kinkoshinkai’s BodyBlog

It’s been a couple years since I certified as a trainer. I’ve taken individual clients here and there, but now, I am officially a trainer at the gym where I’ve been working out for the last year.  I’m excited to get to charge for the advice I’ve been giving out free to those who ask.  Now, when someone asks advice, I’ll just schedule a session with them!!!

It’s a great validation for me of what I’ve been doing and learning.  I’m still pursuing my master’s, too, though it was on hold this semester while I paid off my car.  Having the NSCA certification at the end of the Master’s program will be a great credential to add to the gym.

On a sad note, my gym owner/manager, and friend, is struggling with cancer in his salivary glands and throat.  He’s fighting like crazy, and in the last week of his second round of chemo this week.  Prayers, positive thoughts, karma, whatever you can send, from anyone reading this would be greatly appreciated.  He’s pushing people away, because his big fit body is deteriorating and he doesn’t want to be seen that way.  But his heart and will to fight are still huge.  Fitness right now is saving him, literally.  THAT’S what it’s all for!!

I lost my camera at the Olympia Expo AFTER taking a BUNCH of photo’s that are irreplaceable to me!!  It was in the afternoon, between the Muscletech booth and the 4EverFit booth on that aisle somewhere.  I’m devastated, not for the camera, but for the photos!  Any help through extended blogs would be GREAT!  The view screen doesn’t work, so identifying it by the photos themselves can only be done by downloading them.  Whoever found it is welcome to do so.  It’s a Sony, cheapy and a little older model.  Don’t have the number.  Silver/gray. PLEASE help me track it.  I contacted lost and found at the Convention Center, but it hadn’t shown up by the time I had to leave.  Help, help, please!!

It wasn’t totally true.  While I didn’t find a lot of my bodyspace friends, the lovely and always superb Ava Cowan (more beautiful in person even) was at the BB.com booth, along with Bob the Chickster and crew.  My photos came out blurry with her, though, so I’ll try again today for a postable shot.  The list of bodybuilding pros I actually got to talk to and meet is long.  Fluent Spanish got me a little extra time with Gustavo and Silvio, and a smattering of Japanese got me a bit of time with the recently returned from exile Hidetada Yamagishi.  Brandon and his fiancee (who is repping at the Flex booth and trimming down for Figure Nationals!!) were super friendly, having gotten acquainted already at the USA’s.  The list goes on.  I was in heaven, and I’m up and getting ready for Day 2!!

The Expo was a BLAST!!!  Meeting models (gorgeous, friendly ladies) Olympians (my heroes), company representatives (especially the athletes at their sponsor booths), seeing the Ms. Olympia pre-judging, (my 3 favorite gorgeous faves, as well as the rest of the phenomenal, muscular ladies - LOVE THEM), and bags FULL of goodies that wore out my traps and delts to carry!!  What more can be said?  I didn’t find any of my bodyspace friends today, though.  Maybe tomorrow!

For the few years I’ve been training, I’ve basically been alone.  It’s allowed me to learn to push myself, the freedom to plan and execute my workouts as only I see fit.  While I’ve made friends at the gym with whom training tips and tidbits are shared, I’ve still trained alone essentially.

This week, I’ve had a training partner for the first time.  We set a time to meet at the gym.  We alternate sets.  Spot, support and encourage eachother.  It’s really been a delightful new experience for me.  He’ll only be in town for six weeks while our performance contract is running, but for that time, I’m looking forward to seeing what new growth and training insights I gain.  Thus far, being the "new guy", he’s been content to pretty much follow MY routines, altering them for himself where needed, but we match up extremely well in most regards.  

I’ve read and seen the pros and cons of training partners, from partners who chat too much or are incosistent or late, to those who really are well matched and supportive of one another.  Thus far, I am extremely fortunate to be paired with the latter, and this week’s training has me REALLY feeling it.  I’ve done my training exactly as planned, and as I would have trained alone, and yet the partner variable feels like it has pushed me a little more, which given how hard I push myself anyway, is pretty cool!!  I think I’m really going to like the next 6 weeks and expect some good growth.

Within the space of half an hour, I hear out of the mouth of an actress that weighs easily 300 pounds the following three statements, and had the accompanying thoughts:

As the chair bent, "Oooh, this chair has a problem"  - my thought (Yeah, it’s problem is it wasn’t built to hold 3 people instead of one, or your oversized ass!)

As she stood at the top of the stage stairs and another actor was supposed to descend, "The stairs are too narrow for him to get by" - my thought, obviously (It’s not the narrow stairs, it’s the oversized obstruction!)

and lastly, "Thanks for helping me up, I have a bad knee" - my thought (Your knee is fine, you’re just asking it to do far more work than any human knee is built to do)

Now, could I have said any of those things, out loud, to a woman, in response to her ridiculous statements?  Of course not!  But when, in coversation, I mentioned something to do with genetic structure determining muscular shape and potential, she said out loud, "I’m a littlle concerned that you even know that!"   WHAT??????  And one of the other actors who is near my age constantly accuses me of working out too much, or getting too big, or being full of testosterone, or whatever completely inane sh** comes to his mind.  And he even says it when we’re BOTH AT THE GYM!!!

