43 contest prep fat the set up 1

The Contest Prep Phase Overview Contest Prep: Like a fat loss phase, but taken to extremely low body fat levels and peaking for stage look Goal: drop body fat and hold muscle tissue • N

Contest Prep The Set Up

UNIVERSITY

Lesson Overview

• Are you ready for contest prep?

• How long to prep for?

• How to pick the right coach or self coach?

• Initial Nutrition Set Up

• Initial Cardio and Training Set Up

• Initial PED Set Up

• Initial Posing Set up and waist training

• Lifestyle Set up

Are You Ready for Contest Prep?

Mentally

Know you why?

Self Confidence and Positive Outlook (outcome vs process focused)

Work ethic and motivation

Coping Strategies

Core beliefs and faith

Physical

Division Optimization

Body Composition

Health Status

Recovery Capacity

Extrinsic

Lifestyle

Relationship Status

Job/finance

Leisure Time

Picking a Timeline for Prep

Division choice (how lean, how muscular)

• Essential fat 3-4% men; F 10-12%

Starting and End points for Body Composition

• Van Der Ploeg 2001

12-week prep: 5F BBer, Dexa 18% to 12%; skinfold 25.5mm 8 site

• Rossow 2013

6-month contest prep natural males

14.8 to 4.5% (10% body fat change (3% fat free mass loss)

• Hulmi 2016

20 +/- 4 weeks females

27 Female, training, hormones 20 +/-4 weeks

23% to 12% body fat, more body fat loss = more muscle loss

Rate of Loss

• Garthe 2011

0.7% vs 1.4% (resistance trained females, 0.7% no change in lean body mass, 1.4% decreased muscle mass)

• Mero 2010

0.5kg vs 1kg (1kg decrement in bench press strength)

Extra factors

• Byrne 2017

30wk vs 15wk fat loss diet (30week had 2-week diet, 2 breaks) 50% more fat in 30-week diet, same diet period, decreased drop in RMR)

• Ready 2 weeks out

• Diet style (calorie cycling and days in a deficit)

• Level of competitor (muscle mass level and experience)

• Drugs enhanced fat loss rate

Picking a Timeline for Prep

Putting it all together:

• 20-30 weeks of contest prep (10% body fat total)

• 0.5-1.5% weight loss rate

• Faster fat loss initially, slower at end

EXAMPLE:

• 220lbs M 12% body fat

• 9% fat loss= 20lbs of fat (~25lb)

• First 10 weeks 0.8% 17lbs

• 1 week diet break + deload

• 8 weeks 0.5%- 8lbs

• 2 week ready early

• 21 weeks for contest prep

• Potential 1–2-week buffer added

0

10

20

30

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

WEEK TO SHOW

Fat loss Change Over Weeks of Contest Prep

Selecting a Coach

Coaching Components:

• Track record of experience

• They have done it themselves

• Applicable education background

• Communication and Personability

• Passion

• Do they truly care?

Self Coaching:

• Self development

• Self educating

• Finding mentors and consultants

The Contest Prep Phase Overview

Contest Prep: Like a fat loss phase, but taken to extremely low body fat levels and peaking for stage look

Goal: drop body fat and hold muscle tissue

• Nutrition is progressively decreased, interspersed with cyclic

increases

• Training Stimulus must be held high to maintain tissue, but will be manipulated based on recovery

• Cardio/NEAT will increase from offseason baseline or step count increased

• If Enhanced, PED usage is elevated and progressively increased in prep, along with addition of phase dependent drugs

• Posing practice is progressively increased

• Sleep, stress, relaxation time and Routine is highly consistnet

The Fat Loss Phase and Contest Prep Phase

Physique expectations and assessment

• Holding new muscle or recomp if using PEDS early in Prep

• Decreased body fat down to division appropriate leanness

• Initial weight loss can be from GI weight (food volume decrease, Muscle glycogen decrease) Rate first week can be >1.5% body weight

• If PEDs increasing may see no change or increase in weight from water retention

• Plan will be adjusted based on subjective and objective data

• Optimally progress or at minimum maintain gym performance

• In a contest prep phase, we likely will reach a point of metabolic

adaption and need for hard fat loss digging causing many negative

physical and mental alterations (sleep disturbance, libido change,

performance drops, menstrual changes, digestion changes, food focus)

Fat loss rate Goals:

• From a high body fat a high rate of fat loss is possible and preserving muscle tissue is much easier than in a lean state

• This should be “easy” fat loss before hard stalls happen

• We don’t want to take too much time away from offseason

Rate:

0.5-1.5% weight loss per week

Starting Prep From a Holding Phase

• Need to not have dieted for weeks prior, holding phase and weight stable

• 5-10% above stage weight, no more than 10% body weight loss ideally

• Prep not started from low calorie level and/or high cardio level

• Health markers in a good spot

Have all your tracking tools ready

Weekly Pictures

Waist Circumference

3 largest caliper sites

Body weight

Fasting Blood Glucose

Weekly Blood Pressure

Daily Step Count

Gym Performance

Biofeedback

Let's look at each variable set up…

(Nutrition, cardio, training, PEDs)

