Bodybuilding Classic Physique Division Offseason log
You know you who it is already. Can't recall my old password or even what email I used so here we are. I promised I'd start logging if legend n1h did. So that's why I'm logging.
Short term goal:
Successfully formulate a relatively optimized and easy to adhere to offseason diet model. In terms of food selection, I am more or less following Chris Tuttle's recommendations. Our very own BGP has been getting some free diet stuff from Chris since he has a full client load but will send a handful of emails to people for free if you ask nicely and want help. If you don't know who that is, go on youtube/instagram and see the man's work.
Remain injury free, which is easy with my new exercise selection which loco would describe as "leg press and lat pulldown 4 lyfe"
Adjust to a more strictly bodybuilding programming style as opposed to a "powerbuilding" style.
Here is the medium term goal:
2024 summer on stage in classic physique division at a level that would be competitive for winning a pro card. Winning the card itself is immaterial for the medium term, it'll happen when it happens and I will be patient.
Possible obstacles to this goal are gym closers due to continued zero covid policy, possibly moving countries and being unable to focus on prep in the interim, or international political disaster. All of which are legitimate risks.
Ostensibly we will start competition prep late winter 2024 and do a very long slow 20-24 week prep where I never need to bring carbs lower than 200g/day.
Long term goal:
Compete in one professional level show in the classic physique divison in the next 10 years. Don't really give a **** about placings.
Natty: No. Test, deca, mk677, humalog, cjc with 1295 with DAC, berberine (although the last one is both a PED and a general health supplement). Low doses. high dose AAS are massively overrated for hypertrophy, the real magic is the insulin and gh (or gh secretagogues in my case). less than 1g of injectables with PEDs that work on the IGF pathway is much better than 3g of injectables, for example. I'd advise anyone who wants to go down the PED route to incorpoate gh or gh secretagogue peptides along with insulin while they are still taking 1cc of test per week before you ever add any other AAS or increase test dose. You can keep your AAS doses much lower if you actually address this very critical muscle building pathway rather than solely relying on AAS, which are harsh... man...
No prep drugs or harsh AAS until the aforementioned 2024 late winter date.
Diet: High carbohydrates with carbohydrate cycling (2 high days the day before my 2 leg days, 1 low day on the day off, 4 medium days per week offseason), moderate protein around 1.125g/lb of bw, low to moderate fats. I tried a high fat Palbumo approach in both offseason and precontest this academic year. It was a ****ing disaster; this is a terrible way to diet for bodybuilding. Although if somebody is not trying to look lean/dry/hard on stage and maintain athletic performance in the gym, it'd be a great diet to follow because antecdotally it can lead to very high compliance for some individuals because it just destroys so much of your physiological cravings and lowers appetite considerably. Somebody like the apple-pied obese woman who's username I don't even remember might do well on this because she could probably eat 80/20 ground beef bunless bacon cheeseburgers twice a day for an emotional high, not feel hungry the rest of the day, and have only consumed like 1800~ calories daily.
More detailed post with training program and food log to follow. I'm a busy man.
Push
Internal rotation
Machine press: 62.5kgx21, 17, 15
Incline db: 30kgx16, 10, 15
Pushups/delt raise superset: 3 and 4 sets respectively
pushdowns: 20kgx22, 3 more sets myorep matching
2 sets of cable curls to failure between each pushdown set, drag curl style seems to not aggravate my pec tendon.
Cardio 25 minutes 125 average hr
Pressing movements hugely respond to increasing food and bodyweight over a few days wow. Coulda probably pred and gotten 17-18 on the first set of incline db.
Pull
Strapped pullups: bwx17,13, 10 last set tried neutral grip it was okay
Unilateral plate loaded pulldowns: 2ppsx12, 10, 8 each side
Row machine: 67.5kgx14, 12, 11
Cable rope lat prayer: 15kgx15, 9
EZ curls: 20kgx29, 3 more sets myo rep matching
70 minutes
30 minutes incline treadmill 125 average HR
14k steps
Exam schedule is making it hard to do morning cardio and I hate doing it later in the day at school because it's too hot so I'm just going to do some post training cardio sometimes.
