I have been following your best plan for natties (plan 1). I have done this in order to reduce volume somewhat, or a lot actually.
I am still experiencing the same effects on training after a few weeks that I experience on other plans, i.e. fatigue, slight depression, loss of pump / vascularity, de-motivation etc.
I am making the assumption that volume or something related is the problem, because if I start feeling like this, if I let up completely and just walk for 30 mins everyday for a week or two, I start feeling better and can get after the weights again for a week or two before going down the same road again, and unfortunately, this is no way to make gains or even pick up any sort of conditioning. ( I can see that my resting heart rate creeps up from a low of 44 bpm to a zenith until I stop the weight training.) Indicating some sort of stress.
My diet is fairly clean (I am not in a deficit and am not looking to shred), I also take pre / peri / post workout nutrition and include fair amounts of Omega 3âs (I loosely follow your pulse / feast plan, works for me).
Should I drop compound movements for a while to see how I go? If so, what do I replace them with, especially in the scheme of the best damn plan for natties? Should I just go lighter than my already, relatively light weights? I canât see my dropping any more volume as my workouts last anything between 30 - 40 mins, which is fairly short as it isâŠ
I would appreciated your guidance as I do not want to adopt a stop / start training style again, for fear I wonât get back into itâŠ
Hi Bigmax, thanks for the reply. How are you going?
Actually, I am on TRT, diagnosed secondary hypogonadism. Iâm on 45mgâs Test E twice a week, brings my total and free T just into the upper 25%.
This fatigue / slump problem is something I have been trying to address for a while nowâŠEverything so far points to Adrenals, hence my asking how I can try to train around thisâŠI need to improve my conditioning and lower my weight. Plus, I really enjoy weight trainingâŠ
I have checked âVersion 2â of the best plan for natties and I see that CT posted a 4 day week version, meaning an extra 2 days of recoveryâŠI am going to give that a bash and see how I go, after recovering this week
It sounds like youâre not able to consistently recover to the point of running a program more than a few weeks in a row. Why not build in a âde-loadâ week every third or fourth week? Even if you donât feel like you need it yet when it comes around, clearly you will soon and if itâs scheduled into your plan you wonât feel like âwhatâs wrong with me?â when you feel like taking the week away from weights.
Remember that youâre doing these workouts and training to also feel better and get more out of life, so if youâre run down and depressed from your workouts something should change. Good luck.
Training years, because of this issue I have never been able to accumulate more than 2 months of training in a row, so I am not sure of my training age, probably still noob (I am 44)
I am a coffee drinker, but not heavy. I use CTâs pulse / feast diet, anabolic pulses during the day and health solid meal at night (along with workout nutrition). HSM includes veg & fruit.
Sleep usually around 7 hours a night in the week, around 9 -10 hours on weekend.
before the ââdeloadââ week, you should only try to reduce your frequency and your intensity ! go in the gym 3 times a week, monday wednesday and friday ! try a full body split 3x times a week, and the other days go walk 20-30 mins outside with some stretching ( active rest ) and see how it goes !
donât try to overdo things, donât do more than this and see what happen after a few weeks.
sleep well, eat well and donât over use stimulant.
and after that if it donât work i dont know whatâs wrong but if you reduce intensity and frequency maybe you will be able to train every week for a long run !!
Hi Bigmax, many thanks for your reply, much appreciated, reallyâŠ
After doing some research as well as some serious introspection, I have come to the conclusion that my problem might lie with my aerobic_fitness_ or rather the lack thereofâŠ
I did the MAF (Maximum Aerobic Function) test today (Dr. Phil Maffetone), based of on article that I read here on TN and I reach my MAF with 1 minute of starting to run at a pace of 7km/h. This is piss poor (sorry for the language, but really, it is piss poor.) I really also doubt that I could run a mile even at that snails paceâŠ
Aerobic fitness is not something that I have really paid attention to during the past years (barring kettle bell swings etc) so I am thinking that that might be the missing link, so to speak. I only recently added walking in the mornings to my routine, mostly for recovery than for fitness, soâŠ
I will withdraw from HIIT & traditional weight training for a while and concentrate on building a solid aerobic base via walking / running on a treadmill as well as âsteady stateâ cardio with weights as per another article here on TN. All this to be performed below my MAF.
