At the beginning everything was going my way. I was relatively injury free, full of motivation, and excited at the challenge of getting to 205lbs.

Then the setbacks started to happen. One after the other something impeded my progression and hindered my goals. Each time beating my motivation levels down to a new low.

To give you an idea of what kind of struggles I’ve been thought I’ll list a few of the complications in my life:

• I have a herniated L4-L5 disc (I guess that back injury I had months ago was a lot more serious)
• Tendonitis in both both shoulders which has led to some impingement
• Tendonitis in my right elbow
• And to top things off I just recovered from the flu which effectively has knocked off over 10lbs officially setting me back to where I first started

Fun times right?

I don’t know what my next move is. I’ve obviously started physiotherapy for the herination but have been told that exersises such as heavy squating and deadlifting to elimited from my routine permantley.

What am I to do now?

There is a possbility that I will make a 100% reovery but only if I put in the work.

At this point I’m so worn out from all the set backs that finding the motivation to countinue seem impossble.

Do I quit? Should I continue? Is this the end?

There are a few things that I’m going to have to take care of before I get started. I’d like to first get a check up with my doctor and get a Physical. My doctor knows I like to workout and that I’m pretty active but I haven’t talked to him about what I have planned for the future. My diet is going to be changing dramatically over the next few months so I want to make sure that my bodily systems are in fine working order.

In addition to having a check up I’d like to have my physiotherapist  check me out. I haven’t worked out for almost 2 weeks due to chronic pain from my current injuries. My back, elbows and shoulders are messed up and its about time I start taking care of myself.

I’m gonna keep you guys posted on my progress, Hopefully all goes well.

If I’m seriously going succeed in this challenge I need to break down all the aspect of Training, Nutrition, and Supplementation into parts that are going to be easy for me to carry out.

This leads me into today’s article which will focus on how I’m going to Ease into a Bodybuilding Diet.

Eating all this food might not be such a good idea

Incremental Change is the name of the game

In the past I’ve always rushed head first into changing my diet and workout regimen. And every time no matter how well I was doing I eventually quit due to injury, lack of motivation, or plain laziness.

This time around I’m going to take a step back and slowly change my diet at a speed that will allow me to maintain the drastic changes I’ll be making.  The goal is to be 100% set in my ways in about 8-10 weeks. Every two weeks I’ll set a new goal and focus primarily on that goal. Hopefully if all goes well by the start of November I’ll be well on my way to putting on 30 pounds for next years bodybuilding show.

Week 1 -2 (September 1st – 14th) – Cutting bad Fat from my diet

The first couple of weeks are going to be pretty easy because I don’t really have a high fat diet to begin with. What I will do is make the right choices when it comes to food preparation. I’ll avoid eating fried foods more often, I’ll make sure to be more aware on whats on labels and I’ll do simple things like taking skin off chicken before I eat it.

Week 3-4 (September 15th-30th) – Eliminating refined sugars from my diet

This is probably be the hardest thing for me to do. I am an admitted sugar fiend. I love to eat candy so giving sweets up is going to be hard. But I think I can do it. In addition to giving up candy I’ll be staying away from drinks that are high in sugar and avoiding using pure sugar in my coffee.

Week 5-6 (October 1st-14th) – Making Water the main beverage in my diet

Another hard challenge. I more of a juice guy over water but this is a change that my body really needs.

Week 7-8 (October 15 – 31st) – Making sure my Caloric intake is controlled and having multiple meals a day.

At this point I’m not going to focus in on how much protein vs carbs I’m eating. The main objective is to be eating a lot of food over different periods of the day. I’m going to try to maintain anywhere from 3500 to 4000 calories a day and we’ll see how my body responds.

Weeks 9-10 (November 1st -14th) – Macronutritonal Management

At this point the majority of the hard work is over. I just need to make sure that my macronutritional ratio are in order. I’m probably going to be eating close to a 40:40:20 (Protein:Carbs:Fat) split but I might eventually decide to go heavy on the carbs since I”ll be bulking.

In Summary…

So there you have it that’s my nutritional plan of attack for the next 10 weeks. Its going to be hard but with your support I know I”ll be able to pull through.

BUT at the same time there is going to be a lot of scarf ice, pain, suffering, sweat, blood, and tears. I’m not sure if I’m not sure if I have what it takes to aggressively bulk up to 205 pounds and then cut back down for a bodybuilding competition.

For my new readers (and old), in case your wondering what I’m grumbling about, I’ve been thinking about getting into bodybuilding for sometime now. Even though I’m still skinny and working on mastering techniques for hardgainers, entering a bodybuilding show with only a year of preparation would be an amazing accomplishment. It would set myself, our hardgainer community, and this website form all the other hardgainer specific websites that have recently come up.

How many sites have actually had a normal guy document his progression from the very start all the way to the end.

I think I’m going to do this…

What do you guys think?

