Pics from this past weekend taken Sunday, 11/15. Since I’ve started with Stu just under two months ago, we’ve seen some surprisingly significant changes. I think one of the things contributing to this is he found I was under-eating on most days. I wasn’t counting calories at the time, just eating what I thought was right for the day, and it turns out it was under, and significantly under on my low days. So, since working with Stu, it’s the first time I’ve very consistently been eating this much and it’s been paying off. Especially adding an extra leg day, there’s no doubt I’m putting every bit of food to good use. Enjoying it while I can before the cut begins soon!
that back double bi shot is awesome
[quote]Yogi wrote:
that back double bi shot is awesome[/quote]
Thanks Yogi, much appreciated man.
This is week 4 of the 5 day split, I’ve adjusted well to it after a bit of extended soreness in the legs. Typically, my legs are significantly worse with DOMS than other muscle groups, but it’s improved quite a bit since adding the second leg day. Here’s the current split:
Monday - Chest and biceps
Tuesday - Legs (hams first)
Wednesday - Back, abs and calves
Thursday - Delts, triceps and abs
Friday - Legs (quads first)
Something I’ve found helpful to keep the sessions fresh and keep progressing is varying which end of my rep range I stick to during the workout, and sometimes during the entire week. Generally, most of my exercises are in a 5-8 rep range, or a 10-15 rep range. Sometimes for a couple of weeks I’ll try to get a lot of volume, and strive for 8 reps or 15 reps respectively. More recently the last few weeks I’ve been going the other direction, 5-6 reps and 10-12 reps. Going to 5 is a lot different than going to 8, etc., and aside from allowing me a slightly different focus for the session, it’s helped me to keep improving my strength. I’ve had some good PRs over the past couple of weeks, including:
Leg Press - 22 plates for 6 reps
Rack Pull - 555 for 5, and 605 for a single
Incline DB - 90’s for 8
While I know there are a lot of guys on here that can crush those numbers, for someone who’s 5’4" and 160 lbs, I’m pretty stoked about it.
I vary my “finishers”, between drop sets, extended sets, loaded stretching, partials, etc. I tend to utilize them more on higher rep schemes, but if I have someone to help me, will add them on heavier work. Last week I was able to do a strip set on T-Bar row with the help of a buddy, as well as a strip set on leg press when people are around to help.
Went to Home Depot over the weekend and got a nice 5’x3’ mirror to set up a posing area in the basement, I have room for more mirrors but will start with that one and see if I need to add more. As I’m typing this now, I looked at my calendar to see how far out my first show is, a WNBF northeast regional show in NJ, typically at the end of March. The exact date isn’t set yet, but it looks like it’s about 16 weeks out. Holy shit, really starting to creep up.
The contest dates have been posted finally, and fortunately there’s a little more time than I thought until the first show.
April 30th - WNBF Northeast American Pro-Q. This is also coincidentally about 25 minutes from my house, glad I won’t have to deal with the logistics of overnight travel.
June 26th - WNBF Hercules Super Pro-Q.
We’re planning on starting to cut after new year’s, giving us a good 16 weeks to go slow and steady, and “stay ahead of the suffering” as Stu said. Right now my calories are in a good place to start the cut, between 2600-3000 depending on the day, so hopefully we won’t have to get to super low basement levels. Currently at 160lbs, I’m imagining I’ll end up somewhere around 140ish, so I think that would be bantamweight?
My schedule is getting busier with my music writing, so I’m going to have to go back to a 4 day split shortly, and POSSIBLY a 3 day full-body program, depending on how many clients I get. While I’m still teaching full time, I’m hoping to transition to writing from home full time within the next few years. I think I’ll be able to make it happen, but right now it means taking on as much work as I can to build it to the point where I can comfortably stop teaching, so burning the candle at both ends is an understatement, especially with the training.
Last year I did a 3 day full body program for about 4 months from Jan-April, Leroy Colbert’s method I found on this article, “Full Body Workouts of the Legends”. Full-Body Workouts of the Legends. It’s an outstanding program, takes a while to complete the sessions but I made great progress on it. I really enjoyed being able to push as hard as possible, knowing I had a recovery day the next day (M-W-F were training days). Frequency wise, I think it would work out. I’d be hitting every muscle group 3 times a week, with 18-20 working sets per muscle, so total volume per muscle group would be about identical to if I was doing a typical split. While it may be not a traditional way to prep, I may have to do it, and Stu and I both feel confident it would work out well if that’s what we had to do.
In the mean time, today I’m gonna crush my leg workout, go to my parents for Chanukah and eat some some good jew food 
While I’m about the least Jewy Jew you’ll ever meet, we enjoy the holidays, and I take my jew food very seriously.
Started the new split this week, Stu and I thought it would be best to stick with one training plan throughout the entire prep rather than risking having to change it half way through. My writing schedule is getting packed with new clients, so best to change it now. Mentally, I feel much better knowing I’ll be able to balance work, my business and training, and of course my amazing wife and pups, which is going to be important as it’ll also allow me not to feel as stressed as I would have trying to make it work with a 4 or 5 day split.
On that note, I’m extremely fortunate that my wife is so supportive of my competitive endeavors. She kicks ass in the gym, helps cook and prep meals, measuring everything out, takes care of business like a pro. If she didn’t take on these extra responsibilities, I wouldn’t be able to make this work between work and my business. I’m a lucky dog.
So, now doing a 3 day program, A-B-A, B-A-B style, with an accessory workout at home on the weekend. Long sessions, yesterday took me about two hours and fifteen minutes, but with some nutrition and supplementation adjustments, I still had good strength and performance throughout. Every training day (M-W-F) is a high carb day now, also added another scoop of Plazma, so 3 scoops to get me through the session. The only real obstacle with these long sessions is to make sure I have enough “currency” as CT says to get through them. So, with a Finibar and 3 scoops of Plazma, can’t go wrong there.
We also have a good amount of carbs on Tuesday and Thursday, including a new addition of a peanut butter banana sandwich. Man, the joy that food can bring, I never thought I’d so look forward to a sandwich on an off day!
[quote]robstein wrote:
We also have a good amount of carbs on Tuesday and Thursday, including a new addition of a peanut butter banana sandwich. Man, the joy that food can bring, I never thought I’d so look forward to a sandwich on an off day! [/quote]
What?! Next thing you know you’ll be downing Poptarts!
S
Hope everyone had an enjoyable holiday and new year, we had a great time filled with family, good food and enjoying spending the days with my wife and pups. Back to the grind we go tomorrow, and today officially started the contest prep for the WNBF Northeast America Pro Qualifier, worldnaturalbb.com/event/wnbf-northeast-america-natural-bodybuilding-bikini-physique-fit-body-figure-championships/. Fortunately it’s less than 30 minutes from my house which will make travel and logistics much easier to manage.
For training, we settled on a full body program, 3x per week. It’s a modified version of a full body program I did last year I got from an article on the site, Leroy Colbert’s full body routine. 3x per week (M-W-F), with 2 exercises per muscle group, 3 sets each totaling 6 working sets per muscle group, so about 36-40 sets total. We modified it slightly to rotate the exercises each day, so I can get all of the angles and keep good variety in there, and also added a 4th set for the lower rep work. So, 7 working sets per muscle group, plus some calves added on, about 45ish sets and 2 hours to complete start to finish, including some warm up sets.
I’m excited about switching to this program for a variety of reasons:
-It allows me to have enough time to balance training, my business and family.
-As we’re moving forward in the prep of course the goal is to keep as much LBM as possible, and with hitting every muscle every other day, I think we have minimum risk of any potential loss anywhere.
-Every training day is a high carb day, along with 3 scoops of Plazma for the session. Psychologically this helps, knowing I just came from an off day, fresh and full of carbs, I have to earn them and kill the workout.
