Diet, Supplements and Enhancers

Dec 2, 2003
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Funny how things come round again.
Old timers were basically full body 3x week, then "once a week" splits became popular, and nowadays higher frequency is making a resurgence.

I don't get splits where the trainee hits a muscle group just once a week. Just not enough frequency. Smashing a muscle from all angles for 12-20 sets and then leaving it to next week? Obviously it differs from person to person and making sure the big rocks for adaptation are in place - sleep, nutrition, (supplementation o_O), etc but the accepted window for super compensation is 48-72 hours or 2-3 days after the muscle group has been worked. So completing those sets over the week in a 3x full body, or 1x LB : 1x UB : 1x FB, or 2x LB, 2x UB split will most likely be more beneficial to progress.
 

12Chill

Norm Smith Medallist
Jun 13, 2014
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I don't get splits where the trainee hits a muscle group just once a week. Just not enough frequency. Smashing a muscle from all angles for 12-20 sets and then leaving it to next week? Obviously it differs from person to person and making sure the big rocks for adaptation are in place - sleep, nutrition, (supplementation o_O), etc but the accepted window for super compensation is 48-72 hours or 2-3 days after the muscle group has been worked. So completing those sets over the week in a 3x full body, or 1x LB : 1x UB : 1x FB, or 2x LB, 2x UB split will most likely be more beneficial to progress.

Probably highly popularised by golden era bodybuilding and people continued on with it. Even these days Instagram or YouTube Instagram fitness figures will follow that split and all their young and impressionable viewers will follow. Problem is, most of these guys are on the gear.

Enhanced lifters can absolutely get away with it though for obvious reasons, they’re the one group that you’d actually recommend the 1x a week frequency to, and it works well for them.

Hitting a muscle group once per week for a natural lifter though, you’re absolutely missing out on some potential gains.
 
Oct 6, 2005
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Probably highly popularised by golden era bodybuilding and people continued on with it. Even these days Instagram or YouTube Instagram fitness figures will follow that split and all their young and impressionable viewers will follow. Problem is, most of these guys are on the gear.

Enhanced lifters can absolutely get away with it though for obvious reasons, they’re the one group that you’d actually recommend the 1x a week frequency to, and it works well for them.

Hitting a muscle group once per week for a natural lifter though, you’re absolutely missing out on some potential gains.
Half way through this book at the moment

Amazon product ASIN 9963916317
This is the type of routine he advocates, it's completely different to the kind of high frequency training I've followed throughout my entire lifting 'career'. I'm going to give it a shot through winter and I'll be very interested to see what my results are.

1617236684583.png


This guy gives a flavour of what the book is about https://www.elitefts.com/education/...mcrobert-training-advice-youre-not-following/
 

12Chill

Norm Smith Medallist
Jun 13, 2014
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Half way through this book at the moment

Amazon product ASIN 9963916317
This is the type of routine he advocates, it's completely different to the kind of high frequency training I've followed throughout my entire lifting 'career'. I'm going to give it a shot through winter and I'll be very interested to see what my results are.

View attachment 1091080

This guy gives a flavour of what the book is about https://www.elitefts.com/education/...mcrobert-training-advice-youre-not-following/

I’m interested to see what sort of results you see.

Initially there are a few things that stand out.

Obviously that is very very low frequency. Things like training chest and quads once a week is likely to leave gains on the table. Training is simply the stimulus needed to cause protein synthesis and it generally spikes for a few days, and if you’ve hit it pretty hard it’ll likely also take a few days for you to feel ready to go hard again. So if you hit chest on Monday by the time Thursday rolls around your muscles are ready to put in some intense work again, and protein synthesis has dipped back down to normal levels, so the muscle building process from that initial workout is finished. If you don’t work chest again around thurs/fri you’re really just resting the muscle unnecessarily when there’s another perfect 3-4 day time period before the next scheduled session in which you could hit chest again, gain muscle and recover- doubling your total weekly work.

And I completely get that his idea is to hit chest/quads/etc once per week- but every single recent study leans heavily in favour of hitting a muscle group more than once per week for optimal gains (some faster recovering muscles like calves and traps can handle 3-4 days quite easily too). Essentially, why just provide 1 stimulus for protein synthesis a week instead of 2 when there’s plenty of time to recover and build from 2 sessions on that particular muscle?

Secondly, the limited amount of exercises. Again, every new study suggests 3-4 exercises per muscle group (some more simple muscles can be suited to just 2 like the biceps) as different movements will recruit different muscle fibres in different portions of the muscle. For complete hypertrophy across the range of the muscle, a variation of movements is best.

