- Just married (dieting is not the best way to start a marriage)
- Wife is pregnant (that means two of us are cranky in the house)
- Can’t afford it -> entry fee, org. card, polygraph fee, gas money, new posing trunks (new house, making gym in basement, I have more than myself to worry about now)
- Can’t take vacation in Sept (we have a big project cutting over in my department on Oct. 1)
- I don’t look any better than I did last year (what’s the point then?)
- I don’t seem as in to it as last year (last year I watched all the videos, read books, etc…. this year I’m just doing it)
- Low energy (My 6 year old step-daughter still wants to play with me a lot… in a few years she probably won’t… I hate to waste this time with her because I’m dieting)
A lot of bodybuilders think of bodybuilding as their life. That’s not me though… bodybuilding is a hobby… my family is my life. Bodybuilding would never bring me the happiness that they have. However, my family is very supportive of my bodybuilding. My wife does the grocery shopping and even prepares most of my food for me. But doing a contest is very hard on a family. I still get cranky… even if it’s for a split second. It’s hard for me to put my family in that situation.
Bodybuilding is just something I do. I try to do it 100% and put my all into it… but I have to remember to keep things in perspective. A lot of times I question if dieting for a contest is worth it… it’s not that it causes huge problems… it just places little burdens on everyone that you know… really. So this week I’m focusing on keeping things in perspective and realizing that there are more important things than bodybuilding… while at the same time still doing the very best that I can. I’m trying not to let my hobby get in the way of living my life.
With all that said… I’m about 11 weeks out now. Here are some pics.
I haven’t been too happy with the last two workouts. Arms on Thursday was worthless and today we were maxing out on squat. I squatted 425, but I quit there after this happened when my bro was squatting 565:
In other news, we did watch Rambo and it was awesome. I recommend every watch it. Here’s my favorite trailer:
I’ve been busy and lazy - so I’m barely getting around to blogging for this weekends workouts.
I was also able to watch the new Jay Cutler video - From Jay-to-Z. Jay seems a lot more human in this video… he says a lot of times he only has been eating 3 or 4 meals a day, and lately he hadn’t had much time to train so he was feeling small. This was before his 2nd Olympia win, so sometime during the year he must’ve got it together.
Yesterday was squat. Every workout seems to get better, it’s been great this last few months, breaking down personal barriers. Yesterday’s sets were:
- 135 x 5 (x 2, warm up)
- 225 x 5
- 315 x 5
- 385 x 5 (this was a tough set)
- 415 x 3 (assisted, just to get used to the heavy weight)
It was another great leg day and we killed our quads after squat with front squat and extensions.
Today was Shoulders and Biceps, but in preparation for the powerlifting meet we’ve also starting benching heavy on Sundays too, first thing. Today’s bench was good. I worked up to 305 for 2 which was tough. So then I jumped to 325 and blew right through it. Then I tried 340 and got it about halfway up. These are without the pauses at the bottom which is required in powerlifting though… so in the next few weeks we’re going to start training for that.
Then we did our regular shoulder and bicep workout. We did dumbbell shoulder press, then 3 sets of 10 with dumbbell curls (I felt these really well), cable side laterals, rear laterals, and barbell curls.
Me and my brother lift at Gold’s Gym in Omaha. Everytime we lift I hate the gym a little bit more. We’ve thought long and hard about different options - but right now it looks like we’re stuck at Gold’s Gym.
Gold’s has treated us pretty good for the past 2 years, however they’ve recently decided to make some changes. They’ve put ads on the radio saying “they don’t want any concrete heads” … “and people carrying around gallon jugs of water”. The gym itself has turned into a circus with lights and sirens going off complete with Disney music in the background.
Everybody who lifts any amount of weight jokes about it all the time - “you’re going to set off the alarm!” And the serious lifters aren’t really a small portion of these gyms’ members. We’re all experienced and have been at the gym for a while, but according to their radio ad, “Gold’s Gym would rather get a new member than keep an old one.” How does that make any of their members feel?
My bro sent me an e-mail today with a quote that he liked and I did too:
As a young lifter, I remember going into the gym and seeing some really big, strong dudes lifting heavy weights, clapping chalk, and making a lot of noise. The music playing on the stereo made you want to work out the moment you walked inside. This has been replaced by a bunch of pencil neck “trainers” with extra-medium muscle shirts and small shorts running around with clipboards having their clients balance on top of a swimming pool ball, juggle dumbbells, and recite their ABCs backwards. - Paul Caldwell
I searched and found the rest of the article here: www.EliteFTS.com I don’t know who Paul Caldwell is and have never lifted at his training facility - but I’d like to… anything’s got to be better than Golds Gym Omaha.
I’ll start with my big news - I got engaged last week. I’m really happy and excited to become Pearl’s husband and Brooklyn’s step-dad. However, life and bodybuilding don’t mix. We want to get married this year (2008) and we want to get married in the spring/summer. This happens to be right in the middle of my diet for the Kansas City show in September. So here’s my rough plan - I’m going to start dieting a few weeks ahead of time… probably the first week of April. We’re planning on getting married in May and I’ll probably let loose a little bit - eat some normal food, a small piece of cake, and some alcohol. I honestly don’t think it’ll mess up my diet that much - and if it does… I’m not going to put bodybuilding ahead of my life.
Speaking of life… here is a brief video of my Christmas with my family:
Other holiday news. I got a new, accurate scale so I don’t have to rely on gym scales . Switching back and forth between gyms was giving me an inaccurate record of my weight. Now I can weigh myself at the same time every day - so I’m excited about that. Also, on the topic of weight - I think I’m the only person in the world who loses weight during the holiday’s. I weighed myself earlier today and I was down a few pounds since Friday.
And other news - my bro decided to start a blog regarding his training. Check it out at http://ZackBest.WordPress.com.
It’s been a long weekend off of lifting - tomorrow is back on the grind.
This is my first post. There will be a lot more to come in the near future.