New Split Log

Pretty basic 4-day split for me. I’m going to diet for about 5 weeks before a big trip to LAS VEGAS (my Eden). I am carb cycling with an interesting, experimental approach. Cals will be set to 10-12X’s body weight on lifting days with low fat/moderate carb/moderate protein. I will have 2 days of PSMF on Wed and Friday with a cheat meal (small refeed) on Saturday.

Here it is, started yesterday. I will vary my biggest movements but aim for 12-16 sets per muscle group. My starting stats are 5’9" and ~175-180.

Push (Chest/Shoulders):
BB Bench 5X5 @ 195
DB Shoulder Press 3X8 @ 55
Incline Flys 3X10 @ 37.5
Lateral Raise 3X10 @ 20
HS Incline Bench 3X10 @ 55

Pull (Back/Hams):
Deadlift 5X5
Wide Grip Pull-ups 3X8
Good Morning 3X8
DB Rows 3X8
Leg Curl 3X10-12
Seated Cable Row 3X10-12

Legs (Quad/Calf):
Squat (rotate front/back) - 5X5
Leg press 3X10
Leg extensions 3X10
Calf Raises 3X12

Arms/Abs:
Dips 3Xfailure
Chins 3Xfailure
Bis 3X10
Tris 3X10
2 Direct Ab excercises

I’ll be doing morning cardio for 30-40 mins at 65% max HR to try and cut into my calories a bit more. I’ll post starting pics later today. I don’t plan on getting much stronger especially running a caloric deficit but this is a big change for me, coming from 3X’s per week Waterbury total body stuff. That should provide ample shock to the system for some newbie gains at first!

Goals: Maintain lean body mass and increase my bench, squat, and deadlift. Drop weight to ~165-170 before my vacation.

Back/Hams tonight…awesome.

I had 2 cups strawberries and a 16 oz. Rockstar Zero carb for a pre-workout meal. Made a nice para-WO shake with 1 scoop Surge, 1/2 scoop Gatorade, 1/2 scoop CMDI (Complete milk dairy isolate 80% casein/20% whey). It mixed much better than the Gatorade and CMDI only.

This was my first go of a 5X5 deadlift program…HAHAHAHA that’s all I can say. I’ve never felt such exhaustion. I hit a wall mid-way through set 3 but managed to finish, just took my time with each rep and had my brother yelling at me all the way to the end.

Deadlift 5X5 @ 265
Wide grip pull up 8,8,7
Good morning 3X8 @ 145
DB bent over row 3X8 @ 80,80,85
Single leg curl 3X10 @ 35
Close grip cable row 3X10 @ 100, 105, 110

I know I’ll be thoroughly sore and I hope to be rested and ready for quads/hams after my day off tomorrow. I need to post a starting pic.

Post-WO dinner:
2 small potatoes
1 large bagel + 1 tbsp PB
10 large shrimp

Starting pics. Want to slim the waistline so my back will look proportionally bigger. I obviously need to work on my lat spread/back width.

Legs

Back

Front double bi

Chest/shoulders

Quads/calves tonight…left the gym unable to walk like a normal human being. I actually failed on my final rep of squats for the first time in my life.

Back Squat-4X5 @ 245, 1X4 @ 255
Leg Extensions-3X12 @ 135
Leg Press-3X10 @ 360
Standing Calf Raise-2X8 @ 90
Seated Calf Raise-1X10 @ 90

High carb day made it up to 265g, but the excess calories definitely came from fat. I have 6 Costco sized muffins left over from my refeed last weekend and I need to get rid of those fat bombs.

Macros - 200p/265c/70f (2,600 kcal)

Finished my 4th workout this week with arms and abs. I challenged my brother and myself to drop sets to failure on chins and dips. Went out and had a few beers for a buddy’s going away party tonight, too…been drinking quite a bit lately and that definitely doesn’t help the calorie count.

