Living, Lifting, and Loving

Sometimes life reaches out and slaps you, and I don't mean a nice fun slap on the rear end, I mean a cold, hard, stinging slap across the cheek that leaves a red mark. I have felt like that for a while now and am starting to recover.

I am not one who likes to complain, in fact, when I see people only complain about issues on Facebook, I just take them off my feed, I don't want or need to see their downers.

I have had a few injuries for a while and I tried to keep people updated but I tried to avoid whining, I detest whiners.

I had a contracted glute muscle, then a hamstring strain, and two strained hip flexors. This all started back in June. Here we are, September 27 and I think I am healed, finally.

I never stopped training, I just modified my lifting. In the course of that I discovered that I was neglecting a few areas so I have now added them into my regular days. The problem is, there aren't enough days to fit everything in! So I am cutting back on cardio and adding in more weight lifting. I think that's a grand idea, too much cardio does not create the look I like.

Last week I started in with hamstrings at BodyComp Gym. We did RDL's but went "light". Now light is relative, right? Hamstrings need to be trained with heavy weight if you want to grow them, those little light weights really won't do much for these massive muscle fibers. We ended up doing 170 pounds for sets of 10 reps, then on the second session moved to more reps but left the weight the same because I could feel a "pull" a little and was afraid I would tear the muscle..... 

On Saturday I tried squats. My last day squatting prior to this was August 25, so it was almost a month to the day and I was apprehensive. Roy said not to lower my weight from what I was doing a month ago. He said do lots of warm ups till you feel good, then start with the same weight. Drop the reps if you need, but never, ever lower the weight.

So I didn't. I did 5 sets of 8 reps with 135 pounds, below parallel. I felt great, squatting is real weight training, in my book if you don't squat, you don't lift.

So now that I am back on track I had to change my split a little, when I couldn't train quads I started training triceps and biceps, boy my arms looked great after a couple weeks of doing this twice a week. Now I want to keep them looking like that, so what's a girl to do? Here is my split for a while now:

Monday 5:00 am Gold's: Calves, Posing, Cardio

Monday noon San Jose State: Stairs, jump rope

Monday 5:30 pm BodyComp Gym: Hamstrings

Tuesday 5:00 am Gold's: Shoulders

Tuesday noon San Jose State: Stairs, jump rope

Wednesday 5:00 am Gold's: Biceps and Triceps

Wednesday noon San Jose State: Stairs, jump rope

Wednesday 5:30 pm BodyComp Gym: Quads

Thursday 5:00 am Gold's: Hamstrings

Thursday noon San Jose State: Stairs, jump rope

Friday 5:00 am Gold's: Calves, Posing, Cardio

Friday noon BodyComp Gym: Shoulders

Every other Friday 4:30 pm 24 Hour Fitness: posing with Kristy Enos

Saturday 6:00 am Gold's: Quads, Posing

Sunday 6:00 am Gold's: Back, Posing

I am adjusting the calories down slightly (slightly!!) by reducing the fats and increasing the lean proteins, starches are staying the same but very little as usual. That's a nice way of saying I am keeping my paws out of the nut butters!

I am missing my son more than ever. He's been away at school now for five weeks, so not only was my passion in life taken from me (the lifting) but my son also. I will get to see him soon, and then once again life will be completely back to where it should be.

Living, Lifting, and Loving.

Posing and Physique Changes

I realize these pictures are slightly blurry, I had a very hard time flexing, posing and pointing my phone in the right direction! But I want to show how my physique is changing, and how the posing is coming along.

I have been doing well at adding mass and maintaining a fairly lean physique. I fluctuate up and down a few pounds here and there, but for the most part I have been adhering to my regular diet with one or two "normal" dinners a week. "Normal" is food my family eats......

I am definitely bigger, that's clear to everyone around me and to myself, I am the hardest one to convince! I told Roy that recently I was in a meeting at work, and for the first time in my life I felt almost like a freak. I looked around and noticed that my arms were bigger than anyone else's in the room, male or female. I was muscular, none of them were. I felt odd, but then I realized I work damn hard to look like this and I am proud of my physique, and it quickly passed. I picked up my pen, flexed a little and thought of my training later that night. LOL!

The upper body looks great- better than ever actually! In these photos my arms are pumped up, this was taken after training Biceps and Triceps on Sunday morning. The previous day was Back day and the day before was Shoulders, so the upper body had three days of hard and heavy training.

I have been working with Kristy Enos for posing and she has been amazing - she is a wealth of knowledge. She started in Bodybuilding, so was well versed with posing prior to when she switched to Women's Physique. 

She has helped me to find the poses that work best with my body, for instance, I will be using this pose (with arms raised up) for my double biceps front pose. I have such a great wide back and V-taper that having the legs both out creates a great shape, and the illusion that my quads are bigger than they actually are.

This pose can be done many different ways, but at least one foot must never be flat in all of the poses, hence the reason I am on my tip-toes. Most competitors seem to favor the one foot flat, and one on tip-toe, I plan to look different.

Kristy has taught me that in Bodybuilding and Physique, you think "bottom up", meaning the first thing that moves is your feet, in a smooth and flowing manner, and the rest of the body follows. This is not at all like figure where the posing is much easier, much, much easier.

Posing is very, very important in this sport, more so than what people realize. Yeah, Everyone on the stage has a rockin body right? (well most of the people), so what makes the difference? What makes one competitor stand out from the other? Stage presence and posing. You need to look comfortable, confident, and like you are enjoying the experience. It's tough, especially if you aren't particularly comfortable standing in front of strangers nearly naked! But that's where the confidence comes into play. The confidence that comes from working hard training and eating right day after day after day. The confidence that comes from watching yourself grow and improve.

I think these photos also demonstrate what a great job Roy Ganju has been doing with my overall training program, and now my arm and shoulder training, they look fabulous to me! Big, full, round and well proportioned. Legs had to have a bit of a break due to injuries, but the month long rest may prove to be just what I needed to kick start the growth. My long term goal has been to increase the size of my quads, and I have, but I had a slight set back so now these little legs are ready to work hard!

Saturday, September 22, I believe I get to start squatting again, so that means re-thinking my training split all over again.  I don't want to stop training the arms, so I will need to go back to some of my two a day lifting splits. Typically on the days I lift with Roy after work, I only do cardio (and train calves) in the morning. I will need to start throwing in some additional lifting mornings then,  and that's OK since I am not trying to drop any weight right now, so I really don't want to do a lot of cardio. I still run my stairs and jump rope at lunch, so I am set  I think.

Whether or not you plan to compete, I think you can see that the training program I am on has been making dramatic changes, and it's the type of weight training anyone can consider, just for the aesthetic appeal alone. You don't have to compete, it's great just to look ripped!