Some pros: each and every set should be absolute quality due to the low volume and length of the sessions. No junk sets where you think you’re doing something but you’re really just too fatigued to actually hit the muscle close to failure and your limiting factors are CNS fatigue or respiratory related.

Focus on the compound lifts, they’re the crux of any workout program for a reason. But if you already do all of those things and all you’re really doing is removing isolations, you’re not really getting anything extra out of this program. Chances are you’re reducing muscle hypertrophy across the entire muscle due to limiting the amount of movements for each muscle (not that I think 5+ movements per muscle each session is required but 2-4 minimum).

At least the exercises per muscle can be addressed to some degree with the 2 additional exercises per session of your choice, if I were to program it, I’d do the following.

Deadlift
Bench Press
Chest Supported Row
LUNGES/BULGARIAN OR OTHER SPLIT SQUAT MOVEMENT
BICEP CURLS

Squat
Chin Up
Overhead Press
LYING LEG CURL
INCLINE DB PRESS/OR A FLYE MOVEMENT

So over the week you hit:
Chest x 2 days (M - Bench Press / T - Incline Press or a Flye Movemenr)
Quads x 2 days (M - Lunges/Split Squat Movement / T - Squats)
Hams x 2 days (M - Deadlift (though for hypertrophy I’d honestly recommend Romanian Deadlifts) / T - Leg Curls)
Back x 2 days (M - Row / T - Chin Up)
Biceps x 2 says (M - Curls / T - Chin Up)
Shoulders x 2 days (M - Bench Press / T - Overhead Press + either extra chest movement chosen)
Triceps x 2 days (M - Bench Press / T - Overhead Press + Incline DB Press if chosen - no isolation work here but going heavy on all these should net some decent results)

So at least hitting the muscle groups 2x times per week in some capacity (except calves, some people have decent calves without working them though so isn’t always a training necessity in a case like this where training is really stripped down) but won’t be across as many exercises as I’d like to see. Recent studies suggest at least 10 working sets per muscle group a week so there’s a chance you might not hit that with this program, but you can.

Overall I think this program would work really really well for beginners. Big focus on getting stronger on the compound lifts, full body sort of routines multiple times a week (though I think full body 3x a week is superior to 2). As someone with more training experience like yourself I wouldn’t expect huge results but I’m interested to see how you go. If you were missing some of these compounds in your last program you’ll do very well for that muscle group as change can always be good if you’ve been stuck in a routine for a while. Also if you have been in a training rut and half assing some exercises and this stripped down program motivates you to push each and every set close to failure moreso than you were doing before, obviously there’s results you’ll see there. Apart from that I personally think it’s limited and if all things were previously equal (focusing on compounds, pushing to 0-3 reps in reserve every set with a high intensity, training each muscle group 2x a week with a variety of exercises and continually overloading and feeding to grow) then I don’t think this program is going to show results that are more significant.

Note; current PT, Bachelors in Exercise and Sport Science. Far from an expert, just analysing the program in the best way I can 👍🏼

Love when people guinea-pig ideas though (I spent the last year doing barbell back squats which no one does anymore instead of back squats to see how strong I could get with an awkward movement and whether my hypertrophy was optimal, which it probably wasn’t). We’re all different so this could work super well for you and that’s the beauty of training and individuality.

Keen to hear some results in a few months time mate, best of luck with it.
 
Oct 6, 2005
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I’m interested to see what sort of results you see.

Initially there are a few things that stand out.

Obviously that is very very low frequency. Things like training chest and quads once a week is likely to leave gains on the table. Training is simply the stimulus needed to cause protein synthesis and it generally spikes for a few days, and if you’ve hit it pretty hard it’ll likely also take a few days for you to feel ready to go hard again. So if you hit chest on Monday by the time Thursday rolls around your muscles are ready to put in some intense work again, and protein synthesis has dipped back down to normal levels, so the muscle building process from that initial workout is finished. If you don’t work chest again around thurs/fri you’re really just resting the muscle unnecessarily when there’s another perfect 3-4 day time period before the next scheduled session in which you could hit chest again, gain muscle and recover- doubling your total weekly work.

And I completely get that his idea is to hit chest/quads/etc once per week- but every single recent study leans heavily in favour of hitting a muscle group more than once per week for optimal gains (some faster recovering muscles like calves and traps can handle 3-4 days quite easily too). Essentially, why just provide 1 stimulus for protein synthesis a week instead of 2 when there’s plenty of time to recover and build from 2 sessions on that particular muscle?

Secondly, the limited amount of exercises. Again, every new study suggests 3-4 exercises per muscle group (some more simple muscles can be suited to just 2 like the biceps) as different movements will recruit different muscle fibres in different portions of the muscle. For complete hypertrophy across the range of the muscle, a variation of movements is best.

