u/Greedy_Author3855

- John Meadows/Mountaindog1. Formerly one of the best coaches in the game (RIP) & a prime example of a guy who didn’t have good genetics but worked his ass off to get freaky jacked & shredded. Has like 2 million instructional videos about training every different body part on his channel. This is the guy to defer to if you’re trying to learn how to execute movements, structure workouts, etc. Also has a bunch of good programs available online if that’s your thing.

- John Jewett. This guy is a little gay sometimes but he’s still a great resource for anything bodybuilding related & his training instructionals are valuable.

- Chris Tuttle. One of the best coaches in the game. Does a lot of podcasts & is a great source of knowledge on everything from training to diet to drugs etc… believe he’s a registered dietician. Also a good personality/entertaining to listen to. Doesn’t make instructional vids like Jewett or John meadows but give some of his podcasts a listen.

- Seth Feroce, Evan Centopani, Nick Walker: these are more guys that are great to watch as examples of how you should be training.

First time since the diet started. Theres been zero cheating or slip ups on this one but I got fixated on the idea of a chipotle bowl for multiple days straight. So I ate that & then had a full tub of nonfat Greek yogurt with sugar free syrup & cinnamon plus some chicken & baked potato. Straight bullshit but it was good. Hopefully it’s out of my system. We’ll call it a refeed

On a side note I quit kratom completely like 2 weeks ago so that’s been good. 

The diet is reaching that point again. Getting out of bed is harder, cardio is hard, going to w*rk is hard. All I really feel like doing is laying down. Lately I’ve been zenned out. Can’t afford to let shit get to me & spend most of the day in my own head. I’ve started treating the day like a cardio session. I do 45 minutes on the treadmill each morning. When I’m doing that & the stopwatch reaches 15 minutes I’m 1/3 of the way done. Then at 30 I’m 2/3 done. My day is similar in the sense that it’s 3 blocks of time. In the mornings I clock into the pissing me off factory. After getting off I have to go train. Then I come home, eat, & go to my second job. After training & eating I tell myself “15 minutes left” 

In regards to being more zen, the strategy I’ve been trying to use to lessen some of my neuroticism is going places with the mindset of not absorbing any energy. I don’t care what other people are doing, I don’t have any emotional reaction towards it. I imagine myself walking around surrounded in a reflective translucent bubble that bounces shit off of me. Especially in the gym. I’m only there to output energy, can’t absorb anything. My brain needs to turn off, the analytical processes need to go quiet, that’s stopping me from outputting energy 

I’m not present for most of the day, even if I’m engaged in a talk with someone I like it doesn’t feel like I’m fully there. I think about reaching my goals around the clock & I visualize the mutation I want to have. I already achieved something like this & sometimes still feel surprised when I look in the mirror especially during times when I’m lean & striated. I’m going to stay locked in for 2 more bulk & cut cycles

There’s a lot of people online nowadays who say things like “bulking is cope” “food isn’t a stimulus” as a reaction to the older gym/bodybuilding culture of GOMAD type of activity & becoming obese on your bulk. Theres also a lot of dorks online who think that things like meal timing & eating a clean diet are “bro science cope” because IIFYM & CICO and etcetera even though guys that got huge have been utilizing nutrient timing & eating clean bodybuilding diets for decades (meaning there’s many years of empirical evidence behind doing this.) 

First thing I want to talk about is the “bulk cope/food isn’t a stimulus” thing. The statement “food isn’t a stimulus” is objectively false. There are two pathways in your body that are relevant to muscle gain- MTOR and AMPK. The former is the “growth” pathway. when MTOR is active your body is in building mode, this pathway comes on only when it senses that you have enough nutrients to justify letting your cells divide. Whereas AMPK is more like the repair & conserve pathway. This pathway is active under conditions of caloric restriction, whenever you’re doing cardio, when glycogen stores are low, etc… helps mobilize stored fat & glucose so you have energy. It also inhibits MTOR. 

