Lean Bodies Consulting

So I often rant and rave about contest prep strategies that I think are silly - nonsensical even - yet sadly, oh so commonplace in our competitive circles. I think people get in shape in spite of some of this stuff, not directly because of it. The internet is a gold mine for examples and so are clients of mine, who hear and see what their friends are doing.

I pride myself on rying to do it the ’smart’ way - at least I consider it the smart way; at the very least, the sane way. Now don’t be offended if you do something that you see me make fun of. Hey, it’s your choice.

But you know what? Here’s something that’s really sad - competitors who do a show, even do well - great transformation, good placing in the show, etc. - and decide to give it up. Why? Because they just can’t see themselves going through that prep again. All the cardio, the extreme restrictiveness, the big post-contest rebound, and so on. And because it’s such a common methodology, they’re lead to believe it’s the only way. I mean, hey, I don’t blame you. I’m pretty sure most competitors start off on their competitive trails for multiple reasons - one of which is that they think it’ll be fun to do a show. An overall enjoyable experience. And then … it’s just not. Now I’m not saying it’s ever going to be easy getting in contest-ready condition, because surely, it’s never easy. It IS hard, it DOES take sacrifice. But in the end, you should walk away with a good experience. Most are never going to make a living being competitors; it’s a hobby for many. Hobbies are fun.

I had a client who I have now worked with on three separate occasions, who decided she wanted to give it a go; she wanted to do a show. Of course, I was all for it. And here is a comment she just sent me via email that sums it up - see? Fun. Great experience.

I just don’t think I have the words to tell you how grateful I am for this experience. I have grown so much and learned so much about myself. Being so committed to achieving this goal has given me such strength and built a lot of character for me. Something just clicked for me in this prep and I’ve been happy the whole way through. Part of it was not worrying (too much anyway) because I knew I was in the best possible hands to get me to where I needed to be – the smart way. And part was my mindset. I chose not to alienate myself or avoid social situations that involved food (done that many times before!). It then became more about the people in my life and not the food. I felt more connected and supported, which is important to have when you’re doing something difficult like a contest prep. And the last part was just having a goal to work toward. I have realized that usually the things that are tough are the things that are worth it in the end. And this competition experience was definitely was worth it! I’m so ready to do another one because I know I can do even better! Thank you thank you thank you!!!! Mwah!

There IS another way.

Disclaimer - apologies (only small ones) if this offends you.

It doesn’t take a rocket surgeon (yes surgeon :lol:) - or a smart contest prep coach for that matter - to get fat off someone if they starve them enough and get them to do enough cardio. How does that make a trainer … awesome? 14 hours of cardio a week? 21 hours of cardio a week? 1200 calories while doing that amount of cardio? This isn’t the program recommendations of a great trainer, IMO - it’s the program directions of someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing - who has one tool in his or her toolbox. Eventually everyone will get in shape if they eat few enough calories and do enough exercise for long enough. And people pay for this?

What? You’re not losing fat? Hmm, we’ll we’re already doing an hour of cardio a day. Let’s double it. Two hours a day now. We’ll also drop your calories to 9x BW too.

Two weeks later

Nothing? Alright then - 8x BW in calories and you get no carbs but vegetables and you get no fat either. And you only get nearly fat-free protein sources - egg whites and orange roughy for you. Wait, make it two-and-a-half hours of cardio a day. I also want you to do walking lunges - no weights - every day for 20 minutes - to spot reduce the fat off your glutes and legs of course.

Weight starts falling.

What? You’re hair is falling out? Suck it up, you’re a competitor. Hardcore!

Brilliant!

I’m sorry but you have to diet extremely hard and do hours upon hours upon more hours of cardio per week to lose what? You better be getting Biggest Loser results and dropping pounds of it each week. I mean, a pound of fat has a whopping 3500 calories. Unless you’re crawling on the treadmill and you have the math skills of a 2-year old (subsequently adding up your 2500 calories and thinking it’s 1000), then it’s NOT working very well now is it? A pound a week? (Because you know you’re not dropping 3lbs per week and you’re not even dropping 2/week if you’re pretty lean), then that’s not success. You have to do ALL THAT for a pound of fat? Come on now. Your body is broken if that’s what it takes. Actually let me correct that - that’s not what it takes. For anyone. Do you really consider that a winning formula? Because you might have “won”?

And another thing - those that don’t do their prep this way? Those that get in shape with sane dieting and sane amounts of cardio? They aren’t just genetically lucky. They work just as hard as you do. They just work smarter. There’s nothing special about you that deems it absolutely mandatory to do 7, 14, 21 hours of cardio per week to drop a small amount of fat per week. I mean, if a pound of fat is 3500 calories and you’re doing all that cardio and you’re dieting hard, don’t you think something might be a tad wrong there?

