Coach Darian Bates

Stubborn fat is physiologically different from other fat stores.

But understanding the mechanism doesn’t automatically tell us how much difference manipulating that mechanism makes in the real world.

Take fasted cardio, for example
Training in a fasted state lowers insulin and can increase fat mobilisation and oxidation during that session. It doesn’t mean fasted cardio produces greater fat loss than fed cardio when calories and protein are matched.

The same applies to HIIT

High-intensity intervals create a large catecholamine response that may increase mobilisation from more resistant fat depots. That’s a plausible physiological mechanism but it doesn’t automatically mean HIIT is superior for reducing stubborn fat in every situation.

And the same applies to yohimbine

Mechanistically, it blocks alpha-2 receptors, removing some of the inhibitory brakes on lipolysis. Whether that translates into a meaningful difference in body composition is much less clear and depends heavily on context, including your overall energy deficit and how lean you already are.

This is an important distinction because increasing fat mobilisation is not the same thing as increasing net fat loss.

You can release more fatty acids from a fat cell, but if those fatty acids aren’t subsequently oxidised, they can simply be re-esterified and stored again.

And this is why trying to manipulate “stubborn fat” when you’re still carrying plenty of body fat elsewhere is largely pointless.

Regional differences in fat mobilisation exist regardless of how lean you are, but they become practically relevant when you’re lean enough that the remaining fat is disproportionately concentrated in those more resistant areas.

You don’t suddenly unlock stubborn fat at 10% body fat because your adipocytes received the memo.
It doesn’t change the fundamentals.
A calorie deficit is still required.
Patience is still required.

Hunger is information, fatigue is information, fullness, cravings, recovery and performance are all information.

But information isn’t necessarily an instruction.
And none of this requires insulin resistance, PMOS, or any other four-letter abbreviation to explain it.

You should absolutely pay attention to what your body is telling you. But then you need to interpret those signals within the context of what you’re actually trying to achieve.

Fresh vs canned pineapple 🍍

If you’re eating pineapple around your protein-containing meals for the potential digestive benefits of bromelain, fresh is the better choice.

Canning involves heat, which largely inactivates bromelain, while fresh pineapple retains its proteolytic activity.

Is this going to meaningfully change your gains? Probably, definitely not.

But pineapple is a convenient source of carbs around training anyway, and also delicious.

The idea that cycling off completely “resensitises” you to anabolic steroids and therefore produces more muscle over time sounds plausible.

The problem is that nobody has actually demonstrated that in humans.

Yes, muscle growth tends to be fastest early in exposure before slowing down. Yes, androgen receptor protein can increase early before returning towards baseline. But neither proves the existence of some recoverable state of anabolic sensitivity that resets when you come off.

The simpler explanation is that gains slow as you accumulate more tissue and move closer to your current physiological ceiling.

What we do know is that coming off doesn’t immediately return you to normal physiology. You can spend weeks or months with suppressed endogenous testosterone while the HPG axis recovers, only to suppress it again when the next cycle starts.

That doesn’t make blasting and cruising “safe” by any means, continuous exposure carries its own risks, particularly as cumulative exposure increases.

But the argument that cycling is more anabolic remains theoretical.

The argument for avoiding repeated periods of post-cycle hypogonadism is considerably easier to defend.



Exercise overlap doesn’t automatically mean exercise redundancy.

Two exercises can train largely the same musculature but differ in joint angles, range of motion, resistance profile, stability demands or whether they’re performed bilaterally or unilaterally.

And sometimes that overlap can actually be useful, and often it can be not so useful.

A walking lunge followed by a unilateral leg press is a good example. The target musculature is similar, but the lunges come with much greater stability, coordination and systemic demands. Moving to the leg press allows you to continue exposing the target muscle to high levels of tension in a much more stable environment.

Why not just do the leg press and forget the lunges? Great question, I’ve linked a reel covering that :)

I think a better way to determine if an exercise is redundant is to ask whether or not it is giving you something that the prior exercise did not.

To be fair, “your fascia is dehydrated” is a significantly better sales pitch than “you probably need to lose some body fat.”

There is some legitimate physiology buried underneath these claims, but unfortunately none of it supports the idea that hydrating your fascia will unblock your lymphatic system and make you lean.

The explanation for getting lean is painfully boring. You manage your calorie intake, eat enough protein, train consistently, stay reasonably active and repeat that for longer than you probably want to.

But apparently that answer isn’t interesting enough, so we need this shiny new thing!

Because if the answer is some hidden physiological mechanism nobody told you about, then you just need better information.

If the answer is consistently doing fairly basic things for a very long time, unfortunately the responsibility lands back on you.

I wouldn’t really call this a hack, but hell, if calling it “the best hack for huge delts” gives the video a better chance of performing, then that’s what we’re doing.
Moving the cuff higher up your arm shortens the external moment arm at the shoulder.

The moment arm is the perpendicular distance between the joint’s axis of rotation and the line of force.

The further that force acts from the shoulder joint, the larger the external moment arm and the more torque that same load creates at the shoulder.

Move the cuff higher up the arm and you bring the point of force application closer to the shoulder, shortening the moment arm and reducing the torque produced by the same absolute cable load.

So, essentially, the same weight becomes mechanically easier.

That means if you normally perform your lateral raises with the cuff around your wrist or forearm and then move it higher up your arm, don’t be surprised when you can use considerably more load.


savanna trump

Fix your glute kickbacks!

When the pulley is set up too high, the cable pulls downward instead of forward so at the top of the movement, your leg is already elevated and the glute doesn’t work as hard to resist that direction. 

When you lean too far forward, you turn the movement into more of a horizontal swing where the tension shifts away at the top. It’s also harder to stabilise so you end up using more momentum. 

For my training plans, comment DBC