- Joined
- Jun 29, 2010
- Messages
- 371
I'm currently 6 weeks out from my first show (MN North Star), and the last few weeks I have noticed some things that are drastically different from the first half of prep; maybe this will help other first timers or those thinking to compete, and it would be awesome for vets to chime in with their experiences! Here we go...
1) This is the biggest/ most important one... the margin of error for diet/training/cardio is really, REALLY low. Getting down to 10-12% was pretty easy (considering I'm a natural fat guy), I just had to be consistent with my diet/cardio 5-6 days per week and I could have 1-2 full on cheat days and still make decent progress week to week. At this point it is a completely different story, a single cheat meal will easily set me back 2-3 days; Sunday morning I was 201 and lean/dry, I went to a Thai restaurant after training with some friends and had 2 big curry entrees and woke up Monday at 209, bloated and swollen so bad I could barely get my shoes on. Not fun.
2) This goes hand in hand with #1... this is not the time to develop good habits, those should already be in place. At this point, dieting should not be that mentally difficult, you shouldn't have to force yourself to do cardio, and you should have your daily routine down to a T. I know a guy that is also prepping for his first show, has great genetics and is naturally lean, but has no self-discipline. He is 2 weeks out and looks no different than he did at 12. He constantly bitches about diet and cardio and makes excuses in order to justify his fuck-ups. I have been doing cardio almost daily for 6 months now (started at 10-15 minutes per day) and have only missed 2 sessions in the last 6 weeks. Yes, diet and cardio sucks, but at some point you just have to accept it as something you just "do".
3) Unless you have a crappy appetite, at some point you will have to cut out shakes. I am blessed to have an "average" metabolism, but cursed to have an enormous appetite. Starting 8 weeks out, my training volume was at 30-120 minutes of lifting and 60 minutes of cardio daily, and cals are down to around 2.8-3k. When I drop below 3k cals I feel like I'm starving to death, and the 1-2 meals I was replacing with shakes simply wasn't cutting it. The cravings were insane... not for junk, just for MORE FOOD. Since switching to all solid food and slightly upping my fats, my appetite is sated a little better. This makes food prep more time consuming, but it is worth it. Also, my poops are now enormous!!
4) Posing is actually a lot harder than it looks. I used to make fun of it when I was just doing PL, but there are a lot of subtleties that make a huge difference. It has taken a lot of work to simply "not suck" at posing, I'm still a long ways from good.
5) You better have a helluva support system around you and/or a lot of discipline... if your GF/wife/friends/family don't support you in your prep or get pissed because you can't do something (dinner/drinking/travelling/whatever) it will make your prep very difficult. My GF is being very supportive, but I can tell she is agitated at me when I am in the gym 2-3x per day and I have to spend less time with her. I try to make up for it by going for long walks with her and counting it as part of my cardio and occasionally she will come to the gym and do cardio with me.
There are lots more things I can't think of right now, let me know your experiences!
1) This is the biggest/ most important one... the margin of error for diet/training/cardio is really, REALLY low. Getting down to 10-12% was pretty easy (considering I'm a natural fat guy), I just had to be consistent with my diet/cardio 5-6 days per week and I could have 1-2 full on cheat days and still make decent progress week to week. At this point it is a completely different story, a single cheat meal will easily set me back 2-3 days; Sunday morning I was 201 and lean/dry, I went to a Thai restaurant after training with some friends and had 2 big curry entrees and woke up Monday at 209, bloated and swollen so bad I could barely get my shoes on. Not fun.
2) This goes hand in hand with #1... this is not the time to develop good habits, those should already be in place. At this point, dieting should not be that mentally difficult, you shouldn't have to force yourself to do cardio, and you should have your daily routine down to a T. I know a guy that is also prepping for his first show, has great genetics and is naturally lean, but has no self-discipline. He is 2 weeks out and looks no different than he did at 12. He constantly bitches about diet and cardio and makes excuses in order to justify his fuck-ups. I have been doing cardio almost daily for 6 months now (started at 10-15 minutes per day) and have only missed 2 sessions in the last 6 weeks. Yes, diet and cardio sucks, but at some point you just have to accept it as something you just "do".
3) Unless you have a crappy appetite, at some point you will have to cut out shakes. I am blessed to have an "average" metabolism, but cursed to have an enormous appetite. Starting 8 weeks out, my training volume was at 30-120 minutes of lifting and 60 minutes of cardio daily, and cals are down to around 2.8-3k. When I drop below 3k cals I feel like I'm starving to death, and the 1-2 meals I was replacing with shakes simply wasn't cutting it. The cravings were insane... not for junk, just for MORE FOOD. Since switching to all solid food and slightly upping my fats, my appetite is sated a little better. This makes food prep more time consuming, but it is worth it. Also, my poops are now enormous!!
4) Posing is actually a lot harder than it looks. I used to make fun of it when I was just doing PL, but there are a lot of subtleties that make a huge difference. It has taken a lot of work to simply "not suck" at posing, I'm still a long ways from good.
5) You better have a helluva support system around you and/or a lot of discipline... if your GF/wife/friends/family don't support you in your prep or get pissed because you can't do something (dinner/drinking/travelling/whatever) it will make your prep very difficult. My GF is being very supportive, but I can tell she is agitated at me when I am in the gym 2-3x per day and I have to spend less time with her. I try to make up for it by going for long walks with her and counting it as part of my cardio and occasionally she will come to the gym and do cardio with me.
There are lots more things I can't think of right now, let me know your experiences!