Nutrition Contest Prep Set Up

Coming off a holding phase

• Food intake has been close to maintenance level or slight surplus

• Should have adequate protein, carbs and fat to initiate

• Training volume will be brought up to hold lean tissue, this will drive a slight increase in expenditure

• Food will need to be reduced 20-30% in calories

• This reduction initially should be a removal of offseason “non tracked meals” “cheat meals” “junk food”

• Calorie reduction should come from carbs and/or fats from non peri-workout meals

• Some of this can come from cardio increase

• PED introduction can enhance the fat loss effect on a smaller deficit

• Pull calories from meals that are not around training as a starting point

• Carbs and fats can be reduced individual or together depending on starting point and preference

Nutrition

Recommendations

Energy Protein Fat Carbohydrate

Weekly weight change novice/interme diate

Weekly weight change advanced

Contest

Prep

20-30%

below maintenance

1.2-1.5 g/lb/day

0.3-0.7g/lb /day

1.0-3.0+

g/lb/day

0.5-1.5% per week

0.5-1.5% per week

Training and Cardio/NEAT Contest Prep Set Up

Resistance Training:

• Train within your recovery capacity PED introduction can allow for higher training volume, volume should be higher than a holding phase

to hold tissue in a deficit, but less than peak push phase

• Feeling fresh in beginning of prep is not a justification to train more

• Only straight sets, remove (drop sets, rest pause sets, beyond failure sets) manage fatigue

• Add back in the training day removed during the holding phase: EX: Pull

Push Off Legs Off then to Pull Push Legs Off

• Continue normal load rep progressions like any other phase

Cardio/NEAT:

Increase in cardio if needing to keep food high Ideally manipulate one variable first (decrease food or increase cardio, then monitor response Step count can be a focus at the start of prep, we are simply trying to increase energy output and get more active

I would try not to let direct cardio workouts exceed the number of

resistance training sessions you have per week in this phase

We want some cardio to have adaptation in place before deep in prep when tools to learn new skills and recover is poot

PEDs Fat Loss Phase Set Up

AAS:

Move from TRT into a Blast

Can set up based on minimal needed for tissue holding

Can set up more aggressive to grow as well, base on previous cycle and rate of progress Can I grow into the show?

GH:

Can hold GH 2-3 IU or move upwards to 4-8IU

Time one dosage of 2IU pre fasted cardio

Insulin:

Not used during this phase

SERMS/Aromatase Inhibitors

Use as needed based on response

Save for final weeks of contest prep for water control

Health Support Compounds:

Metformin

ARB/Telmisartan

Fat Loss Agents

Clenbuterol and T3 reserved for later stages of contest prep

Clen can be used cycle in prep, early on, break, then reintroduced

Posing and Waist Training

Posing

Start of prep

should be started at onset of Prep

Minimum 1-2 session per week

5-10 second hold each pose

2 rounds

This can be done when taking your progress pictures

End of prep

1 session posing daily

5-10 second hold each pose

4 rounds continuous

Waist training

Every morning

Start: 10 abdominal vacuum holds for as long as possible End: 15-20 abdominal vacuum holds for as long as possible

Lifestyle Set Up

Routine:

Organization in all things

Time management

Plan ahead

Set your eating, training, and sleep times

Plan your work schedule and time off for prep

Mentality:

Prioritize your prep

Stay within your support network

Head down and get to work

Embrace the suck

Stay thankful in all things

Don’t need to be a lone wolf, but manage social time appropriately Remove distractions

Summary

• Contest prep is rewarding, and grueling process and we want to come to stage ready

• Proper initial planning for readiness and giving the right timeline will allow successful prep occur

• The initial phase of prep should be smooth and easy fat loss before

we get into stall outs and making the decisions to dig hard and scrap off the last bit of fat

References

Mero AA, Huovinen H, Matintupa O, Hulmi JJ, Puurtinen R, Hohtari H, Karila T:

Moderate energy restriction with high protein diet results in healthier outcome in women J Int Soc Sports Nutr 2010, 7: 4-10.1186/1550-2783-7-4

van der Ploeg GE, Brooks AG, Withers RT, Dollman J, Leaney F, Chatterton BE: Body composition changes in female bodybuilders during preparation for competition Eur

J Clin Nutr 2001, 55: 268-277 10.1038/sj.ejcn.1601154

Rossow LM, Fukuda DH, Fahs CA, Loenneke JP, Stout JR: Natural bodybuilding

competition preparation and recovery: a 12-month case study Int J Sports Physiol Perform 2013, 8: 582-592

Hulmi JJ, Isola V, Suonpää M, Järvinen NJ, Kokkonen M, Wennerström A, Nyman K, Perola M, Ahtiainen JP, Häkkinen K The Effects of Intensive Weight Reduction on Body Composition and Serum Hormones in Female Fitness Competitors Front

Physiol 2017 Jan 10;7:689 doi: 10.3389/fphys.2016.00689 PMID: 28119632;

PMCID: PMC5222856

Garthe I, Raastad T, Refsnes PE, Koivisto A, Sundgot-Borgen J Effect of two different weight-loss rates on body composition and strength and power-related performance

in elite athletes Int J Sport Nutr Exerc Metab 2011 Apr;21(2):97-104 doi:

10.1123/ijsnem.21.2.97 PMID: 21558571