Post Op. Contest

Some people think that you should save your calories to have a cheat day. There is some truth to that, but if you eat strict throughout the week, a cheat day will help to rev up the metabolism and keep you honest during the rest of the week.

Switching over from contest diet, to bulk diet – my cheat days went from ½ a day to a full day.

This past Friday I consumed about 8000 calories or so, give or take. (who’s counting)

During the car ride to work, I consumed 1 quart of ice-cream which held about 1000 calories. Throughout the morning, I continued to ingest four more. This totaled 4000 calories into the system. Still hungry and shocking my co-workers, I then treated myself to a 12 inch philly cheese steak with chips. (had a diet soda, since regular is too sugary for my liking) total calories by early afternoon were close to 5500 or so.

By dinner time, it was time for pizza, cookies and more ice-cream. During the mean time, I also ate several Mrs. Fields cookies and a container of oreo cookies. By 10:00 at night, I finished off the day with a few fish crackers and went to bed. I felt filled, but not stuffed… go figure.

This equals to about 8000 calories, maybe more or maybe less.

The reasoning behind this is your body can relax and it tricks the body into not going into starvation mode. It’s also a lot of fun, since I usually weigh less the following day.

www.kevinbtaylor.com

As one for not wanting to be less than perfect, it’s been decided to move the contest to the summer of 2009. This is frustrating in one aspect, but I want to make sure I do this correct the first time and not regret it later. I would be ready for the contest in November, but I believe it would be difficult to win the overall. Ian and I came to the conclusion yesterday that it’ll be too close to call and there would be a risk of not being at my best. Being the perfectionist that I sometimes am, there will be a focus of mass and staying lean for the next 10 months.

After the three surgeries, my body went out of good physical condition and my waist ballooned up to a max size of 44. During the last two month, the waist has dropped to about a 34. This 10 sizes wasn’t done during the last two months, but during the past nine. The result is waiting for the stomach to tighten and getting back into peak physical condition. The past two months have allowed for a dramatic transformation, but more needs to be done. The new diet will be as follows.
1 Breakfast: 8 Egg whites / with 2 yolks 30
6:20 AM oatmeal 1/2 cup
fruit

2 8:30 - 9:00 Protein shake with glutamine 40
with low fat milk

3 12:00 6-8 oz chicken
potato, rice or broccoli or pasta 50

4 2:00 PM protein shake with glutamine 40
with low fat milk

5 4:00 - 5:00 pm pudding 20

6 6:30 - 7:00 pm 6-8 oz chicken 50
bake pot or rice or pasta
with vegetable

7 9:00 PM 6-8 oz chicken or fish 50
with peanut butter
280

I’ll post Friday’s cheat day diet tomorrow, but I ate about 8,000 calories during the day.

www.kevinbtaylor.com

The continuing challenge with the dieting is work and school. Due to the nature of my job, it’s easy to miss a meal or have the temptation of numerous office meetings/client meetings. The challenge is to know and plan ahead. I had a meeting earlier today and was able to look at the menu ahead of time to plan the meal. As a precaution, I ingested egg whites beforehand just in case my plan backfired.

 My challenge tomorrow is to have access to clean protein, while going to an all day training where I don’t have the schedule or freedom that I normally have with office.

Focus for tomorrow:
Pre-package tuna – 5 oz and easy to ingest.
Pre pack broccoli – easily eaten and on my list of foods I’m allowed to eat.

I’m unsure if lunch is provided or we’re given a break. If a break is given, it’s that much easier. The diet itself is easy, even though my wife doesn’t like eggs anymore and it’s etched into my daily routine. With eight weeks left, it’s not a problem to make changes to any part of the diet.

www.kevinbtaylor.com

The continuing challenge with the dieting is work and school. Due to the nature of my job, it’s easy to miss a meal or have the temptation of numerous office meetings/client meetings. The challenge is to know and plan ahead. I had a meeting earlier today and was able to look at the menu ahead of time to plan the meal. As a precaution, I ingested egg whites beforehand just in case my plan backfired.

 My challenge tomorrow is to have access to clean protein, while going to an all day training where I don’t have the schedule or freedom that I normally have with office.

Focus for tomorrow:
Pre-package tuna – 5 oz and easy to ingest.
Pre pack broccoli – easily eaten and on my list of foods I’m allowed to eat.

I’m unsure if lunch is provided or we’re given a break. If a break is given, it’s that much easier. The diet itself is easy, even though my wife doesn’t like eggs anymore and it’s etched into my daily routine. With eight weeks left, it’s not a problem to make changes to any part of the diet.

The past few days have been a challenge on trying not to fall off the diet. The lower carbs/fat is taking the toll mentally and physically.

Today:

Breakfast 10 egg whites 2/3 cup oatmeal
mid day – 6 oz chicken/ 1 cup broccoli
Lunch 12 egg whites 1 cup broccoli

Afternoon
6 oz chicken 1 cup broccoli
8 egg whites

Dinner 5 oz tuna / 1 cup broccoli
Before bed 5 oz tuna / 2 eggs with yolks

The challenge this creates is additional stress on the immune system and fatigue. Currently, a nasty 24 hour bug is running through my house. Both boys got a piece, and now Erin. The bug has flu like symptoms, but appears to be a short-lived sickness. The hope is that I can avoid this and continue with the dieting and training. I’m currently loading with vitamins and making sure to avoid any baby drool that may transmit the bug. Otherwise, the training today went very well and I began working out abs every day until the contest.

