Dirty Gerdy Ferrigno/Excalibur Prep Log 2014

Training
21

[quote]Mr. AWEstomy wrote:
Hey Gerdy,

I have seen your pics on Facebook and IG. Great physique!

What is your offseason and dieting philosophy or breakdown like ( along the lines of macro composition or if you follow any specific ideology like mountain dog diet and intra workout nutrition, carb back loading, iifym, bro diet, etc)And what supps do you like to regularly use?[/quote]

As far as off season versus pre contest I’m a mix of all you mentioned lol

I track my meals in the off season to make sure I eat enough. Pre contest I have set targets. So there is your iifym. However, I learned a lot from reading John Meadows stuff so I don’t junk it up too much. I eat nutritious foods and get a decent variety. Since I have ulcerative colitis I have to be careful or else I can set off a flare and lose 20lbs lol.

When I start the actual “cutting” process for a show I like a carb cycle. Usually a high, med, low cycle. Nothing too complex. Pre/Intra/Post nutrition will depend on what drugs I use. I have tried intra workout stuff in the past but never really liked it. Pre/post I definitely pay attention too but I find my workouts are better when I just drink water during training.

As far as supps I’m big on the recovery stuff. I do protein, carbs, aminos, low stim pre workouts, trans alanyl glutamine, fish oil, etc. I also do a lot of stuff for health and anti-inflammation because of the colitis. I own two supplement stores in the LA area so I just get what I need from there and usually it’s from one of the exclusive lines to our company.

22

[quote]Lonnie123 wrote:

[quote]Dirty Gerdy wrote:
I think I need to improve a lot lol but the two I’m choosing to emphasize are my traps and hamstrings. I think that by thickening up my traps I will give the illusion of having a bigger back. I feel my hamstrings are probably the most lagging muscle I have.

I also think that my rear delts, calves, and arms need to come up.

When I start thinking of lagging muscles I list them all lol! So now I’m choosing to just focus on 1 upper body and 1 lower body muscle until I bring them up. Then transition to the next.

-Brandon Gerdes[/quote]

Dont know how I missed this for this long, crazy to see the progress you have made Gerdes (gonna split the difference in your user name and real name and just go with the last name, plus it sounds cool)

I think having big Traps and Hammies are the way to go… I never hear anyone say anything but “if the traps get too big they make the shoulders look narrow” but I have NEVER seen someone with traps so big that they make a person look smaller, only bigger.

Meadows has really opened my eyes to what huge, hanging hamstrings can do to a physique, and in my opinion its one of the body parts that when built properly is part of that “next level” of physique development.

As a follow up to your answer above, how exactly do you go about prioritizing those 2 body parts, just increased frequency? I’ve never really understood the “Get bigger overall, but especially HERE” kind of training.[/quote]

LOL I was telling my friend the same thing the other day! He brought up the “narrow” thing and I asked him for an example. He couldn’t find one. Plus I’m pretty tall and wide. I have a lot of room to fill out back there. I don’t think bigger traps will make me narrow or “blocky”.

Definitely agree on hams. I don’t see too many that are “wow” bodyparts on people and those that have them definitely catch attention.

With regards to what I’m going to do to bring them up. I will hit them 2x a week to everything else which is just once. Well it’s once every 6 days or so. So slightly less than a week. Right now I’m not training more than 2 days in a row without a rest day. I definitely buy into the HIT philosophies when it comes to recovery but I still modify stuff and try new things to find what works for me. I will also incorporate a tad more volume for those muscle groups. Not in the sense of just doig more but doing more…smarter. So for hamstrings I might add an additional 5 sets of 10 reps with a lighter weight and feel the muscle on top of my typical higher intensity stuff. I think at this point since I have a decent amount of years training under my belt that often the lagging muscles just don’t have a good mind muscle connection and when I train them I may not be 100% training them and instead cheating and using other muscles to move the weight. Hope all that made sense. lol

23

[quote]Mikehr wrote:
Dont post much but great physique man and gonna be following a long for sure, does Chris do your diet? And do you bump carbs on the body parts you want to bring up? [/quote]

Thanks man! Chris who? lol

I do my own diet and I have Stan McQuay as my eye. I send all my “plan” to him and change what he suggests I change. If he says to add/subtract food, change training, etc. I listen. I trust his eyes. Not only has he been doing it for a long time successfully but aside from height we have similar body types and philosophies on health and what type of look we want to bring to the stage. He stays lean year round as do I and he grows into shows. Whatever works for him is likely to work on me so I’m excited to continue to work with him and learn. I don’t like to just be told what to do without hearing their reasons and learning so I can apply that knowledge in the future.

