The Trainer...The Mentor... The Bodybuilder's Best Friend

Bodybuilding is not a solo effort by any means. Some might think that because its just you and the weights, and you and your diet, it is all about you. True achievers have people behind them to help them rise. Anyone who thinks he can do it on there own has a big ego and ultimately, his head will get in the way of his success.

When you are training for a competition, there is an entire support team in place that you may or may not appreciate. Roommates, lovers, parents, friends... they all share the same goal that you have, and in little ways, do their part to get you there. Ask yourself some questions and you'll be surprised. How did you learn your training routine? How did you perfect it and develop it? How did you develop your diet? Most likely, from people who know about the best ways to grow your muscles and the foods that provide the fuel for the highest success and they provide the advice willingly and kindly. Even your neighborhood butcher makes the extra effort to give you the cleanest, leanest meat. Some people help more directly. Your training partner pushes you on those days that you just aren't particularly bothered to [more on this topic to come]. As we all know, the fitness sport is extremely trying to your emotions and you often times find yourself mentally exhausted. The support from your close ones, partners, family... it really gets you through at the end of the day. The enthusiasm they share for you and that they cheer you on helps you feel good and the you get pumps the needed motivation into your program. The regulars and owners at the gym where you work out are probably among your biggest admirers, and maybe they open early to help you get your cardio in on time. I remember when I first started, dieting was one of the hardest areas for me, and I actually had my mother lock the kitchen door, hide the key, and on particularly difficult nights, lock me in my room. I know it sounds extreme, but you have to do what you have to do! The trainer is obviously the largest part of your support team because he puts you on the straight road.

One of the biggest fitness challenges that we encounter is our vision of ourselves.

The trainer might not know more than you in terms of muscle development, diets, and routines, but at a certain time when you compete, in the middle of your preparation, you go blind... you become like an adolescent who can't see the progress and your self-image suffers. Like a child with a mother, you need that guidance. Kai Green uses the analogy of the Rocky films, when Micky shouts at Rocky about how to fight when he's in the ring. Of course Rocky knows how to fight, but at that time in the ring, he’s blinded and he needs the extra help. Our trainer is our Micky, because in that moment, when we are getting ready for a show, you need the extra voice and eye to remind you to step forward or back, even though you know it already.

Where is the loneliness in the sport? If you reflect honestly, you will find your road cluttered with people who are following you wherever you want to go.

Peace and Love and big muscles.

RECIPE OF THE WEEK: Cheesecake

I'm feeling a little sweet lately so this week, my recipe satisfies the craving without the guilt.

CHEESECAKE SEMIFREDDO

1 jar of sugar-free marmalade (flavor of choice)

1 packet of Low-Fat Digestive Bisquits

1/2 stick of margarine

1 packet of low-fat Philadelphia Cream Cheese

Hand full of walnuts (or almonds)

The Crust:

Crush the bisquits. Soften margarine, and add to crumbs. Mix until pasty. (Sometimes, less margarine may be required to achieve desired texture). Spread paste onto a 9x9 inch pan.

Filling:

Soften cream cheese and add walnuts. Fill crust with mix. Spread marmalade to taste on top. Refrigerate for at least one hour or until firm.

Enjoy!

Love and Peace and big muscles.

Off-Season: A Discussion

Bodybuilding, as a competitive sport, is not even 150 years old. While the practice of building muscles for various purposes dates back to the ancient Greeks, we have a long road ahead of us in learning the best ways to develop our muscles safely and as effectively as possible. Bodybuilders don't have the advantage of thousands of years of knowledge and development of techniques. We have to combine techniques with new information on how our bodies work, and quite simply, a discussion of what works and what doesn't from people who have been there, done that.

Off-Season is an important time for bodybuilding, because if done incorrectly, it can be counterproductive. Bodybuilders used to gain as much weight as possible thinking that weight gain equaled muscle gain, so that, closer to competitions, they would diet and exercise to reduce the fat and supposedly uncover these extra pounds of muscle underneath and have a nice shredded look. However, we now know this to be a short cut that simply doesn't work. The ugly truth is... there is NO short cut.