Got a DMHA +caffeine +tons of other sketchy stim **** product. It's called "Arsynist" by condemned labz. Took it before and it's POWERFUL, like way stronger than ephedrine or clen. But I'm still not adapted enough to the caffeine which seems to mess up my sleep the most of any stimulants. Been doing coffees in the morning trying to adjust and I'll add it in sometime next week.
more powerful then ephedrine seems like it could be fun! I used to take ephedrine before I played rugby and I would often have to take myself off into a corner for an hour or so after games to calm myself down and would very often still be overstimulated 8 hours after a game when i tried to sleep
Trainers giving 0 dietary recommendations, macros, or even outright meal plans is child abuse.
Personal training is such a racket. Trainers at my gym run their clients through gimmicky nonsense like seated bosu ball cable curls and other silliness on a daily basis. They can get away with it because 90+% of the general population is completely lost the second they step foot in a gym, so anyone giving them any form of direction or guidance is very comforting.
I'm convinced that the only thing you need to succeed as a personal trainer
* you need to look good too. People choose trainers who have the body they aspire to (or want to ****), despite the fact that plenty of them look that way mainly because of genetics.
Perhaps because I am now an old guy, I would always recommend that people looking to learn how to lift properly/get fitter go for the oldest trainer in the gym rather than the best looking one but...it's always the friendly & outgoing young good looking lean
I know I’m really late to this conversation, but one of the hardest things about being a personal trainer is the stereotype that they are all clueless bc so many of them do dumb stuff. The main problem is the bar to entry is super low and almost anyone could get a PT certification. My advise would be in addition to finding someone who has competed, look for trainers with a CSCS (certified strength and conditioning specialist) and/or education in the field. The CSCS is the gold standard in the field requires a degree and the test is much harder than the PT tests.
After watching some John Jewett videos on the topic of pre-contest dieting and on cardio, I've decided I'm dropping cardio down to 5x30minutes per week and just cranking up steps. 15k step minimum but I could easily be getting up to 20k. Some of this will be post-training as sometimes in the morning I just feel tired and/or scheduling makes it difficult to get it in during the morning. I'm going to put my refeeds on Sundays (off lifting) and do just 30 minutes cardio fasted and 10-12k steps on that day and mostly just chill out and rinse off some fatigue. I'll shoot for "only" 600-700g carbs but go ahead and include a fairly large 1.5k cheat meal at the end of the day. Probably one of those fancy burgers or some sort of pasta dish from Cheesecake factory idk.
Regarding personal training, yeah it's a bitch when you do know what you're doing because of so much information asymmetry between you and the audience. They can't differentiate between good and bad trainers and could easily get turned off just seeing one trainer in your gym doing something that even a more intelligent normal person would realize is stupid.
I'm building up more and more online clients but still not charging anyone anything. I'd really like to get more posing clients as so many people are atrocious posers. I consider myself "above average" but far from good or elite in this respect and I've taught 2 guys how to pose starting from zero and find it a lot of fun. I have huge respect for the posing coaches as that's an exceptionally difficult skill to learn and to teach and really has no ceiling. These two guys are insanely impressive and have clearly spent thousands of hours refining this. https://www.instagram.com/cb317fitness/ https://www.instagram.com/kylianortegape... I plan to hire one or both at some point when I'm offseason and have more time and energy to learn to pose.
Most of my "lifter" clients have preconceived notions about what correct training is and don't want my training recommendations but do want my diet/cardio/supplementation/PED consultations. That's a problem i myself had.. always thinking I knew everything there was to know about optimal training. Getting former powerlifting guys to acknowledge the relatively poor stimulus-to-fatigue ratio of their favorite barbell lifts is an impossible task. I should know because I was one of these anti machine guys having come up through Rippetoe-ism
I know I’m really late to this conversation, but one of the hardest things about being a personal trainer is the stereotype that they are all clueless bc so many of them do dumb stuff. The main problem is the bar to entry is super low and almost anyone could get a PT certification. My advise would be in addition to finding someone who has competed, look for trainers with a CSCS (certified strength and conditioning specialist) and/or educati
+1
If they let their cert lapse, they will clearly tell you why they did so.
