The Story of The Bodybuilding Powerlifter

[MailmanMuscle]

Friday 3/1/24: 9,413 steps, 3.4 miles, 1 floor climbed

These are just a few notes and observations from day 1 at the Arnold:

I found a new, low calorie hack for coffee at my hotel (where it’s free 24/7). It’s 4 teaspoons of flavored creamer, 4 tablespoons of unsweetened almond milk, and 2-3 packets of Splenda. This makes 16-20 ounces of coffee remarkably good.

I met the defending Arnold Classic champion, Samson Dauda. That didn’t help my struggle with body dysmorphia.

A new Arnold Classic Physique champion was crowned, Wesley Vissers. He’s taller than Chris Bumstead. That division will be very interesting at the 2024 Olympia.

I was happy to see that USA Powerlifting got an upgrade in terms of production value, location, and seating. They used to be in the main concourse of the convention center where the expo is held. Now, they’re inside the expo with stadium style seating. After this bodybuilding thing, I might have to set my sights on getting back to that platform. I haven’t been to The Arnold as a competitor since 2010.

I ran into Ed Coan today. He’s still the

I saw Dr. Mike Israetel for the 2nd year in a row, and this time, we got to meet his wife too. I showed him our picture from last year and he said he remembered us, and they both gave me some very encouraging words about my upcoming show. That was cool.

7X Figure Olympia champion Cydney Gillon gave me some good advice about fat burners. I think I’m going to use one for the remainder of prep. I don’t know that it will help with “burning fat” directly, but if it helps with appetite control, then it will be worth it to me.

We got A LOT of free stuff - mostly energy drinks and ready to drink bottles of protein.

I’m looking forward to Saturday! I’m having one of my two planned cheat meals tomorrow. There’s a local market here that sells what may be the best fried chicken I’ve ever had. We brought some bagged salad at a grocery store today with some low calorie dressing to eat with it, so I can minimize the damage.

[Clearwater47]

Sounds awesome! Wesley looked amazing from the video and pics I saw. I didn't see anything from the finals, but he blew me away in pre judging. Looked like a clear winner, but I was doubtful they'd actually place him ahead of Ramon. Really happy for him.

Samson is just a beast of a human being. If he keeps growing and ever figures out how to really nail the conditioning he'll be hard to beat.

This is very much off subject, but I had my first Colonoscopy yesterday. I randomly came across your video on that a few weeks back when I was watching videos on it, and then later saw your username here and realized you were the same person from the video I had watched. Thanks for sharing that video - it helped put me at ease for the procedure.

[MarkKO]

Low-key jealous you got to meet Samson, he's my favourite bodybuilder by a mile.

[MailmanMuscle]

Here’s a brief check in while watching the finals of the Arnold Classic.

Low-key jealous you got to meet Samson, he's my favourite bodybuilder by a mile.

He’s one of the nicest monsters I’ve ever met. He’s also a fantastic ambassador for the sport. I’m watching the livestream of the finals right now. He’s either going to finish 2nd to Hadi Choopan, or he’s winning for the 2nd year in a row. (UPDATE: Hadi won, deservedly so)

Sounds awesome! Wesley looked amazing from the video and pics I saw. I didn't see anything from the finals, but he blew me away in pre judging. Looked like a clear winner, but I was doubtful they'd actually place him ahead of Ramon. Really happy for him.

Samson is just a beast of a human being. If he keeps growing and ever figures out how to really nail the conditioning he'll be hard to beat.

This is very much off subject, but I had my first Colonoscopy yesterday. I randomly came across your video on that a few weeks back when I was watching videos on it, and then later saw your username here and realized you were the same person from the video I had watched. Thanks for sharing that video - it helped put me at ease for the procedure.

I didn’t think Wesley won, but I’m not mad that he did. He looked fantastic. It’s going to be fun to see him next to CBum. If Samson doesn’t win tonight, it’s going to be due to lack of conditioning. (UPDATE: he lost)

Man, I’m so glad to read that about the video. Most of the videos that I’ve made that got lots of views are the ones that I wish I could have found before I experienced or learned whatever was in it. Having that effect for others means mission accomplished.

Saturday 3/2/24: 9,257 steps, 3.5 miles, 2 floors climbed

I’ve spent 10-15 minutes practicing posing in our hotel room each night so far.