Some pros: each and every set should be absolute quality due to the low volume and length of the sessions. No junk sets where you think you’re doing something but you’re really just too fatigued to actually hit the muscle close to failure and your limiting factors are CNS fatigue or respiratory related.

Focus on the compound lifts, they’re the crux of any workout program for a reason. But if you already do all of those things and all you’re really doing is removing isolations, you’re not really getting anything extra out of this program. Chances are you’re reducing muscle hypertrophy across the entire muscle due to limiting the amount of movements for each muscle (not that I think 5+ movements per muscle each session is required but 2-4 minimum).

At least the exercises per muscle can be addressed to some degree with the 2 additional exercises per session of your choice, if I were to program it, I’d do the following.

Deadlift
Bench Press
Chest Supported Row
LUNGES/BULGARIAN OR OTHER SPLIT SQUAT MOVEMENT
BICEP CURLS

Squat
Chin Up
Overhead Press
LYING LEG CURL
INCLINE DB PRESS/OR A FLYE MOVEMENT

So over the week you hit:
Chest x 2 days (M - Bench Press / T - Incline Press or a Flye Movemenr)
Quads x 2 days (M - Lunges/Split Squat Movement / T - Squats)
Hams x 2 days (M - Deadlift (though for hypertrophy I’d honestly recommend Romanian Deadlifts) / T - Leg Curls)
Back x 2 days (M - Row / T - Chin Up)
Biceps x 2 says (M - Curls / T - Chin Up)
Shoulders x 2 days (M - Bench Press / T - Overhead Press + either extra chest movement chosen)
Triceps x 2 days (M - Bench Press / T - Overhead Press + Incline DB Press if chosen - no isolation work here but going heavy on all these should net some decent results)

So at least hitting the muscle groups 2x times per week in some capacity (except calves, some people have decent calves without working them though so isn’t always a training necessity in a case like this where training is really stripped down) but won’t be across as many exercises as I’d like to see. Recent studies suggest at least 10 working sets per muscle group a week so there’s a chance you might not hit that with this program, but you can.

Overall I think this program would work really really well for beginners. Big focus on getting stronger on the compound lifts, full body sort of routines multiple times a week (though I think full body 3x a week is superior to 2). As someone with more training experience like yourself I wouldn’t expect huge results but I’m interested to see how you go. If you were missing some of these compounds in your last program you’ll do very well for that muscle group as change can always be good if you’ve been stuck in a routine for a while. Also if you have been in a training rut and half assing some exercises and this stripped down program motivates you to push each and every set close to failure moreso than you were doing before, obviously there’s results you’ll see there. Apart from that I personally think it’s limited and if all things were previously equal (focusing on compounds, pushing to 0-3 reps in reserve every set with a high intensity, training each muscle group 2x a week with a variety of exercises and continually overloading and feeding to grow) then I don’t think this program is going to show results that are more significant.

Note; current PT, Bachelors in Exercise and Sport Science. Far from an expert, just analysing the program in the best way I can 👍🏼

Love when people guinea-pig ideas though (I spent the last year doing barbell back squats which no one does anymore instead of back squats to see how strong I could get with an awkward movement and whether my hypertrophy was optimal, which it probably wasn’t). We’re all different so this could work super well for you and that’s the beauty of training and individuality.

Keen to hear some results in a few months time mate, best of luck with it.
Cheers bro, I'll be sure to keep you posted.
 
Oct 6, 2005
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Good to see. Although I'm skeptical of it myself as I've never been able to notice a difference despite everyone else saying it helps. Citrulline malate on the other hand, I think I've actually noticed a difference.
Yeah I love CM, my cutting pre-workout is 7g citrulline malate, 6g beta alanine, 5g AAKG 300mg caffeine and 500mg vitamin b3

Whenever I'm not trying to lose weight I add 5g of creatine in there too, I've always felt like it gives me a little bit extra punch in the gym.

Actually I remember the first ever creatine product I purchased was 'Endura Creatine Plus" which was creatine with added HMB and glutamine and I remember that really gave me a strength boost (strong placebo impact probably lol) but I was still riding the n00b gains train at that point.
 

Jugada

Brownlow Medallist
Dec 5, 2012
10,702
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West Coast
Creatine wont do anything until it has time to get into your system which will take at least a week of continued usage. Even once you have built up a high level taking a scoop wont make you feel the effects, its just a gradual build up. Citrulline and other pre workout supplements give an immediate effect so it's obviously going to be much easier to notice a change from 30 minutes ago compared to noticing a 5-10% improvement from several weeks ago
 
Oct 6, 2005
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300mg/kg of sodium Bicarbonate Doubles Athletes' Anaerobic Running Endurance

This study's 4 years old but it's pretty profound results meant I thought it was worth posting. Incidentally suppversity has quickly become my favourite supplement related resource.

