3 Years of Progress


This picture was taken before I started bodybuilding/powerlifting roughly 3 years ago.


This picture was taken 1.2 years into my lifting career.

The rest of the pictures posted below were taken yesterday in a purely unpumped state.









Let me know your opinions guys.

You have made some really good progress. The one thing I noticed right off the bat is the lack of abs on your very lean body. Are you just not flexing at all or is this a weak point for you? I gave you a 7 look lean but you still can put A LOT more size on.

Your chest seems to have improved a lot. Do you train legs? You’re not showing them.

[quote]BF Bullpup wrote:
Your chest seems to have improved a lot. Do you train legs? You’re not showing them.[/quote]

Really, because I see 2 leg pics.

[quote]BF Bullpup wrote:
Your chest seems to have improved a lot. Do you train legs? You’re not showing them.[/quote]

It was really hard to flex my legs on the day the pictures were taken. My legs were extremely sore from doing 30+ minutes of non stop squatting.

I was doing my own form of a modified Dynamic workout for box squats. I used a 6 rep rep max on my front squat and did explosive singles with 10-30 seconds of rest between reps. …my legs cramped up twice yesterday …3 days after my workout ;/

[quote]shizen wrote:
You have made some really good progress. The one thing I noticed right off the bat is the lack of abs on your very lean body. Are you just not flexing at all or is this a weak point for you? I gave you a 7 look lean but you still can put A LOT more size on. [/quote]

Yeah I agree to an extent, but in some of the pictures I’m not really focusing on fully flexing my abs. Recently, I started incorporating a lot more core intensive movements into my workouts such as front squats and good mornings. …my abs have actually improved a lot because of this in the past 3 months.

Good job man, obvious progress there! Keep it up.

D

I love seeing progress like this. Great job Mr. Ben. Feel like throwing out some lift numbers and a WO plan?

[quote]Brant_Drake wrote:
I love seeing progress like this. Great job Mr. Ben. Feel like throwing out some lift numbers and a WO plan?[/quote]

Before I ever touched a weight I played basketball for 7~ years.

My workout plan during my first year was a typical bodybuilding style of training. I would train for about 1.5-2 hours per day for 5 days a week.

My workout plan during my second year was similar except I focused more on moving heavier and heavier weight and spent less time in the gym as a result. I was still using a split based bodybuilding approach.

My workout plan during the start of my third year was an upper lower split where I would focus solely on the big compound movements. My main objective was to progress in bar poundage on the bench, squat, and deadlift. I didn’t really focus on progression in any of my other lifts.

2 months ago I started a Westside approach to training which I decided to cycle in for a 5week period. After the 5 weeks of Westside I decided to focus on the Olympic lifts - which I have never done up to that point - and did that for 2 weeks with the intention of doing Westside again for 5 weeks once those 2 weeks were over. I never went back to Westside. In fact I decided I’m never going to follow a program again.

Since that point my workout program currently consists of bench press, dips, pull-ups, deadlifts, front squats, cleans, and glute ham raises, barbell rows. Rarely do I ever do anything else.

An upper-lower type split works best for me so I still use that; however each day in the gym is very different from the last. I couldn’t tell you what my workout would be next week because I just usually decide what I’ll do when I wake up in the morning or what I’m motivated to do for that day.

A typical workout can consist of one or a combination of the following:
max effort work
Dynamic work
6x6 on some compound lifts
40minutes of cleans or clean and jerk
8x10 on on some compound lifts
Yielding Isometric holds + other isometrics
Negatives
Supersets

My maxes from college:

Bench press: 315x3
Deadlift: 470x1
Back Squat: 405x3