JD_Johannes’s BodyBlog

‘Fit for Combat’ the book I wrote with IFBB Fitness Pro Nita Marquez is now #11 on Amazon.com’s list of best selling Fitness and Exercise books.

Last week Nita taught the system we outline in the book to a Brigade of Army Soldiers.

I’ll be taking off for Iraq in a few weeks then will loop through Afghanistan too go snow boarding in the Hindu Kush with some of my cronies.

After 1.5 training weeks since I got back from some work in Afghanistan, things are back on track.

When I’m overseas I do what I can to keep training.  I spent some time filming news at a US military outpost in Laghman province that had a pretty good gym and was able to get some little workouts in before the daily grind of missions in the heat.

Most of the trip though I was living in safe houses and rundown hotels.  So did pushups, pullups, handstand push ups, etc.

I tried to eat as much meat as I could and found a small grocery in Kabul that had some whey protein.

Life/work got in the way, but I didn’t use it as an excuse to eat like a pig and not train.

I’ll be heading to Iraq in a few weeks to do some more filming so my priorities are strength, speed and stamina.

I will worry about appearance when I get back home for a few months this winter.

On the morning of June 12th I weighed 206 pounds and looked like this.

Then I went on trip to San Diego for work and a lot of fun and came back on June 14 super bloated.

Today I am back down to 207.

That is up 12 pounds in a few days and down 11 pounds in 6 days.

The gain was from a lot more carbs, salt and sugar than I normally eat.  The loss was from my normal eating plan and training that worked most of the water and bloat out of my system.

If I was more ambitious huckster I would use the pics as before and afters and say some pill did the magic.  But it was just regular weight lifting, some intervals and a basic diet of meat, eggs, fish, oats and whey.

I’ve gotten a lot of questions about diet from people who are using formulas to determine their caloric intake.  In my opinion most of those formulas are not very useful.

Let me illustrate this with a common formula for determining resting metabolic rate.

RMR = 9.99(WEIGHT in Kilograms) + 6.25(HEIGHT in centimeters) - 4.92(AGE in years) + 166(GENDER)-161

If I were to plug in my specific data, the formula would look like this:

RMR = 9.99(94) + 6.25(177.8) - 4.92(36) + 166(1)-161

(*Note, men enter “1” for their gender, women enter “0”)

So if I calculate it out my RMR is 1,879 calories.

Ok.  Now, how on earth was this formula derived?

(more…)

No pic this week.  Slept late and had to get to the airport for a few days filming in the desert.

On Friday morning my weight was down to 205.6 Lbs.

Fat thickness at the illiac abdominal 6.2mm

Waist 89.5cm.

Of course I ate way to much traveling and working so today I’m holding water and ballooned up to 213 Lbs.

Nice progress this week.

My fat thickness at the illiac abdominal went from 7 to 6.5 and my waist is down 1cm to 90cm.

Lean diameter of the upper arm is 138.8.  I am still nice and strong in the gym.

Everything is moving in the right direction.  After a little carb refeed this weekend the next adjustmet to the diet is replacing my current whey with a sugar free whey and cutting out a few more grams of oats.

Then I start zero carb cycles and longer ketosis runs.

No, I’m not doing a contest.  I just enjoy doing this in the summer and have 8 weeks before I head to work overseas.  So, why not look good at the pool for the next couple weeks?

After the PHX trip I was up to 214 Lbs.  Thanks Nita!  Mostly it was water, we ate out a lot and even though it all fit pretty well on the plan, there was more salt and carbs than usual.

Then I miscalculated my carb rotation last week.  My thought was the uptick in eating during the work in PHX would allow me to re-start at higher carb intake.  It didn’t work as planned.

This week I walked down to 17grams of intentional carbs.  Tomorrow I will have a refeed with 34grams carbs from oats and big leafy green salad.  I don’t even pretend that is a "cheat."  It is a controlled refeed.

Next week I will walk down to basically zero intentional carbs on Friday then decide if I want to reset and run through a four-week walk down, or jump into ketosis.

Just got back from a long weekend in PHX working with my business partner Nita Marquez.

I got in a few good workouts with her and some of her personal training clients and closed out our most recent project–a book detailing Nita’s workout and nurtition plan.  I am a product of parts of the plan.

The book is not a "eat this" or "do this workout" as much as it is an explanation of the systematic approach used by an IFBB Pro like Nita to dial in what works for her.  The system can be used by anyone to dial in on what works for them.  There is no secret technique, just methodical application of the basic laws of physiology.

After watching her guide so many figure competitors through the process, it is really straight forward.  So straight forward a lot of people can’t believe it works.  The secret is, there is no secret.  Or, if there is a secret, it is precise tracking that allows you to determine with quantifiable data what works for you.  The only tools are a food scale, body fat calipers, cloth tape measure, a bathroom scale and a notebook.
Nita is planning on competing this year.  I’m pushing for the Europa in Dallas because it is a short drive down the road for me and I hate commercial air travel.

