Last Week Strategies for Competition
“He looked incredible the week before the show, but awful on stage.” This is what happens to a lot of bodybuilders who inaccurately time their peak leaving them looking better a week before the competition or a week after the competition! Getting ready for a show primarily requires one systematically strip away as much body fat as possible without shedding any valuable muscle mass. When you are lean, I mean extremely lean, you can do a lot of things that final week and actually see changes. That is, you can manipulate your water and carb intake to produce a fuller or harder look.
As with dieting, where there is no one-size fits all method to getting into tremendous condition, there is no one-way to approach the final one week period to competition. To illustrate this point, I have prepped several people for several competitions taking a different approach each time. 2001 Mr. Olympia: Jay Cutler depleted extremely hard and loaded heavily. The result; arguably his best ever. Though, for his 2003 Ironman win and his victory at the 2006 Mr. Olympia, he did not deplete and load. Victor Martinez’ 2003 Night Of Champions win and 2004 GNC win; both shows we depleted hard and loaded mildly. For his disastrous placing at the 2005 Arnold, he did not deplete and load; which cost him the show. Yet, Troy Alves did not deplete or load for the 2005 Ironman where he was in absolutely unreal condition and I did not have him nor Eduardo Correa do much of that for 2009. The take home message; every time you approach a show, things are a little different, the body is different and responds differently so you have to take those factors into consideration. I’ll outline the guidelines I use with bodybuilders. Hopefully you can learn from my experiences and apply them to your own body.
1) Fullness is A Factor
I worked with Chris Cook (Photo above by Bill Comstock) for just a couple shows. The first time out, he nailed it at the Nationals and won the overall. I went out to his house more than a week before the show to start out last the week prep. When he posed, he looked soft, with no real hardcore cuts. However, he looked real big and when you touched his muscles, they felt like rocks. That rock hard feel and full looking muscles responds incredibly well to hardcore depletion of carbohydrates. I had him cut his carbs to zero for four days and we went to the gym every one of those four days and did endless sets of light weight higher rep training for all the body parts with the goal to suck every last ounce of stored muscle glycogen from the muscles. After four days, he looked tighter. When he added carbs back in the final three days, his body changed every 12 hours and he became as hard as nails. When a bodybuilder looks full and his muscles feel hard to the touch, never be afraid to deplete the hell out of the body. I know Chris thought I was crazy; no carbs and lots and lots of sets, but I knew it would work. I used the same method with Jay for the 2001 Mr. Olympia. His muscles felt like cement a couple weeks out and I knew that his muscles could withstand severe depletion. When the muscles do not feel that way, cement- like, often the bodybuilder flattens out (the muscles shrink) with depletion. That was the scenario with Troy Alves the first time I worked with him for the 2005 Ironman. His muscles looked full and hard, but when you touched them, they didn’t have that super hard feeling. I knew if he depleted too hard, his muscles would flatten out and he’d only look worse from depleting, not better. Therefore, he only mildly restricted his carbs a week out and mildly loaded the final two days. Though Gustavo Badall won that show, the entire audience was extremely vocal in their support for Troy. He looked amazing and I thought it was one show where he should have come away as the winner.
2) Fatigue is a Factor
Warning: if you are extremely tired from dieting and go into the final week excessively beat up from the long weeks of fewer calories, carbohydrates and cardio, then you’re setting yourself up for failure if you choose to deplete and load. Simply put; the final week is an extremely stressful event on the body. If you are already too tired, then depleting will end up flattening the muscles down too far to the point where the depletion process can only make you look smaller. In addition, many times when you load a fatigued body up on carbs; either the muscles do not readily load up so you end up looking flat. Or, the result is excessive water retention. From my experience it seems the body builder who carbs up in a severe state of fatigue simply ends up retaining water, which interferes with his condition and definition. That’s why I recommend the bodybuilder start his contest prep far enough out from the show so he can take the 2 weeks prior to the final week and rest more, stop cardio and decrease the intensity of his training. This, somewhat of a rest phase, makes a big difference in the way the body responds to the depletion and loading process. When the body is fresh and not suffering from excess fatigue, the depletion and loading process is far more effective.
