Thanks Ricky,
You show fine symmetry and superb definition!
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Ricky, that is great!
What is your height?
thanks for being kind… this morning I weighed high 180’s (forget exactly)… in those photos I was about 163… at a height of 6 feet. Josh Trentine who first encouraged me to compete told me something I alway remember. At first I protested that the idea of having my ectomorph body on a stage was hilarious… he reminded me first that natural bodybuilding, particularly at regional levels is a far cry from what you see in the magazines… secondly, he asked me to estimate what weight I thought I needed to be in order to have visible abdominals, and then said, whatever number you come up with, subtract 10 more lbs and you’re getting close…
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Ricky,
I’m seriously impressed by your enthusiasm and experience of bodybuilding (as well as your scientific and critical approach).
To me, bodybuilding is not about bodysize. It’s primarily the choice of an active lifestyle with the aim of building muscle and staying healthy long term. You compete with yourself. The greatest challenge is to understand how your own body works/respond to various stimuli. Attention to detail, quality of excercise and continuous evaluation of methods - demands thoughts. Not forgetting concerns re diet, sleep and stress. The above seem to correspond well with Dr Darden’s ideas, which is why I ended up here…
That being said, I believe you (and Mark) are role models to follow, in order to learn valuable experience. Though being a more or less active trainee since 1991, it feels like I’m still learning…
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thanks again, appreciate the kind words
Challenge 14,’actually
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My challenge 14
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In order to reduce time between exercises as per Dr Darden’s previous recommendation earlier on the thread. Thanks for asking.
I remember seeing that now that you posted. Thanks!
Hey Ricky
First, I have owned 2 Multi Triceps machines and only realized the hand pads were backwards on the first one I owned after I bought the second one that had them mounted correctly… That said, can I make a suggestion that will improve the resistance curve on your Hammer Lateral Raise ? I have this machine and tweaked the curve by mounting 2x4 sections between the arm pads and frame. This results in an almost perfect fall off at full contraction and even better, more resistance in the starting position. Very easy to do, just measure and drill holes in the wood corresponding to the holes in the frame and pads and mount using bolts that are 2” longer. Definitely worth the effort.
Mike
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Ricky , since it seems you like to focus on longevity and such I’m wondering about your thoughts on certain exercises that possibly might not be good ones to employ in the long run. I’ve seen a lot of videos where it’s said that exercises like overhead presses , dips, pullovers etc can lead to shoulder impingement and rotor cuff troubles etc. A lot of stuff is said about positioning of the hands and raising your arms overhead, especially presses. It seems there are many exercises people commonly use on here that might not be such a good idea if your concern is not having shoulder trouble in your later years? What are your thoughts on this?
Scott
I highly recommend Bill Desimone’s latest book Joint Friendly Fitness. I think that all those exercises can be used with modifications (depending on the individual). Bill’s book in my opinion is a must have for anyone, and especially for us more mature trainers
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Roch
Rick
It looks like I reached my peak somewhere between week 3 and 4, depending on whether you look at AM or PM readings, and whether you compare single days or 5 day averages… in the last week to 10 days, I started to develop a familiar spasm in my left shoulder blade area, which, historically, has been for me, the canary in the mine shaft, indicating, I’m pushing the overtraining…
I think I prefer the leaner look in the before pictures… but that I won’t implicate the method, but rather my own choice to eat like a pig… and for that reason, not real happy with the trade off of added muscle and that much added fat; again, my own doing. Thinking of amending as per earlier posts, and possibly shortening to a 21 or 28 day program with more controlled calories, but regular protein intervals, albeit, with leftover mag10/plazma and other protein I have. Feedback welcome.
Nevertheless, the added muscle was literally double the previous 35 days, and any gain at my age and with a 40 year training history is good. Keep in mind, that I was already using 301030 interspersed with other methods well before beginning this.
One question is how much muscle I would have gained simply by eating more and continuing everything else the same.
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I did not double my muscle. I gained approx 2 lbs (5 day average) in 35 days compared with a 1 lb gain for preceding 35 days. I can’t argue with your assessment of pictures
also, if you look at contest pics previously posted, which seemed more impressive, I was 25 lbs lighter, and almost certainly had significantly less muscle, yet looked better. Leanness often trumps actual muscle when it comes to appearance imho
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I agree with Scott. This was an outstanding effort on your part, both to follow the program as closely as you did, and then to document the results so thoroughly in real time.
As for the results, I am not terribly surprised by what you report. I regularly see articles about people who adopted a particular training regime and/or diet and then got dramatic increases in muscle mass… 10 or 20 or 40 lbs in a relatively short time frame. Those anecdotes never seemed relevant to me, because I have never seen a huge gain in muscle in response to changes in either diet or exercise. When I have bulked up to drive strength improvements, it has always resulted in a lot of fat gain. In particular, the +2-inch gain in waist size resonates with me!!! I’ve done that before…
FYI, I’ve added a link at the end to a narrative review of a collection of studies that looked at the effect of overeating on body composition. The majority of these were done with sedentary populations, and show (duh) the majority of weight gain comes from fat, with lesser increases in lean body mass and water. You can look at the numbers and decide for yourself if your gains were any different. I will note that the paper includes a few studies where overfeeding was done in athletic populations with a high protein content diet, and this does seem reduce the amount of body fat that is gained. So maybe next time, prioritize protein intake?
believe me there was LOTS of protein
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more info from Inbody
Roch before
Roch after
Rick before
Rick after
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