S3E19: What Separates Champions From The Rest feat. Cliff Wilson

We talk with coach Cliff Wilson about how small, intelligent choices in peak week, nutrition, and communication stack into stage-day wins. We push beyond trends to show why boundaries, anti-fragile systems, and better show production raise the ceiling for natural bodybuilding.

• Cliff’s path from athlete to full-time bodybuilding coach
• Early wins from doing things differently
• How peak week can improve five to fifteen percent
• When to adjust sodium and potassium with carbs
• Fast vs slow metabolism peaking strategies
• One-variable testing and cleaner observations
• Why newer coaches should master carbs first
• Boundaries, written check-ins, and better decisions
• Traits that separate world champions
• Resilience after slips and bad placings
• Training and prep under menopause and injury
• Lessons from WNBF Asia on pro-level production

Instagram: @cwteamwilson

Website: https://www.teamwilsonbb.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Meet Coach Cliff Wilson
• 3:20 From Skinny Hooper To Coach
• 6:30 Early Wins And Going Full Time
• 8:40 How Much Peak Week Can Improve
• 10:35 Sodium And Potassium Strategy
• 13:20 Metabolism Types And Peaking Styles
• 17:05 Advice For Newer Coaches
• 20:53 Traits Of Elite Coaches
• 25:14 Check-Ins, Boundaries, And Better Decisions
• 28:32 What Champions Consistently Do
• 31:58 Resilience, Setbacks, And Fast Rebounds
• 36:10 Most Challenging Preps And Lessons
• 44:05 Building Anti-Fragile Athletes
• 47:20 Asia’s Natural Bodybuilding Production
• 53:20 Raising Standards In Natural Shows

Transcript

SPEAKER_02: 0:05

Okay, we are back. Today we have a very special guest on our episode. Many of you may have heard his name before. He is the great Cliff Wilson. Thank you for coming on, my man.

SPEAKER_00: 0:19

I appreciate it, guys. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02: 0:20

Yeah, it's absolutely an honor. So, yeah, before uh we get into uh who Cliff is, telling us uh a little bit about your background.

SPEAKER_00: 0:32

Yeah, I I always tell people I'm kind of living the dream here. I I've coached bodybuilders and pretty much only bodybuilders for I'm going on 16 years now and been doing it full time about 14 years. So um yeah, I I I get to just focus on competitive athletes. And um, I've been competing myself uh for almost 20 years at this point, and um, you know, I've been lucky, I've been fortunate to work with really great athletes over the years, and um so you know, to date I've been able to work with um multiple world champions, coached well over 100 pro pro champions, and uh coming up on a couple hundred pro cards here.

SPEAKER_02: 1:12

As uh yeah, as you guys could probably see, he has invested over 180 something pro cards now. Something like that.

SPEAKER_00: 1:20

Yeah, yeah, you know, it's funny. I have like a Facebook group with all of my current and former clients, and every year we just kind of like I don't usually post about it too much publicly, but every year we just kind of like keep within our group our own stats, and everybody's been really excited because like our team, we're two away from 200. Um, we're we're two we're two away from 200, and we have three amateurs left to compete this year, and so everyone's like, come on, we can do it, you know. Um so yeah, I don't know. I don't know if it'll come this year, but uh you know, we'll see.

SPEAKER_02: 1:50

Well, yeah, uh yeah, we should lead her, uh sure I do hope that uh happens, and it's a really great way to end the 2025 year.

SPEAKER_00: 1:57

Yeah.

unknown: 1:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02: 1:59

So uh Cliff, before you uh got into coaching bodybuilding, what did you do before then?

SPEAKER_00: 2:05

Um so I got into in in general, I was pretty young when I started training. I I played basketball in high school and then in college. And when I went to college, they were like, you are so damn skinny, you've got to hit the weight room. And so I I it got to the point where I found myself looking forward to the weight training sessions much more than the practices. Um, and so I think that's where I kind of found my my love of training. Um, and I knew instantly that I wanted to compete one day. I I'm not necessarily built like a bodybuilder, but I knew I wanted to do it because I loved it so much. So um, you know, I I I really focused um on trying to get a more intelligent approach just for my own competitive career. And so I spent about four or five years just kind of honing my own tactics before I even competed for the first time. Um, during that time, I actually I bounced around from a couple of different jobs. I owned my own landscaping business on the side of things. Like I didn't fully know what I wanted to do yet, and I didn't know bodybuilding coaching could be its own career. Um, a lot of people don't know this, but actually, what the first show that I ever um put a client in, um, it was just two guys that I was helping at the gym. I wasn't charging them or anything like that. I was just helping them out because I didn't know if I knew enough to be coaching, but um I knew I knew more than they did. And so I helped them out, and then um one of my guys won the overall. And Lane Norton had already been coaching for like six or seven years at that point. He had been really established, and he came up to me and he's like, Man, he goes, Your guy was shredded. He was like, You could make a good living at this. And I was like, Hey, maybe I can make a good living at this, and I just went all in on it.

SPEAKER_02: 3:54

So this was 2000 and what, 2009?

SPEAKER_00: 3:57

Yeah, 2009. I put one guy, uh, one guy on stage in 2009. Um, and it took off pretty fast from there. I didn't realize at the time I was doing things quite a bit differently than what other people were doing. Peak week, pacing, just a lot of things. At the time, I didn't realize, but there was a big like bodybuilding.com culture. A lot of people were kind of doing their similar things, and I was not on the bodybuilding.com forums. I was just doing my own thing, and so I wasn't really biased by anybody else's opinions, I was just making my own, and it took off quickly because I was doing things differently, and seven of the first eight shows that I had a client in, I had an overall winner. So it was just like you start picking up wins, and then everybody's like, oh, what's going on over there? And I it picked up fast. From from the time I put my first client uh in a show to the time I was able to quit my job and go full time was probably only a year, year and a half.

