18 Week Bulking Progress Update

It is now 18 weeks into my bulk and I sure am feeling fat now especially after the holidays.
My last "bulking" update was my 10 Week Bulking Progress Pics post where after a no carb/cardio day, I was weighing in at 172.5 lbs.


Eight weeks later, after a no carb/cardio day, I am weighing in at 178.5 lbs. This is up 6 lbs since my last update 8 weeks ago. This isn't quite the 1 lb gain per week I was shooting for, but I think that may be a good thing as I feel like I'm really starting to pack on the fat.

Can still see my abs but looking very blurry

At 14 weeks, I had finished up my 8 week run of Anabeta. So what did I think of the Anabeta?  Well, initially after the first 4 weeks I thought things were going well as I was feeling better and stronger both in and out of the gym. I also thought I looked better in the mirror. 


However, with the last 4 weeks of Anabeta, it didn't seem to make any difference. I started to gain more fat and wasn't really gaining strength like I had been. I'm pretty sure the holiday eating had lots to do with it but it seems that perhaps Anabeta is best used in 4 weeks spurts (or maybe not at all).


After my Anabeta run was done, I was not using any extraneous supplements. For the previous 4 weeks I was just taking the basics: Protein, creatine, BCAA's, fishoil, and multivitamins...preworkouts also used on chest days. I still had the T2-Xtreme left from my first 4 weeks of bulking but decided not to use it since it didn't seem to do anything.

Looking bulkier with no more xmas tree :(
Actually looks like I've lost muscle due to the fat covering it up!

After this 4 week break of not using any extraneous supplements, I will be using the Testopro and DAA stack by AI Sports Nutrition. I grabbed this stack for a great price during their Black Friday sale and decided it would be a good addition for my last 4 weeks! Both Testopro and DAA supposedly boost testosterone so I'm hoping it will help pack on some extra muscle/strength during these last 4 weeks of my bulk.


It's been almost a week since I started the stack and I feel "something" already. Strength has increased in the gym, my libido is even higher than normal now, and I just have an overall alpha-male feeling. It feels great actually! 


I'm looking forward to seeing what other results this stack will bring. But what I'm really looking forward to is being done with bulking. Being fat sure is a difficult mental barrier to get over. I don't know how the average person can do it. It's hard for me to look into the mirror looking so bulky and blurry after achieving levels of leanness I never had before. I don't know how the average person can be okay with looking seeing so much flab on their body.

Can still see abs and striated delts but I really hate looking so blurry!

Wish me luck with my next 4 weeks! Anybody else bulk up or still bulking during the winter? How are things going for you?

Make 2012 Your Best Year Ever

The new year is here and many of us will be making resolutions to improve ourselves, our lives, or possibly even the life of others. I stopped making New Year's resolutions a long time ago. I am constantly trying to improve myself so I never saw the need to wait until New Year's to make a change. So just like years past, for 2012 I don't have any resolutions.

Is your New Year Resolution list like this?

Three years ago I read a blog post that literally changed my life and I'd like to share it with you all today. It's not related to building muscle, losing fat, or looking aesthetic...but taking the message and applying it to your own life will help you enjoy your journey for aesthetics tremendously!


The article is by Leo Babauta of Zen Habits blog. Although I don't agree with his views on diet and exercise, his stuff on happiness and minimalism is great.


The specific article that changed my life is "The Single Secret to Making 2009 Your Best Year Ever". After reading this article, every year since then has been my best year ever!..the article had THAT big of an effect on my life and I hope it does on your too! 


Let's help each other make 2012 our best year ever! 

Look Good in Your Halloween Costume!

I went out to party for Halloween this past weekend and had a great time. Being that it was Halloween and tons of people were out, I saw plenty of people in costumes. I saw people that looked awesome in their costumes and people that didn't look very good in their costumes.

So what did I notice was the main difference between the people who looked awesome and ones that didn't? 

I could tell the awesome looking people lifted weights and watched what they ate. The awesome looking ones had a good build and defined muscles!

Ryu and Caveman looking awesome in their costumes :)

Having a good build with muscles and low bodyfat is a great thing during Halloween...you could pretty much wear any costume and look awesome. You don't need to worry about being too skinny or too fat or not looking right. Everything will look good on you!

There are a ton of reasons to lift weights: Build muscle, lose fat, get stronger, increase testosterone, be healthier, live longer. And now you have another reason: Look awesome in your Halloween costume!

Lift weights and be anything you want!

