I have been on a lifetime bulk and began to feel undiseplined and unhealthy. Also tired of looking like I don’t even lift. All I did was quit eating fast food for the past 3 months and changed my workouts a little… Here I am now.
There is alot that can be critiqued but I never thought I would have to drop this much weight just to see some abdominal muscle
Like I said I have basically been on a lifetime bulk so this is all new to me. 25yo I just want to look like I lift and be healthy at this point. Kind of don’t know all my goals anymore.
Critique away guys
Body fat guesses would be interesting. My guess is 21% at the start and maybe 14/16% currently
Interesting. We’re the same height. Starting at a little less than you did, but with less LBM, as well, I got down to 143 late last summer before I really started to look lean (I think I have big abs, so seeing them wasn’t as big a deal). So I know what you’re feeling. I’d probably have to drop to 135 (high school wrestling weight) to look like you do now.
Damn wasn’t expecting you to look so jacked from the title. Was expecting a DYELer
I think you’d have to cut even more to get peeled, but I think abs having some difficulty showing is a byproduct of permabulking
I saw a video with Paul Revelia saying that you prolly need to get lighter than you usually want to to get really shredded, and alot of guys are uncomfortable going so low in scale weight. I personally wouldn’t want to.
So many people say “we all have abs, you just need to cut”, and then cut, and don’t have abs. Because they don’t smash their abs. You can hypertrophy your abs quite a bit. You’re very close to seeing abs, obviously, but a lot of people with more bodyfat than you have clearly visible abs, because their abs are built properly. It’s a bit strange, how everyone says to work muscles to get them bigger, but we should just ‘have less fat’ and our abs will pop out accordingly. Nope. You’ll have to work them if you want to look anything other than emaciated.
Yeah, what @flappinit said. I think you looked pretty jacked, and definitely look like you lift. But it looks to me like your BF is low enough that you could definitely be showing some amount of abs if you had more muscles there to show. My BF is quite a bit higher than yours, and I am pretty sure I can flex my way into showing more abs than what you are showing. Or, as I like to call them, Fabs. Fat Abs.
Would be curious to know how you train your abs as well.
Meal plan- I used to count my macros be super up tight and weigh everything for years. I would be so worried if I wasnt feeding the body at least 4000 calories. Now I just go by feel and tweak things here and there. Generally like this -
Meal 1
-Snack on some kettle chips on way to work(about 2 servings throughout the day)
-Zero carb energy drink
Meal 2
-Half a tub of fat free yogurt (about 2.5 servings)
-Blueberries or banana
Meal 3 (lunch)
-2-4 slices Whole grain bread
-Grass fed butter
-Honey
-Chicken bone broth
-4-6 eggs (usually 4)
-Orange juice or real cranberry juice through the rest of day
Meal 4 (*dinner my biggest meal, I eat as much as I want my only rule is no McDonald’s or taco Bell like I used to)
-Whatever my wife makes usually pasta or tacos or rice and beef. Usually alot of meat
-If she doesn’t cook I’ll just go to Chipotle and get the biggest bowl possible and double meat
Cardio- Nothing specific but I walk 90 percent of the day and carry metal around for 10-12 hours at work so I guess that is a free workout itself.
My workout has been mainly bodyweight/calisthenics during this cut. I’m about to add more weights in hopefully this week.
I usually just try to hit each muscle twice a week. High volume. I’ll do like 500 push ups one day or 100-200 pull ups, maybe some handstand push ups, I just pick something and do it for alot of sets and reps. 3-6 days a week. Ab circuit at the end of every workout. Really going by feel now and listening to my body. I’m not trying to go heavy all the time to give my body a rest and reset from all the stress I put it through. Because constantly training with like 85 90 percent of my max for months burned me out.
Now I just do lighter high volume bodyweight workouts. I’ll be back in the gym soon and will try to do calisthenics and free weights. Also taking a break from legs right now (just doing bodyweight squats) and just maintenance because squats and deadlifts would always put me in the dirt for weeks. And honestly I feel like my legs got too big compared to the rest of the body. Which is weird because they are not that strong. They are good where there at rn.
I used to squat (and bench) almost everyday doing a daily max. Sort of a Bulgarian method. Which was actually fun until everything started to hurt alot lol
But that about sums everything up hope that’s not overkill on information
I used to never train abs directly until recently. Only compound movements. This was exactly how I used to think and it did not pay off lol you are right
Thanks for the positive feedback. Looking at the scale is the hardest thing mentally. Anytime I want to lean out, I talk myself out of it because of some numbers on a scale
I should have mentioned - you look great, dude. You can continue the cut and your abs will show, you’re close. But they won’t pop like you want them to pop until you work them, and you’re already doing that, so just keep doing what you’re doing.
Here’s a couple leg shots I know everybody love leg pics I understand tho lol
Idk why they always looked kinda big to me but my squat has always been fairly weak. It makes no sense. They are on a little vacation rn but here but here we go well see what everyone thinks lol
