Are you sure you're eating enough protein? How much carbs are you eating when you carb up? I followed a precontest diet consisting of protein and fibrous carbs. Two days a week I carbed up with 200 grams of carbs. I lost bodyfat quickly on this diet but return to normal eating post-contest. Make sure you are working out hard & consistently. I train with a former IFBB World Champion. Since I've been training with her twice a week I've gotten leaner, harder and stronger. I pushed myself but she pushes me harder! Three sets of leg extensions? I think you need more than that. We have similiar proportions. I'm 5'11 127lbs 8% contest. Off-season 130lbs 12%. Remember even at 12% BF you're leaner than the average women. You don't want to be very lean all year round. I lose my Menstrual Cycle when I'm under 12% and it doesn't return until my bodyfat goes up. I hope this helps you, good luck! ||24.189.143.126||reg|| Z||000005||MS||11-27-2000||03:08 AM||mad.scientist55@hushmail.com||Welcome Ana. Glad you've decided to join in. I could ask you for a LOT more details about your training, like how long you've been on Body Opus, what your actual diet (carbs/protein/fats) is, what your goals are (etc etc etc....) And it would still be helpful to get this info from you. But at first glance there are a couple of things that I will comment on. At 5'8 inches, 125 lbs you almost certainly need to cut back on the cardio, increase your resisitance training and increase your calories. And, unless your are using AAS, you will have to put on a bit more fat if you want to gain strength and hardness. Now is the time to decide what you REALLY want from your weight training and why. If it's pure muscle mass with minimum fat gain, then you have to consider AAS. If you want to be a catwalk model with NO MUSCLE, high % bodyfat but thin looking, then keep on doing what you're doing. If you don't want to use AAS but wish to gain muscle then you have to be prepare to gain some bodyfat initially, and then worry about cutting the fat after you've gained some muscle. But most of all, no matter what your goals, if you've been 'dieting' for too long you need to take a break. It is not physically or emotionally healthy to diet all the time, and you will never make any noticeable muscle gains while on a peremanent diet. ||202.180.64.90||reg|| Z||000006||F1hybrid||11-27-2000||09:13 AM||phatboy@columbus.rr.com||You're overtrained and your routine is just that, routine. It doesn't surprise me that you aren't making any gains and remain soft. More cardio is not the answer. Cardio for weight loss is as overrated as lunges for toning thighs. Diet is also important. You have to have carbs about every 3 days, and esp. before heavy workouts. I can tell when my clients have gone too long without carbs, they look flat and soft.
Check out some of the recent training threads. These issues have been discussed to some degree.
F1||65.24.124.217||reg|| Z||000007||SassyS||11-27-2000||09:57 AM||latexss@yahoo.com||Hi Ana and welcome. Glad you decided to join the board. There is alot of great information here and if you do a search on a particular item, chances are, you'll probably find it. Also, you'll get some great advise.||207.86.230.77||reg|| Z||000008||WarLobo||11-27-2000||01:25 PM||warlobo@operamail.com||Wecome Ana, hope you stick around and join in the conversations. As you can tell, we have a no nonsence group of folks ready and willing to "tell ya like it is."
------------------
LAte
Lobo||199.211.225.194||reg||
Z||000009||edgecrusher||11-27-2000||04:16 PM||mikebethdo120@aol.com||First of all skin folds have a possible error of 5%. Meaning if a person is charted at 12% bodyfat he or she could be anywhere from 7 - 17%. Next on Body Opus Dan Duchaine recomends training no more then 3x a week. Otherwise you expirience sever muscle wasting. To much cardio will especially lead to this.||149.151.1.106||reg||
Z||000010||Ana||11-27-2000||08:45 PM||||Yes,10% BF. in Greece. I had "help". I won't
elaborate further. I've been doing bodyopus
since last may. Well, strictly Atkins in may
then a switch to BO. My Diet during the week
consists of:
Snacks-Pork rinds, walnuts, lunch meats, D.eggs.
Lunch,Dinner,Breakfast-All proteins, romaine
lettuce,Asparugus, cheeses, cream cheese w/
splenda and real cocoa for treat.
ONLY WATER w/ multi.V., L-glut.,Vanadyl, chromium, DHEA., Melatonin.
E/C/A 1st. thing before gym.
And about my routine..your right, I need to
trick my body. I skipped the gym today,feeling like I've been run over. Tommorrow I'll try everything different.
Thanks you guys. ||205.188.192.154||reg||
Z||000011||MR. BMJ||11-27-2000||09:18 PM||mrbmj32@hotmail.com||If you are following the BodyOpus diet, then you should be doing a weekend carb-up, are you? How long is your carb-up? You may be getting spillover from this. I followed BodyOpus for quite some time with great results, but eventually I had to cut the 48 hour carb-up to a 24-30 hour carb-up to get to the next level. After making the changes, I had less water retention and spill-over. The weekend carb-up on a CKD will either make or break you.
MR. BMJ||205.188.197.162||reg||
Z||000012||MR. BMJ||11-27-2000||09:30 PM||mrbmj32@hotmail.com||Also, you may be overtraining by going to the gym 4 days out of the week. I, myself, when on a CKD, will only go to the gym Mon (lower body and back), Tues (rest of body), and Sat (whole body circuit training). The whole point of the workouts on Mon. and Tues. are to stimulate the muscles to grow while you still have fairly high glycogen and insulin levels, then the Fri. (bodyopus) workout (grand depletion workout) is a whole body workout (high reps that do not damage the muscle fibers, instead is used primarily to reach as low of glycogen levels as possible) to help establish supercompensation for the weekend carb-up.
MR. BMJ||205.188.197.162||reg||
Z||000013||Ana||11-27-2000||10:52 PM||||The wk.end, I surely don't over do it.
I eat every 4 hrs....pro.drink w/ strawberry,
broccoli,pasta,yams,sunday dinner at mom's.
or sat. night a resturaunt meal. My stomach
seems to shrink alot so I get full on a little food. I drink a ton of H20 come sun.
night. and that's it. If I feel terribly
hungry I'll have a spoon full of Cream Cheese or meat and cheese roll-up before bed.
Thanks for the insight.||205.188.192.154||reg||
Z||000014||MR. BMJ||11-28-2000||02:17 AM||mrbmj32@hotmail.com||How long is your carb-up? Try to limit your fat intake during this time. The main purpose of the carb-up is to re-glycogenate the muscles for Mon. and Tues. workouts, plus it also helps repair any tissue damage that was inflicted during the previous dieting week. Therefore, try to digest high GI carbs and proteins at the beginning, then taper it to slower GI carbs (assuming it is a 48 hour carb-up, a 24-30 hour carb-up you can/may get away with digesting High GI carbs the whole time. I can.). Then, the last couple of meals should be high GI carbs again (liquids if possible) so that your body can quickly use them; Thus, quickening your descent back into ketosis for the following week. Try to avoid fats and whole protein foods like chicken and beef the last couple of meals. Actually, protein is not really that important for the weekend carb-up anyway. I am gonna stop here. Like I said in the last post, the weekend carb-up will either make or break you. If you fail to get the carb-up right, you might as well do another diet.
MR. BMJ||152.163.204.202||reg||