This post has obviously been a long time coming -- almost 6 months!

Well still training and unlike before Christmas I can say the training is going well.  I call this blog gettin bigger but it has been a tough slog this winter for putting on any size.  Actually when I weighed myself on the 15th I was down to 180.25...not exactly gettin bigger.

But I should be headed in the other direction very soon.  I finally made the plunge into the dark murky waters of "enhanced" bodybuilding supplementation and I should be gettin a lot bigger in a couple of weeks.  

After being all gung ho to do a natural show last summer it might seem like a 180 degree turn to now be headed down this road but it's not really that big a deal...I think.  While I respect natural competitors tremendously I just think that aesthetically I am more interested in open competition.  

So as always I have some crazy long range plan.  Compete at the qualifying show in November 2010.  That gives me 18 months.  I should be able to put on some serious mass in that time but plan on doing it sanely and gradually.  I'm even working with a trainer once every couple of weeks.  I know what I'm doing in the gym but these sessions are mainly just to step up the motivation a notch and get a good intense training session in.  My trainer is planning on competing at this year's provincial show in July.  He's a bulky 285lbs right now and plans to get on stage at 245.   I figure he'll be a fair bit lighter than that cuz he's packing a lot of bf right now but it's very cool to train with him and get the scoop on preparing to loose 40lbs for a show.  

One and a half reps

I work out at very low key gym...it's not a destination sorta place or a place that attracts particularly hard core lifters or anything like that so it is pretty rare that I see someone doing something different or new.  Plus lately I've been working out at 06h00 -- just me and old people who can't sleep at that hour! So it was cool last week to spot a French guy who was busting his tail doing bench presses with a pair of 25 lbs plates on the bar.  I was kinda surprised he wanted a spot, he looked way stronger than such a puny weight.  I asked him how many reps he was going for and he said 8 and I almost suggested he could do way more and then he said that he was doing 1 and a half reps.  I had no idea what he meant so when he started to alternate between full reps and partial reps I realized how hard the exercise really was.  When he was done I told him that was probably the hardest set I've ever seen someone do and he replied that ya, the alternating totally fucks the muscle adaptation...a great technique to challenge the neuromuscular pathways!

There is a discussion of this technique here.

This blog was supposed to be about my progress in the gym but really I should rename it to "Fouad's biggest fan" or something like that...let me explain...

First though, the gym: things are going well.  My shoulder seems to finally be healing and I'm about to start on my major mass-building phase for the winter.  Last winter I made the best gains of my life so I'm optimistic that I can repeat the diet and training and repeat the gains or even improve on 'em.

Fouad's Biggest Fan:

The Olympia was last weekend.  Nope didn't get to watch it and even the web re-brodcast was a bit too much for me this year.  Still I'm pretty happy to see that there is a new Mr. O.  The Dex vs Jay stuff over at Flexonline was pretty lame but glad to see the best physique emerge as the winner for a change.  I was also glad to see that Phil Heath lived up to the hype and placed an impressive third.  The crazy thing about Heath though is the marked imbalance between his right and left arm development -- I've never seen such an obvious difference!

Denis Wolf and his legion of fans have gotta be disappointed with his 4th place finish.  He looked way better on Saturday than on Friday but the 07 Wolf was far superior to the 08 Wolf.  I saw an interview with Wolf that said for the first time ever he had someone look after his contest prep for him -- Chad Nichols I think...too bad they didn't give the prep a dry run for another show.  Still Wolf will be back next year to battle it out with Heath and Dexter.

The other person I really hope to be up there battling it out for the top is Fouad Abiad.  Not sure how many plugs I can give the guy but if  you haven't read his blog yet go read it NOW!  Fouad's blog shows what an articulate, honest, and real guy he is.  It has made me into a huge fan.  This is kinda new for me, being a "superfan"...I'm a bit freaked out that I'm going to do crazy things that will embarrass both he and myself...I've already mentally constructed several e-mails to him offering to help with his website, kill people for him, that sort of thing.  But I think the best thing I can do for the guy who I think is one of the brightest stars in the future of the sport is to send some e-mails to the BC Bodybuilding Assoc suggesting, well pleading with them to get Fouad to guest pose at either their upcoming November show or at the Provincials in July.  That's not too crazy, right???

