Psychoholic's October 2nd Natural Debut Prep

[Psychoholic]

Howdy!

I've been running a pretty decent log that started off as a REDuction review, but I'd like to now start a contest prep log.

Old thread:
http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?p=430533621

So this will be my new home for posting the steps towards that goal.

My wife Nikki and I are planning on competing at the October 2nd SNBF show (we thought about the one in November instead to give us more time, but it's a Pro and Amateur show and will probably have far more people competing - since this will be a first for both of us [she's doing Figure, I'm hoping to do Novice Men HeavyWeight]).

http://www.snbf.com/events.html

I am seriously considering hiring a trainer - not for the workouts, but I need a by the numbers, 'this is what you will eat' kind of person. My workout partner is an animal, and if I bring the latest workout ideas with me, he's always down for whatever challenging workout I have planned (I get a kick out of planning insane workouts - it's the diet I have issues with).

You can follow my daily food log here:

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/diary/psychoholic

I will be adjusting my food over the next couple of days to be more 'chicken and broccoli' than other and working to hit 2600 calories a day with a 40/40/20 split. I also plan on lifting 5 days a week, and doing cardio at least 4 (we are training for a half marathon as well, so we add a very long run on Sundays - I know that distance running is miserably catabolic, but this is a goal that we have set and will hit) - cardio will consist of elliptical machine or running on the road (I hate treadmills).

[Psychoholic]

Had a great shoulder day yesterday:

Seated bb ohp: 20@95, 15@155,7@185,3@185, 15@135
One arm db side raise: 6x10@30,
2 arm rear delt raise cables - 15@27.5, 10@30, 2x12@27.5
Standing front raise: 5x10@25
Shrug machine: 20@180 w pause, 20@270, 15@360, 12@450, 12@540

Calories were a little off yesterday, but not horrendously.

Did 47 minutes on the elliptical this morning, burned 578 calories, avg heart rate was 131 in zone for 38:11.

[Psychoholic]

Man, I felt like an f'n monster today in the gym. Some reason is the idea of 'training' instead of 'working out' delineation - I just felt more focused and ready to rip the heads off endangered animals.

Deadlift (this was my heavy exercise for the day): 12 x 225, 6 x 305, 4 x 405!!!!! (new personal best), 10 x 305
Wide grip lat pulldown: 4 x 10@160
narrow cable rows: 4 x 10 @ 200

[Psychoholic]

Yesterday only hit 1970 calories - i need to do a better job of calculating early in the day and taking all the right food. We cooked last night, so I've got plenty to choose from today.

Elliptical this morning: 47:11, 572 calories, avg heart rate 135, time in zone 34:05. I drank a redline on an empty stomach this morning and was having a much harder time keeping my heart rate around 130, it stayed around 140 most of my workout. No biggie, got a good sweat going.

The soreness in my legs that I was attributing to the 10k we ran this weekend is incorrect - it's from the elliptical! I need to keep working on it and build up those muscles like I did with my running. Looks like I'll be doing the elliptical at least 3 days a week plus 3 days of running mixed with my 5 days of lifting - so I'll actually do my cardio this go around. I used to hate doing cardio, but since we've been running I don't find the elliptical to be such a pain in the ass (just shins). I guess I'm in better cardiovascular shape than I used to be.

[Psychoholic]

howdy!

Did 30 minutes on the treadmill this morning - 3 mph at 6% incline - had a good sweat brewing - my legs were sore as hell from the elliptical though and I ended up hobbling out of the gym.

Had a great chest day!

Flat Bench: 15 @ 135, 8 @ 225, 1 @ 315 (new PR), 6@225, 8@225, 10@185
Incline smith bench: 3x10@205, 8@205, 10@185
Superset incline/flat db flyes: 3 pairs of supersets - forgot the weights I used.

Was completely shot after this, but felt awesome. My only real goal today was to hit that 315 and finally did - so was kinda cruising after that.

[Midnight_Lifter]

Did I mentioned I am so IN for this? :D

Lookin' good so far. What do you need from us for success?

[Psychoholic]

Sup ML - thanks for subscribing!

Ran 7.5 miles this morning in 1:50 - burned about 1300 calories (half marathon is 4 weeks away - EEK!).

I'll have a longer post tomorrow about my game plan and some help I might need - right now, I need FOOD.

[Psychoholic]

Howdy howdy folks.

Feelin good, feeling inspired to tear down mountains in huge chunks and carry them off into the distance. I think those Skip Lacour podcasts really put some stuff in perspective and having awesome workouts also puts it over the top.

