Today’s newsletter deals with some of the lessons that I came across in my long journey through the weight room.
If you prefer a more visual delivery here is the video https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1404594452967546&id=100002510152012
Lesson1
You need a supportive environment. Growing up, my parents were very supportive of the sport in terms of financial support, cooking the right foods, etc. Later on, my family took the same role. If you environment does not support you, you might have to make changes.
Lesson 2
You need to know what you are training for. When I was training to be a faster swimmer, my body looked a lot different than when I wanted to be a better bodybuilder.
Lesson 3
Adjust your diet for your body type. When starting my first prep, I went on a zero-carb, high-fat diet, with disastrous consequences; my body look liked hell and my workouts were void of energy. Once I switched to a higher carb, low fat routine, things improved dramatically. Take away: the leaner and the fitter you are, the more carbs you’ll need.
Lesson 4
Train for your body type. For a while, I was under the impression that I was a hard gainer and therefore should train very little with huge weights. It yielded nothing… my body has small joints and mostly type 1 fibers, making me a prime candidate for high volume, medium weight, medium intensity training. Instead of training three times a week, I should have trained twice a day.
Lesson 5
Most supplements are crap. At some point, I tried to cover up sub par eating habits with the excessive use of supplements. It does not work. Outside protein, creatine, caffeine, fish oil, zinc, and wobenzym… the list gets very thin
Lesson 6
Long bulking cycles don’t work for natural athletes. After my first contest, I decided to get bigger, so I ate everything in sight for three months. Result: a fat man in June. If you want to put on weight, eat above your maintenance for two to three weeks, then cut back for a week.
Lesson 7
You need a greater reason to train. Most of my success came when I tried to be a better family man, father, and educator to others.
Lesson 8
The boring stuff works. Once I discovered periodization, along with proper loading and delay phases, I made the most progress even though I was already in my late 30s.
Lesson 9
The flashy stuff does not work. Over the years, I tried every hot program under the sun, with very meager results. Remember, if the was a way to train only 20 minutes a week, do you think the NFL would still do two a day?
Lesson 10
Learn how to pose: even if you have no desire to go on stage, learning how to pose will dramatically improve your results since it will better the mind-muscle connection; this holds especially true for harder-to-train muscles, such as back or hamstrings.