If you love dressing up and going out for Halloween, get a head start on next year and start lifting weights now! 

Check out my Aesthetic Bulking Plan on how I'm building muscle and after that check out my 12 week transformation series to learn how to cut the fat! (Scroll down to Search this Blog and type in 12 week transformation)

Intermittent Fasting Interview on Super Human Radio

Check out my interview with Carl Lanore and Dr. Andro on Super Human Radio!

Superhuman radio interview with Carl Lanore and Dr. Andro on Intermittent Fasting!

Duong Nguyen and Dr. Andro discuss his amazing transformation using Intermittent Fasting combined with weight training! Listen to the show at the link below:


Listen to Duong Nguyen on Super Human Radio

12 Week Body Transformation continued - Diet

How I dieted during my 12 Week Body Transformation

When it comes transforming your body and losing the maximum amount of fat, DIET is the single most important factor in accomplishing your goals.


Most people think the opposite. They think that they can start exercising hardcore and the diet will take care of itself. This is a mistake that too many people make as they can easily out-eat the amount of calories they had burned in the gym.


There's a saying that I read on Vince Andrich's blog "You can never outrun your mouth" which is the perfect way to describe how exercise can't overcome a bad diet.


This is why finding a diet that you can follow with ease and stick to is a crucial factor to success. 


I know I don't do well with carbohydrates and there's lots of research showing a low carbohydrate diet has metabolic advantages over other diets. So the diet I decided to follow was a high protein, high fat, low carb diet. 


Daily Schedule
This was what what a typical day was for me in terms of nutrition/supplementation:


7:15 AM - Wake up (Take 1 gram of Vitamin C, 1 OxyElite Pro, 4 Free Test)


2:00 PM - Take another OxyElite Pro


4:00 PM - Preworkout Myofusion shake (25 grams of protein)


4:30 PM - Workout (sip on my BCAA/Creatine mix during the workout)


5:45 PM - Post Workout Myofusion shake (50 grams of protein)


6:00 PM - Eat dinner (Take 6 grams of fishoil, 4,000 IU of Vitamin D, multivitamin)


8:00 PM - Myofusion shake with milk (33 grams of protein)


My dinner usually consisted of 3 chicken thighs, 4 eggs, 1 oz of cheese, some leafy green vegetables, and either a whole or half a grapefruit depending on how I felt.


Now you may be wondering where the food and protein shakes are from the time I wake up until my preworkout protein shake.


The answer is that I didn't eat anything or drink any protein shakes from the time of my protein shake the previous night to my next preworkout protein shake! Crazy huh? :P


Intermittent Fasting
This may sound crazy but this is the basis behind Intermittent Fasting.


This was the eating pattern I followed during my transformation which is essentially short periods of fasting otherwise known as intermittent fasting. This is the exact opposite of what is generally recommended these days which is to eat every 2-3 hours to keep the metabolism revved up.


In my previous dieting experiences, eating every 2-3 hours was a real chore. Having to constantly think about where your next protein source was going to come from was a big hassle. 


With intermittent fasting, I am not thinking about nutrition all day long. The only I think about nutrition is during the 5 hours between my preworkout protein shake and my nighttime protein shake.


What I also found with eating every few hours is that every time I ate, it would make me hungrier and want more food! Of course since I was dieting, this was not a good thing.


With intermittent fasting, I am almost never hungry now! I was hungry at first, but that was because my body was used to getting food every few hours. After a couple of days of intermittent fasting, your body adapts and then the hunger goes away.


Eating this way has made dieting sooo easy for me that EATING is actually the hardest part of it (sometimes its difficult to eat that much protein which is why I also rely on protein shakes).


If you want to learn more about intermittent fasting, check out Martin Berkhan's Leangains blog. His site is full of information and research debunking a lot of the myths on dieting.

Martin Berkhan knows what he's doing

The best thing about Intermittent Fasting is that it's just so easy to follow and adhere to. I wake up, go on with my day, and don't think about food until my work day is over!


Note that I didn't follow Martin's guidelines exactly, but I modified it to work best for me and still got great results! If you decide to try intermittent fasting, I would recommend following his guidelines exactly at first, and then make adjustments if needed.


Give it a try!
For those who don't like eating every few hours or even eating breakfast, I would recommend you give intermittent fasting a try. It might change your life...I know it has mine :)

12 Week Body Transformation continued - Training

How I worked out during my 12 week body transformation


I decided that heavy weight training was going to be a priority for me during this transformation as I wanted to maintain as much muscle as possible. I've dieted before where I didn't lift as heavy and ended up losing too much muscle mass and strength. I was going to do my best to not let that happen this time around.