There are a few things that activate MTOR.. like resistance training, testosterone, but also INSULIN and PROTEIN… leucine specifically is good at turning on MTOR which is part of why it’s important to eat clean food & not proteinslop bars all the time because it “fits your macros.” Also, when is insulin released? When you eat carbohydrates. We all know insulin is anabolic. Protein & calories are like drugs by themselves. Food & nutrients increase IGF1 production in the body, they give you permission to grow & divide. 

What does this mean in practical application? It means whether you’re trying to conserve muscle or trying to grow, you should be eating frequent meals, bodybuilding style- 4-6 meals per day for women and 5-7 meals per day for men. Each meal should have a solid hit of QUALITY protein from meat, poultry, fish, eggs/egg whites, whey, etc… anything high in leucine. I just divide my protein intake evenly up throughout my 6 meals except a bit less is allocated to the preworkout meal for digestion purposes. If you’re trying to get bigger, obviously these meals should also contain enough carbohydrates to elevate your glucose/insulin levels. 

This also means that when you’re trying to grow, you should give yourself an abundance of nutrients. You don’t get big “maingaining.” Make sure that MTOR is turned ON as often as possible. I’m not saying eat junk food & get fat. Don’t do either of those things. I’m simply saying you shouldn’t go for long periods of time without eating & that you should be in a solid caloric surplus, not a fucking 150 calorie surplus that might or might not be a surplus depending on your step count for the day. If you’re on PEDs and you want to get BIG… like mutation… you need an excess of nutrients for that. You need the insulin and the IGF1 signaling constantly. 

Lastly, in practical application this means that you should take advantage of nutrient timing & manipulate your insulin production on purpose. Bodybuilders who use drugs do this to a more extreme degree by injecting supraphysiological amounts of insulin around their workouts & cramming hundreds of grams of carbs into the body. If you’re natty then you obviously aren’t going to achieve those supraphysiological insulin levels, but you can still take advantage of insulin by spiking your blood sugar before, during & after the gym. Eat the sugar when it benefits you. Get the glucose & the insulin circulating in your blood when you’re about to train & jam that blood into your muscles. 

Saw this big dude in my gym who I’ve never seen before. Looked like he takes gear/does bodybuilding which is rare to see in my town. didn’t have headphones in so I walked up & pulled the old “yo bro you’re jacked any tips on training lats?” Since we were both training back. He goes “yes” in the stereotypical gruff Eastern European way. Found out he’s Ukrainian. Very thick accent, it was kind of hard to understand his speech. He starts by pulling these single handed mag grip sort of attachments from a gym bag & was raving about how I need to buy them lol

Shows me a few exercises then just pulls up Instagram on his phone and starts showing me pics of his car. His ig profile looked like some influencer shit, he has links in his bio for you to buy stuff lol. Also starts making me watch the YouTube videos he makes with his friend. It’s random foreigner e-slop. Like, videos of him & his friends doing donuts in Lamborghinis with Eastern European phonk music playing & blond lip filler bimbos walking around & smoke machines? Chill guy it was just a weird interaction. I didn’t expect to be trapped in it for 20 minutes

If you have a goal you aspire to reach with your physique & you’re not getting there then usually the god-honest solution to your problems is that you need to suffer more. I’m tired of people acting like fucking wimps. I see it online constantly & I hear it in real life from people I know who like complaining that they’re too fat or too skinny or can’t stick to a diet & always have some excuse as to why. No matter what excuses you come up with the reality is usually that you need to suffer more

“I can’t hit my protein goal” (LOL) “I can’t lose weight” “I’m doing everything right but I’m not gaining muscle” 

> Just get down the fucking food > Eat less, be hungrier > Take steroids

Usually you actually know exactly what you need to be doing but you’re not willing to do it. It takes what it takes… it doesn’t matter if you’re already doing 90 minutes of cardio & eating 2000 calories & still don’t have the veins & striations you want. Eat less & do more cardio. Another thing that irks me is that people also like to have a lot of nerdy little debates about nutrition & diet & what’s optimal. IIFYM bro!! A calorie is a calorie! No, you know exactly what you need to be eating which is single ingredient food & not bullshit garbage that “fits into your macros.” The former just isn’t as dopamine inducing as the latter. Suffer more

Don’t even get me started on “moderation” and “having a balanced lifestyle” which a lot of you 🚬s on this sub have complained at me about. Let me say it again, you know what you need to be doing to reach your goals if you want a body that’s impressive. That doesn’t involve hours & hours of socializing & going out with your friends every weekend. “It’s just for tonight bro it won’t affect anything” yes it will. If every week or every 2 weeks you chose to spend a weekend drinking & having fun instead of doing what you were supposed to be doing, in 3 years the guy who didn’t do that is going to mog you. Small decisions compound. 

A lot of the time my entire day is doing shit I don’t want to do. 45 minutes on the walking pad before work. Get off work, train hard for 2 hours then go home for an hour, prep food for tomorrow & go to work again because one job isn’t enough to fund my lifestyle & pay the bills. Go home, immediately make meal 5 & 6 then sleep. More chicken breast & green beans than I’d prefer to eat. No time for socializing & having fun aka getting nothing done. It’s hard but I’ve been making decisions like that for years on end & it’s why I don’t look like the same species as myself from 3 years ago. 

When I say that I’m not trying to complain. No one’s holding a gun to my head & I undoubtedly enjoy the long term process of self improvement. But day to day it’s often not at all fun or enjoyable. It’s just hard work & suffering. Like I said, small decisions compound. You need to be able to act like an adult & make the harder decision or deprive yourself today so you can benefit from it in weeks, months or years. Doing this not only allows you to take yourself wherever you want to get physically but also builds a tremendous amount of character & it’s turning me into a grown man. 

I’m dieting again so no more slamming 120+ grams of carbs before the gym & drinking 50 more grams of sugar inside the gym after taking insulin. So obviously the pumps are worse. Because of that I’ve started leveraging sodium & water more because I can’t use food to my advantage to the same extent.

I train about an hour after getting off work. at the end of my shift I started intentionally drinking a lot of water because I tend to feel dehydrated when getting home. I’m also drinking more water/electrolytes in the hour after getting home when I’m preparing food/cleaning/whatever before training. My preworkout meal is a big sodium bomb compared to my previous 2 meals. Also includes some potassium from No-Salt. more water/electrolytes while I’m eating preworkout meal. just don’t overdo it & cause dissension/nausea from drinking too much.

post workout meal is also high in sodium & potassium to help replenish whatever i lost. I also take like 15mg cialis before training which helps a lot when you’re not eating high carbs. highly recommend. Using cialis doesn’t revoke natty status but I get some people don’t want to take pharmaceuticals so if that’s you then use L citrulline , L arginine, liquid glycerol etc before you train

TLDR around physical activity is when you need the hydration & minerals (sodium potassium etc) to pull water into your muscles & help them feel full & contract well. especially pertinent when you’re eating lower carbs. place your highest salt intake around workouts & stay hydrated leading up to training

I want to post something insane to scare them away but there’s no Trenbolone inside me right now so I’m uninspired

Back in the dieting mode. Not too happy about it but it’s not too bad yet. I’m still at 3200-3400 calories. Thats about minus 1.5lbs per week for my size & activity level. Locking it down tighter to 3000 over the next week, going to try to get 2lbs per week off. I’m enjoying how I look for now. I’m looking really good after dropping a bunch of water weight from slashing the carbs + dropping all the drugs except 280 test. Some nice veins & striations back in, cheekbones pop out again, girls miring. It’s gonna get worse from here on out the lower the carbs get. I’m not actually depleted yet.

Here’s how I’m structuring this cutting phase. You can & should cut like this if you’re natty, in terms of the cardio regimen (minus t3/clen) & the way the meals are laid out. Protein intake is very high, 250 grams from real sources (chicken, fish, egg whites/eggs, yogurt.) 5 meals a day of 45g protein and a little less (30g) pre-workout.

Every morning starts with 37.5mcg of t3, 37.5mg ephedrine, 200mg caffeine. That goes down the hatch with electrolytes. Ephedrine will get replaced by clenbuterol when it comes in the mail.

