Bodybuilding Training, Can We Make This Clear?

Got any input on training? How is your own training going? How do you train? Do you look like a bodybuilder? It’s OK if you don’t because it’s not so important anyway considering this is a hobby. I just want to know. If you don’t want to answer, that’s fine.

Do you hang with bodybuilders? That is, are you an insider? Once again, its find if you’re not considering this is simply a pastime, nothing more. But perhaps you can offer some insight rather than being hell bent on the barely discernible results of TRT patients versus eugonadal men!

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I’m actually interested in this. I found the article without any links to the studies. The one with the 75% fall was done on ONE guy so screw that. Do you have a link to the other study?

Here’s the article in it’s entirety. I have no experience with contest prep. Perhaps others might have an opinion.

Contest Prep, Tesosterone, IGF-1, and Insulin
One of the beliefs of bodybuilding contest prep is that testosterone drops dramatically as you near your contest (speaking of natural bodybuilders). Some suggest it’s more of an energy issue. Meaning your simply to tired to be interested in things like sex. Others believe the lack of bodyfat, and or fat consumption lead to lower testosterone levels and thus a lower libido. Unfortunately there isn’t a whole lot of science on what really happens.More recently a case study was completed by researchers like Jeremy Loenneke at the University of Oklahoma that followed a high level natural bodybuilder over the course of his contest prep, and the 6 months post contest [1]. This case study has been discussed quite heavily in the bodybuilding news world, but in general they found drastic decreases in body fat, resting heart rate, and blood pressure over the course of his contest prep. They also found that testosterone decreased 9.22 ng/mL to 2.27 ng/mL over the contest prep period, which represents a 75% decrease in testosterone. That’s pretty significant as you can tell, however as with any case study, the population sample doesn’t necessarily prove that testosterone drops during contest prep.If we want a bigger sample size, we need to go back to a rarely discussed study conducted on 14 amateur male bodybuilders [2]. In this study they specifically wanted to find out how contest prep affected anabolic and catabolic hormones. They split them into two groups. The control group was instructed to maintain the same food intake, and training volume throughout the 11-week study. While the Contest Prep group was allowed to diet and train as they wished, but only with the intention that they would compete in the European National Championships at the end of the 11 weeks. I should note the contest prep group was natural, or at least they were self reported natural, and had shown proof they had not failed any drug tests from previous shows, and they also did not fail a drug test at the national championships (at the end of the study).

Training Results

While the study was not designed to compare training regimens, it’s still worth looking at. The Contest Prep group had a much higher training volume over the course of 11 weeks. That’s not surprising since they were in contest prep, but what was interesting was that the training protocol was simply an increase in aerobic activity over the 11-week period. At the start of the study (Week 11) the Contest Prep group was doing the following each week:
600 minutes of total training (10 hours per week)
5.5 Hours of Weight Training

By the end of the study (3 days before they stepped on stage), they were completing the following amount of training each week:
825 minutes of total training (13.75 hours per week, or about 2 hours per day)
5.4 Hours of Weight Training

As you can see, their cardio increased significantly, but they didn’t weight train any more at 3 days out then they did at 11 weeks out. It’s worth mentioning that that total training volume peaked at week 10, where they were spending about 2.4 hours per day in the gym. Meanwhile the control group spent about 1 hour in the gym each day, and of that hour, about 40-45 minutes was spent weight training

Diet Results

Again, not a study looking about bodybuilder diets, but maybe we can learn something. The Contest Prep group followed a consistent 28% protein, 60% carbohydrate, and 12% fat over the course of the 11-weeks. They did note carbohydrates decreased over the prep period, but not significantly. Over the 11-weeks their total calories decreased 13%, which again is not a huge change. Their calories started around 3,700 and decreased to 3,235 3 days out.So their diets didn’t change much, but their cardio volume certainly did. In the end it resulted in almost a 1,000-calorie deficit 3 days out (total calories minus calculated expenditure).Anabolic and Catabolic Hormone Changes

This brings us to the purpose of the study. What exactly happens to anabolic and catabolic hormones during contest prep? Based on this research they found the following:Testosterone
Decreased 11.3% from 11-weeks out to 5-weeks out
Decreased 4.4% from 5-weeks out to 3 days out
Decreased 15.2% from 11-weeks out to 3 days out

It’s worth noting their testosterone levels 3 days out were 17.2 nmol/L, or 505 ng/dl. This is still well within normal ranges (What are normal testosterone levels?). As you also might notice the testosterone drop was relatively small (15%) compared to the study on one bodybuilder in the University of Oklahoma study. One might argue they were using anabolic steroids, but not many guys are using doses that only put them in low to normal ranges before a show. Is 15% a big deal? It’s possible a 15% drop could reduce your libido, especially as a 25-year-old male. But most guys would simply not worry about a 15% drop. This is for the same reasons many are un-interested in testosterone boosters, which typically do nothing more than increase testosterone slightly while improving libido.