I know I've mentioned it before, but making the distinction when I work out of 'training versus working out' is so powerful, it makes you focus that much harder on what you are doing and not just going through motions. I can lift heavy things, but what motivation do I have to go a little heavier, or that one more rep or just another 10 minutes on the elliptical really came into focus when I said "I am TRAINING for this contest", so everything I do is going towards that end goal.

Did shoulders yesterday - felt really really good. Did nice and heavy leaning one arm side raises with a 40# db for 3 sets of 10 (I think - it was kinda blurry), and 2 sets with a 35. One arm rear delt raises with 60's and 70's (2 at 60, 3 at 70) - those were BRUTAL! Started doing seated smith military press (I think we started at 225) and I felt this almost tearing feeling in my inner pecs, so I racked that **** and did standing db ohp instead. Finished off with some good squeeze rear shrugs on the smith. I can definitely see where my rear delts have come up in the last year, probably spent more time focusing on heavy trap work soon and work that into my rotation.

Did 45 on the elliptical this morning, 566 calories burned, avg heart rate 132, time in zone 37:46.

Today was back, and oh man what a good back workout!!!

Dead lift: 20 @ 135, 12 @225, 10 @315, 5 @405 (another PR!), 12 @315 (it felt really awesome to just snatch that **** off the floor without straps and put it on the squat rack so I could get all the plates off of it - didn't even feel heavy).
wide neutral grip cable rows (we don't have one of these bars at the gym at work, so any time I can use it I will): 15 @ 200, 4 x 15@240
Wide grip lat pulldown: 5 x 10 @ 160 (getting tired)
underhand hammer strength low row machine: 2 x 12 @80 (each side), 3 x 10@100 - I made sure I squeezed my back real hard at the peak of this motion.
At this point I was pretty much pouuuuuring sweat and completely out of gogo, so I called it a day.

I did spend about 15 minutes talking to one of the trainers who competes as a natural bodybuilder (his wife competes as a figure competitor) - he gave me some great diet advice and we are going to work something out to help train me for this contest. Having someone who has competed and trains others who compete naturally will be a tremendous asset to my training. Having to be accountable to someone else has it's benefit. One of the things that we are going to do is take pictures every sunday of me so we have a log of what is going on. I'm also going to some carb cycling, try a different approach to cardio and add a bunch more fish instead of shakes (tilapia and orange roughy) and a few other things. I'm fired up as hell!

[Psychoholic]

Needing more carbs this week, also taking out my protein shakes and replacing those meals with some fish instead.

Nikki and I just finished running about 8.5 miles (might have been more - not sure) in 2:10 - burned around 1500 calories! We did some carb loading last night and this morning so we'd have more go-go during the actual run and it definitely helped - I feel beat, but not completely dead to the world like I did last week with 7.5 miles. Bought some new shoes and those helped out a bunch as well - probably could have gone further, but instead of the normal foot and shin pain, my lungs were f'n TOAST - which gives me something I can work with. 3 weeks till the half marathon we're doing, after that - NO MORE LONG DISTANCE RUNNING. Whatever I can do in under an hour is going to be the extent of my running. 4-5 miles a couple times a week in between bouts with the cardio gear at the gym.

[Psychoholic]

Nikki and I had a 'white pizza' tonight made from cauliflower!

http://www.examiner.com/x-355-Low-Carb-Examiner~y2008m6d4-Cauliflower-Pizza-Crust-Worth-its-Wow-in-Gold

Tablespoon of olive oil, tablespoon of garlic, 12 oz of chicken, half cup of mozzarella and sprinkled with some parmesan - OMG good!

[furyhockey]

259lbs and 2600 calories!?!?

[Psychoholic]

I haven't updated my profile weight in a while - I'm actually more around 270.

Well this week is going to be a bit tricky - I had a wisdom tooth pulled yesterday and am on pain meds for it. I'm pretty sure I can't lift for a few days (knowing how I train - the amount of pressure that I'd build up would make a geyser of blood come out of my mouth) or do much of anything, so I need to be super on top of my diet!

On a positive note, my training partner and I are going to the Arnold this weekend! He originally bought the tickets for him and his girlfriend and it didn't work out, so now I'm going. It really sucks that this is the situation that arose, but it'll be fun anyways - and I think that it will help me with my focus and drive to compete after seeing everyone.

