For me it's nothing other than abject laziness. I don't really have time to lift much these days (or more accurately, it's not important enough for me to make the time). If I ever get back at it seriously, there are at least 5-10 H&F regs I'd gladly pay 1.8K/yr to just write me programs, look at some form check vids, and periodically ridicule me for being a fat, weak POS.

good video. Optimum bulking at sub 12 would explain:

-10%, low muscle kid puts on 30lbs training 4hrs/week doing mostly fun lifts. 16 months of generally consistent work and the end result beats 95% of the gym, looks effortless.

-25% average guy never partitions well, never has the discipline to cut down properly. 2 or 12 years later looks the same.

I've thrown lots of money at "online coaching" before and in hindsight it's always been standard templates that don't really get adjusted at all to individual needs.

$1.8k/year may sound like a good price but at $150/month you can't really expect much of his time or attention other than some quick weekly catchup.

No idea about what you're supposed to get for that price, but I wouldn't be surprised if it ends up being a basic layout and some emails.

Yeah exactly. He already has outlined his PED protocols, for training he says mostly do what you want and the PRO SPLIT is probably the most effective even though he personally trained higher frequency, and it would be mostly dietary adjustments. Given where I live and how different the available foods are compared to urban michigan, it doesn't feel worthwhile to have an online coach. Mayyyybbbeee for a contest prep, but for offseason?

Also, a lot of my lacklustre gains over the last 2 years completely reversed once I got my digestive issues sorted out. That was seriously holding me back, both in terms of recovery and making it impossible to use oral AAS which I've always responded to a lot better than anything injected. If you gave me a choice between 40mg/day of dbol or 2g test e/wk, the dbol would absolutely be stronger for me, but probably not for a lot of other users. I think I'm getting training a lot more optimized as well, as it turned out the ultravolume approach with lighter weights was too much stress for my joints to handle and I actually feel better doing higher intensities with much fewer sets, which is counterintuitive and the opposite of what most bodybuilders report. Everyone's different though.

Delts+left pec
Standing db ohp: 10s from 12kg up to 20kg on each side
cable side raises: 4 sets to failure each side
rear delt prone flies: 3 sets to failure with 4-6kg dbs
INcline db press (left side only) 20kgx10x3
Flat db press (left side only): 20kgx10x2
Machine press (left only): ???x15x3

cardio: 45 minutes during the workday of liss, 20 mins on bike about 135 average hr.

I'm thinking I need to do some kind of overhead pressing. I think that even though my shoulder never hurts, problems in the pec/elbow are very likely the result of shoulder problems and my right side winged scapula. I reckon balancing out the horizontal/incline pressing with some overhead free weight work is a good idea. I'll have a shoulder day for this break, and perhaps if I find getting to the gym 5x/wk too cumbersome, I'll just buy some DBs at home and do single arm standing ohp there. I REALLY like that variant; I'm able to totally take pec and front delt out of it and make it really just side+rear delt+a lil bit of trap. I have a feeling this will be best for overall shoulder health and balance as well. Feels like a great pump and like it isn't over-recruiting my triceps either.

My pec/bicep tie-in hurt again. So I guess the ohp is out for now and we'll jsut train left side of the chest for now.

Legs
HBBS: 100kgx10x3
rfess 15kgx10, 17.5kgx10x2

At my school gym with less equipment. Went heavier knowing that I couldn't do as many exercises, but rests were still really short and I think I should have gone 105kg on hbbs. It's k though, better safe that sorry for now. Knees felt great but left hip flexor did not feel great. The air conditioning is totally awesome in here so I may end up using this more when it's too hot in my normal gyms, especially for back day. There is a pulldown machine and on a back day I don't really *need* anything but barbell row, pullup, deadlift, chest supported db rows, and pulldowns.

Free Thremp.

So I watched a good bit of it. I guess the mechanism he proposes is plausible. As you said earlier, we're not going to get a study, so who knows if it is true. There are plenty of things that seem logical w.r.t. how the human body should work but when you actually test them, you find out that things don't work quite how you expected.

In this case, I guess it doesn't matter. Whether his proposed mechanism is correct or not, if assuming that it is and acting accordingly yields the desired result (which seems to be what is happening), then who cares? So, I suppose for the time being, I'll go ahead and assume that it is true also.