I got 10 lbs of whey isolate for $60 from Mutant. I would have bought vanilla, but they had already sold out of it, so I settled for strawberry. At that price, I’ll be happy with it.

As mentioned in yesterday’s post, I did buy a fat burner today: Burn from Core Nutritionals, which I didn’t know was owned by Paul Revilia - who I’ve enjoyed on YouTube a lot. It has 50 servings, but I’m not jumping right into a full serving. I’ll start with a half serving for a month, and if necessary that will leave me with another 35 full servings. That’s 65 servings to cover the next 68 days.

My wife made me sit and watch a bikini fashion show with her. I “reluctantly” agreed.

Speaking of bikinis, after all of these years, I still don’t understand the judging criteria for the bikini division of bodybuilding. The fashion show was more fun to watch than the bikini competition.

We already don’t need to buy more energy drinks for a few months, and we have one more day to stack up. I’ll post photos of our free stuff after tomorrow.

Speaking of photos, I’ll be sharing IG posts as I put them up over the next few days, starting with this one. I’m itching to get to the gym tomorrow evening!

[MailmanMuscle]

Yesterday’s travel home got me behind on my log, but this IG posts give ome insight into how Sunday went, on top of the 10,652 steps and 3.9 miles (no data on flights climbed for some reason).

[MailmanMuscle]

In my last post, I left my IG posts from Sunday as a recap of what I did in the gym. If you’re interested in more detail and nuance of how that Sunday session after the Arnold expo went, here’s the recap video I uploaded to YouTube.



As of today, I’m 9 1/2 weeks out (shout out to Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke, for those old enough to catch that). I’m just past the halfway point of the prep for this show. For a reference point, I’m at least 5’7” plus maybe another 1/4-1/2 inch tall. On the last 2 mornings, I weighed 185.8 and 186.0 lbs. My waist is down to between 31.5” and 31.75” (started at 34”). My neck is down to 15.5” from 16”. The bodyfat calculator I’ve been using says that means I’m down to about 12.5% bodyfat from the 16.6% I started at. I think this scale is still fairly accurate. I’m seeing lines I’ve never seen on myself before, and veins are showing up all over the place, including my shoulders, lower abs and thighs. It’s actually freaking me out a little, but in a good way.

According to one of the tutorials I’ve been getting guidance from, I should be 10-12% bodyfat at this point, but definitely not at/over 15%. So I think I’m on track, but I’d rather pick up the pace a little for my own peace of mind. I’m not making drastic changes, but there are a few things that I’ve been holding off on that I’m going to start.

1. Diet/Supplements
* Switch to more lower fat protein sources going forward, meaning chicken breast, and switching to 93% lean ground beef instead of the 90% I’ve been eating. 93% lean ground turkey and 92% ground chicken are still in play. Also less egg yolks (1 max per day). Still drinking 1% milk, but only about 12 ounces per day, 16 ounces max.

* 2 tablespoons of half and half in coffee. I usually drink two cups per day, so that reduction in cream makes a big difference in fat intake. Once we run out of the half and half in the fridge, I’ll start using the flavored creamer hack I discovered in Columbus.

* I started using one of the fat burners I got at the Arnold.

2. Training
* No more rest-pause until after the show. I may not even do drop sets. One or two max effort work sets per exercise. This is more about injury prevention than anything else. I can hear Dorian Yates in my head, reminding me that the injuries he sustained were from continuing to push the intensity and load too high close to the Mr. Olympia competitions.

* No more trying to increase the weights on exercises, barring some exceptional wave of strength on a given day. If I can increase reps with the same weight I used on something from a previous session, then I will. That will indicate that I’m not getting weaker. But I’m not going to attempt a load that I haven’t done in the past few weeks. This is also another injury prevention protocol.

With all of that said, I got back to work yesterday, and back to the gym tonight. Here’s how that went.

Tuesday 3/5/24: 14,690 steps, 6.8 miles, 5 floors climbed

Wednesday 3/6/24: 11,814 steps, 5.2 miles, 6 floors climbed

Upper #2, Planet Fitness

Smith Machine Pendlay Row - discovered these in the last week or so - they’re a keeper
bar/15 reps
90 lbs + bar/10 reps
140+/10
180+/8 (0:26) - started using Versa Gripps here; last 2 reps didn’t touch my stomach
160+/10 (0:32) - next to last rep didn’t touch

What makes these so effective is the gym’s rule against slamming or dropping weights. Since I don’t want to make noise, I have to be able to control the weight on the way down, which is very different from the way I remember doing Pendlay rows with a free barbell. “Catching” the weight at the bottom puts a lot of heavy tension on you in a stretched position, and setting your lats to start each rep from a dead stop still requires you to generate a lot of force on the concentric part.

Low Incline Bench Press - On these benches, the 1 position is flat, and the 7 position is vertical. I had it on 2 for inclines.
bar/10+ reps
90 lbs + bar/10 reps
140+/6
160+/7 (0:30)
145+/7 + negative (0:31) - I knew this was my last set, and that I couldn’t get an 8th rep, so I did a slow negative as low as I could before racking it.

Rear Delt Machine
70 lbs/13 reps
130/18 (0:46) - the last 3 reps were partials

Pec Dec - done on the same machine as rear delts, facing the opposite way
85 lbs/12 reps
145/13 (0:46) - last 2 were partials

Smith Machine Shrugs - I don’t know why I didn’t do these after the bench press
90 lbs + bar/10 reps
180+/10
270+/12 (0:32)
230+/13 (0:35) - used Versa Gripps for both work sets

Arnold Press - weights are per hand
45 lbs/8 reps
60/9 (0:45)
50/10 (0:45)

I was really happy with this exercise. I haven’t done Arnolds since February 19, and that day I used 65’s for 10 reps on the first round of a drop set. That was the first upper body exercise I did that day, and second overall. I’ll take 9 reps with 60’s doing them last as a good sign that strength - and also muscle - is still largely intact.

If time allows, I’ll do triceps and calves in the gym on my route tomorrow.

[MarkKO]

You've got a solid plan going forward it seems.

[cgeorg]

Agreed, and this is a really fun and well written journey to follow.

[Renascent]

Agreed, and this is a really fun and well written journey to follow.

+1

[cole]

sounds like you had fun man. im kind of jealous, seems like a great event to go to. also got some quality time in with the wife it looks like.

[DCR]

Echoing everyone that this continues to be a great follow.

For a dude at your current BW / bodyfat percentage and dropping, those are some serious Arnold presses.

[MarkKO]

Echoing everyone that this continues to be a great follow.

For a dude at your current BW / bodyfat percentage and dropping, those are some serious Arnold presses.

You've seen his arms and shoulders, right?

[DCR]

Echoing everyone that this continues to be a great follow.

For a dude at your current BW / bodyfat percentage and dropping, those are some serious Arnold presses.

You've seen his arms and shoulders, right?

Haha yes, they’ve been making me consider a Planet Fitness membership.

[MailmanMuscle]

You've got a solid plan going forward it seems.

From your mouth to God’s ears…

Agreed, and this is a really fun and well written journey to follow.

+1

Echoing everyone that this continues to be a great follow.

Thank you all! Glad you’re enjoying it, and I’m glad I found this forum. This is a fantastic group to be a part of.

For a dude at your current BW / bodyfat percentage and dropping, those are some serious Arnold presses.

You've seen his arms and shoulders, right?

Haha yes, they’ve been making me consider a Planet Fitness membership.

Here are clips of the top sets reported in yesterday’s post, in sequential order from left to right. The aforementioned Arnold presses are in the last clip. My new favorite back exercise - Pendlay rows in the smith machine - are first.



I did manage to get to the PF on my route today for a bonus workout. Triceps, calves, abs. Done in 15 minutes.

Thursday 3/8/24: 10,908 steps, 4.8 miles, 3 floors climbed

Cable Pressdown - with V handle
30 lbs/10 reps
50/10
80/1 - nope, my elbows asked if I was crazy
70/10
70/11

Triceps Press Machine - basically a seated dip machine
130 lbs/10 reps
205/13
205/10

Calf Press - on seated upright leg press
145 lbs/13 reps
205/16

Hammer Ab Crunch Machine
50 lbs/15 reps
70/15

[MailmanMuscle]

Friday 3/8/24: 15,313 steps, 6.9 miles, 8 floors climbed

Yesterday, I was dragging from the moment I got out of bed, and not the normal drowsiness because I didn’t sleep enough. It was straight up lethargy. My daily wake up weigh in was 184.8 lbs, up 0.2 lbs from the day before - essentially no change. I had a hunch that the culprit for the lack of energy was a lack of carbs on Thursday. By dinner time, which for me is always late (after 8-9 pm), I had only consumed 115 of the 205 grams so was allotted for the day. But because of a recurring problem with the gas supply to our house (it’s inconvenient, not dangerous), we were unable to cook what we planned for dinner or for my workday food on Friday. So my wife and I ran out to get salads from MOD Pizza (they’re an amazing value by fast food standards) before they closed.