So, here’s the question.  when did it become okay to ridicule someone who’s doing everything they can to stave off age, look good, be fit and strong and healthy, but taboo to tell some fat-ass what a drain and obstruction she is to society or some pre-maturely aging co-worker that maybe if HE worked as hard he’d live longer and not look like a 60 year-old has-been rocker when he’s only in his mid-40’s???  What the hell kind of skewed-ass double standard is THAT??????

Just had the HUGE honor of meeting three amazing BodySpace people.  The ripped and muscular Pitmommy - Jackie, the hot a bubbly Dawn Melanie, and the gorgeous and desireable Aletha.  What great ladies each!!!  I’m exhausted from a long day, drive included, but I also sat next to an empty seat for the men’s pre-judging.  Shortly thereafter a massive man sat next to me, who turned out to be Brandon Curry.  Super nice guy.  Met his lady, and a few of his friends.  Chatted, judged and critiqued together, and then watched him get on stage with his Heavyweight class and look AMAZING!!!  Lot’s of other great stuff for later.  Now, to bed.

So, for the last two weeks I’ve been getting up at about 6 A.M, getting ready and driving an hour north for 2 hour class.  Get home around noon.  Take care of home stuff, catch a quick half hour nap, maybe an hour if I can.  Head to rehearsal until after midnight and even until 2 A.M. on several occasions.  Then up at 6 to do it again!!  Need I mention, NO GYM TIME AT ALL.  Any working out was incidental to learning exercise technique and physiology in class.  Finally the in class part is done and all that’s left is my research paper.  And the shows open this week, so rehearsal time is way shorter.

Tomorrow, back to the gym.  I’m mentally formulating my new split and trying to reconcile myself to the fact that I will have to re-teach my muscles a bit, and even back off on some poundages.  I need to get back on the "trim down" phase, so the plan is to go high intensity but short lift time, and make time for at least 30 minutes of cardio after training at least 4 days a week if not more.  (I don’t ever do cardio on leg days.)  I need to really mix up my cardio.  I may do the circuit room on some days, or take a brisk walk, hit the bikes - who knows.  As a cardio hater, and with the wierd schedule making meal timing tough, I have to do it. 

I’m going to start with chest still on Monday.  Legs Tuesday and a day off with only cardio Wednesday.  (maybe even two sessions in the day)  Thursday - back, Friday arms, Saturday shoulders and calves.  I think that’ll be my split.  We’ll see how this first week back goes.

I’ve been, due to time constraints, using protein shakes a lot, in place of actual meals.  My calorie intake has been geared toward fat loss, meaning that I started at 3200 calories a day, and have gone as low as 2200 on low carb days.  I’m fairly regular with my meals, staying pretty consistent as to time and content.  Still, I haven’t been seeing increased fat loss as I’d hoped.  I’m doing okay, don’t get me wrong, but a recent BB.com article I think will help.  My protein shakes have been Whey, always.  My whole food meals are chicken, tuna, egg, with oatmeal, red potatoes, fruits and vegetables for carbs mostly.  There’s more variety than that, but those are the staples.

The BB.com article informed me however that my whey protein is too quickly metabolized, and I may not be getting the "slow drip" or "time release" effect that my muscles need to stay anabolic.  The whey, too frequently used, spikes too quickly.  So, with that in mind, I’ve ordered some Casseine protein, powdered egg whites, and liquid egg whites for my proteing supplementation.  Hopefully when I get those in a couple days and begin to use them, the metabolization of the protein will be more gradual, keeping my muscles fed steadily, and digesting over a longer period of time.

On a big up-side, the tailor/costumer for our summer shows measured me yesterday, and compared to last year, I’ve added two inches to my chest, two to my arms, and lost a half inch off my waist.  Now I was just 3 months post contest then, so my body fat was lower.  But still, I’m excited by the growth, and my bodyfat is not out of control now, even though it’s slightly higher.  Yay, me!!!

Today was delts and tri’s.  I superset or giant set my delts, because that seems to really burn them, and I’ve seen better growth over the last couple months.  So I start with dumbbell presses, right into side laterals, rear laterals, and finish with front raises, all in one set with no rest.  Three sets that way pretty much burns the snot out of me and I can’t lift my arms.  After a brief rest I then do Smith presses behind the neck and barbell shrugs supersetted.  It only takes about a half hour but I’m thrashed.  Then I hit the tri’s, which have already had a bit of work from the shoulder presses with dumbbells and the Smith bar.  My tricep workouts vary, but today I did decline skulls, rope cable press downs, and overhead dumbbell French presses.  On all my workouts I log everything, to keep my forward moving for goals and strength gains, and takes the guess-work out of set, rep, and weight planning.  I use it to push myself to try to improve each time in the gym, even if it’s only one more rep than last time.

Well, today, I couldn’t improve on last week, and in a couple of exercises, was even weaker!!!  I hate days like that, but I know that they happen.  It’s been a long time since I’ve had such a day, and I HATED it!!!  It feels like failure, and not the good kind where you push a set to its limit.  I mean failure in that I didn’t meet my goal.  My rest, food and supplements were about the same as always, so the only real difference was I was weaker.  Yecchhh!  I had to let the ego go and just finish the sets I had planned, admitting a small defeat.  The plates and bars got the best of me today.  But next time dammit, I’ll get my revenge on them!!!!!!!