After watching some John Jewett videos on the topic of pre-contest dieting and on cardio, I've decided I'm dropping cardio down to 5x30minutes per week and just cranking up steps. 15k step minimum but I could easily be getting up to 20k. Some of this will be post-training as sometimes in the morning I just feel tired and/or scheduling makes it difficult to get it in during the morning. I'm going to put my refeeds on Sundays (off lifting) an
What do you mean by cardio as opposed to "steps"? From what I gathered, most pre-contest cardio is mostly incline walking at this point? Which weirdly burns an obscene number of calories for the impact. (Kinda like swimming minus the ravenous hunger.)
+1
If they let their cert lapse, they will clearly tell you why they did so.
What do you mean by cardio as opposed to "steps"? From what I gathered, most pre-contest cardio is mostly incline walking at this point? Which weirdly burns an obscene number of calories for the impact. (Kinda like swimming minus the ravenous hunger.)
I'm not too precise with it, but 120+hr = cardio.
sub 100 = walking
100-120 = ???
After watching some John Jewett videos on the topic of pre-contest dieting and on cardio, I've decided I'm dropping cardio down to 5x30minutes per week and just cranking up steps. 15k step minimum but I could easily be getting up to 20k. Some of this will be post-training as sometimes in the morning I just feel tired and/or scheduling makes it difficult to get it in during the morning. I'm going to put my refeeds on Sundays (off lifting) an
I am currently transitioning from doing personal training in person to primarily online. Mostly because as a military spouse it sucks having to change jobs every 2-3 years after building up your business. My last job was at a high end gym in VA comparable to a equinox where sessions with me were $130. Convincing those clients to train with me online for a couple hundred bucks instead of paying 1k+ a month was fairly easy, especially after working with most of them for a year or two. I started an LLC since I know train 12-15 of them online.
Seperate from that I’ve also been interviewing with online personal training companies/apps to train people remotely on a bigger scale. Working from home is appealing to me with young kids and the flexibility it allows and if I do that I won’t have to change jobs every time we move. You should def be charging people you are training, not sure why you are doing it for free.
Mostly because my clients are all China foreign expats who make between 40-60k usd/yr. I'm getting my first regular dude outside of China who's 25 and still new to lifting, pretty excited to work with somebody who's starting from scratch again. When people have a little bit of information they can be a lot more difficult to work with than when people are at 0.
Legs
leaning away db curls: 12.5kgx4 sets failure
Hamstring curls: 47.5kgx19, 13, 9
Between hamstring curl sets did 4 sets of leg extensions 20s
Toes elevated SLDL: 110kgx13, 10 now I feel it in my glutes, think I've got this figured out finally
Leg press: 4ppsx20, 15, 12
3 sets calf raises to failure on the leg press afterword
75 minutes
18k steps 0 cardio
Meal 1
250g salmon, a green apple
Meal 2
175g salmon, 200g sweet potato, 100g green beans
Meal 3
175g chicken breast, 200g sweet potato, green apple
Meal 4
80g cream of wheat, 300ml skim milk, 20mg honey, 1.5 scoop whey, banana, 4ius of humalog
Meal 5
175g salon, 200g sweet potato, 200g pineapple 3iu humalog, 10iu gh
Was a little light on veggies b/c I didn't make time to make them.
Oh I got my gh blood test results back from when I was in Thailand. The standard is to pin 10ius IM 3 hours before blood is drawn fasted. ****ing 29ng/dl which is absurdly high. But it's (Chinese) pharmacy grade and not being damaged in shipping because it's cold shipping in less than 48 hours.
