I make TA look like a MASS MONSTER!

[GoneAway]

21 yrs old
Weight: 70.1 KG at the time the pics were shot

These pics were taken 2 1/2 weeks after I stopped training and dieting. My sole diet since has been utter junk (The Adonis Principles) and I have lost 2 kilos since I stopped training. As you can see, I'm an ectomorph with a fast metabolism. Feel free to rip on my room.

I plan to get back on the horse next week, so consider these my "before" pics.

[GoneAway]

.

[210 and growing]

despite being skinny i reckon you do actually look like you have a good bb structure - can see the lats even at that thin !! Get eating bro - your only 21 so plenty of time to fill out

[GoneAway]

.

[GoneAway]

despite being skinny i reckon you do actually look like you have a good bb structure - can see the lats even at that thin !! Get eating bro - your only 21 so plenty of time to fill out

Thanks man, really appreciate it.

[Always Sore]

Everybody has to start somewhere, keep working at it you already are ahead of many of the people your age good job. The only suggestion I have is at 21 take the faggy wrestling photos of steve austin and big poppa pump off the walls...

[jaejonna]

I like stone cold too

[figgs]

LOL

You're at the right place, dude. Don't worry about a thing. You won't look like that for much longer as long as you take our advice.

How's your training intensity, duration and frequency? How's your diet?

despite being skinny i reckon you do actually look like you have a good bb structure - can see the lats even at that thin !! Get eating bro - your only 21 so plenty of time to fill out

I agree! I was surprised to see those wings spread as wide as they were! I see some back potential! We need to convince you to deadlift to get you to reach that potential!

And don't take down those wrestling posters. I have a friend who's bodybuilding is motivated by his favorite wrestlers and he trains like a fucking beast!

[blondmusclhunk]

Great potential dude.  Just eat!! make sure your getting 1.5 grams of protein per pound of body weight a day, plus vitamins, glutamine and branch chain.  Train each body part heavy and hard only once a week.  Get rest!!! youlll get there!!

[Clubber Lang]

looks like someone was a little generous with his cod piece

[GoneAway]

Thanks for the positive comments everyone. I expected to get torn a new one! Always Sore, my ex didn't want them on the wall either, but I've had them for quite a while. They're a part of my room.

LOL

You're at the right place, dude. Don't worry about a thing. You won't look like that for much longer as long as you take our advice.

How's your training intensity, duration and frequency? How's your diet?

I agree! I was surprised to see those wings spread as wide as they were! I see some back potential! We need to convince you to deadlift to get you to reach that potential!

And don't take down those wrestling posters. I have a friend who's bodybuilding is motivated by his favorite wrestlers and he trains like a fucking beast!

Intensity is about average. I focus on form alot so I kind of lose intensity by going a bit slower, trying to feel the contraction and keep things under control, even if that's not the case half the time. Duration's about 1 1/2 hrs. Diet's going by the Arnold Encyclopedia Level I food, and Level I protein shake. Getting 6 meals a day, about 45g protein in each meal, 30g in shake. It's enough to make me grow, so that's what I'll be picking up again next week.

I was never good at Deadlifts, which is why I stopped months ago. I tried someones advice and took them out of my routine hoping it would help me want to do it more, but it hasn't. Never got the form down, no matter how hard I practiced. Thanks for the encouragement, figgs, and all the best.

[candidate2025]

eat every chicken breast you can find.

[figgs]

Good work on your diet. That's one step down. Now the next is for you to learn all about intensity. Personally, I get little satisfaction out of a set unless it's taken to absolute failure. Even with exercises like squats. I need to do forced reps to absolute failure until I collapse the second I rack the weight. That way, my leg workout is 4-5 sets long and I progress as fast as I'd ever care to. My calf workout is 1-2 sets a week! I'm in and out of the gym, although often I'm limping out... 

From workout to workout, I suggest you focus on working on increasing the levels of intensity each time. Don't jump into it, just feel it through week after week. And then go home and rest!

Do you think you're psychologically prepared for above-average training intensity?

"The fundamental principle of intensity refers almost exclusively to the human will and the ability to command your muscles to contract against the only real resistance-your mind."
-Mike Mentzer

[GoneAway]

figgs, how does increased intensity relate to increased muscle growth?

[haider]

figgs, how does increased intensity relate to increased muscle growth?

it doesn't.

[The True Adonis]

it doesn't.

Actually it can.

[The True Adonis]

You aren`t an Ectomorph by the way.  You still have a good deal of bodyfat.  You just need to keep training.  Muscle will come in time.

[figgs]

it doesn't.

Don't try to confuse LoveTheSport. Training intensity is the single most important determinant factor in achieving optimal muscle growth. Here I have for you a passage from Mike Mentzer's book in HIT from the chapter on the principle of intensity:

"Carrying a set to a point where you are forced to utilize 100 percent of your momentary ability is the single most important factor in increasing size and strength. Working to this 'point of failure,' when another rep is impossible despite the greatest effort, ensures that you pass through the 'break-over point,' a point in the set below which growth cannot be stimulated, and above which growth will be stimulated. Once you transcend this break-over point in the area of intensity, your results will increase geometrically. And for every degree over the break-over point, there will be-as there must be-a dramatic reduction in the amount of time you spend training at that intensity level."