After taking that I’m doing 35-45min of zone 2-3 cardio on the home walking pad. I do an hour if it’s a weekend but can’t do that long if I have to go to work. Fasted cardio with some stims/fat burners is amazing for fat loss. Highly recommend getting a walking pad. if you’re natty, like I said, skip the t3/clen & go for caffeine/ephedrine/yohimbine.

Post fasted cardio I eat 150g chicken breast with half a bag of microwave steamable greens (usually broccoli or green beans.) Keep the blood sugar low in the mornings. Drink more electrolytes/water here too. I season the fuck out of this meal with salty sugar free sauces & No-Salt for potassium.

Lunch at work is the same half bag of greens with 45 protein from chicken or tuna. Plus a small amount of carbs, like 100-150g baked potato.

Preworkout meal is chicken breast and about 60-80g carbs from an easily digestible source like cream of rice or regular white rice. This is the second largest carb bolus of the day.

Im not doing as many sets in the gym but training intensity is still high as fuck. this is critical when losing fat. Strength loss will come but regardless you need to try & maintain the strength & match the heavy sets you were doing X amount of weeks or months ago.

Post workout meal is also 45g protein from chicken breast plus 150-200g carbs from easily digestible sources. Largest carb bolus of the day, carbs get lower after this

Second to last meal is egg whites & a bowl of oatmeal. This meal is a few hours before bed. At this point of the day we also want to start keeping that blood sugar low, so oats are a great option.

Last meal is a big bowl of Greek yogurt. Filling & slow digesting casein at bedtime is super helpful if you’re cutting. Little bit of pb2 & frozen berries in that - again, blood sugar should stay low/stable

Anyone who’s serious about training knows how to utilize body english / momentum / “bad form” in their sessions. It’s an intensity technique, like doing partials at the end of a set. Using bad form can be fucking great for destroying whatever muscle you’re hitting

Keep in mind that you need to have some discernment as far as when you choose to use body english & how you execute it. I don’t advocate for training like Ronnie Coleman or Branch Warren where you’re using excessive momentum from rep 1. Begin the set keeping form as clean as possible & bust out the momentum at the end to squeeze the last bit of energy out of the target muscle

When people say you should end your set when form starts to break down that’s a lie & you’re shortchanging yourself if you do that every time. I agree with that statement if we’re talking a heavy set of squats or deadlifts where there’s a real risk of severe injury. If it’s something like bicep curls, rear delt flies, lateral raises, smith machine or cable rows, tricep pushdowns, you should absolutely be applying momentum & body english as an intensity technique AFTER doing clean reps to totally exhaust your muscles

By the way In the case of squats where it’s not advisable to do reps with shitty form you can torture yourself by dropsetting or moving into bulgarians with lighter dumbbells or bodyweight, supporting your foot on a nearby bench or machine

Momentum & egolifting within reason can also be a great way to progressively overload. If you’re stuck curling X weight for a heavy 4 reps then the most reasonable way to overload is to try and get it for 5-6 reps. but sometimes for whatever reason it just doesn’t happen even though you’ve been trying or have tried switching exercises etc. Pick up the next set of dumbbells, try to get as many clean reps as you can then start swinging that shit. If everything else is in line with nutrition recovery etc eventually you don’t need to ego lift it anymore. Understand? This is exactly how I went from curling 55s to 60s to 65s

In the RS subs there’s plenty of people who acknowledge the importance of how you look or even fully lean into being vain & narcy. But on the flip side, any time there’s a discussion about fitness & working out in one of these subs there’s a subset of 🚬’s who say dumb shit like “I don’t care about how I look bro I just work out to be good at rock climbing!” Often in a way that comes off as virtue signaling. 