Spoiler
Quarter turns and mandatories. Still not sure what I want to do for my favorite classic pose, but probably the twisting back double (colloquially known as the "Arnold" pose). Side tricep or front lat spread (not pictured here) could also be great options for my favorite classic pose. It's okay because I'm bare minimum 16 months out (maybe 20 months).
Front relaxed is all fiecked, forgot to tilt my hips back
looking very good
+1, pretty sick man
I am currently transitioning from doing personal training in person to primarily online. Mostly because as a military spouse it sucks having to change jobs every 2-3 years after building up your business. My last job was at a high end gym in VA comparable to a equinox where sessions with me were $130. Convincing those clients to train with me online for a couple hundred bucks instead of paying 1k+ a month was fairly easy, especially after w
One of the things I will be eternally grateful to AA on is that he taught me how to teach myself. His meal plan was rudimentary and advice was such, since lets be frank... I'm not and will never be an elite lifter. I wasn't even the best casual olytard that hit gym I used to frequent RIP tallinna spordihall.
Guy,
Please show the pics. You give an old man with myriad injuries hope for a better day. And I appreciate this log. (Even if we may never see eye to eye on the first 6-9m of nooB training.)
One of the things I will be eternally grateful to AA on is that he taught me how to teach myself. His meal plan was rudimentary and advice was such, since lets be frank... I'm not and will never be an elite lifter. I wasn't even the best casual olytard that hit gym I used to frequent RIP tallinna spordihall.
Guy,
Please show the pics. You give an old man with myriad injuries hope for a better day. And I appreciate this log. (Even if we may ne
The pics are in spoiler, or maybe you meant "please continue posting the pics" in which case yeah I will.
It's okay, bro. Ultimately the first 6-9 months doesn't matter all that much when you're literally 16 years in like me. It does feel great to have started making real measurable progress again. I started steroids around 10 years ago and so clearly that wasn't the missing ingredient and I was basically the same from 2015-2022 then things started clicking when I discarded old habits. One of the biggest steps forward was outright quitting barbell squatting. I remember my knees just constantly being sore no matter what I did and now even doing this many steps and stairs cardio, I can barely remember the last time my knees were as sore as a typical day when i was 26. Then obviously overhauling my nutrition approach was an even bigger step forward.
I hope I can inspire you just quit oly entirely and maybe give hypertrophy training a go; you don't need to do the posing trunks and ****-eroticism. I'm a fairly feminine metro guy so all the glamour/exhibitionism/looking good/vanity/shaving my bodyhair/buying special jacked guy clothes to look cool in front of 15 year olds is all highly appealing to me, but you can build sum muscles, get stronger, and be healthier by following this training and diet approach minus the PEDs and general extremeness and get that satisfying psychological feeling of progressing your body. Payoffwiz is a great example of this and was also a former olybro. The Renaissance Periodization youtube is a great resource run by a PhD sports scientist you're probably aware of. This style of training and eating is so forgiving compared to oly/pl/strongman and relatively more "functional" modalities.
Push
Machine press: 62.5kgx12,12,12
flat db press: 30kgx15,15,15
Prone raises: 4 sets
Pushdowns: stackx5 sets failure no myo reppin
Cardio: 30 minutes 130 HR
Steps 20k, was up to 18k by the time I started the workout.
I was super tired today and had some minor pec tendon soreness I'm sure I could have trained through but chose to just pull back today. Not a deload session and still got in real stimulus. The pec tendon pain disappeared the next morning (now).
Really depleted. It's fine, refeed + rest sunday. Saturday leg training with the boys at the bbing gym. There's another bbing gym an hour drive away that has a posing room and a ton of competitors. They even have an in-gym restaurant with bbing food. I wish every gym had this. We'll probably make the pilgrimage out there in 2 weeks.
