mythil

I don't really use oil.. From time to time I will stur fry stuff which I do need some oil for but it burns off quick. I do use a little sunflower vegan butter as it's fortified with lots of things I could be lacking so "just in case" but only have it once a day either on toast or on my vegetables.

I was actually told my diet didn't have ENOUGH salt in it so I used a saltier soy sauce which fixed my problem.. Think of that, with all the salt in peoples bad diets today mine didn't have ENOUGH SALT

Actually I found it's harder GETTING to 2500 calories (UK guidelines on a man's intake per day to maintain weight) after becoming vegan than staying UNDER 2500 when I ate meat.

Because I can tell you, I do.

I've never been very "specific" about my diet, I just know (as many here do) what foods are good and bad and I just use those. I also use the "hand rule". Basically:

Open hand amount of vegetables

Closed fist amount of carbs

Palm sized portion of meat (or in our case any protein like food item)

Then I let my protein shakes and breakfast make up for more protein with added fruit in them so I'm also getting my fruit to.

Today I decided "Well I'll go and try to work out how many calories I eat a day" and so on.. It's amazingly confusing if you're like me and make everything from scratch and don't measure everything.. I tried once or twice and did not get it right, so right now I can't be bothered I'll just keep on doing what I'm doing.

Oh I'm thinking of doing each body part every day (4 days a week).

Though every day it's a different exercise that targets that area.

It's just for a short time though

Ahh no no, yea you see this put up on a lot of forums and yea I already know the arguments for and against each side. I've seen people bulk and shape with both setups.

Question is, I may be traveling around for a while due to work and I don't want to miss a split workout day. Was wondering if it would be okay if I switched to full body for a while just in case, for example, I would have to drop a shoulders day.

One thing I did find which annoyed me is an advert for vegan bodybuilding powder that said "Vegan diets are typically low in protein".. Says who?

 

To be fair most vegans I know have shockingly low levels of protein in their diets. Not helped by the fact that some pro-vegan literature you'll see seeks to make a virtue of this fact.

 

Regarding Bulkpowders, their customer service is terrible. Last few times I ordered it took ages to arrive & it's very difficult to get hold of them (they don't publish their phone number anywhere so I had to get hold of it on the grapevine). If you want decent cheap supplements & good service your best bet is http://www.ironscience.co.uk/.

really? Mine arrived in two days

One thing I did find which annoyed me is an advert for vegan bodybuilding powder that said "Vegan diets are typically low in protein".. Says who?

Okay this isn't really a post along the lines of "I hate that bit of fat there" and so on. Everyone's body is different and I think we all have bits that we can't do squat about.

For example, I have very thick and large bones, my ribs are HUGE and come out past my hips (quite a bit) so even at my (fit) heaviest, 170lbs they stick out soo much that someone thought I was literally starving. Also my waist/hip bones are very dense and thick meaning my waist wont really drop below a 34

What about you?

Arg *head desks* how is it every two or three months I end up messing up a part of my body. I went to kendo and my left wrist and left hip/lower back felt a bit off but I put it down to stiffness..

Next day, a lot of stiffness and pain.. Erg!

Okay so my stuff arrived during the week and I had my first shake with it today.

Pea protein + fine ground oats + banana + Water....

It has to be the best tasting protein shake I've ever had, including the old flavored whey protein I used to have (before turning vegan).

It's like banana'ish porridge, sweet but not too sweet..

Well new lifting routine is up, I bought a new steamer.. I really learned out to cook in a Japanese / Chinese style but now I'm just steaming everything, no oil.. Trying to cut out all the stuff that adds fat on. Also measuring body parts as a way to look at how far I'm coming along

Don't see why a guy who kills animals for TV is popular.

Mm I've been lifting a bit for a while with no real gains in mass, strength yes so time to really take it seriously.

Anyway, I'm not focusing on machines really, just that I don't want to wait and extra 20 minutes for the bench to be free.. Come to think of it I could just do it with Dumbbells if the bar is in heavy use.

Weight lifting machines, the chest press and other things, sometimes a hotly debated topic on if they do any good and if they really work.

I was wondering if any of the guys (or women) here use them to any effects? Some times I do use the chest press machine when the usual bench press area is being used and I don't want to wait in line for my turn.

I hear Bear Grylls is a big fan of pee protein.

I hear Bear Grills is a p****

I am in the UK *points to tag and post* heh.

I really don't mind about the taste, really I don't think anyone buys protein powder for the taste (never found one that tasted good anyway) plus I mix mine with fruit and so on so it doesn't taste AS bad.

Rice, I don't want to eat too many carbs. I try to keep my carbs to one meal and one snack a day just because they go right to my gut which I have a hard time keeping off. The pea protein has less carbs, more protein and is about half the price of Hemp.

Hi guys.

It seems hemp protein is going up in price quite a bit while pea protein (which has double the listed amount of protein as hemp) is now half the price.

I'm not sure if they two are different between the UK and US (due to your food laws and ours) though I wanted to ask if anyone has tried it? Thinking of switching due to the price.

Little updated.

 

I read that (no surprise to some bodybuilders and so on) if you're an endomorph you should really look at your diet. Have moderate protein and make sure the source doesn't have high or added carbs, only eat carbs in the morning or post workout and every other meal just vegetables and fruit. Also, eat constantly but small amounts for adding muscle, instead of 3 meals and snacks a day, 6-8 bits of food a day.

 

That's a possibility I guess.

 

For me as an endomorph, keeping diet tight is key to gaining mass without getting fat - I can put on BOTH fat and muscle easily by just stuffing myself, but to do it correctly, it takes a lot of planning on meals focused on protein as the base, few carbs during the first half of the day (only quality sources, no bread/rice/pasta/etc.) and focusing on most carb intake shortly after training.

 

I do very little cardio work, if any these days, and manage to keep fat off via diet and incoporating some higher rep work into my training (which can be seen in my log). I find that if I work through various rep ranges I can still focus on building plenty of streng and size but also can use it well to keep fat off with some endurance rep sets near the end of my workout.

 

If you're getting adequate food intake, it may be that you need to tweak your training protocol (I'm just going through your log now, had missed it earlier). Looking at some of your lifts, it looks like you may be doing more volume than necessary to get some of the upper body gains you need - 10x6 on some of the lifts might be better changed to something more like this as an example:

 

Posted workout -

Monday:

Jogging, as much as I can do in thirty minutes

Incline DB Press: 10x6

Pullup: 10x6

DB Flyes: 10x6 (Machine if benches are taken)

BB Bent Row: 10x6

21's (I like them)

 

I would change to -

1. Do a light 5 minute warm-up speed walk or slow jog to start, but save the 30 minute stuff for post workout, not pre workout in case it may be hampering things a bit.

 

2. Increase weight/intensity for the main lifts like the incline press, try 2-3 progressive warm-up sets then 5x5 with my standard "intensity scale" as follows:

Set 1 - be at a weight where you don't have a problem managing 5 reps, and you could probably get 2 more squeezed out if you really fought for it

Set 2 - should feel like you can definitely get a 6th rep, 7 would have been too much

Set 3 - 5 reps is tough at this point, a 6th may have happened, but may not have

Set 4 - 5 reps definitely tough at this point, definitely no gas left for a 6th rep, just managing to finish the prescribed 5 is the most you could manage

Set 5 - 5 reps is a battle, last rep should be far from easy, and you might even find that you need to take a few seconds to catch breath after the 4th rep to get the set done. You do NOT want to have it where you could get beyond 5, otherwise the weight is too light

 

3. If you can get 10x6 on pull-ups, either work to do fewer sets with more reps as your secondary lift for upper back (try something like 3x12 or 5x5 with weight suspended for added resistance).

 

4. Flyes, while an okay "finisher" shouldn't be a major component of a chest workout if you want to put on size. I occasionally like doing 2-3 sets at the end if my chest is really tight (usually doing 20 rep sets to stretch out), but time could be better spent on something else like close-grip flat benching, or, if you only like working with dumbbells, try palms-in flat DB benching where your arms almost graze your sides on the way down, elbows tucked in with no flare outward.

 

5. I'd do the bent rowing first, it tends to be what will take more out of you when you go heavy vs. pull-ups, and would change to more of the 5x5 as noted above.

 

6. Keep the 21s if you want them, you've got to keep it fun and interesting so long as you aren't compromising your progress.

 

 

Sometimes a few minor tweaks can really make a difference, so just a few ideas to consider to see if they might help!

I was actually thinking of changing things up a bit and see what I can do. Such as 3 lifts for each area. So for example if I were doing a chest/bicep day (just an example off the top of my head) I would do:

Bench: 5x5

EZ Curl: 5x5

Incline Bench: 5x5

Preacher Curls (Or 21's): 5x5

Deck Fly's: 5x5 (for some reason the DB's I'm looking for disappear so I use the machine)

Hammer Curls 5x5

I came up with (didn't invent it or anything just found it easier) splicing lifts because I find if I do three lifts on the same general area one after the other I'm far too tired to do the rest (if I'm lifting heavy).

Little updated.

I read that (no surprise to some bodybuilders and so on) if you're an endomorph you should really look at your diet. Have moderate protein and make sure the source doesn't have high or added carbs, only eat carbs in the morning or post workout and every other meal just vegetables and fruit. Also, eat constantly but small amounts for adding muscle, instead of 3 meals and snacks a day, 6-8 bits of food a day.

That's a possibility I guess.

Well I was talking to some of the staff at the gym today, I got on to how my upper body is mostly crap and has not kept up with my lower body in terms of strength and muscle gain no matter what I do.

I was told it's most likely that I'm an Endomorph body type and will usually struggle to get upper body bulk and strength compared to my legs.

Question is, do I continue on bull headed and just lift as much as I can and hope that somehow it works out (been working on my upper body for over a year and it hasn't got any further) or do I totally change my goals and go for something else with my body, like endurance and cardio and try to build something up there?

I'm thinking of just putting a protein smoothie in the fridge before bed and forcing it down in the morning.

Just letting you guys know, I'm not dead

I've kinda split my training into two month / one month periods.

Two months go into strength

Two go into body shaping

One goes into heavy conditioning (Reason why it's one, I don't want to loose too much mass).

Instead of changing my workout every time I switch months I may just put all of them up there at once.

Hi all

I'm back to the one thing I really hate about myself, I don't wake up hungry. I really can't bring myself to eat breakfast as I don't feel hungry until about mid day (lunch time) and if I try to eat in the morning I just feel sluggish.

Has anything got anything for that other than just forcing myself to eat?

Okay so, messing around with ideas of what I want to do to gain muscle.

If you haven't been following or are a bit lost I'm jumping back and forth between the 5/3/1 program (which I recommend for strength training) which allowed my to lift more and a program to pile on the cosmetic muscle.