jcuiccio 
"Improve body proportion and composition."
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Supplements, Diet and Training:
I don’t go too overboard on supplements. I try to rely on eating whole foods for the most part. Whole meaning as close to nature intended with as little processing as possible. I take a daily multi vitamin/mineral just for insurance. I also drink a lot of green and black tea. But my main staple supplements are the following:
1. Surge by Biotest – Surge is a pre-peri-post workout recovery drink. It contains a mixture of whey protein hydrolysate, which is a form of protein that is digested and absorbed by the body almost immediately. After a tough workout, you’re body is in a very stressed state. It’s in dire need of nutrient replenishment to begin its recovery. You only have about a 45-minute window in which your body is at its peak in terms of absorbing nutrients and utilizing protein. After this window closes, this ability diminishes quite rapidly. So it makes sense to use this type of fast digesting protein. Another important factor in post workout nutrition is initiation an insulin spike by ingesting along with protein, simple carbohydrates in the form of d-glucose also known as dextrose and another simple carb called maltodextrin. Normally, elevated insulin levels are very bad for you in that they encourage the body to store fat and cause health-deteriorating inflammation. This can lead to chronic health problems like diabetes, obesity and high blood pressure to name a few. However, these spikes in insulin during the post workout window are very helpful as they put your body into an anabolic state. This means your body is far better able to absorb nutrients, utilize protein and replenish something called glycogen, which is the fuel your muscles use when involved in resistance exercise. It also triggers muscle growth and fat burning. So you can see why post workout nutrition is very important for those who weight train and Surge fits the bill better than any product for this purpose.
2. Kre-Alkalyn 1500 – I was taking creatine monohydrate for quite a while until I started reading about how it supposedly gets converted into a by-product known as “creatinine”, which is supposedly toxic and can cause some unpleasant side effects like cramps, bloating, diarrea and potential liver and kidney problems. So I stopped taking it and replaced it with an alternative version of creatine called Kre-Alkalyn that supposedly does not get broken down into creatinine. So far so good.
3. Glutamine - Glutamine is highly in demand throughout the body. It is used in the gut and immune system extensively to maintain optimal performance. 60% of free-form amino acids floating in skeletal muscles is L-glutamine. L-glutamine plays a very important role in protein metabolism, and it appears to be a very important nutrient for body builders. When supplemented, it may help body builders reduce the amount of muscle deterioration that occurs because other tissues that need glutamine will not rob the glutamine stored in the muscle cells.
4. I switch proteins every so often but as of late, I've been using Oryx goat whey. Goat's milk is much more easily digested and is lactose free. I get the Vanilla which tastes great. I also use ON casein protein for my bedtime shake. casein digests much more slowly than whey and that's good to keep your body nourished thru the night.
5. Fish oil capsules. Omega 3 fats are essential for fighting inflammation and enabling the body to burn body fat. Data from the University of Western Ontario shows that fish oil supplementation increases lean body mass (during non-dieting conditions), increases BMR (by up to 400kcal/day), decreases inflammation, and improves the ratio of fat/carb oxidized (sparing carbs, burning fat). Recommended dose: start with 6-10g per day of total fish oil (assuming 30% EPA and DHA). I also include flaxseed and olive oil as well.
A sample of my diet…
A year into my comeback, I’d made some excellent progress but was still too smooth. I was about 165 lbs and 13% bodyfat. I knew if I leaned out to under 10%, I’d look so much better. But my attempts where getting me nowhere. I needed some guidance. So I kept coming across these nutrition articles by a Dr. John Berardi. I checked out his website and found his Precision Nutrition System. It’s far too involved to get into here and I highly recommend going to his website and checking it out for yourself. But I can share with you his “10 Rules of Proper Nutrition” which I still follow to this day and is the heart & soul of his system. And those 10 rules are:
1) Eat every 2-3 hours without fail.
2) Ingest complete, lean protein each time you eat.
Also don't mix your fat intake with your carb intake.
Stick to protein+fat or protein+carb meal combinations. Carbs and fats together are a no no! (That’s complex carbs, not simple so fruit in limited amounts is ok to ingest with p+f meals)
3) Ingest vegetables every time you eat. At least a
cup of a variety of veggies is recommended. On
occasion, fruit can be substituted but try to avoid fruit in
the evenings.
4) If want to lose fat, be sure that you save starchy
carbohydrate intake until after you've exercised.
5) Increase your intake of good fats. A fish oil
supplement is highly recommended. Also using olive oil
and EFA's from nuts and flax as well.
6) Drink only 0 calorie beverages. Limit diet drinks
to no more than 3 per week.
7) Focus on whole foods rather than supplements for
your essential nutrients.
8) Have 10% foods. This means you are shooting for 90%
compliance with these 10 rules so plan on breaking
them only 10% of the time in any give week. For example, if
you're eating 6 meals a day, that's 40 meals a week so
about 4 meals a week can be "cheat" meals.