I decided I'm cutting off the diet in 5 weeks. Get some good professional photos done and call it a day, no show. My clen is 120mcg and my yohimbine is 30mgs/morning so I need to taper off or I'll be sleeping 12-14 hours a day if I just cold turkey. I did that in summer 2021 and it was like a solid 2 weeks of spending as many hours of the day asleep as awake. Plan is to slowly reverse diet and even stay on potato/sweet potato/fruit as main carb sources thing for at least the first 2 weeks coming out of the diet and just allow white rice products once a week on refeed days. I'll have at least 2 good cheat meals and drop like $40-60 on each one the two days after I finish the diet/photos.
I will not be bulking the whole way through assuming an end-of-october contest date. I'll be giving a full 24 weeks to contest prep for a national and that gives me just over 10 months of solid offseason where I'll include at least one 6-8 week hard fatloss phase to reset. I might choose March 2026 instead in which case we can probably stick in 2 fat-loss phases along that bulk.
Legs at the other gym
lying hamstring curls: 3 sets failure
Leg extensions: 3 sets failure, terrible designed machine got no real contraction here
Toes elevated PAused SLDL: 110kgx13, 10
Leg press: 170kg (three 25kg plates per side)x20, 15, 12
calf raises
Cardio 35 minutes bicycling each way to the gymnasium
Steps were only 10k.
going to knock out some stairs cardio this morning then refeed with cream of rice, chicken breast, pineapple, and gummy candies with a cheat meal for final meal.
Didn't have any cream of rice, couldn't fit it in. Had just chicken breast+pineapple+basmati rice with gummies for meals 1-4 then a cheesecake factory cheeseburger and fries. In total around 1200g carbs and I think this was exactly the right amount. 800 woulda been too little, 1500 probably too much. Did about 28ius of insulin humalog spaced throughout the day.
I think this is an interesting topic...however...is this considered good writing? There is so much completely unnecessary terminology that I eventually just didn't care if I understood or didn't understand what the author was trying to say.
Also, there's a ton of low hanging fruit in regards to attractiveness that doesn't cost any actual $$ and even rich people completely forego. So...well, w/e, I don't really have a cohesive point here.
Aren't you much more ripped than this guy or am I missing something?
Yes you are clearly missing something. He's among the best posers in the world even though he's very mediocre as a bodybuilder. Tons of much bigger and more ripped people are paying him tons of money to teach them. He's also like 21 so he's got a lot of time.
I think this is an interesting topic...however...is this considered good writing? There is so much completely unnecessary terminology that I eventually just didn't care if I understood or didn't understand what the author was trying to say.
Also, there's a ton of low hanging fruit in regards to attractiveness that doesn't cost any actual $$ and even rich people completely forego. So...well, w/e, I don't really have a cohesive point here.
It's poorly written. But important none-the-less. It's wild how much less stigamatized this industry is in China/Thailand relative to the USA. I suspect there's some "mate competition sabotage" effects going on but it's hard to pinpoint or articulate. Same thing as 20 year olds in undergraduate referring to good looking, charismatic, outgoing, and upper-middle class fraternity members as "douchebags".
Botched workout from pec tendon and general fatigue. I had the high day Sunday but it wasn't enough to bring me back to life. I'm deloading upper body this week.
Push
Machine pressed up to 62.5kgx13 and quit immediately b/c the pec tendon getting irritated. I think the cable curls last week ****ed it up again.
Machine incline fly: 20kgx20x3
Pushups: bwx15x4
Pushdowns: stackx14 , 2 more sets that set of 14 was to failure, I was just incredibly weak today
Side raises: whatever
Cardio: 30 minutes AM fasted
Steps: 20k
I think I'm going to cut out all biceps exercises except ez curls and seated hammers for a bit.
Pull, bicep/pec tie-in mysteriously felt a ton better after just 1 day
Rope lat prayers: 17.5kgx19, 10, 9
Machine rows: 62.5kgx20, 14, 12
1 arm lat pulldowns: 2ppsx12, 12, 10
Underhand rows: 60kgx10, 6, 10
EZ curls: 20kgx12x4
Cardio probably going to drop it and do steps only
steps: 20k
Amazing progress. �� ��
