Mastering Contest Prep: Strategies with AJ Sims for Optimal Performance

welcome back everybody to part two of our show prep with AJ Sims so today we were going to start with around eight

weeks out kind of where we left off last time what's going on AJ how you doing what's up brother doing phenomenal man

we got some great feedback from the last podcast which is really encouraging I'm excited to get uh everybody more

information on Deep dive into prep and methodologies that me and you uh really agree on which is really cool to be able

to get together with somebody not that I have a problem talking to someone that's in disagreement because that that

sharpens us but it's really cool because we know we were speaking right before this on how everyone's kind of almost

trying to reinvent the wheel of everything that that has worked for so long and if it ain't broke we don't fix

it right so we just keep things a little more simplistic which what I believe does for not only coach and athlete is

it uh it takes away the overthinking process which reduces overall stress in my opin

and that's kind of what we do as coaches right like a lot of our job is to eliminate that unnecessary thought right

because I've anytime I've coached myself you know or you see other people do it they tend to overthink it's too much

cardio not enough cardio the DI Conant diet change and gear changes all these things that just aren't necessary

sometimes so one of the things that you and I we agree on a ton but one of the things that we agree with that is like

slowly changing now for some reason is around eight weeks a switch to short Esters right like I see a lot of guys

now doing some weird stuff where they're running long Ester still in not that you can't but it just see it's unpredictable

I it's not easy to control and the look is not always guaranteed right because you're you're playing a guessing game in

offseason it doesn't really matter but like stage lighting every little out of water makes a difference yeah at eight

weeks I typically switched right so we went from you know it was long eser stuff including EQ to I would usually

bring in you test propionate MK propionate uh tren acetate um and depending on the the where the test is

and stuff possibly anavar possibly not wind stroll would be something I would add but typically a little further down

you know anavar I don't know if I touched on it before or not I think anavar seems to be very useful when

testosterone doses are lower I think once a test if you're running you know 700 milligrams of test propionate I'm

not really sure what anavar is adding to the stack yeah at least in my experience it seems like it's just overkilling

you're doing organ stress yeah yeah I mean my my thinking is is changed as well as anavar I I see it more as a

really good benefit um for adding to trt yeah obviously like you said testosterone levels are lower so you're

not getting this super physiological response you're getting a great response but adding anavar on top of that is a is

a beautiful Synergy together um but as far as like pre-contest setting I would rather save any type of orals for winst

which would be my ab absolute favorite so if I had to pick and choose either taking anavar out early adding wistol in

early I'm always going to Veer on the side of wistol earlier take that anavar out and even with pyin uh and just

saving room for other uh compounds uh anavar while it has phenomenal benefits uh even you know the podcast that you've

done on fixing uh maybe even long-term thyroid functionality uh I don't believe in that

type of setting at eight weeks out when you have that many compounds that it's really needed honestly yeah and it's you

know something else with what we agree with is also and I think from a distance people don't always understand it I tend

to Pivot quickly in prep at the end depending on what the athletes looking like or how they feel so I might have a

game plan like I give everyone a rough outline I leave some blanks in there on purpose and I discuss what those blanks

might be and then based on the feedback I get from them and how they look I might change entirely right like I might

be putting something in pulling something else out switching something around more cardio more food something

you know I'm I'm sure you're similar because we don't know right and I don't know how going to react and it changes

yeah no it's it's a great great segue for basically the way that I do check-ins especially with all my

athletes going into I would say the last four to six weeks is we're doing check-ins typically every 48 to 24 hours

uh which keeps me extremely busy right and this is usually I switch everybody over to text message on usually WhatsApp

if they're International just due to being a easier way to communicate um it could change on the Fly I mean you

may have an outline may have a plan you may have a cycle setup you may have fat burners in there uh you may have a

certain amount of cluter rol whatever the case may be but if that person checks in and something went sideways in