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Composition Changes
Body fat dropped from 9.6% to 6.5% (per DEXA scan)
Total weight dropped 9 lbs on average
Lean Body Mass changes were insignificant (meaning they retained lean body mass)

Nothing particularly ground breaking here. They lost body fat and retained (a lot of) lean body mass. Whether or not 6.5% body fat is low enough for a national stage is debatable. I’ve heard people test as low as 4% body fat pre-contest with DEXA scans.IGF-1
Decreased Significantly over the 11 week prep
17.9% Decrease from 11 weeks out to 5 weeks out
22.9% decrease from 11 weeks out to 3 days out

Based on my brief research, their IGF-1 levels (152 ug/L) at 3 days out are quite low for 25 year old males.Insulin
Decreased significantly over the 11-week prep
33.3% Decrease from 11 weeks out to 5 weeks out
45.2% decrease from 11 weeks out to 3 days out

Insulin is known to be muscle sparing (anti-catabolic), but it also is inversely related to lipolysis, a critical step to fat loss. By three days out they were below healthy reference ranges. The authors note that in these circumstances protein synthesis can be impaired.“Fedele et al (8) showed that there is a critical concentration of insulin below which rates of protein synthesis begin to decline in vivo and it is possible that a low but critical concentration of insulin must be available for anabolism after exercise.”

@maverick88 Is the author saying the figures depict fluctuations and are not cumulative?

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What’s even funnier is I never directly argued with you until you replied to my post to Brick. I actually just offered a word of encouragement to someone who tries to offer help and advice on this forum. I honestly don’t care as I’m not on TRT, I don’t compete in bodybuilding, and could care less what shows are tested and which ones aren’t. I respect the dedication and discipline it takes for people to compete, assisted or not.
I really don’t have an issue with your stance overall. I just refuted your earlier statement regarding xXSeraphimXx not speaking in absolutes and quoted the posts in which he did. You can literally find thousands of articles and dozens of studies to prove or refute any point in the fitness industry. None of that means shit compared to time spent under the bar. If you lift long enough, you start to figure out what works for you at the time and what doesn’t.

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My god, you really haven’t offered anything related to the topic of the thread.

I didn’t need much thought for building my legs. They came easily. Squats and lunges for quads and hamstring curls, GHR’s, and stiff-legged deadlifts for hamstring. These were never stubborn muscles, although I’ve had to bring my hamstrings up a bit.

My current leg workout is:
GHR’s
Hamstring curls
Lunges or Bulgarian split squats with dumbbells
Safety bar or back squat
Leg extensions
Stiff-legged dumbbell deadlifts

You’re lucky in that regard. I’m sure you’ve had to put thought into other body parts, but you’re lucky with your legs, man. I, on the other hand, have to try SUPER hard with my legs. To make matters worse, I work out at a hippie-infested commercial gym that has only ONE squat rack. So…I have to get creative with my leg workouts sometimes.

The leg press is all well and good, but it doesn’t feel the same as the squat…does anybody disagree with that or have an idea as to how I can make them comparable?

I’ve found, over the years, that my legs respond best to blunt force trauma, and I find it very difficult to achieve that without a free-weight squat in the mix. I’d love to hear if anybody can blunt-force-trauma their legs without squats…that advice would be super awesome!

What does your entire leg workout look like? Are both your hams and quads not to your liking, or just one of them?

Actually, my legs ARE to my liking…I just think they are under-sized. Does that make sense?

Currently, I have an A week and a B week. A week is a more traditional split, and B week is more frequency for legs and arms (my two lagging parts in size). This is similar to what John Meadows has written about in the past…I’ll just outline my “preferred” A week leg day (B week is a quad-centric day and a ham-centric day). Reps are just template for working sets…not a necessity…

Stair Master (7 minutes…to warmup, etc)
Lying Leg Curls (20, 15, 10, 8, 20)
Back Squats ( 3 or 4 x 6-10)
Pause Squats (8, 10, 12)
Seated Leg Curl using 1 1/2 rep style (2 x 10-12)
Unilateral Walking Lunges (2 x 12 - 15 each leg)
DB Stiff-Legged Deadlifts (2 x 15-20)
…calves…

I used to use Hack Squats, but that machine has been broken and “scheduled for maintenance” for nearly two months now. If I squat, I don’t do leg press. If I leg press, it’s usually because I can’t squat. I usually always use the leg press in my “B” weeks…

I’ve made a lot of progress with this type of template, but my gym does have much leg equipment, so I find consistency hard to come by…

Be honest and brutal, man…my legs have good proportion (between hams and quads)…(I THINK…maybe I’m not objective enough)…it’s just the size that increases at a super slow rate…

Thanks for the detailed reply. Makes a lot of sense to utilize frequency as a special tool. Yeah i guess it’s easy to suggest twice the frequency equals twice the growth, but really it isn’t so cut and dry.

I feel my legs lag since for the most part everything gets trained pretty equally. My arms and upper back get big (relatively) and the same can’t be said for my legs.

Yeah, were the physique contest type aesthetics and straight up size were my priority i wouldn’t train like i do. A lot of performance-focused guys aren’t lacking in the physique department, but they’re doing some pretty gnarly stuff.