9) Develop food preparation strategies. Plan ahead and put some time aside to prepare all or most of your meals for the upcoming week. If you don't have a meal available when it's time to eat you're more likely to either eat something not in compliance with the rules or to skip a meal altogether which is just as bad.
10) Balance daily food choices with healthy variety.
These 10 habits establish sound, practical principles
that everyone can use to improve their health, body
composition, and nutritional intake. Sure, some
fine-tuning may need to take place based on individual
differences. But sticking to this general outline for
the first 4-6 weeks should bring about some definite
changes for the better provided you're sticking to 90%
compliance and not missing workouts.
Here's a diet sample for a typical workout day. Mind you this is for fat loss. My bulking diet is still clean but includes obviously quite a few more calories and carbs:
9:30 am - Breakfast: ½ cup steel cut oats and ½ cup of fresh blueberries, 1-2 Tbs of ground flax seed, generous sprinkle of cinnamon. 1 scoop of protein powder in water OR 1-2 soft boiled Omega 3 eggs. 2 fish oil caps and 2 Kre-Alkalyn 1500 creatine capsules.
(I’m breaking rule 4 here by having complex carbs here instead of after I’ve worked out. But after you’ve been on the system a while, you enter what’s called the individualization aspect where you can fine tune your diet to your own particular needs. As you become leaner and more carb tolerant and insulin sensitive, you’re able to consume more carbs without the risk of getting fat.)
Noon – Pre-Workout: 1 scoop of whey protein in water, 5g of BCAA OR a Metabolic Drive bar.
12:30-45 – 1st workout - 1 serving of Surge (half sipped during workout, other half consumed immediately after workout with 2 Purple-K caps.
3:00 pm – 1st post workout meal: 6 ozs of either grilled chicken breast, tuna or salmon, serving of either brown rice, quinoa, whole grain pasta or sweet potato, serving of mixed vegetables, 1 piece of fruit (optional), vitamins, 2 fish oil caps, fiber caps, green tea.
5:30 pm – 2nd post workout meal: 6-8 ozs of grilled grass fed beef burgers or turkey burgers, serving of mixed veggies doused in ev olive oil (no complex carbs here), 3-4 fish oil caps, fiber caps, green tea.
7pm – 2nd Workout: This workout isn’t as long as my first one so I’ll only have ½ a serving of Surge split into 2 portions and consumed as before – one during, the other immediately after.
9pm – 3rd post workout meal: Choice of 6 ozs beef, turkey, chicken or fish, mixed veggies, (complex carbs here depends on whether I’m trying to lose fat or gain muscle), 3-4 fish oil caps, fiber caps, green tea.
11-11:30 – Bedtime snack: Choice of 1 cup 1% cottage cheese or casein protein shake. The idea of eating a bowl of veggies along with either a protein shake or cottage cheese isn’t very appetizing so I'll just munch on a handful of baby carrots. Then 3-4 more fish oil caps, fiber caps and a tsp of olive oil and/or flax oil and it’s off to bed!
My current workout plan is lifting 2x a day 3 days per week. The other days are spent doing cardio - both HIIIT and low impact like light jogging, riding my bike or simply taking a long relaxing walk. I've recently become aware of something known as G-Flux which suggests that to get the body you want you have to invest at least 5 hours of exercise time a week. I'm putting in around 8 right now an it's definitely helped improve my body composition. Go to this web address to check out an article describing what G-Flux involves:
http://www.t-nation.com/rea dTopic.do?id=909183
I'm fortunate to have my gym a block away from where I work so I can go on my lunch break and then go back again after work. I know that sounds like a lot but I only work each body part once a week except calves which I need a lot of improvement on. My workouts are always changing. I like the variety and it's good to keep the body guessing with varied workout techniques. Several training techniques I like to employ are Rest-Pause work and various types of high intensity work. A recent routine I’ve begun experimenting with is something called Power/Rep Range/Shock which involves rotating different weight and rep schemes on a weekly basis. It gives the body a variety of different types of stimulus and keeps your mind fresh as well. Here’s a sample of what a typical P/RR/S routine looks like. My personal routine has been tweaked to work around a few nagging injuries
Back