The Mr. O weekend starts tomorrow and I'm following it a little more closely then I normally do. I tend to prefer amateur contests to the big pro shows. The amateurs at least seem to be real...I could imagine myself after years of training of building that kind of body. The pros on the other hand are just out of this world, another species, that sort of thing. But I'm starting to come around to the big guys. I think the conditioning at the pro level has gotten much better. Rich Gaspari-like 'rippedness' is back, bigger and better. No more chunky physiques with muscles groups so overdeveloped that muscle separation is non-existent. No more giant waists with big distending bellies. No more Marcus Ruhl basically. Less GH or better GH? I of course don't know.

So here's who I'm expecting big things from this weekend:

Dennis Wolf


Dennis was the guest poser at a show I went to this year. He was big and tight months and months from the only show (the Mr. O) he is doing this year. Plus he was great interacting with the crowd and his fans.

Fouad Abiad



What can I say that I haven't said already about this fellow Canuck. I love his blog, check it out if you haven't already!

Phil Heath

Ok, he is hyped beyond belief but he looked incredible at the Ironman and I credit his physique for changing the expectations at the pro level.

Fouad's Mr. O intro video:



A week to go to the big show...I really hope to see Fouad do well. He deserves it.

Voyer still looks huge when he's working out. I'm interested if he does any pro shows next year.

Nationals and Montreal

As I mentioned in the last post I was in Montreal for the same week as the CBBF Championships.  I attended the pre-judging (well sorta) and was underwhelmed in some ways, impressed in others.  But first: Pro Gym.

Prior to arriving in Montreal I'd asked an on-line bud from Montreal which gym to workout at in Montreal to get a hardcore experience.  Pro Gym Serge Moreau lived up to it's billing as Montreal's top gym.  $40 set me up with a week pass, not an unreasonable amount in my opinion for a gym of any calibre but a steal for a gym as well equipped as Pro Gym.  This place is huge, has huge members and I couldn't help but feel inspired and challenged.  2 huge weight pits, several dedicated cable stations, a huge machine section, enough cardio equipment for an infantry division, plus a bunch of other dedicated areas like a boxing area, powerlifting room, ab studio, etc means that this place gets the big thumbs up from me.  

The membership has a lot of hardcore members.  Simone Voyer who won is pro card in 05 worked out every morning while I was there, a couple other guys who I'd see on the stage at the Nationals also were there as well as a whack of huge guys who pounded away like crazy on the weights and machines.  Overwhelming visual stimulation was a common :)

Pro Gym is the kind of place that I'm not sure I'd want to work out at on a regular basis.  It is a very pro-steroid kind of place where an average joe like me gets some pretty unrealistic expectations about what can be done with the body, still I'm torn, it was so very cool to be somewhere that was unapologetically focused on bodybuilding.  This was not the kind of place that was trying to get office workers to part with some cash every month to use an elliptical trainer once in while.  I kidded to someone at my own gym this week that I sorted expected to have some syringes slide across the desk when I signed up for my pass at Pro Gym.  I'm a bit conflicted about all that.

The prejudging at the CBBF Championships was a major disappointment.  Compared to the Emerald Cup in Seattle this show was weak, mickey-mouse, and a tad bush league.  I'm mainly pissed because the prejudging started 35 minutes late, was so unorganized that each class took 20 minutes or more to be assessed and was a source for sovereignty grievances due to the lack of bilingual directions to the athletes.  So I didn't even get to see the big guys put through their paces because I could only stay a couple of hours.  This would have been plenty of time to complete the prejudging at a BC show or the Emerald Cup but at the Nationals this was only enough time for a handful classes to be judged.  People were pissed at the promoter for not allowing photographs which given the price of the seats and the nature of the event seemed ridiculous.  I would direct my wrath at the CBBF executive who clearly doesn't set up any parameters for the privilege of putting on the event.

Still I was inspired by what I did get to see.  Masters Heavy Weight class here I come in 2013! :)