SPEAKER_02: 4:51

That's actually really quick. So you you did you did say that you make um very different peak weeks for your athletes. So, like how much difference is a great peak um, you know, to make great physique if you have to put in like percentages.

SPEAKER_00: 5:06

Yeah, it uh in my opinion, um some well, first off, some people are more receptive to a peak week than others. Um, I think some people it will make a bigger difference than others. Um there are a couple of factors I think that can be the reason why. Um, one factor is if somebody tends to be um very water retaining, they just tend to hold water a lot. There, I I think usually it's people that are prone to inflammation. If you're prone to inflammation, you can set up a peak weak in a way where you can kind of wipe away a lot of that accumulated inflammation over the course of a prep. Um so they'll be like high responders. Um other high responders are people that just generally don't look good when they are flat. I find that um people that are really shallow muscle bellied, like if you see my pictures, I don't have like real round muscle bellies. So I tend to respond really well to peak weak because I look so bad when I'm flat. And then I'm like, okay, I actually look good when I'm filled. Um and then the people that also respond well are um people that have really round muscle bellies, almost the opposite ends of the spectrum. They'll still look good when they're flat, but then when you carve them up, it's like, whoa, you know, it's really a shocking sight. So I know some people think, you know, you can probably only gain a few percentage points on Peakweek, but I've seen people gain five, 10%, I would say even 15% improvement, maybe even 20 if you're looking at outlier, depending on how you structure it.

SPEAKER_01: 6:27

That's awesome. Well, one thing I did notice when I've seen some of your content is I noticed a lot of people tend to keep variables like sodium and potassium relatively stable. I I believe I remember seeing you mention manipulating those variables a little bit more. I was just curious if that's kind of changed over time with playing around with it, or do you generally keep those variables constant, or is there a reason why you bump one up and lower one?

SPEAKER_00: 6:53

Yeah, you know, it's it's interesting that you bring that up because I find myself in a weird spot in my career because when I first started, there was still a lot of real old school blow bro bodybuilders. And when I first started, I was kind of known as like the science guy, like this nerdy science coach. You know, they're like, oh, look at him, he uses science and uh get out of here. Don't think about it too much, just do it. Um, and then you know, I've changed a few things over the course of the years, but it really my approach is still the same. Like I use science and scientific reasoning to inform my decision making, right? But but I've never been a slave to the research. And so now, because scientific the scientific approach is so popular, but I think a lot of people are slave to the research, now I'm kind of known as the bro meathead guy. And I haven't changed, you guys have all changed, you know. Um, and I say that because this relates to your question, because I think like back in the day, 15 years ago, um, you'd get this bro crowd that would wildly manipulate sodium and potassium. It was really common to just reduce salt down to practically zero and then load up on potassium, and then you'd end up in this really nasty kind of like spilled flat situation. And now I think the more scientific group is tends to be more conservative, in my opinion. They're like, if you look good, don't touch it. I I I mess with it every time because I think it makes a bigger um difference than people realize in terms of what we're looking at as intramuscular and subcutaneous fluid retention. Um the body does like to keep pretty tight ratios on things, but I do think you can slightly, if you know what you're doing, you can slightly swing that pendulum one way for a day or two, right? And then it can kind of it'll come back after the show. Um, but I think that there are ways to make aggressive but intelligent changes. Um and so I think sodium and potassium is one of the more also one of the more variable metrics that you can play with during peak week. What I mean by that is I think that what works for one person on sodium and potassium can work wildly differently for another person. Um I've typically so I I think my experience comes into play with that because when I first started, I I started conservative with my adjustments. And I've even found ethnicities, different ethnicities to often tend to have pretty different, seems almost like different kidney filtering rates in terms of like how do we process and eliminate excess sodium. I mean, if you just look at the sodium intakes between white people and black people, um, generally I can just load sodium up on a pale person. You know what I mean? Um, but then I I kind of want to like maybe load it up earlier for someone that has darker skin and then taper it off because um it seems like that filtering rate is a lot slower.

SPEAKER_01: 9:41

Gotcha. That makes sense. Well, when it comes to like peaking, I know generally most people load a little bit more on like sodium when they're loading on carbs. Um do you find like during depletion? Like, is there any manipulation with sodium potassium during depletion and then when you're loading on carbs and then like on the day of the show, like does it look quite a bit different depending on if you're loading or you're depleting?

SPEAKER_00: 10:06

Yes, yeah. So, you know, for those that don't, you know, that are listening that may not know, like sodium has so many benefits to it's tricky because sodium is the primary extracellular ion. So it's like it's going to be found in heavy compartments and subcutaneous areas. I mean, I think everybody's experienced where you eat this like really salty meal and then you're like puffy or you have like stock lines going. Um but sodium has so many benefits because it's found so heavily in the blood. I think also people have had that experience where they eat just like really salty meal and then they just get this pump that's out of the world out of this world, you know. So you it's really this kind of like Goldilocks thing where you want enough sodium product to produce an optimal pump and vascularity, um, but not so much that you're starting to see this accumulation of COP cutaneous water retention. Um, so there's a couple of things that I find with sodium is that a lot of um solutes, by the way, sodium, potassium, carbs, some people look better when it's actively coming up. Some people look better when it's actively coming down. Um and so if I had to say, I would say, you know, there's always exceptions to the rule, but more generalities. It seems like people with quicker metabolisms tend to look better with sodium and carbs. Like most solutes actively coming up at the same time. It seems like people with like slower metabolisms where they tend to just, you know, they have a hard time getting the weight off, they tend towards water retention, things like that. They look better with things almost like actively coming down. So what I mean by that is like um I may structure it in a way where sodium may be actively coming up for someone with a fast metabolism along with carbohydrates. Um, and then I'll have a situation where I may bring it up, but then like leave one or two days to kind of like clean up if someone has a slower metabolic rate. I I think one thing that's useful that was useful for me early on, and it still is useful. Sometimes if you don't exactly know, because you can run tests during your prep, um, but sometimes it doesn't exactly give you the information that you need, like someone being totally shredded does. So even if you're not sure, you can kind of like build sodium up over the course of a week during peak week and just kind of see what you see. Um, you know, if because like you just build it up slowly a little bit, like even sometimes I'll deplete people for maybe four days or so, and I'll do low and then higher and then higher and then higher. So even during the deplete, they're depleting, so nothing else is really changing. Um carbs are static, uh potassium is usually pretty static, and then I'm just changing one variable and I get to observe what I'm seeing here, and I yeah, I can decide if I like it or not, and then I can once the load starts, depending on how many days it is, um, I can structure it based on what I've just observed.

