
Recap 2014: Cut Phase/ In Season
October 2013-May 2014
Cut Phase Recap 2014:
- Diet
- Supplements (brief)
- Workouts
- Results
Also check out:
- Build phase 2014
- Contest prep 2015 – Calculations and initial plan
- My weekly cut phase updates
- Competition Guide Articles
2014 Diet:
From October 2013 through May 2014, I had a prep coach, Leslie Franklin of Team-Gorman.net. I don’t think I could have gotten through my first season without her. But this year, I am going it alone.
Last year, I signed on with Leslie 21 weeks out.
Starting Diet:
- 60g fat, 28%
- 120g protein, 25%
- 226g carbs, 47% + 250g on refeed day 1x per week
She cut my calories slowly over 21 weeks to:
- 25g fat
- 120g protein
- cycled carb days with 150g on high days, 130g carbs on low days, and 250g of carbs on refeed day
2014 Supplements:
(more details in 2015 prep)
- Creatine Monohydrate – 500g Pure Powder, Took 5 grams with breakfast
- Whey Protein Powder
, 3x per day, especially within 20 min after workout
- Intra lifting session
- Dextrose
- ModernBCAA Plus ( click here to Buy This Specific Product )
- Dextrose
- Pro Supps L Carnitine – 1750 mg ( click here to Buy This Specific Product )
This all worked very well for me aside from a low fat diet causing me to seriously crave things I had never craved before like marshmallows and gummy bears. NOM NOM!
2014 Workouts:
I was lifting each muscle groups 2x per week with 3 heavy days, 3 high rep days and one day off.
Start of Season-
- Saturday: Shoulders & Back – heavy (refeed day)
- Sunday: Legs-Heavy
- Mon: Chest & arms – Heavy
- Tue: off
- Wednesday: Shoulders & back – high rep
- Thursday: Legs & Abs -high rep
- Friday: Chest & Arms – high rep
Just before my first show on March 22, 2014: cardio was slowly added to the following-
- Refeed day- Saturday: Shoulders & Back – heavy, 9 HIIT cardio AFTER workout (refeed day)
- Med day-Sunday: 25 min PreWo Cardio, Legs-Heavy
- Med day-Mon: Chest & arms – Heavy, 9 HIIT cardio AFTER workout
- Med day-Tue: 25 min PreWo Cardio, Shoulders & back – high rep
- High day-Wednesday: 25 min PreWo Cardio, Legs & Abs -high rep
- Med day-Thursday: Chest & Arms – high rep, 9 HIIT cardio AFTER workout
- Low day – Friday: off
– The high, med and low days denote carb cycling for my diet. Refeed being the most carbs.
After my 2nd show in April, The Gopher State Classic 2014, Leslie started to reverse diet me into my 3rd show, the Mr & Mrs Natural MN. Once my third show was done, I had to reverse diet to maintenance calories. Which I failed miserably at. I had been cutting essentially for 32 weeks for 3 shows! Psychologically I needed a break more than my body did. I ate way too much and ate just because. luckily, Leslie knew what she was doing and adjusted my diet to keep my metabolism high. So, after binge eating for about 1 month post show, I gained 6 pounds. I was happy with that but, I kept going. Not bingeing and eating everything in site but just enjoying food whenever I wanted. Over the next 5 months I gained 20 pounds above my stage weight. That was a bit more than I wanted to maintain.
Results 2014:
Upper Midwest, NPC, Fargo, ND: 4th in open figure
Gopher State Classic, NPC, Eden Prairie, MN: 3rd Open Figure
Mr & Mrs. Natural Show, NANBF, Bloomington, MN: 4th in Novice Figure and 7th in Open
Photo’s by Liquid Spectrum
This is a really nice overview…. thanks for the examples. Its always nice to see what methods people are using.
Could you post your measurements for peak week?
Yes, mainly waist hip and thigh. I have a girl that wants to have your proportion from top to bottom but I keep explaining the importance of genetics – not just composition – when it comes to being able to “spot increase” a particular body part.
Thank you & travel safe!
In health,
Liz
Is it dangerous to carb cycle long term? I’m doing high day: 250 carb, 40 fat, 130 protein alternating with low day: 135 carb, 40 fat, 130 protein. Coach told me to had a high (250 carb), medium (185 carb) and low day (135 carb) but it’s so much easier for me to do just the two alternating days as far as scheduling my glute workouts on high days so that I can get 3 glute work outs in per week.
Hi Lorraine, Thanks for emailing.
A couple things:
1) Not knowing your stats, history or current goals makes this challenging to answer in any way.
2) Its not carb cycling that would be dangerous long term, its dieting on low calories and high cardio long term that would mess with your hormones causing issues.
If you are in contest prep, contest prep is unique to the dieting world as you are getting to low bodyfat levels and your metabolism will be affected in various degrees depending on how you set yourself up through your off season. Reverse dieting will be important.
And, whether or not your are in an off season, prepping for a contest, on low cal or high cals, its hard to answer that but, you should trust your coach as well. Everyone doubts their coach and the process but if you did your research, you’ve got at least a decent coach if not great and will get you to where you need to go.
Heather