Chins 3Xfailure 45,35,25,15,BW
Dips 2Xfailure 60,40,20,BW
DB Standing curls 2X6 @ 45, 1X6 @45.7
Seated 1-arm tricep extension 3X6 @ 37.5
BB Preacher Curl 1X10 @ 55 2X10 @ 65
BB Tricep pushdown 3X12 @ 90
Weighted Decline situps 2X10 @ 45
Planks 2X30sec

I had an interesting conversation about nutrition with a girl who’s been stuck spinning her wheels for a year trying to lose fat. I’m convinced she isn’t eating the “1,000 calories” she claims to be, and I’m also skeptical of her method after she told me she read a book that told her she’s allergic to gluten because she is a certain blood type. I tried to convince her that a calorie is a calorie and that she could lose fat/weight if she ate a certain calorie level for an extended amount of time. She refused to listen to anything I had to say and was very stubborn and frustrated with her progress. Something tells me she’d be a difficult client for a nutritionist!

It makes me proud to have been able to make so much progress on my own and with the aid of nutritionists like Berardi, McDonald, Hale, and the T-Nation faithful.

Macros - 210p/284c/53f (2780 kcal)

I’m really frustrated with myself after the weekend. I killed it in the gym last week and stuck to my calorie/carb limits. Last weekend I went to my sister’s graduation and relapsed into college mode. Ate so much junk, pizza, cake, tortilla chips, m&m’s and drank so much beer. Then my parents hosted an open house with tons of munchies that I gobbled on yesterday. I came back and weighed 191 last night.

I realize this was a temporary binge but I actually felt the psychological habits I tried to ditch (guilt, hiding when I ate, seconds, thirds, etc.) come back. A lot of the weight is probably muscle glycogen and water but I can’t see my abs and some of my veins have faded.

So…punishment time haha! I’m going to do a 24 (pre-Vegas) day diet that consists of 6 days PSMF with a weekend refeed. I’ll limit my weekday calories to 1,200 and my refeed to ~maintenance but focus on carbs only (protein sparing). I don’t plan on refeeding on a training day either. I’ll start today. I’m going to continue my split as planned so I don’t piss of my training partner. I’m also going to keep my para-WO drink of gatorade/protein.

Day one of my 24 day fat blitz is over. I have decided to add another component to the diet plan, intermittent fasting. It will help me control calories and also improve my insulin sensitivity para-workout. Plan is to have my first meal about 4 hours pre-WO and have only protein with my fish oils, multivitamin, calcium, and vitamin D supps.

Pre/peri-WO I’m going to utilize the tub of Surge Workout Fuel that’s been sitting in my kitchen. Two scoops is ~40 CHO and I’m adding creatine. I’ve read it’s damaging to your muscles to train on an empty stomach so I definitely plan on having BCAAs/pre-workout protein of some sort.

Today I wasn’t hungry at all because of the weekend binge and I was alert with coffee.

Training was tough as shit, again.

Deads 5X5 1 @ 275, 3 @ 270, 1 @ 265
WG Pullups 3X8
Good mornings 3X8 @ 145
BB Rows 3X8 @ 165
Single Leg Curl 3X12 @ 35
Close grip seated cable rows 3X12 @ 110

Dude you have some big quads.
When I drag myself out of bed to go early in the morning, I take some BCAAs before working out also. I don’t want to eat, but I want something in there besides my coffee.

How is the training going on 1200 cals a day?

[quote]phatkins187 wrote:
Day one of my 24 day fat blitz is over. I have decided to add another component to the diet plan, intermittent fasting. It will help me control calories and also improve my insulin sensitivity para-workout. Plan is to have my first meal about 4 hours pre-WO and have only protein with my fish oils, multivitamin, calcium, and vitamin D supps.

Pre/peri-WO I’m going to utilize the tub of Surge Workout Fuel that’s been sitting in my kitchen. Two scoops is ~40 CHO and I’m adding creatine. I’ve read it’s damaging to your muscles to train on an empty stomach so I definitely plan on having BCAAs/pre-workout protein of some sort.

Today I wasn’t hungry at all because of the weekend binge and I was alert with coffee.

Training was tough as shit, again.

Deads 5X5 1 @ 275, 3 @ 270, 1 @ 265
WG Pullups 3X8
Good mornings 3X8 @ 145
BB Rows 3X8 @ 165
Single Leg Curl 3X12 @ 35
Close grip seated cable rows 3X12 @ 110[/quote]

I think for a PSMF your volume is too high. For back/hamstrings honestly you could do the deads and a couple sets of rows and call it a day. It doesn’t take that much volume to retain mass as opposed to building it, and on very low cals and your level of leanness doing too much work will backfire.