SPEAKER_01: 13:06

Gotcha. That that makes a lot of sense, and it makes sense that everybody be a little bit different depending on their metabolism, their ethnicity, and all that kind of stuff. I've even observed it a bit in some of my clients where they seem to like, yeah, if I load them on carbs, like they feel a little bit quicker, or like they end up looking for a little bit and it takes some time to clean up. So yeah, I I that makes a lot of sense.

SPEAKER_00: 13:27

Yeah, you you know what, yeah, and it it's one thing that's it's uh I'll also say is because um, you know, sometimes when I say things, like I just like I just said, oh, here's a protocol you could follow. Um sometimes I maybe need to put a caveat on that. I've been doing this for like you know 15, 16 years now. Um, when you first start peaking somebody, the variables are very overwhelming and you don't even always know what you're looking at. Um, so when I say that, my advice would be until you're like really locked in with um, you know, so with coaching, um, like I don't know if you've noticed this, but coaching and bodybuilding in general, things seem to, I don't know if you guys watch football or whatever, but like when you get like a rookie quarterback, they always say like they're you know, the game will slow down, if that makes sense. You know, like everything seems to be moving so fast. I find coaching tends to be that same way. Like when you first start coaching and you've got a peak week to manage, you're like, oh my god, there's so many moving parts, I can't manage it all. Like eventually it slows down. So I'm gonna put a caveat on there. Like, if you're a newer coach, um, I would really hone in on one variable at a time with your client. So I'm gonna put that caveat on there. If you're new to coaching, even with your in your first couple of years, I would say like don't tinker with sodium and potassium too much. Get the carbs right first. Then once you're sure your c your carbs are in the ballpark, then start tinkering. You know what I mean? Because I think that managing too many things at once for a newer coach or a newer competitor would probably be too many moving parts and you know, be moving too quickly to make those decisions. So I want to put that caveat on there. I don't want people being like, you gave me this advice, so it was totally totally garbage.

SPEAKER_01: 15:05

Yeah, no, that that makes a lot of sense. Yeah, if you're trying to do it so many more variables, you're not really knowing what's kind of moving the needle in terms of making that. So that's that's very for sure. Uh one one thing I want to ask too, based off of like somebody that's newer to like coaching credits, somebody that's elite, like how would you say, like, what are like the certain traits that like a very elite coach like yourself do you think have compared to somebody that's maybe like your mentoring uh coming up? Like, what do you notice like the like yourself compared to them, like the slight differences or what you develop over time?

SPEAKER_00: 15:40

Oh, that's a great question. That's a great question because I've known some people over the years that I view to be highly intelligent and highly educated, but then their clients just they don't look great to me. Do you know what I mean? Um, so it's like sometimes you can know all the research on the human body and you can be a highly intelligent person, but it doesn't always equate to results. And so um, if I had to nail down a couple of traits, um first off, I think let's just put the the thing that needs to be up front is you kind of have to be in love with or obsessed with the coaching process. Um, I've also seen people that were really great coaches at one point, and then it's almost like they lose their love of it or they get distracted by, you know, they want to go down the social media route or other, you know, other things. Um, and it's like their results taper off because they've lost their love or obsession for this process. So I think being in love with this process or or obsessed with it or both is is a great trait to have. Even after 15 years, I I wake up with show day in particular. You know, it's like, let's do this. I think that that's a prerequisite, honestly. Now, and you put in that, I think the other thing is that uh you have to be able to set your boundaries. Um now, my boundaries may not work for everybody as a coach, but I think you have to have your own. Now, what I mean by that is um I'm really hardlined on a few boundaries with some of my clients, uh with all my clients. It's like um, if somebody applies to work with me and they need to lose 40 pounds to be stage ready, and they tell me they want to compete in 20 weeks, it's too fast, at least for a natural athlete. You know, I I if it's an enhanced athlete, they can probably do it. But a natural athlete, it's too fast. You won't look good on show day. There's that tendency to want to say yes, especially, especially if you you need the money. That's why I I always tell coaches don't leave your job until you actually um like have to, because when you start making decisions because you need the money, the results are gonna suffer. Um, so you know, just don't do it because then at the end of the day, this client is going to get on stage, they're not gonna look good, you're not happy, they're not happy, they're gonna go to a different coach because they're not happy. And now you put a look on stage with your name on it that is subpar. So I think that having that standard, and even another thing is like this may be controversial here, but coaching, it's really common right now. I noticed everybody wants phone calls and video calls. Um I think it's bad for the process. Um, I think phone calls and video calls are bad for the process because, and I stand firm on that. Like sometimes my clients, I explain to them why, because I'm not gonna remember everything that's said on that call, and neither will you. Um, so we're gonna spend a lot of time rehashing what we said. Um, we're probably gonna rehash it through email. Um, then the other thing is when you tell me something and I have to make a decision on that call, um, I've had no time to ponder. Um, sometimes even two minutes, right? Like I have an email come in, I assess the entirety of the situation. Two minutes to think about the the um repercussions of what I'm going to decide. It allows me to see the whole picture and think about it before I make a decision. But if I'm on a phone call with somebody, it's literally I have seconds to make a decision, and it's the first thing that comes out of my mouth. Um, I used to do phone calls with my clients weekly uh from 2010 to about 2015. Um, and I noticed some clients would really like the phone calls and they wanted them. Other clients were like, nah, I'm good, uh, you know, I don't need to. And I noticed the clients that didn't use the phone calls were getting much better results. And so finally I was like, hey, this is why I'm taking the phone calls out, and then everybody started getting those great results. Um, it was much more efficient. Um, and then the other thing is they have time to think about what they're telling me, also. Um, I find that when somebody gets on a call and it seems like they always want to tell you how tired they are, right? And how hungry they are. Um, but I think that when they have time to reflect on what that is, they end up being like, okay, this is manageable. He doesn't need to hear about all this. You know what I mean? So, so setting the boundaries, those are just a couple examples. So you gotta be in love with it, you have to be able to set your boundaries. And then the last thing is I think the right amount of the correct amount of ego is important. Um, I think to do this job, you have to have a certain amount of ego, right? Like you're like, yeah, I can make all the decisions for all these people. You can't be devoid of ego to be like, I'm gonna take this on and I can do it and do it well. Um, I think if somebody's too humble or lacking confidence, I don't think that you're in the right mindset to make these decisions to put people on stage. But you can't have so much ego that you aren't willing to listen to what your clients have to say. You aren't willing to change your mind when evidence comes up that you might be doing something wrong and you're gonna find yourself irrelevant before too long. So I think those are some of the primary characteristics that I see in successful coaches.

