53
love that. That’s That’s great. Because I often think the same thing, once you once you start, and once you put that first toe. In, you’re very quickly reminded of all of the good reasons why you’re there and why you’re doing it. And there is a, you know, I believe that we use the word addiction and mostly negative connotation, but I do think there is some good avenues to addiction, and that feeling of well being in that feeling, which is probably what most addicts from every is chasing, is a feeling of well being. You can absolutely get that from exercise

Ed Jones 15:29
and also, and yeah, I know you’ll you’ll know these stories too. I’ve lost count the amount of people who either had a fall accident, a car accident, or had was deathly sick, who survived that would not have survived if they had not been fit muscularly. If the Texas skeletal system even in car wrecks, it can, it gives you that cushion. And no people who are unfit can break, and we we tend to bend more. So I it there. There’s nothing negative about it to me at all, except you have to pay a price with your time slot so but the benefit is 10 times greater. Now for a person, whether they be young, middle age, especially middle age and older, never been to a gym, never been to the big gyms, the little gyms, your great little gym train station. How could they do this? If they walk in the gym unexperienced, what do they need to do?

Matt Davis 16:21
My best advice would be absolutely keep it simple when you started, and even when I started, we didn’t have YouTube, we had we didn’t have the internet, really, but we had books, and that was a tough you had books and you had other people in the gym. Yes, I would encourage people to take advantage of the tools that are out there now, with the internet and YouTube, you can learn everything you need to learn on YouTube from really, really expertise people, and then take that knowledge into the gym with you on the first day. But beyond that, I would say, Pick some really simple stuff, even if you’re doing that, and get good at the basics. You go into any gym and you see the big gyms, it seems like 1000s of pieces of equipment. And I’ll tell everybody the truth about it, that’s 1000 different ways to do only four or five of the same things. You’re going to do some kind of squat, some type of a press, some type of a pool. There’s four to eight versions of movement patterns, and then you have a whole lot of variation on those same patterns. And that’s, that’s the main thing I help people with, is sort through all that and eventually find the best one for them. But I would get back to what I said earlier and say, focus on training muscles, like, what’s a good chest exercise? I would tell that person going to the gym and exploring, I would say the one that you just really feel your chest working, you feel that pump, you feel that burn, that’s a great chest exercise for you. And if it maybe it is for the next person, or maybe it’s not that doesn’t really matter. As you know, everybody in the world thinks they need to do bench press if they’re a man, I honestly haven’t seen it be the most effective chess developer of a lot of this stuff we have now. So I would say, don’t feel beholden to do what everybody else does, but you can always take notes and cues. But to me, that’s the base level of starting is identifying the muscle first and foremost, and then if what you’re doing, you’re getting that feeling and that work in that particular muscle, I love it. That’s the key, and you’re so

Ed Jones 18:40
right, we have the access with our little remote control of life, our phone, to tap into the best experts in the entire world. Again, going back to creating the team, the team needs to be the right team now, and there’s a lot that we have to wade through to get to the right people on the internet. But you talk to people you do like you, maybe they come train with you at the train station. In a short time, you teach them the basics, whatever it takes is whatever you need to do. I know you’d agree with that. Tell people if they wanted to contact you or be a client. How could that happen? Well,

Matt Davis 19:13
obviously the easiest way in 2024 is probably social media for most people. So Matt Davis ispb Pro on Instagram. My wife is figure jewels, Matt Davis and Julie Davis on Facebook. So that’s probably the easiest. Our email is train station, hixson@yahoo.com but those are probably the more those have evolved into the more traditional ways. Now, yes, yeah, it

Ed Jones 19:42
is. And, you know, a different atmosphere here than you would if you go to a big corporate gym. This is where I grew up. This kind of gym. This is still the magic place for me. It creates also friendships, bonding with the people you work out with. Oh yeah, it is not intimidating you and not I don’t really see any. Gyms. It’s intimidating. No one is bullying anyone, and so it is a place of welcome.

Matt Davis 20:08
I think the gym is one of those places, as are a lot of sports that transcend and break down all the other separations that we all have, from age to background to all of those things. It doesn’t matter once you get in the gym, because we’re all really wanting to do the same thing. And the good gym members appreciate and recognize that that, you know, if there’s a newcomer in the gym and they’re there to lose 200 pounds of body weight, well, they’re doing the same thing I’m doing. They’re just on a different part of that spectrum, because I was also that guy that was six, 460 pounds first day in the gym. And there were other people there that day I remember vividly, like Tony McKinney. They were just wonderful people that, hey, come on in. You know you’re you’ve been hanging around a few days. Come on in the club. So that’s to me, that’s always been one of the beautiful things at the gym. I

Ed Jones 21:07
walked in to Cosmopolitan spa 14 years old, 119 pounds. My upper arm measured 10 inches. Most of women are bigger than 10 inches, and I’m exactly like you. It took a while, a little bit, but you know, all of a sudden, hey, let me, let me show you this exercise that I’m doing, and I just couldn’t get enough, couldn’t get enough of it. And there were periods where I did not eat healthy because I didn’t understand what health was to build muscle. I thought it was just all the calories or all the bad food you could eat, would be right? Well, we learned, as we grow and get older today, and again, we didn’t have internet. We just listened to whoever, or just watched look, went to a restaurant. Thought, the more, the better. Today, we are blessed to have what we have, and blessed to have people like yourself and your wife, Julie, who can, who can be a coach, even if it short run, learn the basics. And I just, I think you’re hero to this town, and I love that we have a great relationship. And how you work with nutrition world, it’s been amazing. You’ve been on my podcast several times with vital health radio, and you work with Adam. You work with everybody. Your goal is the betterment of everybody that you come in contact with. You have no hidden agendas. So thank you very much. Thank

Matt Davis 22:16
you. I really appreciate the kind words.