Get ready for your rebound. I have been saying this for quite a while now - those who do the most cardio in their preps are invariably always the ones with the most horrendous post-contest rebounds. And I think this is separate from the psychologically influenced rebound triggered by retardedly restrictive contest diets where you get only 5 foods. Of course, you’re going to start eating after that. Sheesh.

But the cardio? It’s almost as if it’s programming you for fat storage when the calories become available again. Whether it has to do with an efficiency phenomenon or something else entirely, the bottom line is that cardio junkies rebound terribly, more often than not. I don’t really care why it happens – just that it’s happening. There is far too much empirical evidence in contest circles to deny this.

Why do you think 30 minutes of cardio stops working and becomes 45 minutes? And 45 minutes per day becomes 60 minutes? And 60 minutes becomes 90 minutes? Something is happening there for you to have to be continuously adding more and more cardio. So what happens the next time you diet? Do you have to do even more? I know of competitors who return a previously successful contest prep program (successful meaning they got in shape) and it doesn’t work for them - nothing happens. Hmmm

The prep methods of many competitors are in my mind, nothing short of downright silly. It’s sad really - to see what some people believe they have to do in order to compete. And it’s not even the competitor’s fault - it’s the people they entrust themselves to. I can’t believe some of the stuff I’ve read. Boiling chicken breast in distilled water? What? People still do that? Cutting sodium a full week out? I’m sorry, but what the heck? Fish and vegetables 6x a day? 3 hours of cardio? A day? And it’s not like competitors are coming up with this stuff on their own - they’re being instructed to do this and they’re paying for it!!

And never mind how silly and just beyond explanation it is; it’s downright damaging. I can’t tell you how many competitors I’ve worked with now that have come from the above and my first order of business is getting their bodies responsive to diet and training again and correcting the damage done by their previous trainer. Many times over now.

Listen, being a hamster on a treadmill is not the only way to get in contest shape. Hamsters aren’t even cute.

There IS an easier way. No, not easy – as getting in contest shape will never be easy, but it’s easiER. And it can be a far more enjoyable experience. Man, there’s some troopers out there. Girls who go through this every single contest season. You have to hand it to them – that’s seriously some hardcore dedication. Hey, if you like it - more power to you. But …

There IS another way.

Comments? Agree? Disagree?

1. Here’s a good one for ya:

Talked with trainer by text yesterday and he called me this morning to see how i was holding up. My diet changed as of today and he told me i MUST get the 2 hours of cardio in … in addition, I have 15 minutes of step-ups … to work the booty

Where to begin?

Do you realize my keyboard has dents from typing about these subjects?

15 minutes of step ups to work the booty? Who is this trainer? They belong in another industry. So what is the 15 minutes of step ups going to do to ‘the booty’? Is it spot reduction cardio? Sure, of course that works. Muscles grow or they shrink. Or I guess a third option is they stay the same. I’ll assume that since this person is dieting (the 2 hours of cardio per day gives it away), that the step ups are not being done to ‘build the booty’. So I take that’s to mean they’re being done to strip off booty fat? If someone ever tells you to do this - you need to immediately start laughing hysterically at them. And then call them an idiot.

2. How about this one?

I recently started talking to a girl I went to high school with me and she has hired a trainer for the first time to do a figure competition (she’s done a few in the past apparently). She tried to “give me some pointers” from her trainer (mind you I never asked, she just offered because I’m a “newbie”). She thinks her trainer is awesome because he “really gets into her muscles” by having her do bodyweight lunges for about an hour. No joke. And SS cardio not to be done above 60% max HR. MAN I am SOOO glad I am working with you Erik.

Ok, you thought the first one was bad - and she was only doing 15 minutes of step ups. This poor girl is getting AN HOUR of lunges. You know, to get really deep into those muscles. Can these trainers even keep a straight face when they say this? Let’s not forget - how incredibly boring would 60 minutes of alternating lunges be?

Oh and don’t go past 60% MHR - because if you do, you’ll burn NO FAT. Let’s bow down to the fat-burning zone. Oh wait, one more thing - make sure it’s done fasted too.

3. This comes from the same source as the last point.

The same girl I talked about in my last biweekly gave me a few more pearls of wisdom the other day. First, her diet sucks. She gets like 1 tbsp of peanut butter, and lean steak every third day, but has to eat egg whites/chix/veggies/oatmeal for the rest of her diet. Poor girl also has no salt, dairy, fruit. She told me to watch the fruit and yogurt because “They have a lot of sugars in them that will keep you from getting the leanest you can.” Oh and no surprise she has 2x day cardio.