I agree with the previous post!
If you make your training partner mad, tell him it’s only temporary…you could still go in with him for a spot or whatever.

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:

Dude you have some big quads.
When I drag myself out of bed to go early in the morning, I take some BCAAs before working out also. I don’t want to eat, but I want something in there besides my coffee.

How is the training going on 1200 cals a day?

[/quote]

The training is going well after one day, lol. I have a feeling with 4 days of heavy, high intensity, high volume lifting I’m going to really need a substantial refeed for glycogen replenishment. I plan on a Saturday evening refeeed and then going out for the Seattle Solstice festival to have a few beverages :slight_smile:

[quote]yakbutter wrote:
phatkins187 wrote:
Day one of my 24 day fat blitz is over. I have decided to add another component to the diet plan, intermittent fasting. It will help me control calories and also improve my insulin sensitivity para-workout. Plan is to have my first meal about 4 hours pre-WO and have only protein with my fish oils, multivitamin, calcium, and vitamin D supps.

Pre/peri-WO I’m going to utilize the tub of Surge Workout Fuel that’s been sitting in my kitchen. Two scoops is ~40 CHO and I’m adding creatine. I’ve read it’s damaging to your muscles to train on an empty stomach so I definitely plan on having BCAAs/pre-workout protein of some sort.

Today I wasn’t hungry at all because of the weekend binge and I was alert with coffee.

Training was tough as shit, again.

Deads 5X5 1 @ 275, 3 @ 270, 1 @ 265
WG Pullups 3X8
Good mornings 3X8 @ 145
BB Rows 3X8 @ 165
Single Leg Curl 3X12 @ 35
Close grip seated cable rows 3X12 @ 110

I think for a PSMF your volume is too high. For back/hamstrings honestly you could do the deads and a couple sets of rows and call it a day. It doesn’t take that much volume to retain mass as opposed to building it, and on very low cals and your level of leanness doing too much work will backfire.

[/quote]

Hey Yak and Ms. MD,

Thanks for the feedback! I completely agree with you guys and I’ve done a round of cat 1 Rapid Fat Loss, which was awful in terms of fatigue and mood levels. I was only on a two day per week, total body routine and that was adequate in terms of retaining mass and strength. The more frequent refeeds will allow me to crank out the sets and and reps and possibly have an anabolic effect over the weekend. I know my body well enough to determine whether the volume is too high and will reassess after one week.

Yak, did you supplement with any sort of BCAA/creatine concoction during your fasted periods like the Get Shredded diet recommends or did you restrict your liquid intake to mainly water?

[quote]phatkins187 wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:

Dude you have some big quads.
When I drag myself out of bed to go early in the morning, I take some BCAAs before working out also. I don’t want to eat, but I want something in there besides my coffee.

How is the training going on 1200 cals a day?

The training is going well after one day, lol. I have a feeling with 4 days of heavy, high intensity, high volume lifting I’m going to really need a substantial refeed for glycogen replenishment. I plan on a Saturday evening refeeed and then going out for the Seattle Solstice festival to have a few beverages :)[/quote]

I kinda like doing a severely reduced calorie intake for a couple days and then back to normal. I think it jumpstarts things.

Have a beer for me!

[quote]
Yak, did you supplement with any sort of BCAA/creatine concoction during your fasted periods like the Get Shredded diet recommends or did you restrict your liquid intake to mainly water?[/quote]

Nope, just lots of coffee and diet Rockstars.

That solstice festival sounds neat!!
you know, I don’t even like beer but for some reason one sounds good right now…huh, weird.

[quote]yakbutter wrote:

Yak, did you supplement with any sort of BCAA/creatine concoction during your fasted periods like the Get Shredded diet recommends or did you restrict your liquid intake to mainly water?

Nope, just lots of coffee and diet Rockstars.

[/quote]

That’s hilarious man, great minds think alike. I love the Rockstar Zero Carb. Buy them by the case!

So far so good today as I sip on coffee. I don’t have any hunger or fatigue issues but it’s only day 2. Tonight I have a softball game followed by a “push” workout (chest/shoulders).