If I’m ever going to get to 185lbs I’m going to have to take serious look at how I can correct these problems as soon as possible.

I’ve come up with some simple sure fire ways to overcome some of my obstacles, maybe you guys will find these helpful too.

My Motivation Issues

Often times when I struggle with motivation I head back to one of my most popular posts on this subject. (Click here to read) I find often times I need to re-evaluate my priorities. My biggest issue is the fact that I keep putting work ahead of my own goals.

I need to learn to be a little bit more “selfish” and focus on doing what is best for me even if this means pissing a few friends and clients off.

Another issue that puts a damper on my motivation levels are my current injuries. Every time I feel that I make progress I feel like I’m held back by my shoulder, back, or elbow. I’m going to have to train a lot smarter if I plan on continuing at the pace I’ve set

Finding Time to Eat

Funny enough this used to never be a program but ever since school picked up and work got busier I find it hard to get in my normal feeding patterns. I’m simply going to start scheduling when I eat. This is probably going to be the most effect way to force myself to eat somthing. During the gaps when I’m not personal Training or at School I’ll set designated times where I’ll ignore everything that is happening around me and focus on eating and eating alone.

Additionally I’m going to really simplfy what I eat each day. I need some form of routine each day so I know what I’m eating at what time.  I’m thinking of having the same Breakfast, Midmorning Snack, Afternoon Snack, and Pre Bedtime Meal each day to help elimanate some of the thinking that goes into my meals. This will effectively save me time which could be used to stuff my face.

Finding Time to Train and Staying Healthy

These two issues are hand in hand because my health affects how well I train. As of right now I have 3 major injuries that have plagued me for the past year. I have an inflamed sciatic nerve that is aggravated with hip flexion. This has caused me to give up Squatting, deadlifting and most exercises that involved flexion of the hip. I have an impinged shoulder that seems to be getting worst and worst each day and tendonitis in my right elbow.

In order to be able to workout now I usually spend about half an hour warming up my joints and another half an hour spending extra time to stretch and ice post workout. So instead of needing an hour to workout I now need 2. Each day I strategically plan my workouts so that I have enough time to avoid causing worst damage to my current injuries but it’s hard. For this problem I’m simply going to have to stay diligent and try my best to work things out.

As for staying healthy I have taken extreme precaution to ensure that I get back on track. I now do rehabilitative exercises on my off days to assist in my recovery. This takes anywhere from an hour to an hour and a half to do which is more time spend in the gym. I don’t mind this but I don’t know how long I can keep up this pace.

These are just some of the issues I’m currently dealing with; do you guys have any suggestions? Would you like to share some of your issues? Just let me know by posting below.

We both want to get bigger, we both love a challenge, and we both want to showcase our progress for all of you to witness.

With that said Hardgainer-Transformation Presents:

Competition Format and Rules

• This Competition will run from July 20th all the way to December 1st 2009
• I’ll document my progress as per usal on my website, Alex will make a weekly post to let you know how he’s doing
• Veiwer participation is more than welcome. Whatever you guys want to see or know will be explained just ask away
• Every 4 weeks we’ll get together to find out who’s in the lead
• The Loser treats the winner to an All you can eat buffet

This competition will be judged on 3 factors

1. Amount of Weight Gained – Whoever puts on the most amount lean body mass
2. Total Inches Put on – Totals from inches put on from Arms, Chest, Thigh, Calf, and amount of Inches Loss from Waist
3. Visual Appeal – We’ll have a vote leaving you guys in charge of what look you like better.
4. (If you guys come up with other things we can judge with I’ll be more than open to adding other criteria)***

The Tale of the Tape

Weight	167 lbs	156 lbs
Body Fat %	13.5 %	13.7 %
Chest	35 inches	35 inches
Right Arm	12 inches	13.5 inches
Waist	29.5 inches	32 inches
Right Thigh	23 inches	22.5 inches
Right Calf	15.5 inches	15 inches

.

This is certainly not your typical competition but would you expect any less from me? Be sure to stay tuned as we continue to race towards our goal of new found size and strength.

178lbs! Obviously a good amount of water retention but surely I’ve put on some mass so I’m very satisfied with that number. In the mirror I’ve noticed that I’m starting to fill in again which affirms this large number.

Realistically I’m thinking that I’m probably 170lbs but that’s still an improvement so I’m gong to continue to try my best to continuing eating and training hard. 

The last few days have progressively gotten harder and ha rder to mantain proper eating habits. It started off with me missing meal times and then missing whole meals. I made up the meals I missed by eating bigger meals but that’s not the type of habit I’d like to start. This has been a problem for me in the past. I get off to strong stars and then I fizzle off.  I’m aware of this problem so I’m going to take the necessarily steps to ensure that I don’t fall off. 