24 hours which it can when you're that sensitive you have to know how to call things on the flight I believe that's

what makes a great coach and I don't think a lot of coaches really talk about that because they talk about more of the

to of the setup and they over intellectualize contest prep when a lot of it yes you do have to have

intelligence you must have experience but you also have to know how to call things on the Fly espec getting to the

tail and people get I think sometimes it's hard on the athlete right they they kind of like to know what to expect and

sometimes we don't know what to tell them I always tell people specifically with peak week and we talked about this

before that I don't know what Peak Week looks like I have a rough idea about depletion and phone someone up but I

outside of that I don't have a clue what it's going to look like I think there's just no way to know right

anyone who tells you 16 weeks out what Peak Week looks like is either lying or they've never done it before yeah or

they yeah they just have no idea what they're talking about because the body change is literally not only day to day

but hour to hour especially the last few days with you know mineral electrolyte balance and glycogen and just overall

systemic stress and how the body is adapting to that stress you know do you have a do you have somebody that may

have higher aldosterone levels because that does happen a lot of people will be uh higher on aldosterone I've seen it

before which is why I've basically you know introduced using things that are an aldosterone antagonist you know like um

aldactone very sparingly now it's not one of my favorites but it does have application when it's needed so you know

these are getting into basically the details of a contest rep and how they can change very often and you're you're

absolutely right you there yeah I'm here yeah we'll have to we'll have to edit that part out

sorry someone someone called me um you're absolutely right when you you make the point that you have to make

calls on the Fly and we should we have a generalized plan in our heads but that could change yeah and I think just to

touch on Al doin real fast in case people don't know what it is it's basically it just gonna ex it's going to

cause sodium excretion right so it's not always the right tool like you said it might not be what you want yeah no not

always times when we get to peak week we can talk about definitely just to kind of touch on on

that diuretics aren't always needed from a pharmacological standpoint you can induce diuresis through natural remedies

which is what I always Veer to do first and all obviously also estrogen control is going to be key to give you that very

dry crisp you know as long as the body fat is off those things come after and unless you really know what you're doing

with that balance you you know it's it's very difficult to uh to manage that properly however again body fat has to

be off estrogen has to be managed switching to quicker Esters I'm 100% on board with and I think that it's

overthought and people have tried to reinvent the wheel of something that's worked for so long and I'm not sure if

it is to gain notoriety or to sound more intelligent maybe than they are I'm not quite sure that's not a shot at anybody

personally I mean who knows people like you said there are people that do utilize that and they do get great

results kind of the same way Dexter Jackson was known to eat Taco Bell three weeks out and was one of the most

conditioned guys on stage just because one person or two people do it doesn't mean that everybody can do it so

remember that we're all individualistic your miles may vary yeah and what and what we're talking about to people

understand in case they they've not been in touch with the new stuff a lot of the guys are running right they're trying to

use the most minimal amount of Trenbolone which this stuff's a personal preference if that's really what you

choose to do it you the most minimal amount of tremone we're talking milligrams single milligrams of this

stuff micro doed and huge amounts of masteron and long estra test and then they're flipping the ratio of the long

estra test and the masteron are try to create that look and I've seen as as high as 3,000 milligrams a masteron an

anthe which to me is wild I would say you know again not a big talking about dose guy but I would say 800 milligrams

probably the top 700 800 you don't necessarily need to use that much there's a huge point of diminishing

returns with these drugs and it's not an excuse not to use an AI I hate to say that again but like use the proper tool

for the job don't try to add an untested you know cancer drug in here that's you know to do a job when we have a

perfectly good tool for that exact job without adding milligrams you know if you want to add more anbal if you want

to add more steroid milligrams in then you can use something like um oh what's the U I'm drwing bik this the suicide

inhibitor arom aromin aromin technically is a steroid you know backbone so if if

you're so concerned with adding it at this at that point you're basically adding Maston in anyway because it's the

same structure versus Arimidex but I I've always just stuck with remedex unless you have a really big issue then

I might swap tetraol and then at that point or if you need tamoxifen so people should also

understand that you're not really supposed to mix tamoxifen and Arimidex together it reduces andex yeah it

reduces effectiveness of the Arimidex so it's not causing harm you're just you're taking one drug that's destroying the