This leads to another question. You said this:

If this is true it seems the optimal way to prep for a show is as follows.

1. Imagine show is one month earlier than it actually is and prep accordingly
2. After step one, take advantage of the 3-4 weeks after the show where you get huge but stay lean.
3. After 4 wks, the real show has arrived and you're jacked AF. Demolish the competition.

Why doesn't everyone just do this?

This is a real strategy, in fact. "cruising into a show". The only problem is that even though you are staying lean, hitting that rebound does involve putting on some water, which, especially for bigger fellas, can lead to a very suboptimal look. But a lot of people are really skilled with using diuretics, which become somewhat needed with a strategy like that. I believe Levrone did this for a few of his best showings; he'd get lean a few weeks early by doing fish+vegetables only in the "last" four weeks before slowly reintroducing carbohydrates and ends up with calories actually *increasing* over the last 2-4 weeks.

The bodybuilder and coach at metroflex gym phoenix, Josh Barnett, also had a few of his clients doing this kind of strategy.

Why doesn't everyone do it? Requires more precision; if you hit the rebound "wrong" and add in too many carbs during that rebound phase, you may end up gaining fat or too much water weight. Even if you don't end up with any fat gain and instead just fill out glycogen, you then need to be much more precise with water manipulation. I've never used diuretics and have a body type that probably will never need diuretics beyond 3 shots a whiskey the night before show, but these drugs are no joke and most would prefer to avoid them as they are somewhat unpredictable and can make a bodybuilder look much better or much worse.

Another reason it's not that common as a stragegy is that it does require being truly lowest possible bf% 3-4 weeks out, and even many literal professional bodybuilders are unable to get to that truly lowest possible bf% on show day, let alone 3-4 weeks out.

Finally, there's a lot of individual variation. Some people look better on stage in that more depleted and dry kind of look; some people (like me) look better when their muscles are more full and a little bit watery as opposed to flat and dry. The ideal combination of course is full+dry, but even most pros can't consistently replicate this every single show (except maybe dexter jackson). Some people are going to look better more depleted and dehydrated/dry, and so pursuing the strategy above would not work well for them. Big Ramy is a great example of that; he actually starts to look worse when he's full of glycogen because of the associated water weight.

When the guys in the 90s went on the post olmypia tour, they'd often end up looking better at the shows AFTER the olympia for exactly the reasons you're thinking about. There is no post olympia tour anymore.

god damn, this was one heluva show. Bodybuilding will probably never get back to this quality without some big changes. People speculate about drugs/training/genetics being the difference between then and now, but I think it's a lot simpler: It's way harder to make a living as a full time pro bodybuilder in 2020 than in 1999. Market is too saturated and it's not as financially rewarding at virtually all levels. Although paradoxically being a coach is way more lucrative in 2020. Back then huge mid 6 figure contracts weren't unheared of and even top level amateurs who had not yet turned pro could get fairly good sponsorships that alllowed them to bodybuild full time.

Thanks for the explanation. I'm a little surprised at the perception that managing diuretics is harder than managing PEDs. I mean millions of people the world over are on diuretic therapy for a variety of reasons. And even the least competent of docs have no problem managing them. Docs managing PEDs is likely much harder. And it's not just because of a lack of experience. PEDs are way more complicated.

As long as you had easy access to get some blood work done to check electrolytes, etc., then I think that managing diuretics would be pretty easy and would require minimal research. I'm confident that anyone who has the nuances of PEDs down could figure out diuretics without much difficulty.

IANAD (I assume you, Melkerson, are), but afaik diuretics are used to prevent water retention because of possible issues with kidneys and/or blood pressure. This is very different than using diuretics to remove only subcutaneous but not intramuscular water. Because AAS and fat burners can change mineral balances and because there's a lot of individual variation both between and within individuals, diuretics end up being super ****ing complicated. You've got to be tracking carbs, sodium, other electrolytes, clen or other stimulant drugs, estrogen levels, bf%, etc and get it juuuussttt right such that you are dropping only that sub-q water and not depleting intramuscular water. IM water is necessary for a pumped/full appearance in the muscle and without it your muscles look flat, giving the illusion of being much higher % bf. I have never used diuretics and probably won't bother since I have a naturally very dry body type that does not hold water. Syndr0m took some dbol and gained like 20lbs of water; I take dbol and gain like 2-4lbs of water. Too many diuretics is obviously worse than too little because you can die or look like **** with no pump. A lot of bbing gurus on the web say that if you are truly diced and lean, no matter who you are, you will not *need* diuretics because your body just won't hold water without massively overcarbing if you are that low on bf%. John Meadows, for instance, does not use them on himself or any clients.