[Psychoholic]

Had an awesome time at the Arnold! Can't believe Kai won over Phil, but everyone looked amazing and it was a blast of a trip. Got to meet some awesome folks, take away some killer samples and overall got a great deal on 2 bottles of Adipoxil and one bottle of TT-33 (of which I'll start including in this log). Watching the powerlifters was probably my favorite part - who knows, maybe one day if I'm completely incapable of becoming a bodybuilder I'll just say screw it and start training as a powerlifter. Here are some pics from the show:

Gunter and I (I love this shot, you can actually see my arm pulling at a 2x sleeve)
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020295/web.jpg?ver=12680576280001

Dexter
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020490/web.jpg?ver=12680577900001

Jay Cutler and some random dude (didn't feel like waiting an hour)

http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020495/web.jpg?ver=12680578410001

Victor
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020290/web.jpg?ver=12680578640001

Eric Fankhouser (huge fan)
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020485/web.jpg?ver=12680579370001

Derek Chamblois
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020482/web.jpg?ver=12680579460001

Shiloe Steinmeitz
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020488/web.jpg?ver=12680580180001

Branch
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020493/web.jpg?ver=12680580610001

[Psychoholic]

"Why yes, that is a John Lloyd shirt"

http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020486/web.jpg?ver=12680579920001

The men's final.
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020335/web.jpg?ver=12680577690001

Arnold and Sylvester Stallone!

http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020401/web.jpg?ver=12680578860001

Ferrigno!!
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020129/web.jpg?ver=12680594970001

The incomparable Jamie Eason
http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100190/P1020126/web.jpg?ver=12680594960001

[Psychoholic]

So I figure the only way I'll be able to actually do cardio twice a day is if I got a really nice elliptical at the house and parked it in the living room. We have a treadmill (it's kinda ****ty - picked it up from craigslist for like 100 bucks) but ever since we started running outside the treadmill is particularly awful. So, behold our latest and greatest weapon in the war against other bodybuilders and figure competitors! The Sole E35.

http://gallery.me.com/psychoholic/100061/photo_2/web.jpg?ver=12681017090001

[Psychoholic]

Yesterday's calories were junk - like 1400 for the entire day... Damned sure didn't eat enough - but I slept a whole bunch, so that was cool. Had an awesome shoulder day, but didn't record it (was feeling it though, trained HARD) - again, tons of sweat.

Bought the new elliptical, took about an hour to put together - got to use it this morning for 30 minutes at a heart rate of 150 (between 145 and 155 the entire time) - not sure the calories (it said 220, but I"m not sure) but had a brutal sweat going.

Those Adipoxil definitely seem to heat me up in a hurry, I was pouring buckets 5 minutes into the workout and never stopped. Dosed 2 in the morning when I got up yesterday, 2 around 4, and 2 x TT-33 before bed. I'll see how that regimine works out - I'm not going to weigh myself until the 31st, so hopefully I'm on track to hit my 248 at the scale here by then.

The goal is to do elliptical twice a day for at least 3 days a week, and try and do some form of cardio 5 days this week. I am WAY behind schedule to hit 220 by July 1st and need to make up some ground. We ate like crap while we were at the Arnold, so I need to work off all that too.

Here's to another great week of eating and working out!

[Midnight_Lifter]

Yesterday's calories were junk - like 1400 for the entire day... Damned sure didn't eat enough - but I slept a whole bunch, so that was cool. Had an awesome shoulder day, but didn't record it (was feeling it though, trained HARD) - again, tons of sweat.

Bought the new elliptical, took about an hour to put together - got to use it this morning for 30 minutes at a heart rate of 150 (between 145 and 155 the entire time) - not sure the calories (it said 220, but I"m not sure) but had a brutal sweat going.

Those Adipoxil definitely seem to heat me up in a hurry, I was pouring buckets 5 minutes into the workout and never stopped. Dosed 2 in the morning when I got up yesterday, 2 around 4, and 2 x TT-33 before bed. I'll see how that regimine works out - I'm not going to weigh myself until the 31st, so hopefully I'm on track to hit my 248 at the scale here by then.

The goal is to do elliptical twice a day for at least 3 days a week, and try and do some form of cardio 5 days this week. I am WAY behind schedule to hit 220 by July 1st and need to make up some ground. We ate like crap while we were at the Arnold, so I need to work off all that too.

Here's to another great week of eating and working out!

Congrats on the new elliptical! My daughter has been on me to get (her) one for over a year now. Yours is a tad out of my price range lol... but definitely looks sweet.

Good luck catching up. Secret weapon - just walk around shirtless as much as possible. You'll want to drop as much excess weight as quickly as possible... :p

[Psychoholic]

We ended up financing this one - we wanted a good one that would last for a long time and had the heart rate workouts that we wanted. I have to say, this is a fine piece of gear!