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When I started getting ready for my first show, we wanted to bring up legs, specifically hams, so I did two leg workouts per week, Tuesday and Friday I think. Tuesday started with quads then went to hams, and Friday was the same work out just in reverse. This was it:

-Warm up on elliptical
-Back squats
-Leg Press
-Leg Extension
-Ham Curls
-Hamtractor
-Dumbbell RDL’s
-Calves

Friday would be:
-Warm up
-Ham curls (I started hams with ham curls to go heavier, I like ending hams with RDLs for a good stretch after contracting them so much with the hamtractor)
-Hamtractor
-DB RDL
-Leg Extension
-Leg Press
-Squat
-Calves

I did this until I started my prep and it definitely help get some additional size on all around and bring up hamstrings.

I also incorporated a good amount of intensity techniques. I typically liked to do partials on the leg curls, and when someone was there to help me, strip sets on the leg press. Drop sets on leg extensions is always a good finisher as well.

In general I think higher frequency is a pretty standard way to bring up a lagging muscle group. Granted it shouldn’t be done permanently I don’t think, otherwise it’ll lose its effect, and you’ll probably notice when you go back to once per week your strength is way up. But if you hit legs twice a week for a good couple of months I bet you’ll see some noticeable progress!

Thanks for details. Will get back hopefully soon.

About two months ago, I started to implement an ‘A’ week and a ‘B’ week. The ‘A’ week is a typical bodybuilding split (chest w/delts, legs w/calves, back w/delts, calves/abs, arms w/delts, cardio/abs/calves, off) and the ‘B’ week is more intersting (arms/delts, legs w/calves, off, chest/back, arms/delts, legs w/calves, off). In that ‘B’ week, the first day is quad-focused and the second day is ham-focused. I feel like it’s helped definition and it’s helped the hams grow more.

Question for the ignorant: What’s a ‘hamtractor’? is that like a seated leg curl?

I was talking with the lady this evening, and she helped me realize that I seem to grow thicker rather than wider in my legs. Apparently, from her viewpoint, I have really thick legs (would look awesome from a side pose), but they aren’t wide (look narrow in a front or back pose). I mean, turning my feet out helps the illusion, but straight-on, they’re narrow.

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Yeah, I like to do that right after lying leg curls, 3 sets of 12-15, just really focus on a tight contraction and big squeeze/pause at the bottom.

Ah, the quad sweep! A lot of times taking a narrow foot position helps. I do this with leg press, I keep a more narrow stance with feet parallel, and position them towards the bottom of the foot plate.

Also sometimes I’ll experiment with where I place my tension in my feet, like as I’m pushing the plate up I’ll think about pushing my feet out, or up, and that will really help direct the tension in the legs. I got that from a Ben Pakulski video, and it’s pretty incredible how a small change can make a big difference.

You can do the same with hack squat (narrow stance) or even on leg extensions, you can try pointing your toes inward towards each other to stretch and stimulate the outside of the quad more.

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I was enjoying this until the TRT / steroid accusations… anyway

I recall a very productive split that utilized P/P/L with more volume than once per week hits. Group the PPL into 3 workouts (M,T,W) . Thursday is off, Friday is Monday’s workout again, weekend off, then resume on Monday with what was the previous Tuesday’s workout, then the previous Wednesday becomes Tuesday’s, and previous Friday is Wednesday’s (clear as mud? Lol)

This allows for rest periods of between 4, 5, and 6 days between workouts over the course of a month - always varied.

In my experience, as a natural to build great body you don´t need to do any pure strength oriented training. Then again when having a lot of strength, the muscle mass seems to grow much faster when switching on doing bodybuilding oriented training.

I have trained with lots of different people and in my overall experience: Most of the natural ones who train in straight bodybuilding manner make slower gains, than the naturals who train first their strength aspects up then bodybuilding aspects. When it comes to more experienced lifters: Well, strength allows pumping muscle with larger weights. And while using larger weights won’t allways transfer to better gains, they sure improve both aspects more. In my world I measure success by: Time spent in achieving a goal. Admitedly sometimes the cumulated fatique factor increases the time spent achieving the next goal. It really comes down to: What kind of stimulation works the best for each invidual. So if doing pure bodybuilding rep range gives the best growth I´m all for it.

I have gotten the very, very, very best gains from: Doing strength/size focused training, while changing the exercises and rep-range weekly, it pretty much has offered 3 options to choose from

A.) 1x stregth exercise per workout, the rest have been bb exercises.
B.) 1x strength day per week, rest are bb focused training, and weekly changing exercise focus.
C.) 1x Weekly changing order of movements, with strength the exercise changing daily for example: such as if I do: Bench press this week as strength movement, the next week I might do pushups with imba weights. While doing bench in 3-4x10 rep-range.

Above mentioned approach also allows to hit the problematic musclegroups with more focus than when just doing the same stuff week after week.

PS: After strength oriented training cycles, I allways get better muscle-mind connection on bodybuilding cycles and size seems to follow in equal manner as the fatique reistance increases. And the strength loss, even after longer pure bb cycle is quite minimal actually, it´s more about loss of mind-muscle connection for larger weights rather than an actual strength loss. I also find switching of training styles refreshing.

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