It did. My diet and exercise plan is 4 years in the making. At first I could eat anything and my body composition was moving in the right direction. After about 1.5 years it started to change.
Around this time I didn’t like the direction my physique was going. I began to tailor my poor eating habits. I decided to eat healthier (what I thought was healthy at that time). I spent May and June doing tons of cardio. I would wake up, have some protein and jump on my bike for a 40min intense ride along the coast.
I alternated my cardio with weight training every second day, and on the days I would train some time I would come back to the gym and do more cardio. What a mistake this was. I lost a lot of fat, but also a ton of muscle and strength.
I got interested in drug use around this time and a friend pointed me in the direction of T-Nation. I shortly found out that this site was more than that; a plethora of knowledge. This is when my training really took off. Although I say that now, I’ll look back in a year and probably laugh at where I was…this always tends to happen.
Now that I ran on a bit I’ll get back on point - I started putting together a diet plan in the summer of 06. It was simple at first because I started with a few items of smaller proportions and built my diet up from there. I thought that it would be easier to determine how my diet affected me if I was to simply add items rather than remove them.
I decided this time forth to see if I could loose fat by simply weight training and little to no cardio. This time around I was able to preserve more muscle and a good proportion of strength. I am a fan of drug use, so this upcoming summer I plan on using a few compounds to help preserve my hard earned muscle tissue and strength.
It is very hard to diet down and preserve muscle. This is one reason I needed to post my nutrition. I would like to be able to preserve as much as I can without the use of drugs, and then go ahead and use the drugs anyway.
Learning what nutrition plan works for the individual is partly based on trial and error. In my ‘earlier’ training days I realized that I was eating way too many carbs and not nearly the right types of fat. Since I am relatively young I have plenty of time to learn from my mistakes and improve my physique. Also, the more I tend to read and learn the better I am at discovery the faults in my diet as well as means of improvement.
Or do you mean falling victim to cheating? If so, I plan when I am going to eat out or have a cheat meal. I may have one cheat meal every month. Over Christmas, for example, I had a cheat meal Christmas morning, Christmas evening and on the 29th when we had a big family outing.
I am fairly new at this. So far I have been keeping my protein intake at a high and consistent level. I shoot for roughly 40 grams of protein for each meal and have 7 meals(including the shakes) which potentially works out to 280 grams a day. I just started to decrease my carbs and calories today and reduced my carbs and calories by approximately 8%. This will be the first time I have actually decreased my caloric intake significantly since I started keeping track.
If I wanted to gain weight I would obviously bump up all of my macronutrients; if I wanted to loose weight I would want to decrease them (except maybe protein). I would also have to change the macronutrient ratio as well. I’m not sure what ratio works best for me, during what stages of training I’m in because 1) I haven’t bothered to determine this and 2) I’m still in the beginning stages of keeping a log.
So far, from my readings I have noticed that there are a lot of varying opinions about these ratios and that the individual must be taken into account. I wish it was simpler. We are all approximately 99% genetically identical to begin with, so there potentially is a lot of room for overlap and similarities between differing individuals. But I can not the fact that we have our individual differences.
During the summer I have a goal of reaching 7%bf. I have a plan so far to go into a state of ketosis or near there once I am under 10%. As I am new to this I will be asking some friends as well as posting questions here. I have used some tips from Berraridi, Thib, Lowery and others. The hardest part is the fact that I can eat and continue to eat. When I do restrict my calories I feel hungry for most part of the day and extremely hungry at nite. I recently purchased some ephedrine and caffeine and have been taking that for about a week. On a positive note I have noticed that it does curb my hunger therefore it may become of use during the summer months. The increase of stimulation of my nervous system has also been of benefit on lifting days, but seems to hinder me when I sprint. This will be a trial run because I plan on using it as an adjunct to my other ‘supplements’.
I am a student attending university therefore my days are quite set. I have regular routines and habits that I have developed over the years. I do my best to be organized. I also like to train and study at the same time(s) each day. I plan my workout routines in monthly and sometimes bimonthly blocks. I work at the university gym which provides me with short 3 hour shifts that are laid out for the entire 4 month semester. I also work as a research assistant for the university; this job allows me to create my own schedule. To others: this diet is not that complex. I hope others take the initiative to develop there own nutrition plans. If you build it from the base up I feel that this is an easy way to help simplify it and you can always make it more complex over time.
Yes, one day I will. I can eat and train like this because I am a student. As I mature, get a job, and start a family this will become ever so difficult. I can not imagine my wife, child and I sitting around and eating cans of salmon and tuna for dinner. I worked as a cook for a few years so I do have skill to make both nutritious and delicious meals. I wish it could be simpler, maybe it can. On the other hand, it is not that difficult considering I eat the same food day in and day out. It is very easy to get groceries when I know exactly what I have to buy. A difficult part is bringing this all to school with me; luckily I have a big backpack and a car. It is hard to simplify this since I am not yet satisfied with my performance or body comp.
If any one can give me some more feedback or suggestion I would appreciate it. If anyone has questions I’m willing to answer.
Thanks for the help thus far, even if no one reads this entire ‘piece of work’ I have gained something myself.