Other Drug so if you really need to add that other layer in there like if someone's very gyo prone yeah or

whatever you know it's safer to me to use letro and and the tamoxifen if you have to but I generally would start with

the remidex it seems more mild to me letro is pretty harsh yeah no it is Harsh it is harsh but you know and we'll

touch on this as we get closer to the show it works phenomenal closer to the to the tail end of the show and you know

one of the big things that I love to do is pulling Labs every two to three weeks some guys won't do it because they're

like dude that's just ridiculous but it's kind of like for me it's like anything outside of that we're kind of

shooting in the dark we don't really know what's going on especially if someone's body is just not responding so

not only do we need to see you know estr as a total with E2 total and free test but get that full range of thyroid all

the way to reverse T3 to see if we're having that cascading effect of that being bound up right so there's there's

a lot of things that i' like to really gauge every variable and really control it it's really

micromanaging um to the point of some guys just aren't willing to do it and I experienced that a lot with a lot of the

top Pros which you know again I don't work really with with ifbb Pros anymore for multiple reasons um but there's a

big reason was they are hard to micr manage a lot of them don't want to do that and they'll hear a lot of

regurgitation online and they just kind of want to copy that right and it's well your body's different from a

physiological standpoint we may have to approach things completely unorthodox or outside of the box customize it towards

what you need and and really find out what the body needs right so you know it's kind of like the the camps that

they have over an oxygen gym in Kuwait and how they have everybody doing two a days and not everybody needs that and

not everybody can recover from that and if you don't know how to manage recovery and fatigue then you are going to just

dig yourself into a hole that you'll never fully come out of and that systemic inflammation is going to carry

its way over into the show so at eight weeks out which is where we're at right now we've switched the Esters the diet

I'm sure is getting more intense as we go along cardio is probably starting to pick up depending on the individual body

fats coming down you're probably starting to get that heavy feeling on certain days in the legs and then of

course this is where people start to tend to abuse stimulants just to have energy which I understand stimulants

have great usage and you know even utilizing caffeine uh for you know some effective lipolysis obviously is going

to also be an inhibitor for appetite it's going to suppress it right it's going to work against you know curving

that appetite but you know at the same time if we're doing all those things and then we're losing sleep uh we're kind of

losing the missing the whole point of what we're trying to do right so I try to get guys to use the minimal effective

dose of stimulants when it comes to it and obviously we talked about the beta 3 um you know clenbuterol as it works on

the beta3 receptor and how that can be continually used uh and then how to time that properly so it doesn't affect your

sleep because of the halflife being so long yeah yeah so typically this is about when you'd introduce clenbuterol

and or albuterol or whatever depending on what you want yeah yeah typically yeah for sure I definitely what I try to

do is is prolong the diet as long as I can and then not not utilize any type of thyroid medication until I see Labs show

that it's really needed right I don't just throw in T4 to throw in T4 with growth hormone because the the consensus

is that it you know it downregulates the conversion I'm always going to start with micronutrients in the form of

iodine and selenium and even precursors of el tyrosine first to really get the functionality uh and then of course use

dietary you know hacks and and and utilization of refeeds and diet breaks and cardio breaks too which I'm a fan of

cardio breaks a lot of people talk about diet breaks but I'm I'm actually a huge fan of stopping cardio for a week or two

and resetting the body and actually bringing the diet down and getting more into a deficit and using something like

a clenbuterol during that phase right because we're having less energy output but the body's systemic inflammatory

response from all that cardio training and just beating it and beating it really gets a nice rest and it gets a

reset that when you introduce the cardio back in you get even more of a fat loss effect and so it comes down to cycling

those things right so again a good coach is gonna have a Keen Eye on when to make those transitional phases yeah and a lot

of times it's bile feedback it's not just looking at an image right like seeing a picture of an athlete doesn't

tell you the whole story and especially with these top guys because they're very good at masking how they feel right

they're posing they can hold a face you know you don't really know until you talk to them and like you said what with

going back to the some of the pros you see it a lot in the even in the offseason they they'll listen to an

extent but then they they ask the other Pros what they're doing and then they want to do the same thing so even if

there's no logic and a great example of this is Anadrol right like I see a lot of guys running 500 milligrams of