-EXTRA RECOVERY, over the years I have found my body responds well to a 3-4 day a week plan. I can keep gaining strength and muscle and never feel too beat up in one area. While I can certainly handle 5 or 6 days, and notice different benefits from that type of split, progress for me slows quicker with a more frequent schedule. Hitting the full body hard (but not to fail) and taking a full day to recover has worked well for me in the past, and while it’s not a typical prep plan, I’m confident it’s the best for me right now.
Cardio to start will be 3 sessions of steady incline on the treadmill in the mornings (planning for off days), and a short interval session on the bike on the weekend. Nutritionally we didn’t really touch anything yet.
A few days ago I was able to head to Stu’s neck of the woods, we did some posing work, got some training in, then went to a local place for some killer wings, burgers and sweet potato fries, one last hoorah before the prep. Working with Stu in person was extremely helpful, I feel much more confident to continue practicing at home. Here are a few pics from the day, about 4 days ago.
1/3/16 - 163.4 lbs
Pics from this past weekend, the official start of the prep for the April 30th show.
Week 1 of the official prep in the books. Good sessions, got the morning cardio in and hitting intervals later today. On the weekends it’s all P/F meals, 6 meals a day as usual. Breakfast, lunch, dinner with protein shakes and nuts between.
My P/F breakfast is typically 2 eggs (local farm), veggies (onions, peppers, kale, sometimes mushrooms), cottage cheese, bacon (local farm, we’ve been getting shoulder bacon lately and it’s amazing), and 1 oz grass fed cheddar (kerrygold).
Lunch is chicken and veggies with nuts, or sometimes avocado.
Dinner is a meat, alternating between ground beef, flank steak, fish or ground pork, all from local farms, along with veggies and nuts.
Between the main meals are unsweetened almond milk MD protein shakes with nuts, usually a mix of organic almonds, brazil nuts and walnuts.
Had the first “I’m in prep mode” moment this week when I went with our superintendent and another teacher to a local radio station to talk about our music program and technology at school, and on the way back we stopped for lunch at panera. I didn’t want to be “that guy”, but they got lunch and I got black coffee. Fortunately, most people at school are used to seeing me with my big ass cooler every day and it’s not a big deal. Looking ahead, my best friend is getting married a week before the first show, so I guess I’ll be bringing my cooler there too!
1/10/16 - 163.2 lbs
Side by side shots from last week - 1/3-1/10
We’re logging weight daily, this week has been pretty much identical to last week. Haven’t lost anything on the scale but with the cardio and intervals, I’m sure I lost some fat somewhere. Typically this is where I’d start getting in my head about it, (shouldn’t I have lost a pound or something?!) BUT that’s one of the many, many benefits of having an experienced coach, knowing I don’t need to obsess about it, and to just keep plugging away.
This week we made some additional adjustments, looking forward to seeing the progress as we continue.
After a nice high day yesterday, about 340g carbs and just under 3000 cals, weight is FINALLY down. Not a significant drop, but the lowest of the prep so far, so that’s encouraging. Over the course of working with Stu from October through December, I was able to put on 7lbs of what we’re both confident is mostly muscle, as the scale went up but conditioning stayed tight and waist line didn’t change. So, averaging out to about .5lbs per week gain. There are a few factors that I think played into those gains, the most considerable one being that I was unknowingly under-eating. We were able to get my cals up pretty significantly for someone who’s just over 160 and 5’4". The first week of the prep the weight didn’t change, but it did stop rising. This week my weight has been pretty much the same every day until today, which happens sometimes, you stall for a bit then drop. A good bump of motivation for the week.
