Brandon Pitre- Muscle Gain and Longevity

About Brandon Pitre

The Weight of Lifting Documentary featuring Brandon Pitre is a closer look at his rise to stardom in his respective class in the USAPL. Here you will see his professional debut at the Virginia Pro meet, and some of his experiences leading to that performance. Some familiar faces in the industry has also shared their thoughts on their personal relationship with Brandon and his future in this sport.
 Filmed, edited, and produced by Rommel Camello. Please enjoy The Weight of Lifting.

Brandon Pitre's Documentary Link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-bhiDitPcw

Your hosts: Colton Cockerell & Trisha Stetzel
Click for more about your hosts:
Colton Cockerell
Trisha Stetzel

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Transcript

Colton Cockerell: 0:04

Hello and welcome to a another exciting episode of Bridge the Gap. We're balancing life through health, wealth, business and relationships.

Trisha Stetzel: 0:17

Hello and welcome to the show. My name is Trisha Stetzel, owner of Results Xtreme Business Solutions. And my friend Colton Cockerell is here with me today.

Colton Cockerell: 0:28

What is going on Trisha, it's kind of weird as always to flip the script and have you introduce the show everyone it is the month of July. So we are focused on health and wellness and we are going to talk to Brandon Pitre today who is a trainer and a power lifter. It just you gotta watch this stuff. look him up. Brandon Petrie, super cool guy, and he has some really cool videos out there. Brandon what's going on, man? So good to see you.

Brandon Pitre: 0:54

Hey, how's it going? Good to see you too. It's been a it's been a good while this is great that you guys are having me on here. I look forward to seeing what this is about and diving into it and see if I can, you know, spit out some information that may help some people know awesome. So

Trisha Stetzel: 1:08

before we dive in, we must thank our sponsor the Sharer McKinley Group LLC. Imagine that

Colton Cockerell: 1:14

man, what a great company. Okay, so Brandon, I think a lot of people out there, you know, you all especially high schoolers, you always hear me I want to get big, you know, that's just like the thing, right? So for someone who is starting a journey is like, you know, what, I do want to put on some weight, I want to gain some muscle, whether it's bodybuilding or doing something, just weightlifting, whatever it may be, what is some easy steps that you can just think off the top of your head to help people like that, who do want to put on some muscle put on some weight.

Brandon Pitre: 1:43

Um, the first thing first is make sure that you have consistency in your life, that is going to be the biggest thing that's like a lot of people's downfall, when they get out the gate, they get very energized, you may, you know, have that energy for like the first two, three days. But then, you know, after that you take four five days off and you come back, I would say just when you get into the gym, find some type of workout routine that at least makes it to where something's fun for you. But it keeps pulling you back in every day. Because that's how you start. You can't necessarily build anything unless the consistency of a foundation is there. Because then it's just gonna crumble apart, you're looking to you know, lose weight, get big, do anything, you got to make sure you have consistency first, and then you can build on top of

Trisha Stetzel: 2:28

Do you think? Or do you find Brandon that having that. an accountability partner helps in that space. Like if you're just starting out and really trying to build that momentum to get to the gym every day, is having an accountability partner a good idea? Oh, for

Brandon Pitre: 2:42

sure. I think that's how a lot of kids in high school even find the gym and they continuously go is because you usually have your buddies that you know, go with you, you'll have fun, it becomes like a social hour. But at the same time, at least it pulls you in there every day. And the more that you're exposed to the gym, the more you're exposed to different things that you may see a powerlifter. And then one day you may see a bodybuilder and then one day like oh, wow, I want to I do want to look like that. And then that's how you start branching off into your own fitness journey. But it starts with a good you know, group of friends is definitely a great way to you know, build some consistency in the gym.

Colton Cockerell: 3:16

Absolutely. And help important, not just going to the gym consistently. So you building that mindset to go to the gym, how important is eating, when it comes to gaining muscle,

Brandon Pitre: 3:27

oh, you have to eat trying to make sure that you skip out on carbs or skip out on this and skip out on that and you know, starving yourself, that's not going to cut it if you're trying to gain muscle, you really have to make sure that you are in a surplus, you have to make sure that you are consistently training that muscle hard. And that's the only way that you're going to grow is that you have to eat you also have to sleep. If a lot of people in school a lot of college kids that want to grow muscle, but you're you know, on, you know, three energy drinks and you on two hours of sleep and you just cramming the books, you need to let your body get some sleep. And if you also want muscles to grow, got to sleep definitely have to eat that's for sure.

Colton Cockerell: 4:10

And so can you can you kind of explain more when you said you definitely have to be in a surplus. Can you break that down a little bit more for our listeners,

Brandon Pitre: 4:17

everyone kind of has you know, where they maintain their weight that and it's kind of the calories that you have been taking in right? A lot of people don't track just yet but you are maintaining your body weight with some type of calories. So the first thing you would kind of do or at least what I tell my clients is for the first week, just track what you're already eating. Don't try and like switch over to like a new diet. Don't try to switch over to anything else. Find out where you are so that we can figure out where you're trying to go. Because you don't even know where you are is gonna be hard to create a deficit or surplus. So let's say that you track for a week you find out that you're at 2000 calories. Right at that point. If you're trying to gain weight. I always advise gaining at a slower Lower rates. So that way you put on as much lean muscle mass as possible without necessarily things getting too bloated and inflammation building. So I usually tell them at 250 calories to whatever that is. So if you're at 2000, on average, let's try to go for 2,250. stick with that for about two, three weeks, let the poundage grow. And then if you want to gain a little bit more, you can add another 250 Within the next like four to six weeks. And then let that sit for a little bit, watch the scale rise, and then just keep going off on that until you stop gaining weight. And then at that point, I add another 250. And then just keep that going. Keep that in check. And that's how you get to a surplus.

Colton Cockerell: 5:41

I haven't heard it said like that before. That's That's fascinating.

Trisha Stetzel: 5:45

Brandon, I was so before we started recording the show, I said Brandon, is this your full time job? Yes. Which I love right now. He is an extreme power lifter. Before we started this show, Colton showed me these videos. Brandon, you're freaking amazing at what you do. But I also know that you coach people. And I think there are a lot of female listeners out there particularly older ones. And when we're talking about muscle, they're like, oh, no, that's not for me. So can we talk about the importance of building muscle for older women, and even men as well, for sure,

Brandon Pitre: 6:22

I believe that, especially for the older woman, it's way more important for them to actually push themselves in the gym and grow that muscle and actually get introduced to the kind of things that I do. So powerlifting, introducing more compound lifts, those are like multi jointed lifts, meaning that you're allowing yourself to like work multiple joints at once within one exercise. And whenever you're doing that, you're building up a lot of bone density through the pressure of stressing out, you know, the bones are the most of through poundage on top of the body over time, is going to build that resilience. So that way, whenever you're 85 or 90, and you see those grandmas and grandpas get out the chair willy nilly, and they're having fun and they're walking free, they probably have some of that training in their life. Because if not trying to get out of a chair or trying to walk is gonna hurt. You see, like, you know, Grandpa get hip replacements and stuff like that getting introduced to compound movements earlier on this thing consistent with that all the way through, you know, 60, 65, 70, 75 is going to kind of limit those hip replacements and stuff like that.

Colton Cockerell: 7:29

And so that's your talk compound movements of deadlifts, you know,

Brandon Pitre: 7:32

right. So you got deadlifts, squat, even even bench I know a lot of people think bench is you know, purely for just chess or just maybe arms. But you actually when you, you know, if you learn how to benchpress the full way you are working every bit of your body, you're working your back, you're working your triceps, working your biceps, you're working your chest, you're working your quads, you're working everything in that benchpress. So those are like the main ones, but you can even do it is something as simple as like a bent over row as well. Those are still some things where you need to have a slight bend in your knees, but you're also rowing with your elbow. So that's another multi joint movement, and just different things like that. So we're using multiple joints at once, which just do a great deal of service to your body.

Colton Cockerell: 8:19

I wish everyone could see what we can see. I mean, he's just poping out his day. Just shirt. I mean, I wish my biceps like that big. You started though, like everybody else, right where you're just like a scrawny guy. And then you start working. Now you get into it. So just kind of go through your mindset to be where you are, kind of tell us your journey starting where you were at. And then how you became the Brandon weightlifting, pastry piece mode, and how you became that and talk about your mindset because that I mean, that's such an important part of working out. If you're really trying to try to you know, create this muscle mass this all this other stuff

Brandon Pitre: 8:56

is funny, like my journey is a little bit different. Mine's a little interesting. So I remember being introduced to any style of working, I didn't get introduced into middle school. I didn't play Little League, I didn't do any like sports. When I was younger. The first time I touched a sport like natural organized sport, I was in middle school, and I didn't know how to play football. I didn't know anything about like anything. So they just threw me on the line because all they said was alright, just go forward and just hit a guy. And I was like, okay, simple enough line up on the line and then just try to tackle the running back or whatever that I don't have to think or anything like that. It's not complicated. And always love working hard. So like a person bigger than me. I have an older brother who used to fight me and you know, try to beat me up all the time. So I wasn't scared of someone who was bigger than me. So I was like, still someone who worked hard but I knew I knew I was doing. Then I got the high school and I started learning more about the sport I started having, like, people that I'm fans of, and I wanted to be a skilled player. And the coach told me that I have no clue what I'm doing and that like But I couldn't play that position. So they're trying to put me on the line as well. And I was like, no. So I dedicated my entire freshman high school year to learning how to exercise, learning how to workout and I would come home from school, and then train and then try to watch YouTube videos on different exercises, like, you know, watch YouTube videos on how I can like, you know, grow my legs, how could get faster, I could be more athletic. And I just stayed with it every single day. And then I worked out with the varsity football players as much as I can. We used to say after the game, so worked out like I just I was I was a workaholic. So then from that point on, I actually started loving the workout part more than I did the sport. And don't get me wrong. As I grew in high school, I love football still. But the working outside is what drove me like, every single time at the practice, I'm working out after games, sometimes I still would work out once I left high school still always kept working out as a part of my regimen. And then that's when I started getting into personal training. And I dabbled in all different aspects of areas of fitness. And I did a bodybuilding show before I dabbled around with CrossFit with all you guys. And I just love testing out, you know, all the different aspects of fitness. The one thing that I was always gifted at was strength. And then a guy at 24, he came up to me and he was like, why don't you do a powerlifting competition. And I was like, okay, as I didn't know that, you still do that. I remember doing powerlifting as an accessory to football in high school. But that didn't really count for anything. And so I was introduced to the sport. And from that point on, I just fell in love with it, that the drive to want to be better than myself every single day, because that number can still go up. There isn't a you know, a cap on a number someone can say that well 800 I feel like that's the most that some of you do. But wait two years, someone's going to do more, you know. And that's exactly what happens every single time I have a friend who deadlifts 1,000 pounds and deadlifts over 1,000 pounds. So you tried to tell him five years ago that you can't do it. And here he is five years later, like it's done, and now is seen as like he wants more. And like that 1,000 pounds is a regular number to them. So there is never a true limit on anything the strength sport, because that number can keep going up. It's more about just seeing for myself, How much better can I get every single day? And even if I'm better than my competition, Am I better than the person I was yesterday? And that's something that will always drive me because I can always be better than myself. I can always say

Colton Cockerell: 12:41

competition myself. See, Trisha that tells you you like

Trisha Stetzel: 12:44

him? I do. He's awesome. So Brandon, for people who don't know what a powerlifting competition is, can you just describe it for us, so people can get an idea of what it is that you just love to do? For

Brandon Pitre: 12:57

sure, for sure. So the competition is, is going to be a competition or what we call meets. So where you get tested for three lifts, which is going to be the squat, and then as the bench press, and then as the deadlift, it is always going to be in that order, you get three attempts to basically put your best effort out there for each lifts. So you get three attempts to squat reaches a bench, and the three attempts a deadlift, and you get judged on like, whether it's a three white lifts, meaning that it's all good, and it counts, or it can be, you know, a three red lift, which means it doesn't count, you have to try again. So that way you can register and total. Or even if you just get two white lights, and one red is still good. And if you get two reds and one white is still bad, and it doesn't count. And basically at the end of the meet, you combine all the weights or all the lifts that got registered to build up a total. And then that's how you decide who wins the competition. So it's all about just putting forth the best squat, your best bench, your best deadlift to standard, which are our standards within the usap USAPL rules and guidelines and seen as the strongest.

Trisha Stetzel: 14:12

So are there brackets or categories based on your body weight? Like how do they figure out who competes against who.

Brandon Pitre: 14:19

So there's actually two styles that you can actually have. So we have different weight classes and divisions, we have separation of gender as well between male and female, but then they also you also still kind of compete with each other because we do things off of a formula for the best lifter. And based upon that they will actually have us all compete against each other with our totals with our body weight and just kind of see like pound for pound who was the best lifter like who was better out of all the weight classes. Cool.

Colton Cockerell: 14:50

I love that and and I want to just reiterate something you said previously is that whenever you started working out you had a why and that was I wanted to play a skill Last position and from there you just fell in love with it and that's what pushed you and then even getting into powerlifting it's not necessarily Hey, I'm gonna beat these people around me. No, I'm gonna beat my personal best and you have a competition with yourself which is very difficult to do like to constantly battle with yourself daily like getting that is the ultimate discipline. And that is awesome. So again, everyone who do you have any questions about working out how to get bigger how to find meet some kind of goal that you're trying to meet? That's the first thing you need. You need your why why are you doing it and you got to have consistency like Brandon said, find a group of people that are working out with I'm sure you could find easily find some people who want to also get shredded or bigger, whatever, whatever word you want to use, right? You hear them all. But the other thing too, we're gonna have Brandon we're gonna have Brandon's contact information in our in our links. So definitely feel free if you're like, hey, you know what, I want to be in bodybuilding. I would not recommend anybody except for Brandon, for you to sit down with have as a coach. So, again, solid guy, you don't find a humble powerlifter. All right, there's usually a lot of ego. But this guy is solid. So Brandon, thank you so much for being on the show today, man. I appreciate having you. Thanks for taking the time.

Brandon Pitre: 16:09

No, no problem. The pleasure is mine. I'm always here to you know, help out any way that I can.

Trisha Stetzel: 16:14

Awesome. Brandon, thank you so much again for being with us. It was so nice to meet you today. It was good. Me too, Trisha. All right. So hey, guys, just a reminder. Like I sip on Wednesdays when we're posting our podcast. So tune in next week for another exciting episode of Bridge that Gap.

Colton Cockerell: 16:32

We'll be talking to Bob Rakowski. So it's going to be good you don't want to miss it. Thanks again for tuning into this week's podcast. Don't forget to subscribe and share this podcast with the most important people in your life. Colton Cockerell with Sharer McKinley Group, LLC is located at 820 South Friendswood Drive Suite 207 Friendswood, Texas 77546 phone number to 281-992-5698. Securities and investment advisory services offered through NEXT Financial Group, Inc. member FINRA/SIPC Sharer McKinley Group is not an affiliate of NEXT Financial Group, Inc.