Anyway, back after not logging in for 2 weeks. Travelling/having fun and all that. Was totally off the wagon 4 whole days of that where I was with my cousin just eating everything. Gained no weight from this.

Yesterday legs

HBBS 110kgx10x3
rfess: 16kgx10x3 each side
hamstring curl: 45x12x3
hyperextensions: bwx10x3

Today arms
Hammer curls: 18kgx17, 8, 6
dual rope pushdowns: 23kgx32, 10, 18kgx10
Rope hammer curls: 3 sets failure whatever
Side cable extensions: 14kgx10x3 each side
HAmmer curls: 2 sets of 20
Single arm cable kickback: 14kgx10x3

Posing: 20 minutes

Cardio: 20 minutes treadmill, 20 minutes bike, 10 minutes outside brisk walk

I feel my fat loss progress is just mediocre and I probably need to drop cals/increase cardio. I can see noticably more vascularity/definition in arms/shoulders/back, but my legs and glutes still holding a huge amount of fat and feels like it's coming off super slow. Only just last week did some vascularity in quads start appearing.

I will be 12 weeks out as of tomorrow. I should post pics I guess.

Bicep/pec tie in tendon still not feeling 100%, but no pain in it throughout the day. Idk how much more rest I will need. Anything that allows me to train it on the right side from 8 weeks out is a windfall I think.

When you referred to the difficulty of diuretics I thought you were referring to the difficulty of not causing serious adverse effects. If you're talking about the difficulty of associated with maximizing results, that's a different issue and I can accept that this may be true.

After all, I have it on good authority is with PEDs all you need to do is take a ****ton and stare at the bar. Doesn't get easier than that.

dude, stare at the bar? All you gotta do is slam donuts through an IV and stay in a medically induced coma for 20 hours a day and you will turn into ronnie coleman. Penis grows to 11 inches and tons of porn stars start coming to try and suck it and sodomize themselves with it because they are so attracted to your muscles and high T levels. CHEATING.

Back training

I wanted to take a break from heavy rows for this week and had to get in and out fast b/c of other plans. But I think being 12 weeks out now it may not be a bad idea to alternate doing rows first vs plate loaded pulldowns or pullups, since my elbows are finally healed enough to do both.

Plate loaded pulldown machine: 2.5ppsx12, 2ppsx14, 1.5ppsx20 or 21
Rows: 70kgx10,8,6
DB CSR: 16kgx14,12
Pulldowns: 95lbsx11,6

Took about 35 minutes b/c of very short rests. Next week I'm ready to attempt 120kg AMRAP barbell rows hoping for 6+. I guess I should film it since that's kind of a milestone. The week before, although I did not log it, I did 117.5kgx6.

I'll be ready to hit chest a week from today. Just doing some pushups and shoulder stuff with dbs today before I go do my cardio outside.

Had a cleanish refeeed yesterday; about 1k calories worth of pizza but then also just a lot more rice with all my chicken meals and some beef fried rice with fried eggs at the end of the day. Next refeed I'm going to cut the pizza and just do a 600g ribeye and some fried potato plus double or triple rice portions with chicken meals.

I got burned out on the pressure cooker shredded chicken so I'm doing half diced thighs half diced chicken breast with soy sauce and bell peppers as my main chicken meal. I have the chicken coated in just enough flavor to prevent splatter, but to my surprise this also helps it keep extremely well in the fridge. I can make about 1kg of chicken per batch and it takes maybe 25 minutes of total prep and cooking.

Don't want more clutter in the n1h thread but I remember one of my hardest sessions.