I’ve been dieting along with my friend Sarah as she prepares for another season of figure contests and I had to travel east this past weekend to give a talk at a conference and schmooze with my cronies.

I planned ahead.  Brought a tub of whey and oats.  There was a grocery store a couple blocks away so I could get some meat.  The hotel had a little gym so I could get a little workout in.

That was the easy part.  I’m used to that.  When I fly I bring some shakers with whey powder in them in carry-on–just add water and I have a snack.  I just avoid carbs and sugars like usual.

What threw me off this trip was my connecting flight home was cancelled and I was stuck at a Holiday Inn Express.  So, I found a grocery store a mile away, hoofed down there, got some more whey and some deli meat and stayed pretty close to the eating plan.

Of course all the salty deli meat has me holding water like a camel, but salt takes care of itself.

After a 30 trip that should have been just 6 hours I felt pretty crappy, but went to the gym and got in a lift this afternoon.  And after a few normal meals I’m feeling almost all better.

On April 25th 2008 I looked like this and weighed 195 pounds in the afternoon.

On April 17th 2009, just a few days ago, I weighed 210 pounds and look like this.

Last year, I used to weigh myself at the gym in the afteroon on a balance scale.  But, the balance scale gone, so now I weigh myself with a digital bathroom scale in the morning.  The weight difference between morning and afternoon is about five pounds.

Does that mean in one year I have put on about 20 pounds of muscle?  Yes and no.  You have to understand how I got to 195 pounds in April of 2008 first, then the 20 pounds of “muscle” will make more sense.

I have spent the better part of the last four years running around Iraq and Afghanistan with a TV camera on my shoulder.

During that time I used an old fashioned power/mass workout combined with some easy distance running and a few sprints to stay in good enough shape to keep up Marines, Paratroopers and a few Spec Ops types.

I was strong and in good enough shape, but I was weighing 240+ pounds.

The best way to describe me was Heavy Duty.  I was the guy with 19 inch arms, a 55 inch chest and a 40 inch waist.  I could bench 365 for a triple and shoulder press 125 pound dumbbells.

But dragging all that weight around the war zones sucked.

When I got back from a long trip in the Summer of 2007, I decided to get the weight off.  I came up with what I thought was a good diet and cardio program and dove in.

But it didn’t accomplish anything.

I made another short hop to the war in the late Summer of 2007 and when I got back, I went to work editing a documentary trilogy about Iraq.

For a change of scenery, I moved into a small condo in Miami owned by a buddy of mine from Iraq whose family did some slum lording.

While in Miami I fell in with the wrong crowd–a crazy group of female bodybuilders.

I already knew how build size and strength, they taught me a knew level of intensity and how to really think about what I ate.

When I left Miami, I continued to dial in on my eating.  But after two months and 10 pounds of fat lost, I got stuck.

After a visit to my doctor and an edoncrinologist I discovered I am mildly hypo-thyroid and have a form of insulin resistence.  My body prefers to turn carbs and sugars into fat, with only a brief pit-stop in the muscles as glycogen.

So, I had to diet even harder.  It was months of low carb cycles, ketogenic cycles and way too much cardio.

But, by April of 2008 I was down to 195 pounds and relatively lean.

Then I went to Iraq again.

When I got back in the Summer of 2008, I worked the system to build myself back up, got on my base eating plan and changed my cardio.

My friends Nita Marquez and Glen & Lisa Krog had me start doing more sprints and only occasional distance running.  When I started doing sprints I got leaner and actually built up a bit of muscle and strength.

I dialed in my eating and training and went from this to this.

Then I went to Iraq again.

When I got home I spent a few months doing my system, which is detailed in my "Fit for Combat" training journal.  It is nothing fancy, but it works for me.

My good friend Sarah is getting ready for a figure show later this Summer, so I have been gradually reducing and rotating my carbs and losing a few pounds of fat.

The amount of muscle I have now is not new for me.  I had even more muscle when I was "Heavy Duty" or maybe I was just a little stronger.

I don’t think I put on 20 pounds of new muscle in a year.  I think I just restored some of the muscle that had been burned off during the long diet and excessive cardio.  Restoring is a lot different than building brand new.

My training system is very old fashioned.  I log all my workouts and try to get more reps or move more weight every week.

I measure my food to the gram.  The precision is very important.

I approach all this very systematically.  Everything is quantified and the variables are controlled.

Because I am not naturally lean or even naturally muscular, I have to dial in on what works for me making gradual adjustments and measuring their effectiveness.

Through this process I have learned there is no such thing as a one-size fits all program.  There are some physiological laws like overload and caloric underload and ketosis.

But beyond that it is tracking, precision eating and careful experimentation to find what works specifically for you.