Meet the STRONGEST Man in Calisthenics | FitnessFAQs Podcast #12 - Mathew Zlat 

Listen on Spotify - spoti.fi/3FD8PLE or Apple Podcasts - apple.co/3DRiRHG Timestamps - 00:00 Warning 00:40 Mathew Zlat Story 1:19 Personal Records 2:25 The Journey 6:29 What's Streetlifting? 7:14 Starting Weighted 8:25 Beginner Routine 9:56 How Strong Are You? 11:05 Optimal Exercise Order 13:30 Perfect Dips 22:45 Perfect Pull-Ups 32:38 Accessory Exercises 37:28 Isolation Exercises 39:41 Training Vs Strict Form 40:42 Pause Reps 42:21 Warm-Up Mistakes 45:16 Rest Times 47:21 Skills & Streetlifting 48:54 One Arm Pull-Up 54:31 Training to Failure 57:06 Injury 58:10 Body Fat 58:58 Hiring Coach 1:01:53 Autoregulation 1:02:40 What to Track 1:03:51 Periodisation 1:04:40 Special Supplements 1:10:15 Advice to Younger Self

I tried for years to learn backbend bridge, front splits and middle splits. Stupid strategy. Once I focused on one thing only, I made huge progress and could do it consistently. Once a skill is mastered, it's easy to maintain while focusing on the next.

This guy's explanation of how he trains is the most in depth, yet easy to understand for the layman, from beginner to advance. His English is superb too. Respect to this young man and his work ethics. Great choice Mr Vadnal 👏🏼

Perfect dips - support be tense, depress scapula, chest hollow - position must tight, close, symmetrical, control weight w/ legs - rear delt at elbow level or below - when pushing, let go of closed chest and abs tension - control is the most important in dips - mentally visualize the full dips sequence - breathe freely, breathe out before dipping to tense abs, - put the weight very low so u can hold the plate with feet Perfect pullups - stabilize 1st in hang - pull as fast as possible - until chin/ neck clears bar - grip a little wider than shoulder width - grip width is up to u - deadstop is good 4 technique - nonstop allows more reps

What a mature athlete, for such a young man he's very well researched and wise.

Wishing him a quick recovery from that nasty bicep tear!

I'm a 60yo slug looking for inspiration. I've watched your channel for quite some time and really feel body weight training is a good fit for me. This interview was absolutely brilliant. One of the best I've ever seen. Intelligent, informed questions answered with honesty, clarity and precision. Not a single second wasted with fluff or ego. Thanks so much.

Great ! His second interview in English i think. Hopefully he recovers fast and keeps setting records in the future!

Fantastic interview with a young master of weighted calisthenics. Kudos!

One of the best quests yet, amazing information and inspiration.

This was awesome! Great in-depth but easy to understand analysis and presentation of Mat's experience. I really love the calisthenics community

inspiring stuff thanks

Just wow, what an incredible video guys, thank you so much for that! It is so hard to get this kind of top information, from the highest level athletes for free, everything nowadays is so hard monetized, BIG thank you for the work you do! I have been in Calisthenics for 3 years and I have learned A LOT from this video!

Amazing interview! Wanted to hear Matthew speak in a long format for so time now. He definitely put a lot of thought behind everything he's doing and I love the fact he's willing to speak out against the prevailing sentiment around certain fitness topic, but in a thoughtful manner.

Awesome podcast! Thank you both a lot

A young person with so much knowledge and wisdom.

I fully agree with the exercise order, your most desired skill/exercise, Basics, isolation. Really good solid advice, especially for newcomers to intermediates.

Been following him for some time, really great strength

Absolute killer pod lads 💪🏻

saw this guy's videos around a year ago, some really insane stuff. I had no idea he was this fluent in English--it's awesome to hear his thoughts on calisthenics and training in such great detail. A top notch athlete who sounds like he's also a good coach

This was a great interview, learned lots of valuable info!💪🏽

Loved this Interview! Lots of gold nuggets of wisdom in there. This dude seems very intelligent. My main takeaway is the protracted/„caved“ position in the dip

Matthew, Great advice. Very, very helpful. Thank you.

Great interview, interesting questions and clear and honest answers. Thanks

50:00 I love this, and I love the fact that even Daniel learns something new and useful. As you said in another video, that even with so many years of training, you're still open-minded and learn so many new things. Keep the great content, this series is gold!

great interview!

love how much Dan is enjoying this conversation haha

Excellent podcast daniel. Mathew was a great guest, and the guy is a wealth of knowledge. Another athlete deserving of respect and admiration. Truly inspiring.

He is clearly very well researched in strength training and programming.

Great talk. Thanks

Greate interview man.

Really great podcast, thanks for introducing me to this dude, fkn awesome content all around from you brother tyvm and keep up the good work, I learned a lot from this one, watched this a few times now actually.

really appreciate the timestamps. Great interview

Very good discussion, thanks.