 

NonPhixion

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Mar 27, 2018
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Anyone tried Bulbine Natalensis.

have been taking 600mg of extract every day the last 2 weeks and it’s had a noticeable effect. Feels like a genuine test boosting supplement. I don’t take many other supplements only zinc and fish oil, but this stuff is legit.
The downfall is I feel more bloated through the day and the long-term health effects are still a bit of an unknown.
not much information out there on it but I plan to cycle it 5 days on & 2 days off after a 2 week loading phase.
Interested if anyone else has any experiences with it
 
Jul 5, 2011
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I heard a lot of good things about Bulbine Natalensis. Will probably order some too. So far i take only iron supplement and vitamin d daily, nothing else
Just reading on examine.com about possible liver and kidney damage from Bulbine Natalensis. I'd chat to a doctor and avoid alcohol etc while taking it. I like ashwagandha instead for a T bump and as an anxiolytic, but it's not without it's side effects and unlikely to be anywhere near as potent with T boosting.
 

NonPhixion

Bookie Assassin
Mar 27, 2018
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Just reading on examine.com about possible liver and kidney damage from Bulbine Natalensis. I'd chat to a doctor and avoid alcohol etc while taking it. I like ashwagandha instead for a T bump and as an anxiolytic, but it's not without it's side effects and unlikely to be anywhere near as potent with T boosting.
yeh i did read that, its not something you want to be taking in high doses everyday.

I have been having 500mg every 2nd day for the last few months. Never taken anabolics myself but this stuff has a pretty profound effect. Definitely works, i have been making the effort to drink more water. The only side effect i have noticed is it causes a little constipation. Was never a big believer in 'natural T booster' supps but im pretty happy with Bulbine.
Only other issue is it mixes terribly, water makes it all clunky and it taste horrible with OJ. Usually mix it with Cranberry juice as it hides the flavor a bit and still mixes pretty well.
I ordered from Ganesha Herbs in the US, pretty much non-existent here in AUS. I'd recommend it, worth trying for a couple weeks, if you are concerned about any untoward effects than check up with the Doc.
 
Jul 5, 2011
15,239
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yeh i did read that, its not something you want to be taking in high doses everyday.

I have been having 500mg every 2nd day for the last few months. Never taken anabolics myself but this stuff has a pretty profound effect. Definitely works, i have been making the effort to drink more water. The only side effect i have noticed is it causes a little constipation. Was never a big believer in 'natural T booster' supps but im pretty happy with Bulbine.
Only other issue is it mixes terribly, water makes it all clunky and it taste horrible with OJ. Usually mix it with Cranberry juice as it hides the flavor a bit and still mixes pretty well.
I ordered from Ganesha Herbs in the US, pretty much non-existent here in AUS. I'd recommend it, worth trying for a couple weeks, if you are concerned about any untoward effects than check up with the Doc.
Any update on how you went with this? Bulbine sounds interesting. Cheers!
 
Jun 27, 2013
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Might start posting a bit more in this fred this year

Last year the goal was to improve strength in my weak points and target the posterior chain, after a sluggish first 5 months recovering from a hip flexor injury then hitting an autumn plateau about a month after I returned to full training post injury. I found a way to get through the plateau in June and built my way up over the next 6 months which ended up leading to a PB bench on Xmas eve, I only had coffee for preworkouts and budget protein for recovery

This year it's all about weight/fat loss and losing a few shirt sizes

I thought it over in December about how to attack the new year to be successful for a long caloric deficit and thought ok, I need to do something about my bad eating habits first before I can start counting the daily calories.

So come NYD, I had to cut out the processed savoury snacks (I'm a big sucker for shapes and potato/corn chips) that was the absolute first thing, particularly not eating them at night on weekends. I had popcorn twice within days of NYD which was better, but I moved onto late night protein shakes instead now (120-160 calories normally with water depending on brand/serving size, so bugger all here)

2nd thing was to have breakfast everyday. I'd normally have a smoothie the morning after a solid workout, but I wasn't consistent enough and ate more later in the day, some afternoons I'd have bad insulin crashes if I ate too many carbs and then couldn't be bothered training until 7-8pm which is ok some days, particularly hot days, but not ideal all the time unless time pressed as I prefer to train around 4-5pm and have tea at 7-730 or something.