Weight Training
During the 12 weeks of my body transformation, I alternated full body heavy days with full body medium days. 


It wasn't quite an every other day alternation as I wanted more heavy days so I used a MWF (Monday, Wednesday, Friday) split where Mondays and Fridays were heavy days and Wednesdays were reserved for medium days. I would sometimes switch this to Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday as well depending on my what else was going on during the week.

Weighted Pullups are awesome

My heavy days were where I worked with a weight that I could do anywhere from 3-6 reps. Medium days consisted of weights where I could get between 8-12 reps. 


Cardio
My days off from weight training were reserved for either cardio or rest depending on how I felt. Although, I normally felt great during my body transformation so most of those days ended up being cardio days :)


I made sure to keep my cardio very low intensity so that I my body would not break down any muscle for fuel. By low intensity, I mean doing some easy incline treadmill walking or the elliptical where my heart rate was kept anywhere between 110 - 130 beats per minute. 

Cardio gets hot

An easy way for me to make sure the intensity wasn't too high was if I could breathe through my nose and not my mouth. My cardio session would range from 30 minutes, gradually working up to an hour over the course of my transformation.


Intra-Workout Drink
To further insure that I avoided any muscle catabolism, I also sipped on a BCAA/Creatine drink mixed in 24 oz of water during my cardio. 


I also sipped on this drink mixture during my weight workouts as well to avoid too much muscle breakdown. The BCAA drink I used was Scivation Xtend, arguably the most popular BCAA product on the market. I felt drinking the BCAA's and creatine really did help in maintaining muscle and even increasing my strength during a caloric deficit.


Example
Below is an example week of workouts.
Format is Set # - Weight used x # of reps


Monday - Heavy workout
Pendlay Rows (Bent over barbell rows from the floor)
Set 1 - 215 x 5
Set 2 - 225 x 5
Set 3 - 225 x 5
Set 4 - 230 x 4
Set 5 - 230 x 4


Front Barbell Squat
Set 1 - 205 x 5
Set 2 - 215 x 5
Set 3 - 220 x 5
Set 4 - 220 x 5
Set 5 - 220 x 5


Weighted Dips
Set 1 - 145 x 5
Set 2 - 145 x 5 
Set 3 - 145 x 5
Set 4 - 145 x 5
Set 5 - 145 x 5


Dumbbell Push Press
Set 1 - 85 x 5
Set 2 - 85 x 5
Set 3 - 85 x 5
Set 4 - 85 x 5
Set 5 - 85 x 5


Ab Roller (standing on feet)
Set 1 - 8 reps
Set 2 - 8 reps
Set 3 - 6 reps


Tuesday - Cardio or Rest
30 - 60 minutes incline treadmill walking


Wednesday - Medium Workout
V-Bar Pulldown
Set 1 - 230 x 10
Set 2 - 230 x 9
Set 3 - 235 x 8
Set 4 - 235 x 7
Set 5 - 220 x 10


Standing Cable Chest Press
Set 1 - 95 x 12
Set 2 - 95 x 12
Set 3 - 100 x 10
Set 4 - 105 x 8
Set 5 - 105 x 8


Two Arm Dumbbell Preacher Curl
Set 1 - 40 x 8
Set 2 - 35 x 11
Set 3 - 35 x 8
Set 4 - 30 x 13
Set 5 - 30 x 10


Single Leg Romanian Deadlift
Set 1 - 45 x 10
Set 2 - 45 x 10
Set 3 - 50 x 10
Set 4 - 50 x 10


Weighted Decline Crunch
Set 1 - 50 x 8
Set 2 - 50 x 8
Set 3 - 50 x 8


Thursday - Cardio or Rest
30 - 60 minutes incline treadmill walking


Friday - Heavy Workout
Repeat Monday Workout


Saturday - Cardio or Rest
Sunday - Cardio or Rest


I generally felt great throughout my transformation and never felt burnt out from lack of calories or working out too much. 


I also actually went on two vacations during the 12 week period, one to New Orleans and the other to Puerto Rico. I didn't workout or watch my diet at all during these vacations but still made great progress with the combination of my workouts and diet :)


More information on the diet I followed will be posted in a future blog entry.


12 Week Body Transformation - Intro

12 Week Body Transformation continued - Cheat Days


Important Key Points to My Body Transformation