TLC: Trust, Love, Consistency

It’s been 10 days since I last set foot in the gym. There’s nothing I’d like to do more than a good hard weights session, but it’s not an option.
I’ve still got the dregs of my cold/flu and my energy levels are almost non-existent. A visit to the chiro yesterday left me feeling a fair bit better this morning but by lunchtime I knew I couldn’t train again today.
I’m taking each day as it comes. If I’ve got the energy I take Kevin for a walk before work, but even this wipes me out. I’ve been keeping my food clean, lean and green and my weight has stayed consistent even after my 10% meals.

All this inactivity and inability to achieve new goals is leaving me in quite a dark headspace and I’m worried that I’m sleeping too much and am actually making my energy levels worse.

I noticed I’d totally dropped off my water intake so I’m trying to get that back up above 4L again. In addition, there’s lots of glutamine and fish oils with every meal and I’ve got some fancy herbal medicine from the chiro which I’m hoping will help.

I’m open to any suggestions from people as how to get out of this hole. All I want to do is get back in the gym and get on with my life!

My last few workout with Joe, my trainer, have left me feeling a little lack-luster. We trained shoulders last night and i just couldn’t get my head into the right space, again. I love training shoulders and left feeling disappointed. I think I like setting my own pace in the gym and working through the weight and reps that I know I can do. On the other hand I love having someone there to help me get out that last 2 reps that I just can’t do myself. I’ve got about 3 more sessions with Joe paid for and I’ll feel guilty if I don’t keep training with him up until my comp, but I just don’t see the benefits right now. All this being said, I’ve had generally unfocussed and weak workouts for about a week now, hopefully it’s just a monthly problem and I’ll be firing again next week. I sure hope so, I can’t handle feeling weak for much longer. On a contradictory note, I’ve also been thinking it’s time to start chatting with more of my co-gym rats. We’ve all trained together for ages and I’m always to shy to say hello.

I’m on day 2/3 of the no caffeine, no chilli, no AS (in addition to my other no wheat, no dairy) and I’ve failed on the no AS and no chilli fronts. When no chilli means, no paprika or chilli I’m just stuffed. Lemon juice, salt and smoked paprika are my staple chicken seasonings. I’m going to have to check how much paprika counts. The no AS (artificle sweetner) is something I would have thought would be a breeze; and it would be, if it weren’t for Xtend. I tried taking BCAA capsules instead but the Xtend has all sorts of other goodies which are just to nice to avoid. Again I’ll be querying this one.

On the no coffee front, I think this was an excellent idea. At 6am I thought it was a lousy idea, but I have slept really well the last few days and anxiety levels are right down. I think I was getting really used to the caffeine and thermofuel wasn’t as fun as it was when I started. Hopefully this means when I’m back on it in a month it will all be magic again. In the meantime my new pre-workout stack is BCAAs, glutamine (must buy more), tyrosine capsules, acytle L-carnatine and creatine. Without a scoop of Xtend in this mix it’s truely gag worthy. I’m also trying to get back on the green tea and have just started taking spuralina powder.

This morning’s workout was only so-so as I didn’t really get enough sleep last night; quality- excellent, quantity-poor. It took me the whole workout to figure out why I wasn’t on the game, so sleep is back on my priority list. After my workout I picked up some berocca high performance, which is what I’ve been using as my multi-vitamin. In all the fandangle of my other sups I’d run out and forgotten about it. The combo of a berocca and a pot of green tea was just what i needed to get my energy back and I’m very glad I didn’t cave on the coffee.

Reading the results from last year’s SA INBA show I noticed that there is an award for ‘most potential’. Normally I squirm at such things, but I really want this one. This is my goal. My body is looking awesome, but I just don’t know where my left delt is going to come from. So my plan is to step on stage absolutely smokin’ and get that award….. That or they need a new category for most deformed!

Tonight, it’s back to Dr Frank for more crunching, poking and worried looks. He does claim to have a plan for my left delt, but (un)fortunately he only works on a whole body basis (kinda why I chose him). I donated blood at the Red Cross yesterday in an effort to find out my blood type. I won’t know this until next week and then he’s going to start blood typing my diet. I’m not sure how I feel about this, but anything is worth a shot and my body is my science experiment.

People complain that their workouts become shit once they start a hard cut. Me, it’s the reverse, my workouts are wicked; it’s the rest of my day that’s turned to shit.