3) Water Intake Is A Factor
I always have bodybuilders drink more from 14 days out from the show to 3 days out. At around the 14 day mark, I’ll have them double up on their water intake only to sharply reduce it to as little as 4-6 cups a day the final 3 days going onto the show. The reason: a higher intake tricks the body to become more rapidly dehydrated when there is a reduction in fluid intake. For example, if the bodybuilder was drinking 1 gallon of water a day and reduced that to 4 cups, his body would fall into a dehydration state as switching from a full gallon to 4 cups is a severe drop off. However, if the bodybuilder goes from 2 gallons to 4 cups the dehydration process is not only quicker but greater in scope. And, here is a secret to loading up on carbs: when you increase your carb consumption the final 2 or 3 days, you should reduce your water intake. This – dehydration - creates a tighter look. While many will disagree with that as, on paper from a physiology point of view the formation of muscle glycogen requires water, in the real world, restricting water causes a visual effect that results in greater definition. This, of course, is affirmed by the use and misuse of diuretics. Diuretics cause the body to lose water resulting in better definition. However, you can create an incredibly defined look simply by cutting back on water intake.
4) Carb Status Is A Factor
How many carbs to eat those final 2-3 days will vary from bodybuilder to bodybuilder. Eating 90 grams a day while dieting? Guess what; 500 will make you watery as a broken dam. Eating 400 while dieting? Loading on 400, 500, or 600 will leave you flat. As a rule, the fewer carbs you ate while dieting, the fewer your carb needs while loading. Likewise, if you eat a lot of carbs while dieting, you’ll need plenty to bring you back. I advise most bodybuilder to eat 2 times the amount of carbs they ate while dieting during the carbing up phase, the final 3 days. For example, is a bodybuilder dieted on 100 carbs, he can load on 200. If, for the most part he dieted on 300 carbs, then he would need up to 600 a day the final three days. Keep in mind, you should not be training the final two or three days so you do not need massive amounts of carbs to fill the muscles out with glycogen. Simply by not training, the body will fill out and bounce back from having gone through a depletion phase
“He looked incredible the week before the show, but awful on stage.” This is what happens to a lot of bodybuilders who inaccurately time their peak leaving them looking better a week before the competition or a week after the competition! Getting ready for a show primarily requires one systematically strip away as much body fat as possible without shedding any valuable muscle mass. When you are lean, I mean extremely lean, you can do a lot of things that final week and actually see changes. That is, you can manipulate your water and carb intake to produce a fuller or harder look.
As with dieting, where there is no one-size fits all method to getting into tremendous condition, there is no one-way to approach the final one week period to competition. To illustrate this point, I have prepped several people for several competitions taking a different approach each time. 2001 Mr. Olympia: Jay Cutler depleted extremely hard and loaded heavily. The result; arguably his best ever. Though, for his 2003 Ironman win and his victory at the 2006 Mr. Olympia, he did not deplete and load. Victor Martinez’ 2003 Night Of Champions win and 2004 GNC win; both shows we depleted hard and loaded mildly. For his disastrous placing at the 2005 Arnold, he did not deplete and load; which cost him the show. Yet, Troy Alves did not deplete or load for the 2005 Ironman where he was in absolutely unreal condition and I did not have him nor Eduardo Correa do much of that for 2009. The take home message; every time you approach a show, things are a little different, the body is different and responds differently so you have to take those factors into consideration. I’ll outline the guidelines I use with bodybuilders. Hopefully you can learn from my experiences and apply them to your own body.