Anadrol so Anadrol has a flat curve response at 150 milligrams now that's not necessarily in 300lb bodybuilders so

it might be slightly higher in a bigger D but it ain't 500 milligrams so it's one of those drugs that as soon as you

get to a dose it flattens out and this only side effects there's no more response so 500 to me seems a little

crazy I 150 200 perhaps but like 500 is no reason for that kind of stuff but they do it because other guys do it

right like you know Mi Mr Olympia is doing it so I must do it if I want to be Mr Olympia that sort of thought process

and like you said just because they're doing it doesn't mean you need to do that stuff no not at all I mean I've

seen great responses at the tail end of a prep just for muscular fullness and obviously performance in the gym on 25

milligrams of anol small amounts without getting side effects and blood pressure increases or you know gastric issue GI

issues obviously and and stomach lining issues so I mean it's it's we utilize the tools necessary to get the job done

we don't just say hey you know this guy is really good so we gota let's do what he's doing right I mean because that

doesn't mean that just because he's really good means it's even the the right thing to do you got to do what's

best for your physique this again your mileage may vary in everything that you do and it's all about learning how to

get the most out of the least amount so obviously from a dietary standpoint you're going to have to dip down enough

into a deficit where it's you're going to be very hungry for the most part and that's that's that's another thing it's

it's funny you touched on that people like to mask it cuz I'll always as my guys are you hungry I'm not looking for

them to respond to me in a sense of I think they're complaining when their hunger gets extremely elevated the last

four to six weeks I like that that's showing me that we're getting somewhere that we need based off the bio feedback

we know with the you know gin the hunger hormone and leptin and usually we're having a higher conversion of T4 to T3

not always this is more anecdote that I've seen over the years we're usually getting somewhere that we need to when

hunger is really slowing down okay what's actually going on in the background causing that is it stress

induced is it uh you know your sleep is getting irritated like you're sleeping a lot less which typically if you do sleep

less gin does go up insulin sensitivity goes down but usually if you're doing everything in adhering to the program

when hunger gets really high it's a great biof feedback for me um and that could be genetic too because people do

have different hunger hormone signals uh but typically if you've been following the client from 20 weeks plus and then

all the way down you know man I'm starving like I just did a high carb day and then the next day I'm even more

hungry we did something from a physiological standpoint internally where we're going to see results happen

in the next 72 hours typically that that refeed or super saturation did what need to do so yeah I mean it's exactly what

you're saying man it's and I we bringing up refeeds again too I don't know you might do it differently than me I would

typically re like carb cycling and stuff to me in the offseason is a little different structure I think during prep

when you got you are going to be hungry like you said yeah when you're at the end and genetics do vary but you are

going to be really really hungry if you're not really hungry you're not that lean I mean I stayed incredibly lean

when I was younger for years a few years on end I was starving all the time yeah all the time like I don't think people

understand the sacrifice to be that Ty paper thin skin you are hungry you might be very good at control or not showing

it that you're hungry your body is just partitioning like a Ferrari it's just literally running through food in every

s yeah and just like you said at that point too that's when people start to struggle with going hypoglycemic and

then you have to kind of implement you know maybe fattier cut cuts of meat like red meat or salmon wild Cod salmon or

even utilizing different you know essential fatty oils you know coming from extra virgin olive oil which should

always be in a dark glass bottle by the way because when light penetrates it it destroys all the good benefits from it

or getting an extra virgin coconut oil because it's made up of 50% MCTS or even you know some sort of Brazil nut because

Brazil nuts have selenium in it too for iodine production so you may have to you know put that in with the carbohydrates

at the end just to slow down the absorption of you partitioning through the carbohydrates essentially which is

what a lot of people do too when they carb up because when they're carbing up and they're utilizing glucose disposal

agents or insulin or even without that they're just you know I've seen uh because you know I'll have my guys take

their glucose fastet and post prandial and it literally will just drop from you know your your normal post prandial and

then they'll go down to 50 uh in a really quick period of time so then we have to kind of control it and that's

why we again I I go on a tangent and I kind of get ahead of myself because I get excited about this stuff that's why