3rd thing was to reduce meal portions at certain times of the day, particularly tea. I already felt as I was a regular late afternoon/early evening trainer then lunch should often be the biggest meal of the day, though I rarely adhered to this

After 11 days I felt I had gotten the hang of improving these things so I felt it was time to start, so on the 12th (last Wednesday) I decided ok, lets start the calorie deficit.

So since last Wednesday, nearly everything I've eaten gets weighed out on my scales unless I'm eating the entire contents of something already labelled and I google the numbers to add up.

The main things I'm looking at is total daily calories and total daily protein intake, as I'm a fairly hard trainer already I feel I can cycle fats and carbs in when I feel they need to be utilised.

I and my dietitian at the time figured out in 2020 that about 3000 calories was maintenance for me at my height/weight, so dropping to 2500 a day for a few months was the go back then (covid lockdowns interrupted), so I felt as I did lose initial kilos and cms off the waist before lockdowns and I'm about the same starting weight now as I was in 2020 (probably have slightly more lean muscle mass now though coming off a far higher training base) then I will go with 2500 again for 3-6 months, then will readjust once I notice a pattern of my weight plateauing then I might drop the number to 2300 or seek out fat burning supplements to help or something.

As I mentioned before, I had regular insulin crashes after lunch previously (particularly after eating starchy carbs), what's great about the last week since the deficit started, even the last 3 weeks or so since I started targeting smaller meals that the crashes have almost gone away, think I've had just 1 in the last 3 weeks, instead of about twice a week previously. I think as I'm starting to use up my glycogen stores more effectively now, I can have the carbs like rice or mash potatoes for lunch and know my body will use them as fuel to burnout 2-3 hours later without the added crashes. On Saturday I was totally burnt out, however I came off a high protein, but 2100 calorie day with a hard leg day on Friday, so I reckon it may have been a little bit of CNS and probably a lack of glycogen to fuel the muscles considering I was 900 calories in deficit, so I had home made air fryer chips with steak for tea Saturday night and roughly had a 2700 calorie day and I was feeling as good as gold again on Sunday.

So yeah, it will be interesting to see how I manage my nutrition and training loads.


I also changed from budget Chemist Warehouse protein to Max's over the last week as Max's at least has a reputation for supporting Australian body-building and helping people improve physiques and they have a solid range to choose from direct online be it protein for lean mass/fat loss to mass gainers. The Chemist Warehouse stuff was good for maintenance and recovery, but was WPC/WPI blends around 74-75% protein per serve, so likely higher WPC, so going with Max's pure whey for example bulks up the protein percentage to over 81% per serve and it has more WPI than WPC and also Hydrolysed whey, so hopefully will be a better post workout recovery mix with fast and medium release proteins.

My local supplement supplier sells Max's 2016-onwards range too for the same price or around 5% cheaper than Max's online, but Max's reduces price to around same as my local if buying in bulk, like twin packs/combos, though they do have a bigger range online, like preworkouts and old protein formulas from before 2016 etc. I used Max's years ago on and off from about 18-22 cycling it with the likes of BSC, Dymatize and Nitrotech when I wasn't on the chemist warehouse stuff, so I'm happy to use them again and support a local Melburnian operator, never bought into the Optimum Nutrition hype over the years for example though, felt the brahs chugged and puffed over it way too hard over the years without looking around at other options.

So I'll see how I go with Max's for about 6 months, will probably buy their Anabolic Night casein which will substitute any night snacking to go along with the Pure Whey for post workout or daytime use. After that and having had a good period of time of dieting I think I have a few options if I need a change up:

1. Look into preworkouts/BCAAs if the fat loss is working but I need some oompf for my training if I start feeling like I did on Saturday regularly

2. Look into fat burners, or Max's Shred System protein if the fat loss is plateauing or slowing down to combine with the stuff I'm already using

3. Change to Rule 1, I used them in late 2017 I think, no problems digesting it, but I got injured and only ate half the tub, ended up giving it to my brother I think so I can't comment on performance/recovery, however they seem to have positive reviews and don't seem to get as chugged like ON by the gym brahs.

Anyways, that's where I'm at, will weigh in first week of February (absolutely dreading it considering what I was in December)
 
Oct 6, 2005
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Might start posting a bit more in this fred this year

Last year the goal was to improve strength in my weak points and target the posterior chain, after a sluggish first 5 months recovering from a hip flexor injury then hitting an autumn plateau about a month after I returned to full training post injury. I found a way to get through the plateau in June and built my way up over the next 6 months which ended up leading to a PB bench on Xmas eve, I only had coffee for preworkouts and budget protein for recovery

This year it's all about weight/fat loss and losing a few shirt sizes

I thought it over in December about how to attack the new year to be successful for a long caloric deficit and thought ok, I need to do something about my bad eating habits first before I can start counting the daily calories.

