How can I avoid the post contest water bloat?

[SoonerBigD]

I know there are a lot of guys in here with a lot of experience and I thought I'd try to tap into that.

I'm doing my second show this year. 15 days away, the NANBF Tulsa show. Last year, I put on 25lbs in the two weeks following the show. The vast majority of it had to be from water. Every part of my body went soft and my feet and ankles swelled up so bad they hurt. I didn't think I went crazy after the show. I did drop off the contest diet, but I wasn't eating straight junk. It was my basic offseason clean-ish bulk with a couple extra 'junk' meals.

My question is what can I do to not repeat this. Besides the discomfort, My sister's wedding is 2 weeks after my show and I'm a groomsman. I don't want to be puffy all over like I'm having an allergic reaction. I've got to fit in my suit and I don't want to look weird in the wedding pictures.

Will I have to stay on the clean for two more weeks? Taper the calories back up? Is there something with sodium/cardio/anything? Go off the diet for a few days, then back on til the wedding? That's really the only day I'm worried about. If there's some trick to get back to 'normal' for a day, I'd take that too.

For anyone interested, my diet is as follows: I've been slowly tapering down in calories and carbs since I started 12 weeks ago. I'm 5'11. right now I'm at 200 lbs. Right now, I'm taking in about 2500 calories and 160 grams of carbs on lifting days and maybe 2000 with minimal carbs on no-lifting/cardio only days. This isn't too different than what I did last year.

My week of show plan on water/salt/carbs is to not start tapering water til friday, when I'll cut it in half roughly and cut off about 12 hours before prejudging. Salt will be cut by a third on wed, by 2/3 on thursday and minimal on friday. I'll start carb loading on Thursday and load up to the show. For diuretics, I'll be doing caffeine and dandelion root, but that's it.

I compete all natural, so no gear or cycling to think about.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

[dubcplaya069]

I didnt cheat at all after my show. The only thing I did was drink maybe a half gallon of fluids in the following hour after the show. By Monday I was up 20lbs. Your body is a sponge post contest, you can limit the cheating all you want but its the fluid that your body holds on to. I am almost a week post contest now and aside from a few cheats I have not really swayed from the diet much at all. I am still eating my oats, yams, 99% lean turkey ect. However my weight went from 208lbs day of show to 226lbs and now its dropped down a bit to around 220lbs. I cant tell the water is slowly coming down, I can see all my abs again, which is a nice relief. Moral of the story, your going to gain water weight, just control the cheating and get back on track asap and things should begin to level out in about a week. Good luck at the show.

[bigsd67]

I didnt cheat at all after my show. The only thing I did was drink maybe a half gallon of fluids in the following hour after the show. By Monday I was up 20lbs. Your body is a sponge post contest, you can limit the cheating all you want but its the fluid that your body holds on to. I am almost a week post contest now and aside from a few cheats I have not really swayed from the diet much at all. I am still eating my oats, yams, 99% lean turkey ect. However my weight went from 208lbs day of show to 226lbs and now its dropped down a bit to around 220lbs. I cant tell the water is slowly coming down, I can see all my abs again, which is a nice relief. Moral of the story, your going to gain water weight, just control the cheating and get back on track asap and things should begin to level out in about a week. Good luck at the show.

^^^this. I went from contest weight of 159 (i'm 5'8") to 179 Monday morning. I cleaned it all up on Monday and did a week of low carb "contest diet" of 100 grams carbs 300g protein and 40g fat and got back down to 168 by that Friday.

[dillon.nelson]

Good luck at the show, I thought about competing but I couldn't go another 4-5 weeks after my other two competitions and on top of finals week

[Bnizzle163]

Reverse dieting is your answer. Have ho the night of the show and eat what you want; you deserve it! Then have a controlled cheat on sunday and monday start back on a reverse diet. Basically add about 250 cals from where you were at about 2 weeks out. Every week or so add in some more cals. Take it easy, and you will have little to no bloat. Good luck at your show!

[MattyH7688]

I didnt cheat at all after my show. The only thing I did was drink maybe a half gallon of fluids in the following hour after the show. By Monday I was up 20lbs. Your body is a sponge post contest, you can limit the cheating all you want but its the fluid that your body holds on to. I am almost a week post contest now and aside from a few cheats I have not really swayed from the diet much at all. I am still eating my oats, yams, 99% lean turkey ect. However my weight went from 208lbs day of show to 226lbs and now its dropped down a bit to around 220lbs. I cant tell the water is slowly coming down, I can see all my abs again, which is a nice relief. Moral of the story, your going to gain water weight, just control the cheating and get back on track asap and things should begin to level out in about a week. Good luck at the show.
Same thing happened after my last show.. My body's water was alll screwed up after cutting 15lbs to make weight, then drinking, then cutting water again within the next 24 hours before prejudging. I only had one cheat meal saturday and my body went to **** with the water rebound... partially because of diuretics too.

[AustrianOakJr]

I didnt cheat at all after my show. The only thing I did was drink maybe a half gallon of fluids in the following hour after the show. By Monday I was up 20lbs.

There isnt anything magical about show time that turns your body into a "sponge". Drinking liquids is not what makes you gain water weight.......well, it is......but its the carbs that make you hold the liquids. So, if your diet was exactly the same, but you simply added more water, youre not going to start holding the water......that is, unless you cut all your water out prior to the show. Then, you will get the rebound effect from the body being deyhrated. But your mistake would be cutting the water out prior to the show.

If you are bloated after your show, you did one of a few things.....you cut water to begin with and completely dehydrated yourself. Dont do that....crank the water right through show time. Or....you messed with sodium/potassium.....and dehydrated yourself. Dont do that.....keep electrolyte levels steady. Or.....you ate more carbs than your body could store away as glycogen. Thats probably the more likely case......so dont eat like a maniac. Have a small celebration meal and get back on your diet the next day. Start increasing your daily carb intake by 25g each week.

[LOWTESTOSTERONE]

best way to break a bloat is feed it water... it will eventually cause a flushing...

[DanTheManB]

Its because of

1--the type of food people eat post show

and

2--Not stopping when full. If you stop when FULL not pregnant and drink water u should be fine

[dillon.nelson]

Its because of

1--the type of food people eat post show

and

2--Not stopping when full. If you stop when FULL not pregnant and drink water u should be fine

food babies are the best