SPEAKER_01: 21:03

Yeah. That that makes a lot of sense. And I never thought about that with like the check-in process, too, because a lot of my clients like, I'll I'll do like an intake form before like the call. So I have a kind of an idea of where they're at, um, and then I'll kind of make the judgment before I even hop on the call with them. But I I could see how that would kind of be if you're on the call and like you're just getting that information now and you have to make that decision right there, how that would definitely be be yeah, kind of thing.

SPEAKER_00: 21:30

And and so there's where I think the individuality comes into it too. Because also the other thing is phone calls particularly aren't usually the best for me. Um, because I think that for me as an individual, I guess like so. If you're making the decision first and then talking about it, that's that makes it a lot easier. And then, but I think that with myself, I find that when somebody tells me what's going on with them, um, I do my best work when I'm able to think about what this person needs to hear from me. I'm usually not the type of person that my initial response is what people want to hear. Like, like I personally, so when I started coaching, actually, when I first started coaching bodybuilders, um, I started having success as a bodybuilder, you know, as a bodybuilding coach. And this is before I just was doing it full time, and I was like, maybe I should be a personal trainer too, right? Because it was like good to get in the gym and I should just do this. And uh my my um wife at the time, she's like, she was she did it with me, we were both trainers, and she was like, Why are your clients always crying? And like, I don't even know, but it wasn't like I was like yelling at them, but it was just like sometimes my responses are a little too straightforward, you know, just a little too blunt, like here's what needs to get done. And then like people think I'm like mad at them because I'm not addressing, you know what I mean? So it helps me in particular to be like, I need to think about what does this person need to hear from me, you know what I mean? Because the first thing out of my mouth will probably be too logistical, and they're gonna think that I don't care about their feelings, which I do, but it's not usually the first thing out of my mouth. So, so even for me, like so. That's where I think as a coach, identifying what you're because some people are also really great at making people feel cared for, you know what I mean, in a call. So I think that's where it's like as a coach, you need to be able to identify your things that make you successful, um, and stand firm on those. You know what I mean? Like, you can't give everything to every client because if it's gonna make your process unsuccessful, then nobody's gonna be happy with that.

SPEAKER_01: 23:27

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Um, to take it back to like the athlete uh perspective, too, because you've worked with a lot of like very high-level athletes. I'm curious, like, what kind of traits do you notice from those kind of athletes, the ones that are like the world champions? Like, how do they tend to handle prep? Like, are most of them pretty good, or um, do genetics sometimes like help a lot, or like maybe just dive into some of those things?

SPEAKER_00: 23:53

Uh genetics help a lot. Um, so I I would say everybody is competing in their own genetic grouping. You have lower level athletes that are battling out to see who the you know the king of the lower genetics are. Um, and then you have these mid-level athletes that are battling it out within their mid-levels. You know, there's like there's of course like crossovers, right? Somebody with bad genetics can be somebody with, you know, fairly good or medium genetics if they do everything right and this person does a lot wrong, right? Um, so when you look at the top, the upper echelon, world championship competitors, you know, I I mean at this point I've coached, I don't know how many individuals, but I'm looking at like a little over 20 world champion or class world champion wins. You are looking at elite genetics all going head to head. Now, I do think getting information from the elite genetics in terms of what they do right is useful because the difference between first place set of world championship and let's just be honest, even like 10th place. It's so small. So everything just really matters. I've coached a few outliers where they're so good it may not always matter.