So come NYD, I had to cut out the processed savoury snacks (I'm a big sucker for shapes and potato/corn chips) that was the absolute first thing, particularly not eating them at night on weekends. I had popcorn twice within days of NYD which was better, but I moved onto late night protein shakes instead now (120-160 calories normally with water depending on brand/serving size, so bugger all here)

2nd thing was to have breakfast everyday. I'd normally have a smoothie the morning after a solid workout, but I wasn't consistent enough and ate more later in the day, some afternoons I'd have bad insulin crashes if I ate too many carbs and then couldn't be bothered training until 7-8pm which is ok some days, particularly hot days, but not ideal all the time unless time pressed as I prefer to train around 4-5pm and have tea at 7-730 or something.

3rd thing was to reduce meal portions at certain times of the day, particularly tea. I already felt as I was a regular late afternoon/early evening trainer then lunch should often be the biggest meal of the day, though I rarely adhered to this

After 11 days I felt I had gotten the hang of improving these things so I felt it was time to start, so on the 12th (last Wednesday) I decided ok, lets start the calorie deficit.

So since last Wednesday, nearly everything I've eaten gets weighed out on my scales unless I'm eating the entire contents of something already labelled and I google the numbers to add up.

The main things I'm looking at is total daily calories and total daily protein intake, as I'm a fairly hard trainer already I feel I can cycle fats and carbs in when I feel they need to be utilised.

I and my dietitian at the time figured out in 2020 that about 3000 calories was maintenance for me at my height/weight, so dropping to 2500 a day for a few months was the go back then (covid lockdowns interrupted), so I felt as I did lose initial kilos and cms off the waist before lockdowns and I'm about the same starting weight now as I was in 2020 (probably have slightly more lean muscle mass now though coming off a far higher training base) then I will go with 2500 again for 3-6 months, then will readjust once I notice a pattern of my weight plateauing then I might drop the number to 2300 or seek out fat burning supplements to help or something.

As I mentioned before, I had regular insulin crashes after lunch previously (particularly after eating starchy carbs), what's great about the last week since the deficit started, even the last 3 weeks or so since I started targeting smaller meals that the crashes have almost gone away, think I've had just 1 in the last 3 weeks, instead of about twice a week previously. I think as I'm starting to use up my glycogen stores more effectively now, I can have the carbs like rice or mash potatoes for lunch and know my body will use them as fuel to burnout 2-3 hours later without the added crashes. On Saturday I was totally burnt out, however I came off a high protein, but 2100 calorie day with a hard leg day on Friday, so I reckon it may have been a little bit of CNS and probably a lack of glycogen to fuel the muscles considering I was 900 calories in deficit, so I had home made air fryer chips with steak for tea Saturday night and roughly had a 2700 calorie day and I was feeling as good as gold again on Sunday.

So yeah, it will be interesting to see how I manage my nutrition and training loads.


I also changed from budget Chemist Warehouse protein to Max's over the last week as Max's at least has a reputation for supporting Australian body-building and helping people improve physiques and they have a solid range to choose from direct online be it protein for lean mass/fat loss to mass gainers. The Chemist Warehouse stuff was good for maintenance and recovery, but was WPC/WPI blends around 74-75% protein per serve, so likely higher WPC, so going with Max's pure whey for example bulks up the protein percentage to over 81% per serve and it has more WPI than WPC and also Hydrolysed whey, so hopefully will be a better post workout recovery mix with fast and medium release proteins.

My local supplement supplier sells Max's 2016-onwards range too for the same price or around 5% cheaper than Max's online, but Max's reduces price to around same as my local if buying in bulk, like twin packs/combos, though they do have a bigger range online, like preworkouts and old protein formulas from before 2016 etc. I used Max's years ago on and off from about 18-22 cycling it with the likes of BSC, Dymatize and Nitrotech when I wasn't on the chemist warehouse stuff, so I'm happy to use them again and support a local Melburnian operator, never bought into the Optimum Nutrition hype over the years for example though, felt the brahs chugged and puffed over it way too hard over the years without looking around at other options.

So I'll see how I go with Max's for about 6 months, will probably buy their Anabolic Night casein which will substitute any night snacking to go along with the Pure Whey for post workout or daytime use. After that and having had a good period of time of dieting I think I have a few options if I need a change up:

1. Look into preworkouts/BCAAs if the fat loss is working but I need some oompf for my training if I start feeling like I did on Saturday regularly

2. Look into fat burners, or Max's Shred System protein if the fat loss is plateauing or slowing down to combine with the stuff I'm already using

3. Change to Rule 1, I used them in late 2017 I think, no problems digesting it, but I got injured and only ate half the tub, ended up giving it to my brother I think so I can't comment on performance/recovery, however they seem to have positive reviews and don't seem to get as chugged like ON by the gym brahs.