Always love Matthew getting the cred he deserves, super strong dude and seems to enjoy sharing the love for the sport he has mastered

His program has been the best progress I’ve ever experienced in my journey. Definitely worth the money to buy all 3 at once. It’s like a 2-3 year program if you stay with it. It’s impressive how strong you get in the pull and dip with just the novice phase alone. Started with 25lbs on both and the end of the first month was at 105lbs 3x7 reps. I got into a car accident so I’m at a stage to recover and will work my way back to that in the next few months since I lost strength. If you’re into this specifically I’d strongly suggest looking into his programs. Was able to stop wasting my time watching RU-vid trying to figure it out how these ppl got so strong. Transfers over to barbell training as well

Really great tips

Great talk, a lot of wise words guys

EXACTLY right about the dips, I got shoulder pain from dips and bench because so many people say you should keep your chest as high as possible and retract shoulderblades. When I stopped that all my pain went away and its the first time ever im able to do dips consistently going more "hollow" as to say instead of retracted, im kinda dipping Dow ny chest the more down I go, feels amazing and better even targets the chest.

Great advice 😄

I would LOVE to have weighted calisthenics competitions here in America 🇺🇸! I lived here my whole life I just began weighted calisthenics this year( the four lift approach: pullup, dip, muscle up, and squat), but I have been training calisthenics for a little over two years now. I began training sports seriously since 11, so ten years ago. When I say I love training, it doesn't begin to explain how much I enjoy it. Keep grinding everyone. Discipline and consistency are the keys to success. If I had to add a third one, I would say to train smart too. I avoided soo many injuries by not letting my ego get in the way. I believe in all of you reading this. YOU WILL MAKE IT!

This is a golden knowledge. I’ll be fixing my weighted dips after this video.

so interesting to listen to you guys! Mathew, you're a great athlete!

Great video. Awesome strength. Dip competition with 3 white lights ? You learn something everyday. Dips & pull-ups are the best upper body exercises.

His english is great! and the information is excellent.

Inspirational af

These podcasts by far the best content on your channel

"At 13 I benched 105 kilos" This guy has like 0.01% top genetics, I don't even know if he can be classified as a human being

Inspiring transformation! Although I prefer lifting, calisthenics is a great way to build muscle and athleticism. Training is important but there are no real gains without proper diet. I realized that after I started following my first meal plan. I found it on Next Level Diet. At first it was tough to eat an excessive amount of calories, but eventually I got used to it. Good diet is a game changer!

Thank you for the Interview! Next i would like you to interview Zeblack Turbo :))

What a legend! Nice english brother we understand you perfectly. Recover soon and get some new PRs :)

What he said about top single then back off sets is so interesting because all the top powerlifters in the us or europe use this way of training. I wonder how much better it is to first do your working sets then do the top single, i might give it a try

Zlat is my OAP inspiration 👍

Мэт, спасибо за эфир, ты рассказал очень много деталей, было интересно!! Daniel, thanks for this podcast!!

A+ on the dip technique advice! (As expected from someone who can dip in the 400 lbs range.)

Fire 🔥 bro fire

not related to strength but matvey also so well spoken in english its awesome

The guy as a child was literally like :"I'm going to do push ups now." few moments later "WHAT? I can't do more? UNACCEPTABLE!!!" and went on to become a legend.

I agree i have big develop arms and forearms sligthy wide shoulder grip works the best on me i tried narrow very hard this guy is honest

being honest, been doing fitness for a long time, so I just tried this today and realized I am waaaay weak that I thought I was strong, getting soon in your class

not knocking weight loss surgery because I do feel there is a place for it. but how you feel about steroids is the same way I feel about wlsurgery. I feel that clients/people/athletes miss the very important journey…the mental fortitude, etc. awesome info as always.

What an absolute expert! He and Smaev are crazy monsters. It's really hard to believe that Mathew hasn't used anything, but maybe... I have my own hypothesis of how to gain maximum strength with minimum side effects, with just 1 cycle in your life. You need to do 2 mg of dbol every other day for 200 days. This will only work if you're a good responder. I gained +30 kg on my bench for 40 days with 5 mg of dbol per day. If I knew what I know now, would have done what I said. The most important thing is to keep your receptors' sensitivity at its best. If you do those 200 days, let's say for a powerlifter (because it's the easiest to measure), you could gain +50 kg on all your basic exercises on the end of this period, while not have any side effects. Many people talk against dbol, but actually the best part about dbol is that it's active in smaller doses than any other steroid. This is of course once you've reached your natural limits.

Daniel, interview the street calisthenics guys: I Am the Proof, Brody Gains, Lox, etc.

This guy is so sharp

Great interview but I wish you had asked him about his lower body training based on some of the video footage we saw.

My favourite interview about calisthenics. The style and approach to training is the most solid amongst everything I've seen.