SPEAKER_01: 25:09

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SPEAKER_00: 25:19

I can't say who, and I won't even say if it's a guy or a girl or whatever, but they've given me permission to tell this story publicly. I had a client one time going for a world championship, and this person cheated on their diet. I drew up a peak week that I was so proud of. I was like so proud of it. I was like, we were in position, it was a beautiful peak week. I was like, this, I feel so good about this, right? I was like, we might get this. You know, you don't always know if you're gonna get a world championship, also, we might get this. Um and Tuesday I get a show's on Saturday, Tuesday I get a text, and it's like, we need to talk. I messed up so bad. Um, this person just full on binged. Um and it was uh the peak week I drew up was a nice, like slow linear building backload, right? Um that was like the goal was to hit this carbohydrate peak on show day. But now I was like, okay, now it's a front load, you know. Um it's a front load. Um we were very spilled over, um watery, like just spilled puffy. And I made a lot of adjustments. It was just day by day, just throughout the whole peak week, you know, through throw it out, day by day adjustments, managing things popped into place nicely on show day, and we won the world championship. And it's kind of funny along the lines of like on show day, everyone's like people are coming up to me and they're like, Man, Cliff, another perfect peak. And I was looking at this person, and I'm like, we're both like, we just won't say anything, we'll just roll with it. Um, so everybody would probably kill that person if they knew what had happened that week, you know, because they were probably but but um so what I'm gonna say is first off, no process is perfect. High level people don't think this, but high-level pros cheat on their diet, get stressed out, they have anxiety, um they have plugs that they start and then have to pull the plug on for one reason or another at the exact same rate as average competitors. They just have better tools to work with, in my opinion. Now, with that said, the top people do have things that put them at the top of their grouping. Um, you know, the top of the mid-levels and all that. They have things that put them at the top of their grouping. And um, you know, I I think that one, they are usually motivated. They don't need they don't need pep talks, they are self-motivated. Being able to be self-motivated is such an important part of this, you know. It's like if if you need your coach to drag you across the finish line, you are probably not going to be at the top of your genetic grouping. You know what I mean? Um they're disciplined, you know. It doesn't mean you never break, but for the most part, on a day-to-day basis, you get up and do the things that you need to do. And if you do break, you're resilient. Um, you come back quickly. Um, even top pros will have breaks in their diet, not all of them, but a good many of them will have breaks in their diet where they mess up. They get back on track so quickly. It's literally like, oh, I had some cookies, let's just get right back on it. You know what I mean? It does not turn into a multi a whole day or a multi-day thing. Um that that's really resilient right there. Another big factor also in terms of resilience is how do you handle a bad placing? One guy that I had compete, he he competed a while ago. Um a lot of people may not know him, but he's kind of a low-key guy. His name's Andy Um Stalford. He took second place at the 2018 IPE World Championships, and he won the Masters IPE World Championships that day. So that year. But before that show, those two shows, he actually did just a random pro show that was not very big and took third place. Um it was a combination of questionable judging, lighting that didn't really, he doesn't have great shape. He's like a mass monster. It's kind of like blocky physique. So you need lighting that really shows off how lean you are, how muscular you are. It was very shadowed lighting that pretty much just showed like sh silhouettes, right? So um the silhouette didn't favor him. So bad lighting, questionable judging, took a third place at a show he probably should have easily won. We got in the car afterwards and he goes, Well, that sucks. On to worlds, you know, and it was like he didn't he didn't go out and eat his feelings, you know what I mean? He just we got back on track and then he won Master's Worlds a couple weeks later and then took second at the open worlds, you know. So it's like right back on track. So I I like to see that, and the other thing I like to see is um someone that is um titrating. Um I use that as a personality. Personality trait. I don't think other people use that as a personality trait, but it's it means to continually measure and adjust the balance of. And I like to see people do that with themselves and the path they're taking. So what I mean by that is like a lot of bodybuilders, like if you ask them, they're like, I'm a real type A personality. Um and I'm like, okay, but maybe we don't bring that personality in situations where it's not called for. You know what I mean? I think, I think adjust yourself to what the situation calls for. Um, a phrase I use with my clients is everything's a hammer, everything's a nail to a hammer. You know what I mean? And I'm like, I want you to have lots of tools in your tool bag. And um, I want you to be able to adjust yourself for what the situation calls for. When you need to be able to rest, I want you to be able to rest. Um, when you when you need to be able to push yourself, I want you to be able to push yourself. Like let's let's have different modes.

SPEAKER_01: 30:49

Yeah, that makes makes a lot of sense. Um with the push and pull too, like what like I know with like some athletes, like sometimes you can push them to the point where they like break and knowing when to pull back, like is there specific some things that you measure that you um get to know from your client when they're getting real close to like that what you could say is like your breaking point, like where they're about to binge? Like, is there some ways that you try to like that as a coach that you go around that?

SPEAKER_00: 31:17

Yeah, yeah. Um, that's a great question, too. And this is where I think you it's also bodybuilding coaching is kind of weird because I coach a lot of high-level people, but I also coach beginners. You know, most bodybuilding coaches, even high-level bodybuilding coaches, still have beginners. And so it's kind of weird if you look at it in the context of other sports. I like basketball, so I'll use it in basketball. Like on the same day, I may be coaching in our sport like LeBron James, but I'm also coaching like a fifth grade basketball player. You know what I mean? Like in terms of what their their experience is and their mindset and their abilities. Like, I'll literally close the email with LeBron James, and then I'm like, okay, let's let's show you how to dribble. You know what I mean? The way you deal with people on experience levels, and I I honestly think of things in terms of that scenario when I talk to my clients, like, because I can't talk to everyone, I can't speak to everyone the same way. Um, so when I'm dealing with somebody that is a total newbie, um, I I I don't trust their opinion a whole lot, right? I'm going to, I don't want to sound like a dictator here, but I'm like, I'm gonna drop the plan. I want you to follow it and then report what you feel back to me because we now are both learning about their body, right? Um, there's gonna be times where I overtrain them purposefully, actually, because I need to know when that happens and they need to know what that feels like. You know what I mean? Like um there are times where I'm gonna push them too hard and they might cheat on their diet because I want to know when that happens. They want to, they need to know what it feels like when they're getting to that point. I take the approach of I take the view that I'm probably I'm gonna work with somebody for a long time. When I invest in somebody, I I take that approach. Um, and so I kind of view this as we are in a process of discovery. We're gonna learn about you, and I'm gonna learn about you, and so are you. You know what I mean? Like we're both gonna learn about you because then over the course of time their opinion becomes more valuable because they know what they feel. You know, I can't be in their body, I can't know what they feel. But now I've run them through multiple scenarios where they know what this feeling is, and so over the course of time their opinion becomes highly valuable to me. So when I get to my elite clients now, so I try to build systems that improve with time, if that makes sense. Like I don't have a set system. I I feel like a system doesn't try to avoid mistakes. Like, I'll honestly, you know, in the early days of coaching someone, I almost try to put in mistakes, right? I try to overtrain them, I try to push them. Um, I push them in we'll do mini cuts that are probably overly strenuous at times because I want to know when they start to struggle. You know what I mean? Um and we learn. Um, so then by the time I've worked with someone for two, three years, now their opinion is very valuable to me when they say hey, and then I start actually changing the end of how I speak to them. I say, when you start to get to this point, you talk to me, you let me know. You know that feeling, you know what I mean? And so now it becomes like this back and forth. Um, now I'm working with a pro, with an NBA player, right? It's like um I can draw up the play. One analogy I always use is the coaches in the NBA, they draw out the play, but those are those NBA players, they know what they're doing. If they're not open, change it on the fly, you know, pass it. Um, even though the play says you should shoot at this spot, if it's not there, pass it. Make something else happen. You know what I mean? So that's where I I kind of expect to become collaborative, I guess I would say.