24

Update:

The USA’s went great and I had a lot of fun over there. I got in two solid days of trainig then got sick with something. Last week I spent trying to get healthy. I still trained but nothing of substance worth posting. I was lucky to get 1500cals in per day. At first I feared my colitis had started to flare. Instead, I now think it was some type of illness that set off a mini flare.

Good news is I’m about 80% back and eating my calories as of sat. My colitis is still not 100% gone but it’s getting better by the day. I should be back and killing it by the end of the week.

I weighed in at 227lbs last night which is roughly 12lbs up from when I started prep 1 month ago.

Some updated pics and possibly some vids once I hit 230 lol

-Brandon Gerdes

25

[quote]Dirty Gerdy wrote:

[quote]Mr. AWEstomy wrote:
Hey Gerdy,

I have seen your pics on Facebook and IG. Great physique!

What is your offseason and dieting philosophy or breakdown like ( along the lines of macro composition or if you follow any specific ideology like mountain dog diet and intra workout nutrition, carb back loading, iifym, bro diet, etc)And what supps do you like to regularly use?[/quote]

As far as off season versus pre contest I’m a mix of all you mentioned lol

I track my meals in the off season to make sure I eat enough. Pre contest I have set targets. So there is your iifym. However, I learned a lot from reading John Meadows stuff so I don’t junk it up too much. I eat nutritious foods and get a decent variety. Since I have ulcerative colitis I have to be careful or else I can set off a flare and lose 20lbs lol.

When I start the actual “cutting” process for a show I like a carb cycle. Usually a high, med, low cycle. Nothing too complex. Pre/Intra/Post nutrition will depend on what drugs I use. I have tried intra workout stuff in the past but never really liked it. Pre/post I definitely pay attention too but I find my workouts are better when I just drink water during training.

As far as supps I’m big on the recovery stuff. I do protein, carbs, aminos, low stim pre workouts, trans alanyl glutamine, fish oil, etc. I also do a lot of stuff for health and anti-inflammation because of the colitis. I own two supplement stores in the LA area so I just get what I need from there and usually it’s from one of the exclusive lines to our company. [/quote]

Would you mind touching on what nutritional strategies or foods you stick with or avoid to help your colitis?

Also, what supplements you have found useful for your condition? (Im guessing glutamine [why trans alanyl?], probiotics, enzymes maybe, etc)

I had my entire colon removed and right now I have a end ileostomy (though we will eventually re connect it to my rectum). Im actually about 4 weeks post op right now (I had a nasty volvulus they had to go in and untangle)

As far as intra workout, did you ever try cyclic dextrins? I always had problems with intra drinks besides water and aminos until I tried cyclic dextrins mixed in enough water.

26

[quote]Dirty Gerdy wrote:
Update:

The USA’s went great and I had a lot of fun over there. I got in two solid days of trainig then got sick with something. Last week I spent trying to get healthy. I still trained but nothing of substance worth posting. I was lucky to get 1500cals in per day. At first I feared my colitis had started to flare. Instead, I now think it was some type of illness that set off a mini flare.

Good news is I’m about 80% back and eating my calories as of sat. My colitis is still not 100% gone but it’s getting better by the day. I should be back and killing it by the end of the week.

I weighed in at 227lbs last night which is roughly 12lbs up from when I started prep 1 month ago.

Some updated pics and possibly some vids once I hit 230 lol

-Brandon Gerdes [/quote]

Sorry to hear that but glad you are on track again and didnt lose much ground