My carbs are low and green for now. Which means I live ‘in the fog’. Luckily though Gen-Tec and Scivation make fog remover. I’m really good at fog removal for workout purposes. I’m not sure I want to even think about how many more sups I’d need to take to stay out the fog on a more full time basis.

After 5 days of following the cut-diet very strictly I’ve made some slight adjustments. In the interest of science and for future personal reference I document  them here.

6am I wake after a patchy nights sleep where I was waking sweating every few hours until I opened a window (ooops I left the heater on). The hound is ready for his walk, doesn’t he understand Sunday’s!? Energy levels at 6.5/10 which is good for me.

6.30am Start cracking eggs (8), sauting spinach, grilling kangaroo and chicken for later. Breakfast before cardio today or I won’t get all my meals in.
Who the hell eats this much food for breakfast anyways? (7 whites, 1 whole egg, 1/2 grapefruit, 50g roo, 120g spinach)

7am sups 5g creatine, 5g glutamine, 3g fish oil, 2 fat burners, 1 multi, 1 scoop Xtend, 1 zinc+magnesium+b6, 1 litre water

7.20am Energy level 8/10

8am wrangle hound, and start 6km walk to the farmers market, by the time I’m half way there (sipping 2 scoops Xtend + 5g creatine) fog is starting to set in for the day; at least it’s not too cold and beautifully sunny for mid-winter.
9am Energy levels 7/10 calories burnt: 125 (note to self: your hilly walk shits on this flat one). Headache in the top, front of my brain moved in for the day.
I just bought 60 (Free-range) eggs!
11am Hope that chicken salad and coffee will pick me up. Nope, no carbs in that one!

Midday: Time to start getting ready for the gym. Screw this cut-diet, I’ll keep the macros but I’m putting pure-carbs in my drink.
What I actually put in my pre and in workout drinks is a bit of a vague ramshackle of sups from my kitchen bench but WOW! did it work.
Pre-workout pick-me up (aprox): 1.5 scoops Xtend, a bigger than usual slug of thermofuel (couldn’t get the doser to work), 5g creatine, 5g glutamine, 2.5gish alca, 3g pure carbs, a tiny pinch of beta-analine.

The beta-analine was a new one to my arsenal. Sean at Aussie Muscle wouldn’t tell me what to expect when I asked if I needed it, but gave me a free sample bottle and told me to report back on what I thought (’don’t take too much or you’ll get twitchy’ was his warning). In this sludge of a cocktail I can’t be certain but I think my power was up and I felt more ‘twang’/tension in my muscles. Is this the right answer?
Boy was I raring to get in the gym, headache gone. The bus couldn’t get me there fast enough. Good thing I chose not to drive.

1.15pm in-workout drink: 4 scoops  Xtend, 12g pure-carbs, 2.5g creatine, 2.5g glutamine
Feeling: Strong, fit, focused, creative (good thing too as this is the mantra I use while I lift rather than counting reps). Shoulder had stop hurting and, wow, new PR’s on everything. Calories burnt: 300 (quads, bi’s, tri’s, calves). I was taking very short rests and pyramiding my sets hard and everything seemed easy.

3pm: home. 150g green beans, 150g brocolli, 150g chicken breast, splash of soy sauce (low-GI fiborous carbs + lean protein, no extra fats). This was monstorously filling and a new part of my experiment. Approx. 25% of my day’s carbs, all green. Will this keep the fog away?

Now/4.30pm: Still feeling mild buzz from stims. No headache since before my workout. Stomach starting to growl, needs water, not food. I think I’ve supped out for the day. I’ll take 1 more serve of creatine/glutamine before bed and some zinc and at that I really should stop.

1 p/c/f meal and 1 p/f meal to go. Will make notes on how I ride out the remainder of the arvo.
Siesta time, I love weekends!

Last night I threw together an emergency protein bar that turned out delicious.

2 tbspoons sugar free maple syrup
1 tbspoon (20g) natural Peanut butter (warmed)
1/2 tbspoon (6g) L.S.A
2 tbspoon (agave and honey) toasted wheat germ (homemade)
3/4 serve (26g) Vanilla vital strength Ripped protein powder

Mix melted PB with maple syrup and 1 ts water.
Kneed in remaining ingredients except 2 ts wheat germ to form a dough.
Roll in remaining wheatgerm and flatten to a cookie shape.
Wrap in press and seal/foil
Leave on top of the slow cooker overnight. This was the trick! Bottom was toasted and firm, top was soft, inside was gooey. Alternatively broil/overhead-grill for 1-2 minutes (sans-wrapper).