If we don't keep on a clean diet, and do our cardio at least three times a week, we will gain more fat which is counterproductive, because 13-15% body fat is the most anobolic. There is a delicate balance here, because keep in mind that if you stay under 10%, the muscle gain is restricted. Why, then, should we gain more weight during the off-season if it is not productive for our goals? Like in my previous post, "Sets and Reps...Is Less More?", I mentioned the problem of the Ego and training with our hearts instead of our brains. We gain an excess amount of weight that does not help us be our most competitive for different reasons, such as looking huge under our clothes, or because it helps us lift heavier amounts of weights. While this is impressive in the gym, it is not good for our bodies, or ultimately, for our competitive goals. We have to keep in mind that when we gain a lot of weight, we are very lucky if a quarter of each pound is muscle. Let's do some math: 20lbs/4= 5lbs of pure muscle in the best case scenario. Don't forget that with the best anobolics and the best support in training and sponsorships, ten pounds of muscle gain per year is a very idealistic goal. Most people, under the best conditions, will not gain even this much.

Another reason why the practice of gaining a lot of weight in the off-season is counterproductive is because we have certain problem areas that hold fat very stubbornly and it is difficult to burn it. The longer the fat stays, the less chances that it will be gone in time for contests. These areas include lower back, glutes, and hamstrings. Some people share the concern that they could lose their muscle during the off-season if they don't gain the extra weight. However, with proper nutrition, eating high quantities of quality foods and calories, there will be little to no muscle loss. For an example, eating a large value meal at McDonalds gives you 1500 calories. There is so much fat and so little nutrition involved in that meal, that, even though you are eating your target calories, will lead you to gain more than the ideal 15% body fat. Anything higher than that is not productive for off-season. If you eat the same amount of calories in healthier foods that are high in protein with balanced carbs and fats, you are maintaining your muscle while restricting the percentage of total body fat. This will help you look like a bodybuilder, even in the off-season, versus looking like a marshmallow man walking around in 100 layers of clothes.

Remember: pure muscle gains are always small. There should be no slacking off in the off-season because to be at your best in this sport, you need 52 weeks of dedication. When competition time comes, you only need 14-16 weeks of dieting, slowly and smoothly decreasing your weight weekly to reveal your well-maintained muscle underneath with hopefully a few pounds of muscle added. By staying lean throughout the year, you don't need to do extra, crazy restricted diets nearing show time. When you are dieting and cardio training in the off-season, remember that you have to be balanced. Less than 10% body fat and more than 15% will not help you. Keep the balance between those numbers and you will be working at your most effective. So where does it leave us? Well 10kg over your body weight should be the best target in your off-season, give or take a kilo or two, depending on you competitive weight.

The sooner you realize that bodybuilding is not so much what you weigh, but how you look in that weight, the sooner you will get into a great condition to become a winner. To be a champion, or to reach your target, is a lonely road. A lot of people cannot understand this sport, including your partner. Like in my previous post, "Back Like a Boomerang", I talked about my struggles with this sport and how I was torn between my love for the competitions and living a "normal" life, but I've accepted that some people will support me, and some people don't want to see me succeed. That tells me that I'm making choices in my life and that is the right thing to do. The faster you learn to balance this dedication with other aspects in your life, the happier you will be. Remember to keep your focus on your goal and don't focus on other people's ideas. There are a lot of people out there who understand and support these athletes so forget about the ones that don't.

Love and Peace and big muscles.

Sets and Reps... Is Less More?

About seven years ago, I discovered a gym in London called Muscle Works. I'm sure you have heard of it, but for those who don’t know, this gym is one of the leading bodybuilding gyms in the U.K. It's like a mecca for those who bodybuild. The owner is Savvas, or Uncle Sav as I affectionately call him, and he also is Cypriot. This gym has the best atmosphere for training. It is a proper, old school, hard-core gym. It's a no-bullshit gym. You can see the hunger in its patrons to be the best. It is a very competitive atmosphere, and it is a great place to feed from the motivation in the air.

http://www.muscleworksgym.co.uk/

Anyways, Uncle Sav and I were discussing the amount of sets per exercise. This was back in a time when I would do 3 sets of each exercise which, if you do the math, added up to 12 sets. Basically, 3 sets of 4 exercises. He asked the question none have asked before as we have all been mainstreamed to do the 3 sets since we began our exercise routines. "Why three?"

I didn’t know what to answer. It was something I had placed little thought into before. He pressed further: "If 3 is good, 4 is better, and 6 will be the real deal, so why not do 6 sets per exercise?"