SPEAKER_01: 34:49

Yeah. No, that's that's very fascinating. Just the perspective you had on there. Like I've never thought of it that way, just like like trying to push him to that breaking point so you understand where that is. I I really like that, actually. That's that's very smart.

SPEAKER_00: 35:01

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, um, there's a uh so you know, people hate people don't like when I say this, but actually I I think sometimes a lot of people would do really well, coaches would do really well with sometimes a lot of coaches are just so highly educated these days, which is a great thing. But then there's a certain point where you hit this level of education. I think you actually need to read things that exist outside the bodybuilding world because they really help. There's an interesting book um called Anti-Fragile. Um, it's by Nicholas Nassim Taleb. Um, and he's an economist. Uh, and the book is kind of on the nature of things, but it relies it it pertains to economics. And the idea being that systems should be constructed in ways that they don't avoid failure or shocks or blows. Um that they those things are actually good for a system as long as the system learns from those things. You try to avoid those same things twice, if that makes sense. And so I I I actually try to take some of that into my own coaching practice where it's like, I'm not trying to avoid mistakes, I'm just trying to avoid catastrophic mistakes, and I'm trying to almost manufacture mistakes within a safe construct to where the information becomes highly useful down the road and makes us much stronger.

SPEAKER_01: 36:21

In terms of a client to like, has there this kind of a different topic, but has there been a client that you've worked with that's had like a really tough experience? Or I I know you had uh William at the Vector show and he has like big like into social media stuff amount of pressure there. Like what would you say is like the hardest client you've ever had to prep and like the biggest takeaway from it? Hard for me or hard for them, or hard to figure out, or do you just want me to give yeah, just like maybe like the most challenging one for yourself, I guess.