It is my understanding that even though it could take between 3 to 6 months to completely finalise the aerobic base, I should see improvements relatively quickly.
I will monitor morning waking heart rate to also manage the training for the day. (case in point, since eliminating weight training for 2 days, my waking heart rate has already started to drop).
So, that is the plan going forward, will hopefully keep you up to dateâŠ
I think this is your problem. Youâre wondering why:
Try eating a diet of only real food for an extended period of time, and I would bet a large sum of money all these issues disappear. One thing youâll notice that all diet articles on T Nation have in common: a large portion of your food $$ goes to Biotest supplements.
I did the math in another recent thread where this myth came up, but of the last 75 total articles posted, only 12 contain any links to a product. Itâs safe to say the link ratio in diet-specific articles are comparable. Possibly slightly higher because supplements are a basic part of any goal-focused nutrition plan.
If you or @antiquity would like to try supporting your claims with facts, give it your best shot. Otherwise, realize that youâre talking non-sense and spreading misinformation.
Wow, such a strong responseâŠdid @antiquity hit a nerve??
First off ChrisâŠyou do not know me well enough to tell me that I am a liar / spreading liesâŠfurther, I made no claims, I simply confirmed that following CTâs Fast / Feast plan will indeed take a large $$ portion of my food budget, I do not think that you can argue with me there as you have no idea what my food budget isâŠ
So, no, I am not talking non-sense nor spreading any liesâŠ
Sorry if you were offended, there was no malice intendedâŠare we cool?
Well, since you arenât spending as much money on food with that plan it can even out (I know that personally food cost a lot. I spend around 40$ per day on food⊠in Canada it might be a bit more expensive than in the US, but still).
Same thing with Chris Shugartâs velocity diet: people look at the price of the supplements and think itâs expensive. But since you buy a lot less food than normal it doesnât come up THAT expensive. Of course if someone eats at McDs everyday you can get by with around 20$ per day of food. And if you buy highly processed, âcheapâ food you can also spend 15-20$ per day (maybe less). But eating a non-processed diet can quickly become expensive. As I mentioned my personal food bill is around 40$ per day. When I travel to Europe it might be a bit less 25-30$. But that is still a large part of my budget.
In the sense that he stated something that was 100% false and you agreed with him, yes. He may as well have said âOne thing youâll notice that all training articles on T Nation have in common: a large portion of your workouts use kettlebells.â Itâs an imaginary statement thatâs demonstrably false.
I didnât say youâre a liar. Antiquity said something, you replied to his statement âthatâs no lieâ, I replied to indicate that youâre both incorrect.
And your food budget wasnât the point (although the Pulse Feast works out to about $15 a day for two meals, and youâre not going to eat two whole food meals that each deliver 60g protein for less than $15). I was primarily addressing his statement about âall T Nation diet articles suggesting Biotest supplements instead of foodâ. Thatâs why I laid out the exact numbers.
As long as everyone understands that his jab at Biotest supplements was misguided, at best, no prob. I wasnât offended, just clearing up a mistake I saw being shared.
Looks like weâre talking about different things. I was referring to articles about diet, not total articles. A quick glance at articles under âDiet and Nutritionâ just now shows that of the top 10 articles under that tab, 4 have links to Biotest products (below). I donât see that as a negative or overly âin your faceâ product advertising, and donât mean it as something that needs to be defended by anyone at T Nation. My statement was clearly an exaggeration, of course not âallâ diet articles will have links to Biotest, but many do.
Which is why I actually said: âI did the math in another recent thread where this myth came up, but of the last 75 total articles posted, only 12 contain any links to a product. Itâs safe to say the link ratio in diet-specific articles are comparable. Possibly slightly higher because supplements are a basic part of any goal-focused nutrition plan.â
Looking at just the Diet and Fat Loss section, 9 of the last 25 articles there contain product links. Again, because supplements and nutrition go hand in hand when talking about optimal results, itâs not unexpected to find more articles that do link to relevant products.
Nope. Not many. Not even most.
Shots that try knocking Biotest donât fly on the forum. So, yes, theyâll be addressed when they come up. This situation seems resolved though.