1) Fullness is A Factor
I worked with Chris Cook (Photo above by Bill Comstock) for just a couple shows. The first time out, he nailed it at the Nationals and won the overall. I went out to his house more than a week before the show to start out last the week prep. When he posed, he looked soft, with no real hardcore cuts. However, he looked real big and when you touched his muscles, they felt like rocks. That rock hard feel and full looking muscles responds incredibly well to hardcore depletion of carbohydrates. I had him cut his carbs to zero for four days and we went to the gym every one of those four days and did endless sets of light weight higher rep training for all the body parts with the goal to suck every last ounce of stored muscle glycogen from the muscles. After four days, he looked tighter. When he added carbs back in the final three days, his body changed every 12 hours and he became as hard as nails. When a bodybuilder looks full and his muscles feel hard to the touch, never be afraid to deplete the hell out of the body. I know Chris thought I was crazy; no carbs and lots and lots of sets, but I knew it would work. I used the same method with Jay for the 2001 Mr. Olympia. His muscles felt like cement a couple weeks out and I knew that his muscles could withstand severe depletion. When the muscles do not feel that way, cement- like, often the bodybuilder flattens out (the muscles shrink) with depletion. That was the scenario with Troy Alves the first time I worked with him for the 2005 Ironman. His muscles looked full and hard, but when you touched them, they didn’t have that super hard feeling. I knew if he depleted too hard, his muscles would flatten out and he’d only look worse from depleting, not better. Therefore, he only mildly restricted his carbs a week out and mildly loaded the final two days. Though Gustavo Badall won that show, the entire audience was extremely vocal in their support for Troy. He looked amazing and I thought it was one show where he should have come away as the winner.
2) Fatigue is a Factor
Warning: if you are extremely tired from dieting and go into the final week excessively beat up from the long weeks of fewer calories, carbohydrates and cardio, then you’re setting yourself up for failure if you choose to deplete and load. Simply put; the final week is an extremely stressful event on the body. If you are already too tired, then depleting will end up flattening the muscles down too far to the point where the depletion process can only make you look smaller. In addition, many times when you load a fatigued body up on carbs; either the muscles do not readily load up so you end up looking flat. Or, the result is excessive water retention. From my experience it seems the body builder who carbs up in a severe state of fatigue simply ends up retaining water, which interferes with his condition and definition. That’s why I recommend the bodybuilder start his contest prep far enough out from the show so he can take the 2 weeks prior to the final week and rest more, stop cardio and decrease the intensity of his training. This, somewhat of a rest phase, makes a big difference in the way the body responds to the depletion and loading process. When the body is fresh and not suffering from excess fatigue, the depletion and loading process is far more effective.
3) Water Intake Is A Factor
I always have bodybuilders drink more from 14 days out from the show to 3 days out. At around the 14 day mark, I’ll have them double up on their water intake only to sharply reduce it to as little as 4-6 cups a day the final 3 days going onto the show. The reason: a higher intake tricks the body to become more rapidly dehydrated when there is a reduction in fluid intake. For example, if the bodybuilder was drinking 1 gallon of water a day and reduced that to 4 cups, his body would fall into a dehydration state as switching from a full gallon to 4 cups is a severe drop off. However, if the bodybuilder goes from 2 gallons to 4 cups the dehydration process is not only quicker but greater in scope. And, here is a secret to loading up on carbs: when you increase your carb consumption the final 2 or 3 days, you should reduce your water intake. This – dehydration - creates a tighter look. While many will disagree with that as, on paper from a physiology point of view the formation of muscle glycogen requires water, in the real world, restricting water causes a visual effect that results in greater definition. This, of course, is affirmed by the use and misuse of diuretics. Diuretics cause the body to lose water resulting in better definition. However, you can create an incredibly defined look simply by cutting back on water intake.
4) Carb Status Is A Factor
How many carbs to eat those final 2-3 days will vary from bodybuilder to bodybuilder. Eating 90 grams a day while dieting? Guess what; 500 will make you watery as a broken dam. Eating 400 while dieting? Loading on 400, 500, or 600 will leave you flat. As a rule, the fewer carbs you ate while dieting, the fewer your carb needs while loading. Likewise, if you eat a lot of carbs while dieting, you’ll need plenty to bring you back. I advise most bodybuilder to eat 2 times the amount of carbs they ate while dieting during the carbing up phase, the final 3 days. For example, is a bodybuilder dieted on 100 carbs, he can load on 200. If, for the most part he dieted on 300 carbs, then he would need up to 600 a day the final three days. Keep in mind, you should not be training the final two or three days so you do not need massive amounts of carbs to fill the muscles out with glycogen. Simply by not training, the body will fill out and bounce back from having gone through a depletion phase