Fantastic interview. Question, for weighted pull ups I have been doing my 5x5 but incorporating "scapula activations" ( not sure what to call it) at the end of each set. So I will do the 5 reps, continue hanging and do reps of the initial scapula activation of a pull up until I am spent. Picked up on it from a video I say a while back. The idea of it was to increase strength obviously. Thoughts?

Some people like to lock at the top doing pull-ups and chin-ups, but I prefer to unpack my shoulders at the bottom and hang so that every time I pull myself up I have to lock and hinge. You can't do very many reps doing pull-ups that way, but it makes you really strong--especially if you do it with a wide grip. Same thing with the chin-ups, except my grip is narrower doing chin-ups than it is doing overhand pull-ups. Also like to throw in some hammer grip pull-ups and hang from the bar while switching between pull-up variations. His dip technique sounds a lot like mine though--go all of the way down, keep the chest hollow and press down with the scapula.

Respect+++

Crazy crazy person, respect arises

I live in India & we have street lifting competitions here infact our current national championship is just 17 years old but became national champion at 16

Subtítulos en español porfavor , me gusta mucho tu canal , saludos desde Suramérica.

That guys row form in the back at 26:10 hurt my head lol.

It would be really great if you invite Matteo Deu to your podcast!

We’ve been doing these contests in USA fyi especially the east coast. It’s more cultural I believe though than an I guess “official sanctioned” competition.

Hi FitnessFAQ, thanks for your effort, could you please enable CC (subtitles) in your videos, I'm not so fluent in English, so I (and many others like me) need the subtitles to fully understand your content.

very good. if started more calesthenics like training in addition to my kickboxing. its very intresting what he say. he doesnt us accessory and explain it very good, why. im going to get used to the rings and started training with them, cause i wanted to get better on the rings and stability overall. some friends are thinking its for more mass or improve other exercises. no- its just for the skill and stability

Really nice Input. Especially the pause thing. And I thought 3 minutes are long. 😅

It would be great to listen to your podcast with Dejan Stipke!

can you do an interview with Andrey Smaev and Matteo Deu next? The only calisthenics athletes at the same level with matthew

Fast muscle gain , but the ligaments and tendons , connective tissues , take a lot longer to strengthen. If he has injured his connective tissues it will take a very long time to heal . I hope it is a bicep tear only . Wish him well , good health and fitness.

wow crazy on those rest times, ive always thought 2-3mins max 5 minute rest will help a lot

Good bro

u know how visualizing an exercise often can help the mind muscles connection. Well watching someone do dips for half this long ass vid made my chest hurt. And i trained my chest 2 days ago

Hey, there have been some street lifting competitions in Montréal before! I know a few guys who participated.

Nice interview,very informative. Let’s get Dejan Stpke.

Never thought you could tear a bicep during pullups, even with weight.

he seems like a really nice guy

I didn't get an operation on time. Biceps is almost 2/3 from original size and like small head is missing.

I'm surprised no one ever mentions bodyweight fluctuations and even what clothes you're wearing at the time when calculating weighted movements. My weight can fluctuate anywhere from 0-5kgs+ in a single day (e.g. having a huge high sodium soup the night before) and then working out in the cold in a hoodie, long pants and shoes vs. topless in a pair of shorts at home could be another 1kg difference. I always weigh myself just before my workout and then adjust the added weight accordingly to match my target total weight (e.g. BW 80kgs +10kg or BW 83kgs +7kg). I find this makes it easier to track and be consistent. Anyways, great video!

Great podcast, one thing I am confused with though, he has a routine 4*8 and if you get 8 on the last set you increase weight by a set amount, that implies that the last set is to failure and not 2RIR

All exercises should be performed perfectly. Perfect means full range of motion, so all the way up and all the way down, hopefully without need for an assist from momentum. Anything less is of course easier, but still a partial movement so you are training to that range skipping the rest of the motion where you will then be weak, perhaps not even able to do. For example, that means unless you are very tight or restricted (in which case there is a major mobility issue or the load is too high to handle), the pullup is to your breastbone, not just to touch the chin, since thats where your scapulas hits in the back. After all, when doing a chest, presumably its all the way down to the nipples and not to off a few inches above.

he benched 105kgs at the age of 13 ... whats going on here ??

Dude... you should check out Slidis and his channel slidis mode. He is a monster amongst us mortals.

just to clarify, assistance is not important for strength but for body building, assistance is very important.

you should do a podcast with Slidismode

what a science hum? he got it down!!!

What can I do while I'm resting for those 10 minuites do I just sit and rest or do crunches thanks

6:17 that one armed muscle-up just ruined any conception I ever had about my own strength or strength potential. I didn't even think such a thing was possible. Consider me officially and permanently humbled. And your English is brilliant, sir

Daniel please bring lgor kowtyn 🤗🤗