Had a great session in the gym yesterday, including a ridiculous drop set on leg press, instigated by a buddy of mine who was helping me out. 4 working sets total, slow negative and pushing to just short of lock out:
14 plates x15
16 plates x15
18 plates x15
Here’s where the fun starts: starting with 9 plates on each side, did sets of 8, stripping one off each side every time. So, 9x8, 8x8, 7x8, 6x8, 5x8, 4x8, 3x8, 2x8, 1x20, at which point my buddy took ONE plate off, leaving one on the right side and told me I had a “bonus round” of 20 more reps. The whole thing was extremely painful, but by that point there a few guys around the machine yelling at me so that certainly helped. Took a few minutes to get up, feeling it today for sure during cardio.
Medium day today, totaling about 2600 calories and 150g carbs. Had the usual cardio this morning on the treadmill at the gym, sipping some BCAA’s, and enjoying breakfast now before the first class comes in.
My in-laws recently gave us their old treadmill, it’s a solid Nordictrack with incline. We had it last week, and upon my first effort to stumble down to the basement at 5:30am and get started, I kept blowing a fuse. SO, the electrician is coming Saturday to install a dedicated circuit, and starting next week I can do morning cardio from home instead of going to the gym on the way to school. It’s not a serious inconvenience to go to the gym, it’s on the way to work, but it’s just going to be easier to roll out of bed and go downstairs to get it done.
Side note, my knees have been bothering me a lot lately and are finally starting to feel better. Heavy leg pressing and hack squats were the culprit, but after increasing Flameout to 8 caps a day and Curcumin to 6 caps a day for a few weeks, they’re feeling much better. Also really making an effort to get more sleep, it can be tough sometimes, but the past few nights I’ve gotten a solid 8 hours and it feels great. (Waking up at 5:30 still sucks!)
1/16/15 - 162.8lbs - All pics taken in the morning after coffee before food
Looking a little tighter today after a slight drop in weight, overall this week from last week about .5lbs, but looking side to side pics from last week I see some progress. Slow and steady, still about 14 weeks out from the show so we’re right on track. We cut some more calories out of the low days on the weekend, gonna hit some intervals shortly on the recumbent bike and enjoy a party tonight at the in laws, gonna bring extra pickles and Zevia soda to munch on.
Right now there’s three steady state cardio days and one interval session per week, so between that and the training sessions, I try to leave Sunday as a relaxation day with no workout stuff. I think it’s important psychologically to have that day of just waking up, enjoying coffee with the wife, and getting done whatever I need to (typically in the office writing music all day) without worrying about working out. As the contest gets closer I’ll probably add some posing time on Sunday, for now I’m adding a 15 minute posing session after steady state cardio in the mornings.
Good progress last week, 1.6 pounds down, currently 161.2. Interesting to note that even though we didn’t change anything nutritionally, cardio, etc., I lost 1.6 as opposed to .5 the week before. We’re not making any changes this week, hopefully things will keep humming along at the same pace.
Friday was the first very tough day of the prep. Starting with a couple nights of very poor sleep Wednesday and Thursday, and fasted intervals on Friday morning. Typically I do intervals on the weekends a little while after lunch, as I feel my performance will be better fueled rather than fasted. Knowing I couldn’t get to the gym Saturday with the impending blizzard, I got the intervals done fasted Friday morning before work, and had the usual training session Friday after work. With my session being full body and taking about 2 hours to complete, I could feel even in the first couple sets it was gonna be one of those “just get it done and get out” sessions. By the end of the workout I was completely trashed, I could feel my CNS was completely fatigued. But, got all the work in, and felt much better yesterday after a good recovery weekend and a snow day yesterday (extra sleep!)
Chiropractor today, and another massage on Sunday, getting a massage every two weeks during the prep. It’s an expense for sure, but it feels SO much better afterwards, training improves, morale improves as I don’t feel as wrecked, so it’s well worth it. On Sundays I go to the therapy pool at the gym and sit in the sauna for a bit. Trying to max out recovery every way possible.
this is such a good thread. Really appreciate all the detail you’re putting into this log.
Hey Flip thank you very much man, I appreciate that very much and it’s always a good little bump of motivation to get some feedback.