Anyways, that's where I'm at, will weigh in first week of February (absolutely dreading it considering what I was in December)
A few thoughts

-Why don't you buy your WPC from aminoz or bulknutrients? Much cheaper than the branded offerings.
-I don't think anything more expensive than WPC is worthwhile (for 99% of the population), I'd avoid WPI or hydrolyzed whey as I think it's a waste of money
-BCAA won't be of any use as a pre-workout unless you're training fasted and even then a scoop of WPC will do the same job for less
-I've started using Arms Race Harness as a pre-workout, it's pretty good stuff
-Almost all the efficacious substances in a preworkout (beta alanine, creatine, citrulline) need to be taken every day to work properly (all the scientific literature I've ever read supports this), it would be worthwhile purchasing these substances standalone from aminoz or bulknutrients as a more affordable option (also you don't want to be taking the full load of stimulants in a preworkout everyday)
-unless you're buying clenbuterol, fat burners are a waste of money
-I can highly recommend the casein from bulknutrients too
 
Jun 27, 2013
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A few thoughts

-Why don't you buy your WPC from aminoz or bulknutrients? Much cheaper than the branded offerings.
-I don't think anything more expensive than WPC is worthwhile (for 99% of the population), I'd avoid WPI or hydrolyzed whey as I think it's a waste of money
-BCAA won't be of any use as a pre-workout unless you're training fasted and even then a scoop of WPC will do the same job for less
-I've started using Arms Race Harness as a pre-workout, it's pretty good stuff
-Almost all the efficacious substances in a preworkout (beta alanine, creatine, citrulline) need to be taken every day to work properly (all the scientific literature I've ever read supports this), it would be worthwhile purchasing these substances standalone from aminoz or bulknutrients as a more affordable option (also you don't want to be taking the full load of stimulants in a preworkout everyday)
-unless you're buying clenbuterol, fat burners are a waste of money
-I can highly recommend the casein from bulknutrients too
I've checked out both AminoZ and Bulk nutrients, never been a fan of ordering supplements online

AminoZ changes their prices depending on whatever browser I use, so I don't know what prices their products really are, also they look like they're in Sydney, so dunno how shipping would be (larger items seemed to be delivered quicker when ordering gym equipment grom Sydney)

Bulk nutrients only do 1 kilo bags of stuff. I guess this is their business model to offer affordable things in small doses so people keep coming back to them. Perhaps I would look this way eventually though.


I went through a preworkout phase in my early 20s, even took the notorious Jack3d, it was a 2-3 times a week thing when I needed a gee up, wasn't every workout



So in short, you're saying just take WPC and Casein, ok
 

Jugada

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BCAAs are pretty much all a complete waste of money and I'd say at least 90% of pre workouts on the market are just an over priced caffeine hit mixed with a bunch of filler. That being said I still use one regularly but you just need to make sure whatever you buy not only has the right ingredients but also the right doses otherwise you are just paying $60 for a fruity drink before sessions.

Bulk nutrients tastes pretty s**t to me now, switched to Musashi protein from chemist warehouse in the last year and is just as cost effective if you only buy when they go on sale pretty reg
 
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Bulk nutrients tastes pretty sh*t to me now, switched to Musashi protein from chemist warehouse in the last year and is just as cost effective if you only buy when they go on sale pretty reg
That's what I've been doing last few years

Switching between Vitalstrength and INC WPC/WPI blends whenever they're discounted

INC Cookies and Cream tastes pretty good and their vanilla is solid too, choc mint wasn't too bad, their chocolate was way too sickly for me though.

Vitalstrength need to improve their chocolate formula, it's so so bland, I only buy vanilla if it's discounted.

For maintenance/recovery never had a problem with them.


Interesting you say Bulk Nutrients tastes s**t now, don't they have a gazillion different flavours?
 

Jugada

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That's what I've been doing last few years

Switching between Vitalstrength and INC WPC/WPI blends whenever they're discounted

INC Cookies and Cream tastes pretty good and their vanilla is solid too, choc mint wasn't too bad, their chocolate was way too sickly for me though.

Vitalstrength need to improve their chocolate formula, it's so so bland, I only buy vanilla if it's discounted.

For maintenance/recovery never had a problem with them.


Interesting you say Bulk Nutrients tastes sh*t now, don't they have a gazillion different flavours?