On an exciting note, I started working at my new job couple of days ago. I’m a Personal Trainer so my workplace is my new home and will play an instrumental part in my progression. My first workout took an hour and a half because I was getting used to the surroundings but tomorrow should be a lot better. I’ll be shooting to finish my workout in 45 minutes.

I have a little bit of a dilemma because working out tomorrow will weaken my immune system but at the same time I don’t want to miss any gym time. I think I’m going to opt to workout and just take it easy at home. 

A positive about today was the fact that despite being sick I ate around 3500 kcals. Obviously not my 4000 kcal daily goal but its better than not eating at all.

I’m going to up my daily Glutamine intake to 20 grams to help boost my immune system while sick and I’ll take my meds and get my sleep. Hopefully this sickness passes quickly.

I feel as if I’m starting to loose focus on what my goal is. Tomorrow I’m going to make a better effort to get 4000 kcals into my system.

I’ve decided on my goal which is to add 20lbs in the next 4 months and I’ve finally found a training protocol that seems suited for me. My diet is set up and ready to go so like I said in my title NO MORE EXCUSES.

A few days ago I ran into a Youtube video on Adam Water, a man who was able to overcome his barriers and successfully transform himself from a chubby person to a lean mean fighting machine. He took a picture of himself everyday and made an epic compilation documenting the changes he had undergone.

He left me quite inspired so I went through a bunch of his videos and ran into the Adam’s 7 steps to Redemption (You can check out the video here).

In Summary He:

• Realized
• Internalized
• Strategized
• Pressurized
• Energized
• Exercised
• Actualized

Although my goals are different from Adams I was able to take these 7 steps and apply them to my situation. Below are my 7 steps to (Redemption) completing my transformation.
 

Realize

In order to realize the magnitude of my transformation I’ve decided to take a picture of myself every day until further notice. This will give me a visual quantifiable measure that I’ll be able to look back on when I reach my goal. Maybe at the end of my transformation I’ll post all the pictures and make my own epic Transformation compilation on Youtube.

Internalize

Looking at the pictures of myself right now does not make me happy. I am not satisfied with my current self. So I’ve internalize this and I’ve decided that I’m willing to do whatever it takes to get to the goal I’ve set for myself. If that means eating 4000 kcals a day I’m ready, If that means working to absolute exertion in the gym I’m ready, If that means eating clean for the rest of the summer I’m ready.

Strategize

How am I going to get to 185lbs? We’ll I’ve updated my transformation page and I’ve laid out my game plan. It’s going to involve a lot of sacrifice but I’m ready and willing to do whatever it takes.

Pressurize

The only way to hold myself accountable was by publicly telling you guys what my goals was and by telling some of my close friends and family members. I’m 4 days into my bulk and starting from tomorrow I’m going to blog daily on how I’m dong and how my bulk is progressing. (Don’t worry I’ll still find time to post information type blog posts too)

Energize

I’ve cleaned up my diet to help with my energy levels. This doesn’t mean that I won’t indulge in the odd cheat meal but for the most part I’ve decided that if I’m going to do this I want to do it the right way from all aspects including nutrition. My Plan is to stick to as many low glycemic foods as possible and to additionally add a lot more fruits and vegetables to my diet.  

Exercise

I’ve finally found a training protocol that is right for me. Bryan Haycock’s Hypertrophy Specific Protocol is going to take me to places I’ve never been before. I trust the program and I plan to prove how superior it is to any other training program.

Actualize

There needs to be some form of actualization when I do reach this goal so I’ve decided to give myself some incentive to reaching 185lbs. I’m going to reward myself for making it to my 8 week goal weight of 176lbs with an Optimum Nutrition T shirt and Shaker Bottle. When I make it to 185lbs I’ve decided that I’m going to get myself a Schiek 2006 Lifting Belt.

As you see a lot of thought has gone into this bulk and it really means a lot to me. I want you guys to come along for the ride so let me know what you’d like me to document and talk about. Would you like me to video blog more often? What are your bulking goals?

I’m 3 weeks away from being out of school and having 4 months of free time to enjoy myself. Or in other words 4 months to Bulk like no man has bulked before!

As I mentioned a few posts ago, I terminated my previous unsuccessful bulk cycle due to various injuries that hampered my progress. I’ll be updating my Transformation Page in a few days to reflect this change. 

In the meantime let me give you a taste of what I have planned.

In order to be 185lbs by September 1st I would need to put on about 1 pound a week from April to August 31st. I’ve already started eating and working out again (still modified workouts due to injury) and I must say things are going well

Additionally one thing I’ve added that I didn’t do last cycle is I’ve set up check points. This check points will act as a measure of how well I’m doing and where I should be in terms of progress. 

As usual I’ll let you guys in on what supplements I’m using and ho much I’m eating and one cool thing I’m looking forward to adding is Videos!

If there are any other things you’d like to see my cover or if you have some ideas for me please let me know because I’d love to hear from you