SPEAKER_00: 36:53

Yeah, okay. Um Will Will was challenging in a different way for sure. Uh because and you know, and one thing that I think is he did so well for his first show ever. Like that was the other thing, is like he didn't even have like a mini cut to really test and get down and really see what he's capable of. He literally got a hold of me and we went right at it and he dove right in. And he won his pro card at a show with like 26 people, and um, it was just so I know sometimes people it I felt like a lot of people were holding him to the standard of a seasoned vet, you know what I mean, someone who's done four or five shows, and I'm like, man, uh just because he's so well known, people were holding them to that standard, and I'm like, man, what he did was insanely impressive, and you know, I so I want to say that, but that was I felt like that was more challenging for him than for me, if that makes sense, because he had so much pressure on him. Um, but I I I think he did fantastic. Um, two scenarios kind of run through my head, which is a little bit of both. One, I worked with a woman named Carrie Bolan. She started with me late in her career, and she she'd been competing like 20 years and couldn't get a pro card. Like she was just always kept falling short. A lot of second place, right? So then 2012, I think it was. Uh yeah, 2012, I coached her and we won a pro card right out of the gate, which was awesome. And then she jumped into her pro debut and took second in her pro debut, which was great. Um, but she was already getting a little older, you know, and so we took like one whole year off, and then we were like, this is gonna be our last season because she was like 49 at this point, and we were looking at her and we're like, she was just so good. Like, honestly, I was like, she might win a world championship. Um, but menopause was very difficult for her. And if you've ever coached anyone through menopause, it is brutal. Um it is brutal. It ended up being almost like we started prep, and then her like her body just wouldn't cooperate, and we're like, why don't we just take a breather, right? So we kind of like paused, and we didn't actually get on stage the year that we had intended to. It was almost like a year later. We like lost some weight and then we just held it and we just like let her body kind of work through just perimenopause, work through it, right? And then we resumed the following year. It was just such a long process and a lot of communication of how she's doing. I had to throw out the idea of like rate of loss. It was just like, we'll get there when we get there, which was so difficult for me because I like to keep a good schedule. She did her second pro show and won, and then we're like, and she she made it clear, she's like, My body is just this is brutal, this is my last time, right? And we're like, she has a real shot at a world championship, and then she tore something in her shoulder while training. Um, the doctor made it clear to us that it was already torn. Further training wasn't gonna make it worse. Um, she was going to need surgery, but we could put it off. Um, it's just kind of like how much pain can she tolerate, right? So actually, heavier training was the most painful thing for her. So we did all upper body for the last two months of her prep in the rep range of about 30 to 35 reps. It was brutal for her because that's you've ever done 30 to 35 reps, that's painful, right? Plus, she has pain uh in her shoulder. Um, but we maintained, I was like, I go, I hate to tell you this, but like in this rep range, almost everything's got to beat a failure, you know, because it's like that's not a heavy load. She maintained her size, we got her like and she won a world championship. Um, it was like I had to just throw away every plan I wanted to set. You know what I mean? It was just like it was come, it was it was a prep of we'll figure it out, you know what I mean? But it kind of opened my eyes. That was back in 2015, I think. Um, it really opened my eyes to you can always find a way to get it done. You know what I mean? Like um, it was very difficult. And then I think the other one was actually the year before when I coached, um, worked with Doug Miller. Doug was unique in its own way because that was that one was a lot of pressure on me. Um, because Doug had already won a world championship. And to be honest with you, he was already considered by many maybe the greatest natural bodybuilder of all time. So if he didn't win with me, that's just a real bad look. You know what I mean? Um and so um, you know, um, and then the other thing is Doug is I've worked with a few people that are like this. You get some people where they are such an outlier. The things you traditionally thought as limits or rules or whatever you want to call them, they just do not apply to this person. Um, and I didn't have a lot of time. I'd known Doug before that, but I didn't have a lot of time to work with him. Like I only worked with him for about the last 10 weeks. Um, and so that was not a lot of time to learn what was going on. Particularly, I had only been coaching about four or five years at that point, four and a half years. And so that's not my experience level was not where it is now. And so I was like, I was on edge, right? I was like, man, there's a lot writing on this, and um, and it was kind of funny even when I he called me and I got off the phone, and I I told my wife at the time, I was like, that was Doug Miller. I was like, he wants me to help him finish this prep. And she looks at me and she goes, Awesome, don't fuck it up. I was like, Yeah, yes, thank you. Thanks, dear. Um but um you know it that that one was challenging because just so many things like that are just such outliers with him. I by the way though, like even like how you say, like, sometimes people get this impression of like these elite competitors, like they're impervious to their own things. One thing that always makes me laugh that's kind of a story I I like with that prep. Doug, uh before we did the world championship, we did the Gaspari Pro. And he we carbloaded him very heavily for the Gaspari Pro, like something he had never done before. And he won that, and then we went into the world championships, and we decided we were gonna keep him in the middle weights because we were gonna we didn't like the idea of him competing against guys that are ahead taller than him, um, because he's just so big that's where he would be. So I was like, we'll just be a little bit more conservative before weighing in, and then we'll look up. And he goes, um, he goes, Okay, that works. I just want to make sure though that I'm as full as I was like at the Gaspari, because you know, when I looked at the pictures, I finally felt like I had some size. And I'm like, oh, I'm like, good, Doug. I'm glad that you finally got some size. I I hate to think what you think of the rest of us.

SPEAKER_01: 43:45

That's too funny. Yeah. No, I couldn't imagine, yeah, the pressure coaching him, especially yeah, just after four four years of coaching. But no, that's that's insane.

SPEAKER_02: 43:54

I remember you guys were talking to Tim from WMVF miles. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 43:58

Yes.

SPEAKER_02: 43:59

And then you guys had a you guys had a uh a seminar over there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03: 44:05

Yes.

SPEAKER_02: 44:06

How how how was that? And um, yeah, what was that about?

SPEAKER_00: 44:10

That's funny. I'm even wearing my WMBF Macau shirt here. Um that was um that was incredible, actually. Um, so you know, I've been I I've been fortunate enough to get to speak in a lot of different countries. The WNBF Asia guys are onto something, like without a doubt. I think a lot of the WNBF US promoters should like go over there and like actually see what's going on. It was the show there in Taiwan was unbelievable. Like they had this big LED screen, like a 30-foot LED screen. It was a pro presentation that was like better than the IFBB Olympia. It was crazy. Like the screen would split open and the pros would walk out of this giant LED screen with it, it was incredible. The thing that the thing that I love about the WNBF Asia guys, and I feel like actually I feel like this is um actually problematic within the US in general, but I feel like other countries do this better. Like when I did the seminar, and when I've done seminars outside of the US, the questions I get are honestly like a lot of the questions you guys have asked, right? Like, what does it take to succeed, either as an athlete or as a coach or whatever? Um, I feel like in the US, the questions I get are very on the periphery of social media and how do I build my name, right? Business tactics, um, social media tactics, things like that. And kind of going back to what makes a great coach, I'm like, or competitor, I'm like, man, you just gotta start with that. You just love this, you can't picture yourself doing anything else. And I got to spend like a week with Sim and Terry from Macau and Ison, you know, from Taiwan, and Admon from Singapore. And it's like everybody just loves loves what they're doing. They love competing, they love bodybuilding, they love promoting. Um, and it was like being around that group of people was just uh so refreshing because it's very rare that you get such a group of people that are just so passionate about it. Um, and they just start with the love of it and then and then you love it so much, you can't help but talk about the mechanics of what makes everything work and what makes it successful and how to make it better. And so um, it was fantastic. I I would encourage a lot of pros to like go there. If if you can afford it, go there. If you have if you're gonna compete, compete there even. Like it was it was definitely worth it was worth the experience. I think it would be worth the experience if you're looking for like something that actually makes you feel like the other thing is in the US, right? Sorry, last thing, it's like they they have this pro event. Um, the US shows do a very poor job of making pro natural bodybuilders feel like a professional at something. Like it's hard to feel like you're a professional when your show is being held at like a middle school auditorium, you know what I mean? Like, I know there's I know there are financials involved, but like find a way to make the pros feel like pros, um, whether it be the production or something, you know what I mean? Like, I think that means more than a lot of the US promoters really even realize.