I'll have implementation the last couple days of fattier cuts and meat we're using more bison meat we're using more

red meat we're using more wild cot salmon just to kind of slow that yeah and it's and at a certain point you

need more energy substrate in there too to use right uh so going back to refeeds for a second so I I typically at that

point when someone's getting very lean uh I'll watch their weight as well when it starts to drop if they're moving like

if the standard if I'm having a guy lose like a pound two pounds a week yeah you know and it starts to drop to three to

four they're clearly starting to tap into tissue at that point regard the drugs um I'll incorporate refeed and

then I'll measure them again the next day because sometimes they need multiple in a row yes I think that's people Miss

it's always not it's not always one refeed real lean guys like me I take two because my weight will actually drop

After High day again like it'll continue it just speeds it up even more and it'll it'll plummet two generally stabilizes

me or even gets me back up a pound which is this glycogen at that point and then I can go right back to a deficit so

that's me at least that's how I would manage carb cycling more the end of a cut versus in an offseason where I might

just do like BDM high and low days depending on you know certain training days and stuff at the end it's really

you want to pull the deficit as long as you can and I find most guys four days a low in a row is about most that the

human body can tolerate like we're talking really low like yeah right I mean

that's Place yeah like there's a dark place you have to go you have to be very comfortable with a place that most

humans are not comfortable going with food on purpose and you have to stay there yeah 100% And then we what we know

you know also is when we get those refeed days in obviously you know going bringing the carbohydrates even in the

evening time santonin cortisol comes down they're going to sleep even better which is phenomenal for Recovery when

they wake up their mood is elevated so all these neurological chemicals that are happening in the neurotransmitters

you know dopamine or adrenaline all these things uh are they're just firing better right they're just more

cognitively enhanced doesn't last too long because when you're that lean it just you blow right through it but yeah

man I will take refeeds uh sometimes two days for sure three days if it's needed top on top of that if they need to add

in you know what I call Super saturation day which is going to be your really high glycemic more processed foods that

really digest well and then on top of that we're going to add in possibly a free meal that could be in the form and

again when I say free meal it's not so much free because I do control that variable because I don't want someone to

go eat a large pizza and Crispy Cream and have these gastric issues for three days and systemic inflammation and they

feel horrible their joints are achy you know I'm talking more along the lines of a homemade cheat meal you know grass-fed

burgers grass-fed cheese sour exactly or if we go get sushi I'll control it I'll say no cream cheese no

fried rolls you know this amount of sushi go get lowfat sorbet or angel food cake that has basically no fat you know

so we're really getting an overfeeding and then the person has a great night of sleep and then obviously you know

glycogen is super compens ated they're loaded they're ready to train they're feeling a great pump and that could last

for 48 to 72 hours then you'll get the drop off and then what I try to do is I try to figure out okay how many days

does it take for this individual to return to Baseline weight and then how many days does it take them to drop

below that Baseline weight and then as a coach you get all this data so when you make these calls you can literally sit

back and know I know this person's body's response I know exactly what's going to happen this is what works for

them and what it does is it allows the client to kind of relax too and they they start to understand I think I'm in

really good hands and I'm going to just continue to trust the process and it what it does too is it sets them up for

like you said those dark days because when you're getting into day two day three of a low carb you know day four is

a little easier if you know something's coming the next day but those midday where you're just literally looking at

your watch every hour when can I eat you're just drinking tons of water and chewing ice I mean I used to be so

hungry I would sit and chew ice at night because just the satisfactory feeling of chewing something but that's what it

takes man it it it's very difficult to get this lean and that is uh more than half the battle of presenting the best

physique possible so you guys need to really understand that me and Kurt are going to introduce a lot of maybe new

methodologies to you but at the end of the day if that body Fat's not there forget about it you you just need to

push the show back and give it a couple more weeks of dieting and just take yourself into a deep deficit and really

dig in really really dig in because it it hurts and with the refeeding too like

you talked about with the simple stuff I know I use all sorts of stuff pie filling gummy bears whatever is like

zero fat that that are new to a lot of people right they're not used to these classic they would be considered

unclean not typical bodybuilding foods but you're going to get glycogen replacement much faster you'll still get

the same amount of net glycogen replacement with fiber it just takes hours versus like if you're gonna eat

oatmeal and the other problem we all run into is if you try to use things with fiber like vegetables on a high day

you're not going to be able to eat enough yeah so want to use the simplest stuff you can use it's a great it's a

great point so on a refeed I'll always drop protein down because carbs are protein sparing dietary fats are Trace

if not even existent I don't need them essential fats in the form of fish oils krill oil that's about all I'll put in

there and then everything else is going to be coming from carbohydrates that is the goal is glycogen replenishment that

is what we want that is what we need at that point so so that is going to come in the form of very uh High uh High

