Just started another CKD, I’ve always followed the Mon.-Tues. workout with 6-10reps and Fri. full body depletion workout.Have had good success with this program but must say I had more muscle loss than I wanted. I’m entering a natural BB contest in 12 weeks and would like some advice on cutting type workouts. One more thing, I’ve read the GBC program and feel that it might be overtraining for this type of diet.
Hey Bryan. Well it’s a little hard to give advice w. the amount (or lack thereof) of info you gave. What was your calorie level? How long did you carb and how many were consumed? One thing you could experiment with being that you have some time is to use a tension-style workout on Friday. It is basically a myth that you should lift always lift lighter when cutting, but I understand the reason for depletion on Friday (better glycogen replenishment). Have you read Lyle’s book? It is much more detailed than BodyOpus. You could do tension style (which might create an anabolic response helping you maintain LBM) up until the last couple of weeks before showtime, then do the high-rep depletion workout for the last carb-up. As far as GBC, recovery seems to be a very individual thing. I have excellent recovery and do a MWF GBC routine on my keto diet, but many are not this fortunate. It should be noted that I take a ton of extra supplements (plenty of antioxidants-basically the exact stack Poliquin recommended), glutamine, potassium, magnesium, whey protein, and I make sure I get plenty of carbs during my carbup. Honestly, I don’t think the training matters as much as you might think. For the most part it comes down to diet and giving yourself enough time to get to your desired b.f, which should be 4-6 percent if you’re competing. Obviously most people (myself included)use higher reps and short rest intervals to get the GH boost, but it’s not the only way. You could keep reps lower and heavier weight and try a standard high protein or zone approach to cut, but you might want to add cardio via interval training if you’re not doing a GBC approach. Hope this helps ya. Give me some more details and I’ll see if I can help you more. Good luck w. the show, wouldn’t happen to be the Heartland Classic would it?
One last thing Bry. You mentioned you had excessive muscle loss, are you confusing this w. water loss? One thing about the keto diets is that LBM will fluctuate greatly. If you’re lifts are maintaining, you’re not losing much, if any, structural muscle, it’s just water.
Thanks Teddy. To answer your questions, calorie levels during the week are about 3,000 daily at 215# body wieght. Bf is 8-9%. Weekend carbloads 36-48hrs till last 6 weeks then 24-30hrs. Keep carbs at 12-14kg lean body wieght first 24 hours and 6-8 second 24hrs.I’ve read both the Ketogenic Diet and Bodyopus. I incorporate a combination of both books. As far as the GBC program is it recommended to train to failure or is it more on the lines of the depletion workout of stopping 3reps short of failure? Last year when I used this diet for the Wis. Natural BB show I dropped 25#. I was 210 and 10% bf and came in at 185 and about 5.5-6%, which was good enough to win my class.This year the show is the Greatlakes BB and Fitness. The competition will be better, so I need to be also. Thanks again
Congrats on winning the Wisconsin show! How long did you diet when you did that? I did some calculating and your numbers show you losing 15 lbs. lean and 10 fat. Something is off here, you actually lost more muscle than fat at these numbers. You shouldn’t be dropping more than 1 lb. of muscle for every 3 lbs. of fat. Were you doing a lot of cardio too? The one good thing about GBC is that cardio is not necessary if you’re following Poliquin’s program to the letter. On my previous keto diets I got ripped but lost way too much muscle, and not just water either judging by my workout poundages. I also looked sicky by carb time. What I found was that I was doing excessive amts. of cardio (up to 45 min. sessions on every off-day plus a little post-workouts), and I was not getting enough water, sodium and potassium. I also found that I couldn’t go anywhere near Duchaine’s recommended carb levels-Lyle’s works perfect for me. After some tweaking, I dropped all cardio except the one hour of low-intensity the morning after my carb-up (24 hr), and added extra minerals and antioxidants, plus 2 salads and small amts. of broccoli. The net result: in 17 weeks I’ve gone from 174 @ 17% bodyfat down to 157 (post-carb) @ 5%. Started w. 147 lean, ended w. 147. All workout poundages went up. Totally drug-free unless you count EC. Actually I could’ve shaved off about 3 weeks of dieting but I had a couple setbacks due to overdone carb-ups (WAY overdone). With GBC, I just try to get the target rep range w. a given weight on each set, then when I can do that I up the weight the smallest possible increment. Most people probably wouldn’t see a strength increase, but believe it or not I did.