SPEAKER_01: 47:23

That makes sense. I think, didn't they even do interviews for the pros? Like, I think I remember Air Hamps talking about how like he it was almost like the Olympia conference where like they were talking to the all the pros and stuff like that.

SPEAKER_00: 47:35

It it was uh, you know, the whole scene over there is like they just love bodybuilding. Like, I mean, you know, they love bodybuilding, they were doing interviews with the pros, they had the smoke coming out as they came out. Each pro got like a very elaborate, like they didn't do this for the amateurs, but for the pros, they got like a very elaborate um introduction. They had their picture up on the big screen as they walked out. Um, and even like my experience, just like they're just into bodybuilding. Um, you know, even like when I do a talk, uh, you normally in the US, like I may give the talk and I say thanks, and we, you know, I I snap a few pictures with the people. I was probably taking pictures for 30 minutes after the talk, just like people are um and people were bringing their books that you know that I wrote the book, people bring the books. I also probably signed like more books than autographs and hats and stuff like that than you would ever believe because they're just like bodybuilding, you know. Um, and it was like, um, I was like, this is even to me, like I I've been doing this so long, I was like, okay, I've never actually like signed so many things in my entire life. This is crazy. Um, but it's just like the love of what they are doing is palpable, and so it's almost like of course we'd make the pros feel like pros. Do you know what I mean? They're a big deal, and so it's just like um I I do feel like the the the quality of everything was just so good, so good.

SPEAKER_03: 49:03

That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00: 49:04

Yeah, I met Terry, I think last year, maybe the year before, uh no last year, uh at WMBF Worlds, and we had like hot pot, and he put like a he like put a raw egg on it. And I think he thought I wasn't gonna eat it and was like, of course I'm gonna eat it. I'm like, I'm not, I don't have any problem. So I was eating and then um and then when we met him again, he was like, I'm gonna put a raw egg on. He's like, put two raw eggs in this one. And I was like, okay. And then um he's like, we'll go to Hot Pot again the next night. He's like, we'll put three on. I was like, I go, Terry, how many raw eggs do I have to eat to make you happy? And he's like, we'll just keep going.

SPEAKER_02: 49:36

That's too funny. That's too funny, yeah. Terry's uh Terry's a mutual friend, he's uh yeah, but it it's it's fun. But I I really agree with some of the uh things that you've mentioned, gave us a lot of uh really good information for really elevating the standard or being a pro bodybuilder is even for shows, it's really, really good insight. But I really think yeah, even just for being an elite athlete yourself and just trying to put yourself in that mindset and just seeing what the world, the rest of the world is doing, really can uh really elevate the or uh just your standard on what this sport can actually bring us and not just get too comfortable in uh you know the North American uh standard. I think it's really, really great. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 50:20

Yeah, yeah. And you know, uh in general, I think you do it for a while, you watch bodybuilding just go through different phases, really. And right now, sometimes it seems like people are less concerned with like what happens actually in real life and more concerned about what it looks like online. And so as a result, I feel like sometimes some certain things there are so many things about that show that were so incredible down to the details that don't even ever get put online because they were like there were just so many things they didn't care about what was going online. It was just great. And I I do think that the US shows and and here's the thing is I have natural clients, I have enhanced clients, and I will say this I think a lot of times the people that run natural bodybuilding organizations in the US they do love natural bodybuilding, but sometimes I think that they forget that the production really matters. Um, and I say this also because like um, you know, the IFBB has started dipping their toe into the natural league, and the IFBB has a pretty good natural production, like they have great lighting at every show. I don't know if you've noticed this, but like they bring their own lighting rig and they make sure that the lighting, like I've been to world championship shows where the lighting is atrocious and natural, and I'm like, this is unacceptable. You know, the lighting has to be perfect at worlds. Like, this is our this is the world championship show. So it's like I think that making sure that all of these things are spot on, and so I say this actually out of love. Sometimes my critiques are probably taken as like too harsh, but I say this out of love because I always want I think the IFUB has its place, obviously, on the enhanced side and then on the natural side, but I want the natural side to do well too, and I want it to thrive. And it's like you're gonna not be around long enough if you don't pay attention to these things that people clearly care about. Yeah, 100%.

SPEAKER_01: 52:08

Yeah, like I would I would love to see natural bodybuilder get to the same level as a guy who be enhanced league. Like, I and I think Taiwan is like a great example of showing like what it can be, and like if yeah, if we can make that happen, I'm sure it's just gonna blow up, right?

SPEAKER_00: 52:23

Yeah, and I and I take the approach of I think that like they both, you know, sometimes the natural and the enhanced side they fight and stuff like that. I think the approach of it's like as long as somebody's not cheating, I don't care. You know what I mean? Like it's like they they each have their place, you know what I mean? Like you just you do your thing, they do their thing, and it's all good. You know what I mean? It's like we all at the end of the day, we all just like to pick heavy things up and get big. So it's like and and get on stage in our underwear and ask people to judge our bodies. Our recreational activity is most average people's worst nightmare, right? Or on stage in our underwear saying, All right, judge me, tell me everything that's wrong.

SPEAKER_02: 52:59

Great. Um but yes, thank you so much again for all the good reversion, Cliff. Uh so can you please let our listeners uh just know where we can find you?

SPEAKER_00: 53:09

Yeah, yeah. Um I most of my information gets posted through my Instagram. It's at CW TeamWilson. Um and then uh you can also find me on my website. Uh it's teamwilsonbb.com. Um and those are those are my two main avenues.

SPEAKER_02: 53:25

Yeah. So if you guys have not checked it out, uh go to his check it out, get his book, and then if you see him, get him to sign it. It's on the eBay make a fortune. It'd be really, really awesome. Get your hat, sign it. Same thing, get him sign it.

SPEAKER_03: 53:40

It's a really great hat.

SPEAKER_00: 53:44

I don't even know why I'm signing this.