The salad had plenty of protein and just enough fat, but very few non-fibrous carbs. So I wasn’t hungry when I woke up. I just didn’t want to move. Once I finished loading my mail truck, I decided to go to the Subway near the post office and get a footlong rotisserie chicken sandwich. I figured the bread would be a good start to getting some desperately needed carbs.

I think I was right, because I started feeling better almost immediately after I started eating. But once I started, it seemed like I couldn’t stop. I didn’t eat any one thing that would wreck a diet, but I kept nibbling at stuff like beef jerky, “bootleg” peanut butter (made out of Great Value PB Fit), rice cakes, and some other pre packed stuff I had. By the end of the night, I was way over all of my macros for the day.

I would attach a screenshot from the app, but I’m being told that the file is too large. I wanted to show that while I was prescribed 190 protein, 50 fat, 250 carbs (all in grams), I landed on 245/80/235.

I was sure that I must have lost some ground on the fat loss. Somehow, I woke up at 183.0 lbs, which I can’t make any sense of. I don’t think I excreted enough water or anything else to account for more than a pound and a half in one day.

Whatever happened, my bodyfat calculates between 11.5 and 12% now. The plan is lower body training and posing at Gold’s tonight after work. I’m exactly 9 weeks out from showtime.

[MarkKO]

Just a thought, have you considered something like Skiploads going forward? As I've said before, I know very little about bodybuilding let alone the pointy end of the diet but I recall reading a bunch of Skip Hill's articles and I follow him on Insta and FB. He mentioned these repeatedly, and if I recall the idea is to strategically overload on calories at points during prep. You'll have to look up exactly how he sets it out, but I think it's something along those lines.

[Clearwater47]

Yeah, I know little about bodybuilding prep as well, but I have no doubt that the reduction in food takes a toll physically, mentally, and emotionally.

[MailmanMuscle]

Just a thought, have you considered something like Skiploads going forward? As I've said before, I know very little about bodybuilding let alone the pointy end of the diet but I recall reading a bunch of Skip Hill's articles and I follow him on Insta and FB. He mentioned these repeatedly, and if I recall the idea is to strategically overload on calories at points during prep. You'll have to look up exactly how he sets it out, but I think it's something along those lines.

I had never heard of Skiploading until I read this. Thank you for the lead. I read some articles that he wrote on it, and I’m trying to figure it out. I don’t know if I have enough time for to travel the trial and error learning curve it seems to require for this show. But I might. And those Skipload periods look like fun.

Yeah, I know little about bodybuilding prep as well, but I have no doubt that the reduction in food takes a toll physically, mentally, and emotionally.

It really does. I think I’m managing it fairly well so far, but I’m bracing myself for more challenges over the next nine weeks, especially starting tomorrow.

The month of Ramadan began at sunset tonight, which means tomorrow is the first day I’ll be striving to fast over the next 29-30 days. For those who aren’t familiar, the fast of Ramadan is a daily practice during the 9th month of the Islamic calendar, which includes among other things, abstaining from food and drink during the daytime hours (essentially sunrise to sunset). On the east coast of the United States, that’s going to be roughly a 12 hour fasting window at the start of the month, and approaching 13 hours by the end. Ideally, I would not stack this fast on top of a contest prep - especially since I’ve never done a contest prep - but the date of my best show option necessitated it. So here we go.

My plan is to consume 1/4-1/3 of my daily macros in the morning before the fast starts, then another 1/4-1/3 when the fast ends, then the remainder later in the evening. If it’s a training day, then we’ll hit the gym between the first and second post-fasting meals. I’ll probably consume shakes more than I have been in the past few weeks because I’ll have less time to chew food. My primary focus is protein - if I am hitting that target within my feeding window from the sources I’m down to now, then the is likely to take care of itself.
Besides, based on what I see in the diet app, I don’t have too many macros to worry about.

