How gary vaynerchuk lost 22 pounds in 90 days
Posted by Michael Vacanti
My phone buzzes.
Gary.
G: I want to talk to you.
G: About something very rogue.
M: I’m intrigued.
G: Call you later.
Needless to say, a Sunday afternoon text from @Garyvee tickled my inner-fanboy.
That’s not where this story begins though.
You see, six months prior, I received a text from my good friend and mentor John Romaniello:
Sorry for texting so late, but wanted you to know you just became Gary Vaynerchuk’s personal trainer.
I had an opportunity.
Take a piece of that Belarusian hustle. Traditionally reserved for predicting snapchat trends and eat shit revis tweets. And redirect it towards molding a healthy and chiseled physique.
Gary and I Failed
Workouts were missed. Solid nutrition was inconsistent. Thus, very little progress.
After eight total gym sessions in 3 months, March brought us some bad news: a torn meniscus.
Some say it was an ungodly crossover. Others remember Gary’s 6’3″ assistant dominating him on a rebound.
Regardless, we were done training. And I was shaping up to be the 5th trainer in 7 years unable to mold the body, and more importantly fitness habits, of Gary Vaynerchuk.
So, after knee surgery and a flurry of “are you doing rehab” text messages (no, he wasn’t), we come back to that Sunday afternoon.
Something rogue. What does that even mean?
I was puzzled. A little nervous. But ecstatic.
Little did I know, but something rogue included all of the obvious:
- Lose bodyfat
- Alleviate chronic back pain
- Build real muscle
And of course, deliver a shirtless keynote.
But there was a new element:
Gary was not looking for another personal trainer. That hadn’t worked in the past. His lifestyle and schedule demanded something different.
Seven workouts per week. Meals weighed and prepared. Restaurants screened and dishes pre-selected.
A person sitting back in coach on his business flights. A +1 on family vacations. A voice in his ear nagging him to drink water and swallow fish oil day-in / day-out.
A CEO for his body.
So, that is my role.
Now, I know what you’re thinking.
Good for Gary, but I can’t afford a full-time health coach.
You’re right. Neither can I.
Nor can 99.99% of people.
But you don’t need one.
The truth is, GV does not have a spare second in his day. He has meetings and calls from 6am-midnight.
He lacks five minutes to scroll his newsfeed, let alone two hours to watch The Bachelorette.
So, at the risk of hurting your feelings, you are not that busy.
You don’t need a body CEO.
However, what CAN help you are the core principles that have facilitated the jump start in Gary’s transformation.
Through training hundreds of clients in the gym and thousands via online coaching, I have filtered five keys that almost always precede success.
Five keys that Gary utilizes to accelerate progress.
What YOU can implement from Garyvee’s Regimen
1. Gary Counts His Macros
Okay, to be fair, I count Gary’s macros for him 😉
But you can count them yourself. Learn how by reading this article.
In short, every fitness book and fad diet is really just a sexy title, smart marketing and a big fluffy bow glamorizing the same principles shared by all successful programs.
You lose weight in a calorie deficit. Combine high protein with strength training to prevent muscle loss. Eat some vegetables, because, duh.
You will learn all of this by counting your macros for one month.
Plus, counting macronutrients offers flexibility in your food choices. Nothing is explicitly “off limits,” making it a strategy that can serve you in the long term.
Not another yo-yo diet that ends when your BFF’s birthday dinner is missing organic vegan non-GMO quinoa burgers on kale buns.
2. Gary Trains With Rage
We all know him.
The friend who talks about fitness. Posts about fitness. Obsesses about fitness. But donde esta progress??
The truth is, most people lack intensity in their training.
They float through the motions, viewing the gym as a clock in/clock out experience. Forty-five minutes is forty-five minutes. Just be there, that’s good enough.
GV is the opposite.
There is deep focus before each set. There is uninterrupted concentration on every rep. All willpower and determination is directed at excelling on the task at hand.
He grunts. He screams. He occasionally tells me he hates me. He runs to the other side of the gym after a tough set. He throws weights (we are working on this).
And it is this intensity that has been monumental for his elite speed of success.
That intensity is what brought his incline db bench press from 6×30’s to 9×65’s. His torn and unrehabed knee is now goblet squatting 60 pounds for volume.
On Saturday, he went to a “really weird zen place, mike” where he “didn’t remember the first eight reps.”
You need to train with intensity.
3. Gary Does Something Everyday
Searching turks and caicos, via motorcycle, for a bench press
When we got breakfast at the onset of this process, G told me that he wanted to workout every day.
“That’s silly,” I thought.
3x/week, four at most, is all we need for your goals. And it’s true. Training frequency does not need to be very high for fat loss.
But there is a psychological component to doing something every day.
Not only is it what Gary needed to ensure fitness would be pillar of his everyday life, but I have witnessed this phenomenon in other clients: Diet adherence is better on days you do something.
So, we do something.
Sometimes we bike. Sometimes we foam roll or stretch. Sometimes we go heavy. Sometimes we do circuits.
One time we took a motorcycle around an island to find a gym with barbells so Gary could test his one rep max on the bench.
But we do something everyday.
4. Gary Limits Meal Frequency
Six small meals per day is still pedestalled by mainstream-fitness as the golden path to fat loss.
It’s not.
It works for some people, and that’s great. But the “stoke your metabolism” bro-logic of 2004 is dead.
Eating 400 calories six times per day will have the same effect on your metabolism as eating 1200 calories twice/day.
If this is a foreign concept to you, I suggest you grab my Beginner’s Fitness Guide right now.
Your meal timing should reflect your schedule and lifestyle. Gary grinds all day. He is too focused to be interested in food.
At night, he usually has dinner/drinks at a restaurant.
So rather than force feed him every 2 hours, which could actually make him MORE hungry (thanks to a little hormone called ghrelin), Gary will often go seven, eight or sometimes 12 hours without food, eating the majority of his calories at dinner.
The bottom line is this: pick a meal schedule that works well for you.
And know that hitting your total macros for the entire day is far more important than any timing strategy.
5. Gary has an Accountability System
Having someone around him for the better part of most days.
Someone to whom he can confess eating that cupcake. Or who tells him “no room for swedish fish on cardio day.”
For a CEO and future owner of an NFL franchise, that means a physical human being on payroll.
For regular people like us, that might be a group text with friends. It might be a personal trainer or nutritionist. It might be an app. It might be an online coach. It might be a spouse (careful, though).
You need someone or something holding you accountable to your plan.
More Questions on Gary Fitness Stuff?
Q&A in the comments!
Ask me anything below, and I’m happy to help however I can.
Theo Dimarhos
Hi Mike! Thanks for the article. How do you deal mentally with craving to eat junk at a certain moment during the day?October 27, 2014 at 7:31 pm |