While I have gotten weaker on squats because of various knee problems, the way I squat now is totally different than this. Used to just be a speed demon with a **** ton of bounce and not nearly enough tension on the quads/way too much lower back involvement. Now I do like 3-6 second descents, have nearly all of the tension on quads/side of the glutes and use very little bounce. Back then I would also squat ultra hard until exhaustion, then have to rest literally 15-20 minutes before going to the next exercise and I end up in the gym 2-3 hours. Now I very rarely have leg sessions longer than 80 minutes and I build up more volume on more different exercise rather than squatting until near death and then kinda bullshitting other exercises and not really striving for week to week progress on those exercises.

Although perhaps problems didn't manifest for years of doing squats this way, I'm absolutely sure learning to do my squats in the way I do them in the video was the near sole reason (other than split jerks) that I ended up with such repetitive knee injuries. Thank god I god un-stubborn and started experimenting with different ways of doing things. I guess I should take a vid next leg session to demonstrate how I do it now.

If I'd learned all that earlier, perhaps I never would have stopped olytarding and starting bodybuilding.

The gods have blessed us with a vintage Evo video. Today is a good day.

Recipe please? I need something like this.

Squat descent is a bit slow btw imo.

Went in planning to deload and give my knees a break BEFORE they start feeling any pain and dropped 15kg off the bar from last week. Despite this, I nearly reached muscular failure on the 3rd set. I must be fairly burnt out on legs I guess.

hbbs 95kgx10x3
rfess 10kg dbsx10x3
hamstring curls: 40-60lbs x 10x4
hyperextension: bwx10x3

Worst workout in a very long time. But hey, bw PR abruptly dropping from 96.5kg in tennis shoes at the beginning of the day on Monday not super well hydrated to 93kg in oly shoes in the evening very well hydrated with electrolytes pre workout on Friday!








I'm not finding it hard to stick to my diet.

M1
1c oats with a mix of water and skim
1/2 c mixed berries
2 scoops whey
splenda

M2
250g Chicken thigh+breast mix + bell peppers
1c rice
no added fats unless I do breast meat only

M3 Same as 2

M4 1.5 cup egg whites+2 whole eggs+2 english muffin. If it's a harder day I'll substitute in 2 protein bars. Each one is 30g carb, 18g protein, and 8g fat. They are weirdly extremely filling for having about 500 calories between the two of them.

M5
Same as meal 1

Mini-cheats 2-3x/wk substitute one meal for a big thick ribeye since I have so little added fat in this diet.

Nice work. Forgive me if this has been mentioned but how many calories are you trying to hit, and how much protein per day as well?

This is perhaps against the grain for bodybuilding, but I don't even count calories. I feel like BMR is way more dynamic than people think based on how long you maintained a deficit, your activity for the day, stress, sleep, training, thermic effect of food, etc. As such, the strategy is more "300g protein per day, fill the rest with mostly carbs, get enough fats to maintain normal hormonal function (not those hormones, you know what I mean...)". We know what foods are sating and dense and we know which foods are trash. Always eat the ones in the first camp, and even when you do need a "break" or are glycogen depleted, STILL try to eat nutrient dense foods with more favorable micro/macro nutrient profiles that are relatively more sating. It's like if I'm going to refeed: Ribeye+home fried potatoes>burger and fries or a subway sandwich>pizza>ice cream or candy with both high fat and high sugar content. It's just too easy to end up going overboard on those kinds of foods. They are not sating enough per calorie. I mean if you are okay with feeling hungry and psychologically must have junk food, knock yourself out I suppose... High sugar but low fat content foods can be okay for refeeds, but I personally don't find them very psychologically satisfying. I'd way rather have the fried potatoes or subway sandwich over coco puffs or gummi bears. If low fat icecream was a thing in china, I'm sure my tune would change however.

And then when not refeeding it's like super ****ing obvious, eat BRO FOODS ALL DAY BABY.

On that note, I am not hungry eating this way, but I do feel very tired and worn down. I am unsure how much of this is because of the diet, because earlier this week I started the most intense chinese course I've ever done. Only 2 total weeks so I am done next friday.