Did 30 minutes with my heart rate around 150 (mostly 155) - said I burned about 220 calories.

Food was still a little under yesterday - I've got today pretty well mapped out, so it should be better.

[Psychoholic]

Missed back day because we had to do an offsite (did cardio though), missed chest day yesterday because of meetings - but I did manage to do cardio twice on the elliptical. Both sessions were 30 minutes with my heart rate over 150. I know I've got a lot of fat to lose, so I'm going to let cardio take priority over lifting if it's a question of what I can do and I'm going to try and get at least 3 days of double sessions in each week.

[Psychoholic]

Ran 8.38 miles this morning!! 1457 calories total.

http://bit.ly/bkRGeE

The half marathon is next weekend - I'm a little nervous.

[Psychoholic]

Yesterday was AWESOME.

I'm finding good amounts of energy and heat from the Adipoxil and my 2+2+2 (tt-33) regimen seems to be working ok, but I think the last part might be affecting my sleep slightly. Need to be more diligent with monitoring my caffeine intake later in the day to truly see.

Had a damn good shoulder workout yesterday - I went down in weight a bit and focused more on controlling the weight and contracting the muscle, which gave me a retarded burn everywhere.

Yesterday's calories/carbs/fat/protein: 2,165 183 70 219

Got up and did 30 minutes at 150+ hr on the elliptical - had a brutal sweat going.

We are not weighing ourselves until the morning of the 31st - so there won't be any updates between now and then on the weight. I am going to do ****loads of quality cardio, run a half marathon this weekend and keep my diet in check and HOPEFULLY I'll be on track by the 31st.

[Psychoholic]

Calories/carbs/fat/protein for the day: 2,138 194 90 176

Today was back day - it was nice and heavy - the way a back day should be!

Probably the most fun part was either the 225 lb tb rows or the 2 sets of 10, 155 lb one arm db rows. Wide grip bent over rows are always a crowd favorite (especially 1 set of 185 and 3 sets of 10 with 225).

2 days of flawless food, plus good workouts and good cardio (it's a big accomplishment) - 105 more to go before July 1st.

[Psychoholic]

And as always, if you wanted to see the food:

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/diary/psychoholic

[Psychoholic]

Did 30 minutes on the elliptical this morning - 230 calories, serious sweat.

[Psychoholic]

So the tail end of March was a little blurry for sure - work got chaotic as hell and interupted my workout schedule, went to the Viva Las Vegas Rockabilly Weekender, then a week in Vancouver for work. Finally back in the saddle and a long way to go still! I'm still stuck where I was before hand, so I haven't made any noticeable improvement in about a month. Got on the elliptical this morning, busted out 30 minutes at 150 bpm on the heartrate monitor. Food should be on point.

We did switch to fresh tilapia instead of frozen, which look a bunch better and cooked up nice! Werd!

[Midnight_Lifter]

Nice - good to see you're still alive LOL...

Glad I subb'd to your journal here otherwise I may have missed your update.
Keep at it, you'll kick ass for sure.

[Psychoholic]

I suppose this is a monthly update at this point.

Weight sucks - sitting around 275, let my cardio training fall to the wayside after the half marathon (hard to get motivated to run) and my general schedule has sucked too.

BUT, hooked up with a badass trainer who is a competitive natural bodybuilder and he's got me doing some gnarly carb cycling and serious caloric cut, plus hiit 3 times a week (addition to my normal lifting schedule). I'm not used to my heavy calorie day being 1800, but I've tried other things with limited success, so we'll see how this goes.

[jpfaherty]

Keep up the good work!

[Psychoholic]

I knew that the spicy bacon fried rice at hibachi sunday (and it was GOOD) was a little sodium heavy and I was probably holding water like mad, but I'm down 8#'s since monday already (realistically I saw 278 monday, saw 268 this morning, I was assuming around 3# for water/salt so that's why I said 275). Maybe there is something to be said for this carb cycling and heavy duty calorie deficit?

Went running tis morning - http://rnkpr.com/a5ncd6

Had a destructively awesome and intense chest day today with my workout partner - was impressed that I got 15 reps with 225 on flat bench, backed it up with another 10, then 6 or 8 for 2 more after that, then a burnout set with 135 for 20+.

I am so stoked that I saw the scale move today that I think I can actually keep this up for a while and get lean!

[Midnight_Lifter]

Nice, keep it going man!