The continued focus on eating strict carbs seems to be placing a toll. I’ve been extremely hungry during the day today and consumed about 40 eggs, 2 packets of tuna, 2 cups of broccoli, 6 oz of chicken and the day isn’t done. My challenge is not falling off the wagon and continuing to eat and maintain my diet. The overall process is good, but to get the remaining fat off my stomach, it’s gotta be strict. With the current diet, my calves/legs are getting very detailed. The same goes for the shoulders, arms and parts of my back. There are less than eight weeks until the contest and the current trend is promising.

www.kevinbtaylor.com

I pretty much cannot walk this afternoon after my leg workout. It is true that those who enjoy lifting weights are little masochistic, so I can’t complain to much.

The workout started with straight sets of leg press calf raises as warm up, followed by a constant drop movement, where plates were taken off during the entire exercise. The weight dropped from 360, down to 90 by the end of the first two sets. At the end, 90lbs remained and the bar was pressed downward as additional stress on the calves and finish them off. By the third set, it was a straight drop followed by an additional stress press to finish off the calves.

Upon completion of the calves, it was followed by strict seated leg curls. This was done with a drop set format and assisted completions after I was unable to complete the reps myself. During this time, contract holds and additional resistance was thrown into the mix to further exhaust the hamstrings.

Limping off the machine, it was time to work on modified hyper-extensions. On the upright hyper-extension, knees are bent, hips forward and allow for an overly exaggerated arch in the back. This will place the sole tension on the hamstrings. To complicate things further, a 25lbs plate is held and as the body moves upwards, the plate is extended. Once I’m unable to complete the movement without the weight, I dropped the weight then move my hands out forward in the superman fashion. Eventually, fatigue sets in and the final stage of this exercise where the hands are placed behind the back, where the resistance is lower and can finish off the exercise. Once the set is done, I lean forward/upside down to stretch out the hamstrings and hold the position for about 15 seconds. (Repeat two more times)

Thoroughly fatigued it’s time to work on the quads. We’re looking towards the leg extension, (hammer strength version) where the focus will be on isolation of the quads. The legs are set to extend on an alternate motion, one goes up/other goes down and so on. This puts extra emphasis on the quads and allows for increased separation of the muscle to assist in further definition. The movements are slow and controlled, bouncing is not allowed and there is a pause after each movement. Cramping of the muscle is the ultimate goal, making it weak and depleted. (repeat 2 more times, but you may have to drop the weight during the exercise)

The last portion of the workout was a combo sissy squat/giant lunges. The smith machine was used to assist with the sissy squat, where you fingers are attached to the bar, on your tip toes, knees to the floor, back is arched and you’re looking up at the sky. Use the quads to push you up to the bar… repeat. This was done until I was fatigued and could not perform the exercise. Once completed, it was time for lunges. Lead with the heel and push back with the heel, then alternate the legs. The combo of these two will assist in working with your leg definition and It’s extremely tiring. I could only complete this through two routines.

The fatigue may be due to the dieting for the contest, either way it goes along with the territory and I have to suck it up. It’s now later in the evening and I’m pretty much sore through the lower half of my body. Enjoy. kt

I’m a big fan of eating on the cheap, since I end up eating quite a bit while training and dieting. This requires a lot of planning and learning to buy foods on the bulk, which keeps the cost down. My total diet consists of spending about $50 a week. This ranges from buying two boxes of eggs, which contain five dozen eggs / or I’ll purchase 6/7 containers of egg whites, since it requires a lot of time to prepare the separation of the egg/egg whites.

What was purchased last week:

6 containers of egg whites (large containers)
1 colossus action figure – (gotta feed my son’s appetite for superheroes)
1 bag of chicken
1 container of crystal lite
3 cans of diced tomatoes
1 Large container of oatmeal
Total cost - $34.00

Groceries the previous week:
10 dozen eggs
3 bags of chicken
5 containers of tuna (10 oz)
Lemon juice Total cost $53.00

The focus is to stay under budget, but have enough food to last the week and hopefully carry some over for the following week. I’m not a big fan of the giant box stores, but they purchase items on such large economies of scale that it’s nearly impossible to purchase these items at a normal grocery store/smaller mom and pop store. I’m constantly looking for new avenues to purchase my food, so if anything comes across the plate I’ll pass it along.

So a new variation to my chest workout was thrown into the mix monday. It involved tri drops and double drops, with a mix of three different exercises. This involved incline flyes with two sets with triple drops, followed by flat flyes double drops, with the end result of decline flyes going to double drops. All sets are done to failure, with a mix of partial reps towards the end. Finishing off, have Ian Harrison hold your arms down and count “really friggin slow”, I’m sensing the man enjoyed that.

Once the chest is thoroughly burned, triceps are to follow. Seated French presses with strict movement are required. This is done with a double drop and locking/squeezing out the triceps to finish the muscle. Continuing further, Ian wants to finish off the triceps with seated dips, with a 45lbs plate resting along my legs. The focus needs to be my butt touching the ground with a full extension in the vertical position. This was done for three sets, after the first set the plate was taken off since the tri’s were fatigued. The final two sets were completed with diminishing returns, but very effective.

Current diet had consisted of numerous meals, mostly of chicken. The day would start with 10 egg whites, oatmeal and fruit. This would be followed by 3 meals with chicken, two of those with broccoli. Ten egg whites, with another meal with chicken and a potato. The day ended with 10oz of tuna and 1 egg. The total results with 300g of protein.

I haven’t totally decided on the next phase of dieting, but it would consist of about 36 egg whites per day and a little chicken with tuna fish ending off the day.

This diet was done as a test in the beginning and 10lbs during the first two weeks. This will start tomorrow and I will continue to reign in the diet during the next several weeks.