In the world of fitness, it’s easy to get swept up by extreme advice, especially when you're eager for results. Even the most seasoned experts have fallen into these traps. Dr. Mike Israetel recently shared some of the worst pieces of advice he followed early in his career—mistakes that led to misery, frustration, and suboptimal results.
By learning from his experiences with these seven common pitfalls, you can save yourself time and suffering, and take a more intelligent and sustainable path toward your own fitness goals.
TL;DR: Learn From The Mistakes
- Avoid Extreme Weight Changes: "Dreamer bulks" and radically fast cuts are highly stressful and less effective than slow, moderate weight gain and loss phases.
- Don't Eliminate Macronutrients: Ultra low-carb or ultra low-fat diets are unnecessarily miserable and can hurt performance and hormonal health without providing a significant benefit.
- Nutrient Timing Isn't Magic: Obsessively cramming all your carbs around your workout offers little advantage and can make the rest of your day miserable with hunger.
- Choose Cardio Wisely: Using a high-fatigue, high-injury-risk sport like Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu for cardio can seriously derail your bodybuilding progress.
Diet Mistake #1 & #2: The "Dreamer" Bulk/Cut Cycle
Following the old mantra to "eat big to get big," Dr. Mike spent years doing "dreamer bulks," gaining one to two pounds per week for months at a time. The result wasn't just muscle; it was a "load of fat tissue," stretched skin, poor health, and feeling winded from simple activities. To fix this, he'd then employ the second mistake: radically fast cutting. By losing at least 1% of his body weight per week, his energy plummeted, training suffered, and he likely lost muscle.
- The Better Way: Instead of wild swings, aim for a more moderate pace. Gain about half a pound per week when bulking, and aim to lose between half a pound to a pound per week when cutting. This approach strains your body less and leads to better long-term muscle gain.
Diet Mistake #3 & #4: Extreme Macro Manipulation
Dr. Mike also experimented with pushing macronutrient splits to their absolute limits, with predictably miserable results.
- No-Carb Cutting: He used ketogenic diets to control hunger, but found they robbed him of physical energy, psychological drive, and gym pumps, ultimately hindering his training.
- Ultra High-Carb, Ultra Low-Fat: At the other extreme, he tried eating massive amounts of carbs (700g+) with almost no fat (under 30g). This was incredibly inconvenient, requiring him to eat almost no normal foods, and it yielded no noticeable benefit over a more balanced approach.
The Better Way: Avoid extremes. A moderate diet that includes a healthy balance of carbohydrates and fats is more sustainable, better for performance, and just as effective for building muscle.
Diet Mistake #5: Obsessing Over Nutrient Timing
Caught up in the hype of the "anabolic window," Dr. Mike took nutrient timing to a comical extreme, at one point consuming an intra-workout shake containing 240 grams of carbohydrates. While he got his carbs in, the experience was terrible. The shake was a chore to drink, and because he had used up his daily carb allotment, he was left starving for the rest of the day. The marginal benefit of this approach, he realized, was practically zero.
- The Better Way: Nutrient timing is not a huge deal. Having slightly more carbs around your workout is a good idea, but distributing them sensibly throughout the day is far more practical and just as effective.
Training Mistake: Using Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu for Cardio
Tired of traditional cardio, Dr. Mike decided to use Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu to burn fat. While it certainly burned calories, the combat sport was fundamentally at odds with his bodybuilding goals. BJJ is designed to "fuck people up," leading to constant injuries, high levels of fatigue, and recovery demands that interfered with his lifting. The two goals simply do not play well together.
- The Better Way: For bodybuilding cardio, choose low-impact, low-fatigue options. Getting 10,000 steps per day is an amazing way to burn calories and improve health without compromising your recovery for weight training.
Conclusion: The Common Thread is Moderation
The overarching lesson from all of these mistakes is that extremism is rarely the answer. Whether it's your rate of weight gain, your macronutrient split, or your cardio choice, a moderate and consistent approach will almost always yield better, more sustainable results with far less misery. Before you jump headfirst into a new, radical-sounding strategy, test it modestly first and see how your body responds.