I'm a chocolate or nothing guy when it comes to protein and bulk nutrients basic protein flavour doesn't do it for me. Really though protein brand shouldn't really matter so long as you arent buying something pumped full of sugar. It's a daily staple so enjoying it should be the first priority
 
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I've checked out both AminoZ and Bulk nutrients, never been a fan of ordering supplements online

AminoZ changes their prices depending on whatever browser I use, so I don't know what prices their products really are, also they look like they're in Sydney, so dunno how shipping would be (larger items seemed to be delivered quicker when ordering gym equipment grom Sydney)

Bulk nutrients only do 1 kilo bags of stuff. I guess this is their business model to offer affordable things in small doses so people keep coming back to them. Perhaps I would look this way eventually though.


I went through a preworkout phase in my early 20s, even took the notorious Jack3d, it was a 2-3 times a week thing when I needed a gee up, wasn't every workout



So in short, you're saying just take WPC and Casein, ok
Not at all, creatine and citrulline both have (very well documented) proven performance enhancing properties, beta alanine somewhat less so but I have all 3 on my daily supplement stack. Creatine's nootropic mechanisms mean it's something that almost the entire planet would benefit from taking everyday.

I take this preworkout https://www.chemistwarehouse.com.au...vitamin-b-for-energy-skin-health---60-tablets vitamin b3 also has great and well documented performance enhancing qualities

I also take ALCAR and AAKG pre-workout but the scientific literature around those is a little less clear cut.

I take this multivitamin https://au.iherb.com/pr/life-extension-two-per-day-multivitamin-120-capsules/86453 only every second day because the vitamin c content is antithetical to athletic performance

in short this is what my supp stack looks like

5g creatine everyday
7g beta alanine everyday
9g citrulline malate everyday
5g AAKG preworkout only
5g ALCAR preworkout only
200mg caffeine preworkout only
500mg niacinamide preworkout only
 
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I'm a chocolate or nothing guy when it comes to protein and bulk nutrients basic protein flavour doesn't do it for me. Really though protein brand shouldn't really matter so long as you arent buying something pumped full of sugar. It's a daily staple so enjoying it should be the first priority
That's what I noticed when I bought a tub of Max's banana

Tastes pretty good in water alone, get a banana paddle pop/banana lolly kind of flavour but not too overpowering or sickly sweet.

Only INCs cookies and cream is the only protein that has tasted better from the last 3 or so years from what I can remember

Most Chocolate mixes used to taste ok when I was in late teens/early 20s no matter what brand I'd buy, but these days it's hard to find a good one, they either seem too bland or too sickly imo or only taste good with milk, so I'm likely to stick with a brand that offers a good chocolate with a relatively high protein content (75-80%), or multiple good flavours with the high protein content.

Perhaps I mixed my protein with milk far too often when I was younger and only do so with smoothies these days or if I feel I need the extra calories/carbs postworkout.
 
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BCAAs are pretty much all a complete waste of money and I'd say at least 90% of pre workouts on the market are just an over priced caffeine hit mixed with a bunch of filler. That being said I still use one regularly but you just need to make sure whatever you buy not only has the right ingredients but also the right doses otherwise you are just paying $60 for a fruity drink before sessions.

Bulk nutrients tastes pretty sh*t to me now, switched to Musashi protein from chemist warehouse in the last year and is just as cost effective if you only buy when they go on sale pretty reg
Wowee I love bulknutrients chocolate and vanilla WPC

Recently bought some aminoz WPC which I don't like as much, aminoz is sweetened with stevia whereas BN is sweetened with sucralose which I think makes a difference
 

Milpool

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I've got bulk nutrients choc and vanilla at the moment, found they both taste best in just straight water. Good mixed in with a bowl of oats with banana too.

Creatine seems like it's going to be just as much of a wellness supplement as a body building supplement soon with all of its general health and brain health effects coming out.

I don't know s**t about much but from what I've heard/studied BCAA's are a waste and usually have nowhere near enough sodium to be of benefit. Also, fat burners are horseshit.
 
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I've got bulk nutrients choc and vanilla at the moment, found they both taste best in just straight water. Good mixed in with a bowl of oats with banana too.

Creatine seems like it's going to be just as much of a wellness supplement as a body building supplement soon with all of its general health and brain health effects coming out.

I don't know sh*t about much but from what I've heard/studied BCAA's are a waste and usually have nowhere near enough sodium to be of benefit. Also, fat burners are horseshit.

Try a scoop bulk nutrients wpc with yopro yogurt

Salted caramel yopro and chocolate wpc from bulk nutrients got me through my last cut but the fruit flavoured yogurt with vanilla wpc taste great too
 
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