Awesome! She gets four different foods on her diet. FOUR!! Does anyone want to bet what’s going to happen the day after the contest? FOUR FOODS!!

Oh no! Fruit keeps you fat! Yeah, it’s the fruit that keeps people from getting lean. How much fruit would you have to eat for that to happen? Sure, a piece or two of fruit is going to be the one thing that keeps you from the stage. Does this even sound logical?

Got any more for me? Let me hear it in the comments.

Ok, so we’ve established answers to the following questions in the first three parts of this series so far:

1. Would I have to do a bulk?

2. How long would I bulk for?

Alright, how about some practical steps? We’re not going to get into the training aspect of this right now as it’s a rather varied topic, so we’ll just keep the focus on nutrition - which really is what will be the final determinant of gains. By that I mean, I don’t care how hard you’re training, if you’re not eating enough to support muscle growth, you’re not going to be gaining size. Period. (exception to the rule - newbies and those new to ‘effective training’)

To go back to another point made in one of the previous posts - expect to gain at least some bodyfat. If you expect to stay lean, expect to stay the same. I’ll give you a few case examples:

1. I was emailing back and forth with a client prospect who has been solely focused on muscle gain for many, many months. She works with another trainer. In our communications, she ended up sending me her pre- and current ‘bulking’ pictures for review. First thing I noticed? Nothing. Literally, I couldn’t tell a difference at all. I asked her what the difference in weight was. The answer? One pound. I believe this was over the course of about nine months. ONE POUND. Now, it’d be great if there was some massive recompositioning here but there wasn’t - no visible changes. I questioned her on this and she said her trainer wants to her stay lean while gaining size.

The results show how effective that strategy is.

2. A client of my own who I worked with for a little over a year. We did a few cut/bulk cycles and yes she gained some body fat during the bulks. But she had a great mindset for all of it (vital necessity in my opinion) and had the big picture in front of her the whole time. The numbers will make my point for me.

November 19/07
Weight - 110 lbs
Waist - 30 1/4
Hips - 33 3/4
Thighs - 17
Chest - 31 1/2
Arms - 9 1/2
Calf - 10 1/2

Contrast that to her final biweekly:

September 16/08
Weight - 109.4 lbs
Waist - 24 1/4
Hips - 33 1/4
Thighs - 17 3/4
Chest - 32 1/4
Arms - 10
Calf - 11

The most glaring point there is that she weighs basically the same as her starting weight - but her waist is 6 inches smaller. Now that’s a recomp.

A successful bulk is obviously determined by the results gained - hopefully you’ve added some muscle and not too much fat. It’s fine to gain, gain, gain, but if you end up the same bodyweight and the same bodyfat - basically you look the same as you did pre-bulk - it doesn’t seem like you did very well. Now if you end up the same bodyweight, but you’re even leaner (see Case #2 above) then you definitely had a successful run. Gaining 20lbs only to lose 20lbs and look no different - that’s not a good bulk.

How much do I need to eat?

Enough!

You need to definitely have more energy coming in than going out. Again, insufficient food intake = no gains. Look around the gym - most people there are trying to gain some muscle, get stronger, etc. Are they? They appear to be working pretty hard and yet, a year from now, chances are they’ll look no different. Something isn’t working. Could it be what they’re doing/eating outside of the gym? Could it be that they train hard for 45 minutes (trying to bulld muscle?) and then they hop on the elliptical for 30 minutes PWO (trying to get the cuts?). It doesn’t work.

So how much food? I generally recommend that you start at an assumed maintenance intake. I say assumed because all of the predictive equations are just estimates. They’re not going to necessarily be 100% accurate, but it’s a starting place for us. If you’re not coming off a hard diet, around 15x total bodyweight is a good ball part. Pay attention to results though - if you’re gaining (beyond water and glycogen) then clearly this is not maintenance. If you’re coming off a hard diet, start a bit lower as metaoblism will be slightly depressed. Stay there for two weeks and reassess. Did the scale go up? Go down? Stay the same? Adjust accordingly. Assuming you were at maintenance, start adding calories. Again, we’re trying to avoid getting too sloppy so take it easy and just systematically raise them. Start at 10% above maintenance, stay there for a bit, and reassess. What’s happening? Nothing? Add another 10%. You basically continue to add calories until you start to see an upward trend on the scale, but not so quickly upward that it’s clear (in the context of expected rates of muscle gain) that you’re gaining too much fat per given pound of weight gain. If you are gaining too much fat, scale the calories back a bit. It’s all about a simple outcome based approach. Base your adjustments on your results.

I’ll touch on macros next time.