Comments like that always irked the shit out of me. The person saying it is usually under the impression that working out to look good is “useless” or morally inferior because it’s only for vanity’s sake whereas working out only to be better at a sport is “useful” & “serves a purpose.” You’re dumb as fuck if you think how your body looks doesn’t matter. This is coming from someone who’s been close to 300lbs & ugly as fuck, 160lbs & anatomy chart shredded, 230lbs & roided out, plus everywhere in between, all in the span of the last 3-4 years. I’m a blackpill Jedi bro. Your head would spin if you experienced the level of mutation that I have 

I’m not going to debate anyone on whether or not it matters how your body looks/if you’re visibly jacked/in shape. Other people’s first perception of you is your physical form. Having big muscles and being lean speaks positive things to your character without you having to say or demonstrate anything in the same way that being fat or poorly maintained speaks negatively to your character. The halo effect & the horn effect are scientifically proven to be real things, so this notion that working out to look good is useless & vain needs to go away. What is getting better at rock climbing going to do for you besides make you better at rock climbing

Being jacked & in shape opens doors for you in terms of business/careers, making friends, dating, etcetera. There’s also just a general quality of life improvement because other people speak to you with more respect. As a man, other men immediately respect you more when they see big ass muscles. Being jacked is kind of comparable to being 6’4 or something. Being physically large commands respect from men in a lizard brain way. Muscles obviously help with women too but not always in a way that’s as straightforward as they find being jacked sexually attractive. Some of them do, or they do up to a certain level of size & leanness. but even if big muscles don’t always turn women on, they get turned on when they see that other men respect you & want to be your friend. Thats a form of status. They like it when you have physical presence in a room & when you carry yourself confidently. Bodybuilding & getting big is a tried & true way to develop that swagger if you’re a young guy who struggles with confidence 

I was watching jay Cutler’s podcast with Milos Sarcev last night. Milos was talking about how he came to the US from Serbia broke as shit. Said he got an interview at a gym & got hired despite speaking no English & not having permission to work in America because he was jacked & aesthetic & the gym owner was gay lol. Went on to say that Joe Weider saw his pictures & let him compete in the IFBB even though he didn’t have legal residency. Again, all because he was jacked & looked good.  

There’s definitely an element of coping & excuse making to people saying “I don’t care about how I look I just train to be good at ______” because getting noticeably big, noticeably lean, or both is really hard. It’s way easier to be a rock climbing 🚬 who just eats whatever & tries to get stronger on wrist curls over time. If you want to get jacked & lean you have to make it your lifestyle because everything you do matters. 

I always wanted big shoulders & arms, so when I started lifting a few years ago I followed the “spam lateral raises” advice & always believed in getting in isolation sets for forearms & whatnot. The issue with that is that it becomes a pain in the ass to do a bunch of lateral raises, reverse curls/wrist curls, ab work, etc if you just got done training chest, shoulders, tris, back, with high volume and/or high intensity. This is why you implement bullshit day 

For the first 2/3 to 3/4 of this bulk I trained legs hard twice a week. Put on a good amount of size & strength. However I’m not fiending for bigger legs & feel like upper body size is more important. So instead of doing a full leg day, to finish this bulk off, leg volume has dropped down while intensity remains. Rather than doing the full leg day I use that workout as the chance to do the bullshit I don’t want to do on chest & back days, like forearms, shrugs, abs, plus even more sets of lateral raises & rear delt flies. So I’m maintaining the legs I built while being able to hit shoulders 4 times a week (lmao) plus getting in the tedious isolation work so I don’t get bogged down by it on push & pull day.

It takes much less volume to maintain size you’ve already built. Just make sure the intensity is there. You can use different techniques to ensure that. The first part of bullshit day sucks because it’s stuff like drop sets on Bulgarian split squats but I only have to do a little bit of that & then I still feel fresh for the isolation work. My legs haven’t lost size from doing this. 

Ive never seen a pro bodybuilder in real life. Trying to conceptualize how an Olympia type of physique would look in person. People always say that pictures don’t do that type of physique justice. I have no frame of reference for how a guy in the 250-300 lean range would look. Closest thing I’ve seen was a men’s physique competitor at my old gym. Dont know if he was even a pro or not but I remember thinking damn this dude looks wide as shit. A guy like nick walker would probably look crazy as fuck in person but again I have no frame of reference because I’ve never seen anyone that was even close to being that big.