Today was ’super Saturday’ at the muscle shop (discount day)  I looked at different protein powders but I do loved Vital Strength’s Ripped Vanilla and have had such a bad experience with the Balance Lean protein that I’m kinda scared to try other flavours and brands, though something like cookies and cream sounds divine. I bought some fat burners, Isatori Lean System 7, to test out. The packet full of warnings were a little freaky, but the guys in the shop said they were the most popular… we’ll see.  Just as I was leaving one of the owners asked if I was competing. He’d seen me in the gym and thought I was leaning out well and looking good for it. I rode that buzz for several hours! It really boosted my belief I could do it and it was also nice that ‘the boy’ was with me to hear it so he doesn’t think I’m as mad.All this put together is helping cement my commitment to competing.Last night I planned all my meals for the week. They still look interesting (not just 20 tuna salads), lots of hardboiled eggs, beans, chickpeas and oats for both protein and fibre. We also bought a slow-cooker which will make things like shanks and even beans easier. ‘The boy’ love casseroles and that kind of thing so it’ll keep us both happy. Overall my diet’s looking 30% fat, 30% carbs, 40% protein at the moment with a minimum of 25g fiber. I think I’ll stick this out for a month and see where I’m at. I’ve got mid-June marked as when I get nasty on the carbs and go back 20%.

Today and tomorrow off to give the shoulder a rest, I’ll just keep my calories as low as I can and then back to the gym on Monday. I’m working a 2 day upper/lower split for the next 2 weeks, hoping that’ll be a decent time to get full motion back in my shoulder. I’m leaning away from lots of cardio, towards intervals and active recoveries instead, because I’m lazy and have set my calories intake low instead. I’ll see how my diet goes and add more cardio in if I’m snacking badly.

I also watched Pumping Iron for the first time yesterday, very funny in bits, but also inspired me to get in the gym and work on my back and just generally on my form. Those guys lifted smoother than anything I see day to day.

It’s also almost time to enlist some help. So I’m going to have to start chatting to the guys in the gym a bit more and find out who’s what. I’m not sure about the PT’s there, but some of the male BB’s seem keen to help (what else they’re keen for is sometimes suspect; sorry boys). Anyone with any suggestions of finding help to figure out my posing and get me back up to 100% please let me know.

Now i must stop procrastinating and mark assignments.

Happy training!

I discovered Australian Muscle yesterday on the net and spotted they did free BF analysis, this happened to coincide with me running out of protein powder so I thought I’d jump on my bike and head over there (only a 10 minute ride).

Had a great chat with the guys in there and they were really helpful. They only seemed to sell things in humungous tubs of over 5kg (I guess big guys want big tubs), but I managed to pick up some creatine and protein powder each in 1kg tubs. I needed to be able to fit them in my single pannier bag. I also got my body fat done for the first time ever. The guy said it’d be a bit whack because I’d been riding but it came up that I was 17% and 66.4kg clothed. I was expecting something in the mid 20’s but he seemed to think that it was pretty correct. He was also very encouraging about my idea of competing in September at the state titles. He seemed to think right now I would be fine for swimsuit and I should have no probs getting to fitness. I really feel on top of the world! I had a goal in my mind of getting down to 15% in 3 months time but I’ve kinda blown that out of the water, or at least it seems so much more doable.

1 year and one week ago, exactly, I started this whole weight training madness at a size 16 (Aussie) and at 78kg so I’m pretty stoked at where I’m at. Hopefully the creatine will help me push things to the next level.

Had a pretty good workout today too. I did chest and tri’s. Did the following.
5 minutes warmup on the rower (stuffed my ankle so I couldn’t run)

Pushups 2 x10

Each 3 sets x (11, 10, 9 reps)
BB Chest Press  7.5kg/16.5lb (olympic bar)
DB Incline Chest Press 15kg/33lb
Decline DB flies 9kg/20lb
Straight arm overhead extension lying flat (what’s this called?) BB 12.5kg/27lb
Skull crushers BB 12.5kg/27lb
Assisted dips BW-15kg (3 x 6 reps)
Tricep kickbacks DB 7.5kg/16.5lb
DB Tricep extensions 7.5kg/16.5lb (single arm)

Wish I hadn’t done that stupid bike ride, now I’ve gotta eat more!