At that point, he introduced me to the concept of over-training [more on this subject to come]. It is important to pay careful attention to your body and the feeling you have after each set. It can be true that after the second set, you have reached your "peak" and any set thereafter would only mean over-training. In other words, you would push your body into catabolic state. This, as any bodybuilder would agree, is exactly the opposite of what you are trying to accomplish. It would be working backwards instead of forward. So, the question then remains: How can we prevent pushing our bodies into catabolic state while still working hard enough to reach our goals?

Too much of a good thing, as is always the case, turns into a bad thing. It is important to focus on intensity moreso than quantity, back to the old adage about quality being superior to quantity. This is especially true in all aspects of fitness, whether you are building muscles or maintaining firmness. The biggest detriment to reaching your desired physical condition is over-training. It is important to pay attention to the signals of your body. When your muscles feel fully pumped, and the burning sensation is prominent, learn to stop. It is sometimes difficult to realize that it is time to stop because we often train with our hearts instead of our brains [more on this topic to come]. Our instinct is to keep pushing ourselves and fight through the pain, to feed our ego with our impressive number of sets and weights, but ultimately, the important thing (our goal) is being pushed further and further away from us.

So, instead of paying so much attention to our egos, we should pay more attention to our bodies, and we will reach our goals more effectively, save our energy for other aspects of our life, and we will be happier and in better physique. But by doing that extra rep, which we are conditioned to do, might actually backfire, and you lose what you achieved in that exercise.

Give one-hundred percent in two sets (instead of three or more) lifting your full weight capacity, doing the maximum reps at that weight... in other words, your 100%, would be equal of doing 3 to 4 sets of 60% or less.

Less is better at the end of the day for achieving our fitness goals. High intensity, less training. Make that your new mantra.

Love and Peace and big muscles.

Some Previous Achievements

BODY FITNESS PUBLICATION

MR. BRITAIN 2008

STARS OF TOMORROW 2007- First Place

Back like a Boomerang!

Anybody involved in the circle of bodybuilding and fitness understands that it is an incredibly difficult and trying sport, emotionally and physically. I have been competing since I was 16 years old, that is almost eleven years. I became serious about my goals to go Pro when I was about 19 years old. I decided then that I would make a serious commitment to the training, the dieting, and the discipline to grow and achieve the physique that would place me among the best professional athletes in the world.

As time passed, it became more difficult, and last year, I lost sight of my goals. I began a path and I had lost my direction. I became a person I did not want to be. I allowed negativity, jealousy, and other people's doubts become my doubts.

For those that are not familiar, my latest accomplishment was placing 3rd in the WABBA World Championships-Short Class. I expected to place higher, but I was drifting away from my path and I wasn't 100%. After that, I called a confidante and told her that I was going to quit, that I was finished with the sport. I had sacrificed a lot and I didn't see why I wanted this life anymore. But... something inside was nagging. I had placed third, not first, which I knew I could have done if my mind was in the right place.

It has been three months since then, and with a new year, a new me! New motivation, new commitment, renovated goals to go Pro. I disappeared from the scene these last three months, trying to live a normal life, like "normal people", but at the end of the day, what is normal? The passion for this sport is something inside of me that I cannot separate from, and like anyone who feels tired, I had to take time to myself, focus on the question: is this important enough to me? The answer is yes. Like the eagle, I needed to renovate. Every eagle has a choice when his feathers grow heavy and his beak grows dull: to die or to engage in a renovation that is painful but necessary. He must fly high into a mountain, away from predators. There, he will pull out every one of his feathers with his claws and beak. Then, he will rip out each one of his nails with his own beak. When that is done, he will hit his beak against a rock until it is broken off.

His beak will grow back, sharp like new. His feathers will grow back, as light as ever, and his claws will grow back, strong. He is a new bird, and his flight will continue for another 40 years. This is something that we must all go through. We all reach a point in our lives where we have the choice to give up, or we can make painful sacrifices to continue.

It is a hard road that we all know well. Sometimes, when it is not enough to find the strength in ourselves, because we are weak, we can look to the people who love us and in them, we can see the best side of ourselves. After the dust of 2009 has settled, sitting back now, the hardships are good at the end of the day, because they make you stronger and you realize who loves you, who will be there for you and who shares your passion to achieve your goals.

Little Nicky is back in 2010! See what damage I can do.

Peace and Love and big muscles.

WABBA World Dec 7th 2009

Guest posing At WABBA Mr. Odysseia 2009 Greece