Knocked out the weekly interval session this morning, 25 minutes on the recumbent bike. I decided to move the day/time I do intervals from mid-day Saturday to Thursday morning, for a couple of reasons.
-Although I feel better performing interval work having eaten of a couple of meals rather than on an empty stomach, I’d rather have the entire day Saturday to not have to go to the gym. The weekends are my most valuable time for writing music, so taking even an hour to stop that and head to the gym really halts my progress.
-I don’t train on Thursdays, so I can knock out intervals without worrying about training later in the day.
-I’d rather have the entire weekend to not have to do anything too physically strenuous, and take somewhat of a mental break from bodybuilding (I’ve found there really isn’t such a thing during a prep, but there are levels. A relaxing recovery weekend with some light cardio and posing isn’t as mentally strenuous as going through a full day of work, eating the meals when I have to and killing a 2 hour workout after.) Physically, I really need the recovery time after my full body sessions throughout week. Mentally, it just feels good to know the weekend has arrived and I can “relax” a bit with the gym stuff. I still do steady state cardio for 20 min in the morning, but that’s in the basement on the treadmill, MUCH easier mentally and physically than heading to the gym for intervals.
-I think I’ll get more bang for my buck doing them in the morning and will burn more fat both during the workout and throughout the day. To compensate for the extra effort with the intervals as opposed to just steady state, I added a scoop of Mag-10 to my BCAA’s, and as usual have breakfast as soon as I get to work, about 30 minutes after I’m done with the intervals.
Posing is getting much better, I’ll post some updates pics this weekend. I’ve been looking at the standard poses on various body builders, and haven’t really noticed until I started studying it how differently the same poses can look on different people, depending on how they’re hit. So, I’ve been working on really figuring out how to best angle each pose, a small adjustment here and there, to best feature my strengths and not expose weaknesses. Getting more comfortable and starting to get more in the muscle memory as well. Now, gotta start coming up with a posing routine. I have my music picked, the prospect of coming up with a whole routine is a little intimidating, but I’m going to start by looking at other routines, finding poses I like, experimenting with some of my own and eventually I know all the pieces will come together.
I’m starting to become very confident in the package I will bring the further I progress into the prep. I know it will be a very tough competition as Stu has told me typically the bantamweights and lightweights tend to come in most shredded/cut, even if they’re not huge they’re diced up and ready to go. I’m hoping with my short stature and wider frame, I’ll have a thicker and wider presentation than others in my class. I’m guessing I’ll be somewhere in the mid to high 140’s, if I’m 150 or above on stage I’d be shocked (but pleasantly surprised!). I’d rather be at the top of the bantamweight than the bottom of the lightweight, although if I do make lightweight, I imagine standing 5’4" @ 150lbs next a guy who’s 5’6"-5’8" at a lean 160, I still have a shot. I feel good that if my conditioning is where it needs to be, which it will be, I have a good chance for my weight class, and will hopefully be comparable enough to have a shot at the overall.
Alright, venting here just a bit. Fridays have been sucking for the past few weeks, today is no exception. Mondays typically are good, after a nice recovery weekend I typically feel pretty fresh and ready to attack the week. By Friday, I’m way tighter/achier than earlier in the week, CNS is fatigued, and mentally I feel somewhat overwhelmed balancing work, my business and the show prep. I’m typically a “glass half full” very easy going and optimistic guy, and by the weeks end little things, stupid meaningless things might piss me off or I’m more impatient than usual. There is never a moment where I can relax mentally between two full time jobs and bodybuilding. Although I’ve been “cutting” in the official prep for about 4 weeks now, I’ve been “prepping” for over 4 months in the sense that I’ve been working with a coach looking towards these shows, and have been just as rigid/consistent with training and nutrition as I would be on a cut. I haven’t missed a rep, a meal, or screwed around whatsoever with any aspect of the whole thing. So, by now as the end of week approaches, it can be tough to stay positive and keep the eye on the prize, while the journey can be extremely challenging.