Laden Foods in the turn in terms excuse me in terms of density and carbohydrates but the volume is easy to eat because

you try to go eat 200 grams of raw weight oatmeal as opposed to you know as opposed to 200 grams of cereal you know

in the form of a Frosted Flakes and it it's just completely night and day you're going to feel totally logged down

bloated and you won't have the gas emptying effect quick enough to get the next meal in or even in the form of

jasmine rice I mean eat 500 grams of cooked jasmine rice is going to be extremely difficult I don't care how big

you are and how hungry you are it's just again like Kurt said you're going to get the same glycogen replenishment but it's

not going to be as easy so we want digestability we want the people to feel almost light on their feet throughout

the day so that their training feels great in the gym and they're just you know really focused mentally on what

they're doing and also from a palatable standpoint it's a nice change up and it gives someone the ability to continue to

go back into that deficit because remember guys there are some individuals that are militant like you whatever man

I'll do what but not everybody's like that so you got to figure out from a psychological standpoint how does this

individual tick and set them up okay we need to optimize fat loss still but I got to work with this mind this mindset

has yeah man coaching is so much more than just the the physiological standpoint but the psychological

standpoint probably 90% of it is that go exactly and we're all different like in like you said our TA is different like I

know like if if I had to do your diet I know you would tolerate anything I could say I need you to eat thumb tax four

meals a day and then you can eat regular Nails the other two nails and you would ask me how much water you should drink

with them versus other guys like wouldn't necessarily do anything that you ask and the other thing like

you were talking about with the bio feedback and let the coach take the wheel and relaxes is communication with

your coach and actually doing what you're asked like I you get guys you always have a couple guys that just

don't tell you quite the whole story or they're not doing what you say right you give them 600 grams of carbs and they

eat 400 grams of carbs how do we know then how to Peak you if you're not actually communicating what you're doing

yeah we need to know I think you're doing X and you're doing y I have no idea what's going on you gotta check

every box and your coach has to know every mad you just have to know what you're doing what you're thinking what

you're feeling how your body you know what it's reacting we end up knowing as coaches a lot of stuff that most people

don't know I know how you go to the bathroom I know what volume is coming out like at the end we could talk about

like urine volume like it's important with Kidney Health like we know all that stuff we have to know all that stuff oh

100% I mean I I get down to the nitty-gritty and guys if they listen to this that have worked with me they'll

know I'll ask them what the color of the p is how much p is coming out bowel movement frequency I mean get back on

the scale find what your weight is at we find the money weight and then we stick that money weight and we hold it because

that's typically the look that we want to hold and we can basically maintain it through specific fluid intake with the

amount of carbohydrates that we need with a certain amount of sodium or potassium balance so yeah Kurt I mean it

all comes down to exactly what we're saying it's all a find balance between physiological response um and and

psychological response synergistically working together with the individual and then we are basically as coaches we are

tracking every single variable in it with sound to The Listener like you guys are so neurotic and over it's not

overthinking because this is data that we need to take in and we take the pressure off of you you don't think

about this this is what we're Computing in our brains to know how we can steer you and land the plane for lack of

better terms so that you have the best look on stage Y and it's also why neither of us are super keen on taking

over preps at the very end oh yeah I have a package on my website that is basically for that it costs more money

because it's a oh yeah deal it's a lot of work I mean it's a lot of work and it happens we get them you're usually

you're usually cleaning up somebody's mess that somebody else created or maybe the individual just didn't know what

they were doing so you're coming in last minute essentially uh doing emergency hail mares to try to correct this as

