ptguy

Right... this is a little scary. I have posted a little, and read quite a lot, so feel the time is right to post what I hope to be the starting point of my development to come.

I aim to be 100% honest.

OK, hi!

My name is Rich, I am 20 and I am a qualified Personal Trainer, which by my own admission means that I am very undereducated in a specific bodybuilding sense. I no longer work within fitness, where I used to teach many different classes including spin and circuits amongst others. I now work within Public Relations, which means my diet has had the chance to improve hugely.

I have a 20 month old daughter, Maia, who is amazing beyond words.

I am extremely passionate about health and exercise, and feel very strongly against the rising obesity levels and general attitude regarding exercise and healthy nutrition. (I think I succeeded in writing that without going off on one...!)

With the intro out of the way, I have three very simple goals, in this order:

To look good,
To enjoy exercise and sporting activity, and
To improve sporting performance (rugby and funnily enough, gymnastics)

I plan to enter the Men's Health cover model competition by the year after next, with a view to succeeding in my attempt at some stage in the year after that if not the first attempt. I have always been interested in fitness modelling, whether realistic or not .

I am 6'1" tall, and weigh bang on 13 stone. I am unsure about my bodyfat % as I haven't had it measured for quite some time, but would guess it to be about 13-14% based on the bodyfat sticky in this section. I have some separation between delts and chest, but little else.

I have been training since I was 15, but cannot honestly say I have trained to my full potential, nor been as educated or as dedicated to it as I should have been. I spent most of my first year in the gym I have now returned to sat on the shoulder press machine, watching other people train, with very little knowledge. Since age 11, I always imagined myself; like a typical young sportsplayer, as a professional in my adulthood. I played a fairly good standard of rugby (County - Gloucestershire), including this year (Under 20s), and dedicated myself to that, breakdancing, and more recently gymnastics more than I did weight training. I have only been more serious about weight training for the last 2 years or so, since working at a gym where I was immersed in the environment. Even since then, i have looked back and thought 'why did I train like that?', or 'why did I eat that food?'!

On that note, I have only recently, since being a part of this forum realised my nutritional mistakes, or the facts that in my opinion have been stunting my progress. We all know that we need protein, but I was not aware just how much I should have been consuming until about two or three weeks ago. My carb count was not where it should have been, which in my naivety I thought would help me lose bodyfat alone. I have also been through stages of real unhappiness with my physique like many on here, I'm sure. I have had two main injuries: one, a recurring dislocation of my left thumb, which has had me in cast three times, and was operated on last year, and two, a shoulder injury, which I was told could have been due to rugby, which was believed to be a bicep tendon injury - this one still plays me up a bit on chest press action and lat raises in particular, where I worry my form is not as tight as it should be.

My diet is now the following; please, please critique. I have only been following this for two weeks, so still too early to tell how it's going, I feel. I always ate a fair amount of chicken and tuna, but two things are for sure: 1, it's now become an autonomous action (that of feeding myself tuna) and 2, I'm spending way more than I was!

Will invest in some more protein when I get paid (used USN Whey previously). I have some 'Test-Drive' tribulus, but do not use it - am really uneducated as to benefits (I was given them by a friend who hadn't even opened the tub).

Meal One - 7am
Calories Protein (g) Carbs (g) Fat (g)
Bowl of oats 300 10 54 6

Meal Two - 10am

Tin of tuna 138 33.8 0 0.2
Pineapple Cottage 279 27.0 25.8 6.3
Cheese
20 Almonds 104 3.8 3.6 9.1
Orange I have no idea!

Meal Three - 12.30am

Tin of tuna 138 33.8 0 0.2
3 Weetabix/120g 296/200 10/6 54/40 6/2.5
Brown Rice
Banana

Meal Four - 3.30pm

Tin of tuna 138 33.8 0 0.2
Salad 30 0 0 0
3 Boiled Eggs 150 18 1.5 15

Meal Five - 6pm

2 100g Chicken 300 60 0 6.2
Breasts
150g Mixed Veg 51 4.2 10 0.6
Bowl of oats 300 10 54 6

Meal 7 - 9.30pm

2 100g Chicken 300 60 0 6.2
Breasts
Brown rice (100g) 166 5 33 2

TOTALS 2762.5/ 253.9/ 237.9/ 68.95
2666.5 257.9 223.9 65.45

OK, still with me? Good... thanks !

Routine:

I currently train 4 times a week, on Tues, Thurs, Sat and Sun. I split my session into:

Legs, Chest, Back, Shoulders, Arms

I walk 3-4 times a week for about 40 minutes taking my daughter to and from nursery and then walking into work, and run to and from the gym about a mile away about twice a week, driving other times.

Here is my routine. I mostly drop set on the last set of each exercise, usually by about 75% of what I was doing (usually has me perform another 5-6 reps). I rest for about 1 and a half minutes in honesty. Unless indicated otherwise, I do 2 sets of 8-12, and 1 of 6-8, then straight into the dropset:

Legs: Squats or Leg Press - 3 x 8-12
Leg Extension
Straight leg deadlift
Calf raises

Superset V-Sits
+ Crunches - 3 x 45 seconds, 1min rest


Chest: Flat DB Press
Incline DB Press
Cable Flyes/DB Flyes
Machine/Smith Decline Press

Back: Widegrip Chin-ups - 2 x 8-10, 1 x 6
Seated Rows
Close grip pulldowns
Deadlift
One arm rows
Shrugs

Shoulders: DB Press
Cleans - 3 x 8-12
Lat raises
Rear delt flyes
Smith shoulder press

Arms: Alternate seated bicep curl
Preacher curl
Forearm curl (supinated)
Dips
Tricep pressdown

Well, here's the pics anyway. Please critique, I feel my weakest areas are:

Calves, chest, abs, and biceps. Not to say everything doesn't need to improve!