POWER: week 1
- Deadlift...3 x 3-6
- One-arm or bb bent rows...3 x 4-6
- Weighted chin...2-3 x 4-6
- CG seated row...2-3 x 4-6
REP RANGE: week 2
- CG weighted chin...2 x 6-8
- T-bar row...2 x 8-10
- Hammer Strength row...2 x 10-12
- Pullover...2 x 12-15
SHOCK: week 3
- DB Pullover/CG chins superset...1-2 x 8-10 each
- Stiff arm cable pullover/reverse grip bent row...1-2 x 8-10 each
- CG seated row drop set...1 x 6-8, drop, 6-8, drop, 6-8
Biceps/Triceps
POWER: week 1
- Barbell curl...2 x 4-6
- Preacher curl...2 x 4-6
- Hammer curl...1-2 x 4-6
- CG bench press...3 x 4-6
- Skull crush...2 x 4-6
- Single arm dumbbell extension...1-2 x 4-6
REP RANGE: week 2
- Alternating dumbbell curl...2 x 6-8
- Cable curl...2 x 8-10
- Concentration curl...1-2 x 10-12
- Weighted dip...3 x 6-8
- Pushdown...2 x 8-10
- Kickback...1-2 x 10-12
SHOCK: week 3
- EZ bar curl/CG chin superset...1 x 6-10 each
- Preacher curl/reverse curl superset...1 x 6-10 each
- Drop set cable single arm curl...1 x 6-10, drop 6-10
- Pushdown/CG bench press superset...1-2 x 6-10 each
- Reverse grip pushdown/incline overhead extension superset...1-2 x 6-10 each
- Drop set weighted bench dip...1 x 8-10, drop 8-10
Chest
POWER: week 1
- Dumbell bench press...3 x 4-6
- Incline press...3 x 4-6
- Weighted dips...2 x 4-6
REP RANGE: week 2
- Incline dumbbell press...3 x 6-8
- Bench press...3 x 8-10
- Flye...2 x 10-12
SHOCK: week 3
- Superset...cable crossover/incline smith press...1-2 x 8-10 reps each
- Superset...incline flye/dips...1 x 8-10 reps each
- Drop set...machine bench press...1 x 8-10, drop 6-8, drop 6-8 optional
Deltoids
POWER: week 1
- Military press...2-3 x 4-6
- Upright row...2-3 x 4-6
- "Cheat" lateral...2 x 4-6
REP RANGE: week 2
- Single arm dumbbell press...2 x 6-8
- Bent lateral...2-3 x 8-10
- Cable side lateral...2 x 10-12
SHOCK: week 3
- Seated side lateral/hammer machine press superset...1-2 x 8-10
- Severse pec deck/WG upright row superset...1-2 x 8-10
- Cable front raise drop set...1 x 6-8, drop 6-8, drop 6-8 optional
Legs
POWER: week 1
- Squats...3 x 4-6
- Leg press...3 x 4-6
- Single leg extension...2 x 4-6
- Lying leg curl...3 x 4-6
- Stiff dead lift...2-3 x 4-6
REP RANGE: week 2
- Leg extension...2 x 8-10
- Hack squat...3 x 10-12
- One legged leg press...3 x 12-15
- Lying leg curl...2 x 6-8
- Stiff dead lift...2 x 8-10
- Single leg curl or seated leg curl...1-2 x 10-12
SHOCK: week 3
- Superset: leg extension/front squat...1-2 x 8-10 each
- Superset: leg extension/sissy squat or leg press...1-2 x 8-10 each
- Drop set: lunge...1 x 8-10, drop, 8-10
- Superset: leg curl seated or lying/toes pointed hyperextension...1-2 x 8-10 each
- Drop set: single leg curl...1-2 x 8-10, drop, 8-10
I don’t include ab work in with this method. I like weighted movements in drop set fashion:
Steep incline weighted sit ups (3 drop sets) – Holding a dumbbell and going heavy enough to fail at 8-10 reps then drop the weight and rep out until failure.
Weighted crunches (3 drop sets) - Same as previous exercise.
Weighted leg raises (3 drop sets) – Same as previous exercises.
Weighted side bends (standing or on hyper extension bench - 3 drop sets) – Higher reps 15-25.
My cardio routine consists of a mix of low energy systems cardio, varying intensity intervals and HIIT. HIIT I only do 1-2 times per week as it’s very demanding and easy to over do. I usually stick to the treadmill for my indoor cardio.
Low energy cardio is usually 30 minutes of walking at 3.5 MPH at a steep incline of 12.
Varying intensity intervals is again 30 minutes of up and down speeds and inclines. I don’t have a set pattern here which is refreshing by being able to decide on the fly how I want to vary things. But speeds range from 4 MPH to 10 MPH.
And finally HIIT is briefer. I perform a series of 30 second all out sprints at the top speed of the treadmill followed by 1-2 minutes of rest at walking speed. I may repeat this for 6-10 “sets” or so depending on which particular phase of weight training I’m in. As I mentioned, they’re very demanding but it’s well worth the effort for the fat loss benefits.
So some advice to those looking to improve is nothing unique. Try hard to be consistent in both training and diet. Always strive for 90% compliance of the “10 Rules of Proper Nutrition”. The more you break the rules, the slower your progress will be. You can train as hard as possible, but if your nutrition is lacking, it will really affect your potential for improvement. |
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