Arms
Hammer curls: 18kgx16, 14kgx12, 9
dual rope pushdowns: up to 23kgx32, 10, 18kgx11
Cable hammer curls: 2 sets to failure at 30kg
single arm cable kickbacks: 14kgx15,12,10
Cable curls: 23kgx3 sets failure
single arm cross body tricep extensions: 9kgx12x3

Posing practice about 20 minutes by far the most exhausting part of the day LOL

cardio 20 minutes 3.5 15 incline HR barely reached 110


I took 25mg ephedrine and a 330ml monster energy drink pre workout on top of my normal clen. Still didn't feel **** and nearly fell asleep on the treadmill.


I got some great shots during posing I wanna upload, but as usual VPN is being a turd and I don't want to spend a bunch of time finding non great firewalled image hosting that is also compatible with 2p2. My legs are finally coming in and showing way more definition and vascularity than even just 1 week ago.

I had of course originally wanted to do a big rebound protocol like justin Harris suggests, but given how worn down I am feeling even at 11 weeks out , I am considering just going start to trt only for 7-8 weeks post show and cleaning out right away. I'll see how I feel as we get there.

These are all the same day. ****ing around with different angles/lighting/camera positions.


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Looking good, imo. Of course, I'm easily impressed so I'm not sure how much stock you can put into that.

If you can, would you mind just posting a regular Evoken in suit photo. I'm curious how much normal attire obscures your physique. I assume it will make me feel better about not aspiring to such levels.

Impossible to find suits that fit, even from a tailor in the west. Even harder in China. Although I have one decent Thai suit that I outgrew, unfortunately. I guess I can definitely wear it now in my smaller state LOL.








**** man, that phrase "not aspiring to such levels" just got me thinking about what I want to do during the break/cruise phase and I'm honestly craving it, which is probably a horrible place to be mentally at 11 weeks out. Very obviously I will not stop training, but I want to do some kind of training other than bodybuilding. It'll be like 125mg/wk of test, 3x/wk lifting 2 upper body sessions 1 lower body session 40 minutes max, LOTS of sprints and high intensity cardio, bulletproof coffee AM fasting, high fats and low carbs. That's exactly what I would advise somebody who just wants to be in shape, muscular, and have an attractive but very healthy body to do and that seems so much less invasive and difficult than even a half assed bodybuilding offseason, let alone a hardcore contest prep like the one I find myself engaged in now. Now I'm like daydreaming about doing that for 7 weeks and actually being able to go out and play tennis or do some sprints without worry. For that kind of "recreational fitness" goal, there'd be no problem adding in like 10-20mg/var, but I won't during my cruise to give my liver maximum recovery.


I've decided that both Dave Palumbo and the "2 weeks on 2 weeks off" crowd are wrong about clenbuterol. The crowd that use antihistimine drugs to upregulate the receptors that clen down regulates are certainly onto something, however. As such, I'm taking a break from clen for 7-10 days, take bendryl every night until I start to develop a tolerance to it, and then getting back on clen starting all the way back from 10mcg/day working up as well as I can throughout the following 9.5 weeks. I have a few reasons for this, 1.) I feel sluggish and burned out and want the stim effect back as I make the final push in this prep. 2.) I do think the fat loss effects of clen diminish overtime more rapidly than Palumbo would suggest, but they definitely don't diminish in 2 weeks. I think maybe more like 8-12 weeks is optimal and after that you need to take a break to reset those receptors. I really wish I knew definitively; there's so much broscience out there and you're obviously not going to find clinical human trials about the best way to use clen for fat loss.

I tried Ephedrine again this morning but this time with a 200mg caffeine tab. I feel cracked out and way worse than clen ever made me feel! So basically no thanks on ECA unless it's for a DL Amrap, an MMA bout, or a marathon!

Well you're quite obviously jacked enough that the suit can't hide it. Definitely agree that you need to work on your suit game (i.e., getting ones that fit well). Considering the premium you place on your appearance, it seems odd that you would let that part slide.

Is the problem that your body changes so much depending where you are relative to a show or that the tailors just suck?

I give almost no shits about my appearance, but for the first 30 yrs of my life, I had all my suits made in Asia (mostly Thailand). There are lot of bad tailors out there, but plenty of good ones.

One thing I would sometimes do is just take a suit that fit well to the tailor and just tell them to copy that one exactly. I found this better than getting measurements, because I think that tailors have some differing opinions on what constitutes a good fit.

Of course, this strategy only works if you have one good one to begin with.