PICT0296.JPG
PICT0300.JPG
PICT0302.JPG
PICT0306.JPG
PICT0271.JPG

Hope to get chatting to some of you soon, any advice or comments would be greatly appreciated . I think that's everything...!

Liam

Hi Rich, not doing too bad there! Best of luck.

ptguy

Thanks Liam!

Mrdaveyk

nice one on posting up mate

looking good, am i right in saying you are just perhaps strength training?

this is going by your goals

best of luck buddy!

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Lost Soul

Nice lengthy post mate, your traps too look very good, other areas are welcoming stimulation

You will get many clowns across the net bleating on about the finer things they know little about which will send you in a pickle.

I fear your calorie intake is a little low
I would drop protein slightly, up carbs slight and fat a fleas d1ck too (protein for breakfast though in the form of eggs or whey)

training, i would look to stop fannying about for now and go upper lower upper lower and go bigger on your movements and lower on your volume

learning a good compound upper lower 4 day plan will aid your career too.

No supplements needed, just a broard spectrum of food you can change

use a range of cardio to keep your body fat in check

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ptguy

Thanks Dave! I'm just sticking to a very blanket approach to reps and sets at the minute, and as I mostly train by myself haven't really moved much away from this. As I said, I really don't know it all; but thought strength training was lower reps than I was doing, higher weight? I guess my main goals are to increase lean mass whilst maintaining a low bf% - original, huh... ?

Will my routine as it is promote this sort of development?

ptguy

Thanks very much, for the last few months I have been giving them much more attention, as they were an area I knew I had to improve. Would you agree with my proposed areas of weakness?

How much would you up carbs by? I'm really worried that my bodyfat will increase, as I have upped them quite a bit in the last couple of weeks.

I could do with changing my programme I guess, as I've been doing this for a few months, what sort of rep/set range would you suggest? Would you still isolate muscle groups such as biceps, triceps, calves etc at all, or just stick to compound exercises?

I realise I need to eat with more variety for adherence sake more than anything, but am unsure of the best substitutes for the food I eat. I'll check out the nutrition section more indepthly!

I only get an hour and a half to go the gym every session, (I put my daughter to bed at 7pm and the gym closes at about 8.30pm in the evenings, 9.30-11.30am weekends, which is longer but my gf dictates how long I can go for in her own little way...!) and cut it fine as it is with the session I have. Maybe when I change to more compound training I will have more time to hit the treadmill/rower etc.

Tell you what, I miss teaching spin in terms of cardio - I used to use it as an interval session for myself as well as trying to push the class - the first time I taught it, I was hanging, I never knew how hard it'd be to talk and train at the same time!

Cheers for all the advice so far guys.

wogihao

I agree with lost soul, go for a heavy low volume program and your sure to hit every bodypart in your 1.5 hour sessions infact your probably be finished with the weights in 30-45mins eventualy loads of time left to chat and have a play with the cardio machines.

I like the DC training myself now, but others enjoy HIT ect... have a look at the diffrent systems and see what one you like and give it a proper go (2 months) to see if it works.

That said if your dead set against low volume work maby go for German Volume Training thats also a very good mass builder but its also boring.

Eat more, think less, dont buy wonder pills - spend the money on real food from the butcher.

Good luck.

Lost Soul

as above

200g of protein 75-80g of fat and enough carbs to grow, get through the day and recover

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PompyMan

hey mate....

if you are going for the mens health cover model look then you are not THAT far off it.... from what I have seen their models vary quite greatly in how much muscle they carry... with a good photographer and a bit of a cut you would probably have the look some of them have....

otherwise... adding about a stone of muscle would make you a shoe in i reckon

you mention only being able to go to the gym for an hour and half well that is too much time anyway mate so assuming a bit of a drive, 45 mins training then back that is plenty enough time. if you are in there for more than an hour you are doing something wrong, maybe others will disagree thats just my humble opinion

but in all honesty mate you look good in the photos, from some of your posts you sound a little unsure of your own ability maybe i am reading too much into it but believe in yourself dude

also mate i have a daughter she is 7 months old and beautiful its the best thing ever aint it!! unfortunatly i dont see her during the week due to work and i often have to go away for a month or two so i miss her greatly

ptguy

Cheers Pompyman, I'd like to be one of the more muscular if you know what I mean - a stone of muscle would do nicely ! I think you're right about me being a bit unsure - there are so many knowledgeable people on here, that I feel a bit naive in comparison. On the baby note, there's nothing better mate, honestly. It must be hard to not see her throughout the week, what do you do for a living?

I'm going to change up the routine when I go again tomorrow, splitting it into two as LS said. It'll feel weird though to train less in terms of exercises per bodyparts - what would anybody suggest for upper? I really don't know what to do in terms of reps/sets - maybe 3 of 6-8? I've just been researching the DC method of training, and feel that this could be beneficial, and also maximise my time in the gym, so if anybody has any advice/suggestions about this, let me know, I'd definitely consider it.:

Bench/DB Press
Wide Grip Chins
Incline Press
Seated Rows
Cleans
Shoulder Press

Any good? I was thinking of doing deadlift on 'lower' day.

Cheers all!