That being said, the journey is what bodybuilding is all about, I realize that more each day. In this offense only sport, I have no control over my competition, and can only do my best to be my best every day, no matter what. It’s one of the primary reasons I decided to compete, to take this trip, knowing I would be facing adversity, and overcome it. It’s easy to watch a motivational video of a classic bodybuilder killing a workout or on stage and say, “yeah man I want THAT!” and a lot of times you wonder what it feels like to go through it. While I’m a rookie to the competitive aspect, I can say that so far it feels different every day. Some days you’re ready to kill it, you feel pumped and invincible. Other days you say to yourself, “holy shit I just need to get this done and get outta here.” But, I’ve also realized that I don’t have to be super pumped or motivated all the time, I don’t have to be mental fireworks every time I’m in the gym, or waking up ass early to do cardio. It helps, but ultimately sometimes I just need to get the work done.
This is certainly not to say that I’m going though this prep begrudgingly, not the case at all. I’d say that 85-90 percent of the time, I’m in good spirits. But, when that other 10 percent rolls around, I know it’s part of the process and it’s ok to feel that way.
Another essential part of this process is my wife (also a total badass in the gym), for whom I am so very thankful, I have no idea what I did to get such an amazing woman. Incredibly supportive, it goes far behind the physical actions she handles, like helping with meal preps, taking care of the dogs and extra house stuff so I can get my cardio and workouts in, always going the extra mile. She can read me so well, knows when I’m not feeling it. I am NOT a morning person, regardless of the amount of sleep I get, waking up at 5:30 is never easy. Yesterday, the alarm goes off, I can barely move or open my eyes, and she sweetly whispers, “come on babe, you have to go kill some intervals. You can do it.” Without her I couldn’t do this, she keeps me positive and keeps me moving forward. Gentlemen, if you have an amazing woman in your life, let her know every day how amazing she is.
I also know that as the show continues to get closer and my physique continues to change, more and new motivation will come, and I’m excited for it. For now, I’m going to have another coffee, get through my work day, throw down some Spike tablets and kill my session today.
1/30 - 161lbs
Some side by side comparison pics, last weekend (left) to this weekend (right). Sorry they’re a little small, if you click on them they get bigger. The weight didn’t shift this week, after 3 weeks of the same nutrition/cardio protocol, the weight loss was .5, 1.6, then .2 this past week. It’s been really interesting to take the data and learn how the body responds to different adjustments, and how doing the same thing each week can still yield a variety of results. The weight today was the lightest it’s been on a Monday by a pound, usually it goes up with some water retention after a low carb weekend. So, I anticipate a decent weight drop this week, usually it gets lower throughout the week after getting more carbs, we’ll see how it plays out. We made a couple of small adjustments for the coming week and continuing with business as usual. I’m glad we started the prep so far out, it’s nice to not rushing towards the show having to make big adjustments week to week, the adjustments we are making are easy to implement each week we cut one or two things here, add a little more cardio time there, etc.
Good weekend all around, got a lot of writing done, had an awesome 90 minute bamboo deep tissue massage, therapy pool, etc., the usual recovery stuff. Cooked up about 9 pounds of chicken yesterday, should be enough for about 2 weeks for us. Found a great method for quickly cooking lots of chicken if anyone wants to try it, took about half an hour start to finish to prep it, then just stick it in the oven:
-Preheat oven to 425 (this cooks the chicken quickly and keeps it really tender)
-Pre-cut however much raw chicken breast you want into large bite size pieces and put in glass cooking tray
-Combine a little olive oil and seasoning, stir well. I use Mrs. Dash’s salt-free chicken and fiesta lime seasoning, along with liberal amounts of sea salt (I’d rather use that than whatever sodium might be in the salted-seasonings)
-Hand mix the seasoning into the chicken
-Cook on 425 for about 20-35 minutes depending on how much you have.
-Season again if you want when it comes out
-Consume large amounts of delicious chicken