Saturday 3/9/24: 13,277 steps, 5.9 miles, 7 floors climbed

Lower #2, Gold’s

This was our first time at Gold’s in about 2 weeks or more. In that time, they got rid of the vertical leg press, which I LOVED. So I’m pissed about that. They also got rid of what I thought was the best of their two pendulum squats. My wife and I both planned to do smith machine good mornings, but for what may be the first time since we’ve wanted to use one, all of the smith machines at Gold’s were in use. So we did them on the reverse hack squat. At least they got a new one with a better platform angle than the one we’ve done these on before.

Standing Calf Raise - outside the locker rooms, get them out of the way
10 reps each with 100, 140, 180, 200, and 160 lbs

I didn’t plan on doing 5 sets of these, but my wife took a little extra time coming out of the locker room, so I kept going

Good Morning - on a reverse hack squat
47.5 lbs/10-12 reps - I realized after doing several reps to get a feel for the machine that a 45 and a 2.5 lbs plate were loaded on it
90/10
180/8
270/9
270/12 - I used the belt for these work sets.

Prone Leg Curl
90 lbs/12 reps
140/18 - really 14 plus 4 partials

Reverse Leg Press

This is a new addition to the gym. It functions like a hack squat, but it looks like a leg press in reverse, with the platform on the bottom and the back pad/seat on the top. I don’t know what it’s actually called, or what the empty sled weighs.

sled/15 reps
90+/10
180+/8
270+/9
300+/8 plus negative after the last rep

I used a belt on the last set. I also found with the empty sled that I’m not trapped if I bottom out the sled. So once I knew I couldn’t make another rep, I did a slow negative and climbed out of the machine at the bottom.

Leg Extension
65 lbs/8 reps + 110/8 - paused long enough to change the pin
155/18
left only: 80/13

“Super Abs” Machine
125 lbs/25 - left side
125/15 + 10 - right side

[MarkKO]

Ramadan kareem to you.

[MailmanMuscle]

Ramadan kareem to you.

Thank you my friend!

As of today, I have 8 weeks and 4 days until the stage. And after 2 days of fasting, I think 2 outcomes are possible. One is that the journey to diet fatigue is accelerated. The other is that once Ramadan ends, being able to spread my ever shrinking daily allotment of macros out over the day will give me a boost to close this thing out by managing hunger better. I’m clearly hoping for the latter.

I’m also trying to be more active on YouTube. Here’s a video I uploaded today with me going through my upper body session from last week (3/6/24). I’m talking through my work sets of Pendlay rows, incline bench and shrugs in the smith machine, plus Arnold press, pec deck and rear delts.



Catching up on everything else…

Sunday, 3/10/24: 5,389 steps, 2.1 miles, 4 floors climbed

Monday, 3/11/24: 5,654 steps, 2.2 miles, 15 floors climbed (!?!)

Upper, Planet Fitness - It was so crowded in there last night, that I don’t know how this fits into my rotation. I just did work.

Cable Pulldown - neutral grip, fairly wide

55 lbs/14 reps
120/9
160/7
200/10 - more like 9 1/2, started using Versa Gripps on this set
170/8

Straight Arm Pulldown - makeshift pullovers, shoulder width grip on the short/straight bar

55 lbs/5 reps
80/0 - nope, wouldn’t have gotten enough reps
65/9

Chest Press Machine - put the seat to mimic a very slight incline bench path

55 lbs/12 reps - not sure why I was stuck on this weight for first warmup sets
100/9
145/5 - started a 6th rep, and bailed after maybe 1/4 rep
120/8

I have always found this machine to be deceptively difficult, but I was a bit disappointed with this. I wanted to do this exercise first, but both machines were in use. Had I been able to start with this, would I have gotten 6-7 reps with that top set? I don’t know.

Rear Delt Machine
30 lbs/5 reps
145/17 - a lot of these were partials

Pec Deck - same machine, facing the other way
145 lbs/11 reps

Upright Row - did these with the fixed weight barbells
50 lbs/15 reps - probably could/should count this as a work set, but I know I had some reps in the tank
60/17 - slight cheat on the last 2 reps

Cable Curl - cable set at the floor, short/straight bar
50 lbs/12 reps

Cable Pressdown - moved the same cable to the top setting, same bar
50 lbs/4 reps
65/13

Believe it or not, I got all of that done in 36 minutes. I didn’t record any of this, and my wife and I did not do any of these exercises together, even though we did a few of the same exercises. Considering our shortened eating/drinking window, we weren’t mad about a shorter gym trip.

Tuesday, 3/12/24: 10,744 steps, 4.8 miles, 5 floors climbed