I’ve always been an active kid growing up, placed first in wrestling and always blew the contest away during baseball, but during the split of my senior year is when I really started to take a liking to the gym, I could always out lift the competition and I loved the way it consumed my life. After high school is when I really started to take a big leap towards the world of bodybuilding and inspired to be on stage and work my way up through competitions and achieve that mental depiction of myself.
Motivation and consistency are two major factors with not just bodybuilding, but health in general. It’s one of those areas where you really need to put some sweat and blood into it to really achieve the greatness that you have envisioned. My motivation comes from life, vanity aside. And the power of self-thinking, I lay my schedule out in my mind in addition to paper to make certain there are no slip ups and I stick to my guns, it really doesn’t hurt that I love the sport either! Nothing gets me more pumped than that first step into the gym, the changes that you can invasion in front of the mirror and actually put them into a physical reality is also very empowering as well as a great sense of motivation, always becoming better and better by the day. More ripped and more jacked! Also I know a lot of people have an issue with staying consistent. Like anything else you need to get yourself into a habit, and then of course follow through. It’s the following through day after day and week after week that really puts you into the grove and once you’re in, it’s hard to get out.
This can be a diverse amount of time; depending on what my end goals are the time can increase or decrease dramatically, but typically if I’m going for size the time in generally lower than normal, on average an hour to an hour and a half, with an end result fixed on maintaining or even cutting a bit off the time can very to an hour to two. The main focus is how good you performed in the gym though; make sure your form and concentration were at its peak so each set is counted to its fullest.
Typical split I swap between.
SPLIT 1
Monday: Chest, Abs. Tuesday: Delts, Calves, Cardio. Wednesday: Break. Thursday: Legs.
Friday: Bicep/Triceps. Saturday: Lats/Back, Cardio. Sunday: Cardio, Abs
SPLIT 2
Monday: Hypertrophy -> Delts, Cardio. Tuesday: Hypertrophy ->Legs, Abs. Wednesday: Hypertrophy -> Bicep/Triceps. Thursday: ~Day - Off. Friday: Hypertrophy -> Back/Lats, Abs.
Saturday: Hypertrophy -> Chest, Abs, Calves. Sunday: Hypertrophy -> Cardio
During hypertrophy workouts I’ll do a general rule of 3X sets + a warm-up set with NO MORE than 20-25 seconds between sets.
And 3-4 exercises per body part, this is meant to be rigorous, welcome the agony!
Warm-up: 10-20 set with a slightly challenging weight.
Set 1: low weight, explosive push with a slow decline till executed without proper form/failure.
Set 2: Medium weight, explosive push with a slow decline till executed without proper form/failure.
Set 3: Heavy weight, explosive push with a slow decline till executed without proper form/failure.
Cardio on HIT days are as followed:
25-30 Minute’s on elliptical with a heartbeat of 85%+ of my maximum beats per minute. With intervals of 5 minutes full out followed by a 1-minute recuperation period. This is then followed immediately by a 5-8 minute cool down walk on a treadmill.
On a normal non-hypertrophy day I’ll stick to a set of 8-12 reps with a 3X set range.
I like to keep it very simple; I stick to my main groups of food - meat, vegetable and complex carbohydrates. I don’t touch sugar, or processed foods. So essentially it’s a high protein, low fat and moderate carbohydrates. I also stick to 6 meals throughout the day, to keep my body burning like a furnace!
While cutting I track my foods pretty well, keeping it to an average round number that hits my macros, also I do not weigh my food.
I’m not really a sweets fan, junk food never appeals to me since I’m a very firm believer of “you are what you eat” the worst food I’ll ever get a craving for would be Doritos, which is maybe once a month or maybe a bag of peanut M&M’s – beyond that I’ve never have an issue with cravings.
As to date it would have to be the changes I’ve brought on within the past 4-5 years. And understanding how my body functions and works, this year I’m set up to enter quite a few natural bodybuilding competitions since I feel my body is not only in a state of competition, but in a state of winning competition’s.
My future goals are to continue to win competitions and stay 100% natural, I also have a personal goal to be on the cover of “Mens Health” and become a great addition to the fitness industry in addition to dedicating my life to become the healthiest I can be.
Tom Platz – Legs.
Arnold Schwarzenegger – Chest, Arms.
Dorian Yates – Back.
If you can dream it you can make it transpire.