Not only does it make sense to any reasonable person, the results speak for themselves. I've been training with high intensity since the beginning, just over 1 year ago.

[GoneAway]

You aren`t an Ectomorph by the way.  You still have a good deal of bodyfat.  You just need to keep training.  Muscle will come in time.

Thanks man, you're definately an inspiration.

How do you figure I'm not an ectomorph? I have a few traits as you can see.

ensures that you pass through the 'break-over point,' a point in the set below which growth cannot be stimulated, and above which growth will be stimulated. Once you transcend this break-over point in the area of intensity, your results will increase geometrically.

I don't fully understand that part.

And for every degree over the break-over point, there will be-as there must be-a dramatic reduction in the amount of time you spend training at that intensity level."

Does this mean you must slow down the set speed once gains are made? Kind of like cycling the intensity on and off?

[figgs]

That Mentzer passage just means that as long as you train with 100% effort of intensity, you will be training for optimal increases in muscle growth. It's like a short cut to results. It just takes a lot of motivation and willpower to train at such high intensity levels for a consistent amount of time. But, as the passage says, you will NEED to train less. While utilizing the high intensity method I only train 1-6 sets a muscle.

[Stavios]

around 35-40 lbs of fat to lose

[alexxx]

Hey bro like mentioned before you have a pretty good structure. Just focus on getting stronger on the basic lifts in the gym and eat anything you can find. Stay with the healthy food though. You are getting good advice on here.

[haider]

"Carrying a set to a point where you are forced to utilize 100 percent of your momentary ability is the single most important factor in increasing size and strength. Working to this 'point of failure,' when another rep is impossible despite the greatest effort, ensures that you pass through the 'break-over point,' a point in the set below which growth cannot be stimulated, and above which growth will be stimulated. Once you transcend this break-over point in the area of intensity, your results will increase geometrically. And for every degree over the break-over point, there will be-as there must be-a dramatic reduction in the amount of time you spend training at that intensity level."

LOL
Very interesting paragraph, though the science behind it seems to be missing. Just because something makes sense in theory doesn't mean it is true. That's where we take our heads out our asses and demand actual scientific proof; NOT a bunch of analogous reference passed off as logical proof.

You may also misunderstand HIT training - no offense, lets keep this discussion free of insults. You say that you have been doing HIT for a year now, since you started training. This doesn't make sense because I remember you posting your high volume workouts on the training section a while back. Your percieved level of intensity may have been high during these workouts (we can get into the definition of intensity later) but this is not HIT training. You can have very intense(again, perceived intensity) high volume workouts, but when you say you do "high intensity training" it is genreally assumed that you follow the HIT layout (Mentzer, arthur, etc)... HIT kinda has a trademark with that. Might wanna be careful with that to avoid confusion.

[davidpaul]

around 35-40 lbs of fat to lose

hes in the mid 30's bf.

you like stavios has said have a good 40 pounds of fat to lose EASILY.

[figgs]

LOL
Very interesting paragraph, though the science behind it seems to be missing. Just because something makes sense in theory doesn't mean it is true. That's where we take our heads out our asses and demand actual scientific proof; NOT a bunch of analogous reference passed off as logical proof.

You may also misunderstand HIT training - no offense, lets keep this discussion free of insults. You say that you have been doing HIT for a year now, since you started training. This doesn't make sense because I remember you posting your high volume workouts on the training section a while back. Your percieved level of intensity may have been high during these workouts (we can get into the definition of intensity later) but this is not HIT training. You can have very intense(again, perceived intensity) high volume workouts, but when you say you do "high intensity training" it is genreally assumed that you follow the HIT layout (Mentzer, arthur, etc)... HIT kinda has a trademark with that. Might wanna be careful with that to avoid confusion.

There's plenty of scientific research backed by Mentzer's statements. I'm not going to pull out the book and search for them all but trust me they exist, to a certain extent. There's no actual lab results or anything that I know of, however.

I understand the HIT workout routine. That's a seperate routine from my own. In my workouts, I focus on the principle of high intenstiy. Not Mentzer's exact routine. I use his routine for certain muscles like bis and calves. I'm going to start my first actual HIT routine in about a week and half. Yeah, I'll admit I didn't think to clarify on the fact that I don't use the HIT routine, but only have used its set of principles as a part of my own routine.

Good memory. I did once make the mistake of using high volume workouts. My workouts were not only percieved as intense, they were very intense. I was always an extremist in the gym. But the level of intensity, which was still great at that point, has been surpassed over and over again with time and experience. It's now all about absolute failure on each and every set.

I think it was around Oct-Nov '05 when I started to lower volume and raise intensity. I remember doing 20 set chest workouts and now, just an hour ago, I finished a 6 set chest workout. And as time went by, I continued raising the intensity which forced me to lower the volume. Even now I'm still learning how to raise intensity. My calf workout has just recently been changed to 1 set. Before that I did 4, but I discovered a new level of intensity that I hadn't known to exist before.

I'm really looking foward to the challenge of following Mike Mentzer's HIT routine! I'll keep Getbig updated on it's effectiveness.