fast as you can so it's a lot of work to do it the right way yeah so so we'll go back to so you're you know now now the

guy's you know 4ish three weeks out right like they should be I like to see guys pretty much ready about that

timeout right like I don't love to bring it like PE peak week is not the time for fat loss I don't know how many times I

could say that you should not be making major changes the appearance can change slightly depending on glycogen and

minerals but you don't want to be changing fat loss there's no fat loss occurring or muscle growing that's

occurring then no not at all they should be more relaxed at that point anyway yeah um so assuming that fat loss right

because that that's that's the kind of the critical thing that like you know four weeks if they're not lean enough

then you have to make a decision as a coach can I pull this out in the next two weeks or are we delaying the show

yeah absolutely I mean that's what it comes down to so yeah by four weeks out we should be getting really close where

you know the glutes are dug out the hamstrings have the piano cords back there so we're getting really dug out

from the rear um some people come in shape from the rear first and the front last so not usual but there are some

individuals like that so then again we have to balance leg fullness to the ratio of upper body fullness what's

coming in first how do we balance it what do we need to fix is this a cortisol issue where they're holding is

it possible estrogen again we get Labs we see where cortisol is at aldosteron at we see where estrogen is at we can

balance that we can start to employ deploy rather and put in different AIS that we need to pull out different

anabolics if there's growth hormone involved you know what type of growth are they using is it pharmaceutical

grade is it ug typically if it's ug I'm pulling that out because I don't even trust that it's real so I'm like you're

just wasting your time right now we don't know for sure so if it ain't pharmaceutical that's going and then

where's the levels of growth you know coming in you know how is it affecting you you know some people obviously we

know with um cero stem you know and you can touch on more of this we know that they put a diuretic ingredient in it to

help you excrete serum actually doesn't have one the other one oh sorry cusum doesn't is it genotropin yeah g does

yeah okay so cem doesn't so you're right so I got those two mixed up so what I've noticed with cem is it can actually

really guys never get out of that water retention so at the end I'll start to kind of titrate it down I don't pull it

out you four six yeah exactly so typically if they're at like eight or 10 whatever they're doing I'll start tie

training it down slowly and then if the person is really really dry and they're just very responsive to it um I can run

it all the way into into the show Almost typically but usually I will uh I'll pull it out and uh or titr trate it down

depending on the look so again so now we're dealing with different variables of compounds growth hormones uh thyroid

medication clenbuterol albuterol do we have yohimbine in there how's the person reacting to yohimbine what's the

stimulant usage like sleep starts to kind of get negatively impacted so then now we need to fix that how do we uh

release excuse me how do we reduce cortisol as a whole uh so we'll go into those factors as well and then systemic

inflammation coming down reps and reserve and training you still need to train hard but you do need to be able to

manage fatigue to an extent where you're not doing see back in the day there was a little different thought process of

doing like 10 drop sets per set and just balls to the wall and there is a time and a place for that I absolutely do

believe not two weeks out yeah exactly so we're not we're not trying to set personal records at two weeks out 3

weeks out but we are trying to still get enough stimulus we are trying to get enough caloric expenditure and we are

still getting a little bit of the fat off at that point but by two weeks out I I believe and I tell all my guys this

that fat should be gone we should pretty much be skinless at that point and now like you said it's a it's management of

glycogen mineral shifting and then you know estrogen control as well yeah so just to back up for a second because

people will ask because we've said it multiple times that you know protein is carbohydrates bearing so people

understand this so you basically your body needs glucose it will it run the human body runs on

glucose just despite what you know keto or carnivore guys want to say about it uh the average person's like 140 grams

of glucose a day for your nervous system if you don't take in those carbohydrates your body is going to make that glucose

and it's going to make it for protein so specific amino acids like glycine alanine could be broken down in the

liver called gluconeogenesis to make that glucose you can't really make glucose from fat it's not very easy it

has to you have to cleave off basically the backbone of the triglyceride which is glycerol it's a very long slow

process it's not it's not efficient it's not occurring while you're exercising so like you said when your carbs are super

high you don't need as much protein I think you and I also probably have shifted our thought with protein over

the last couple years right we used to run tons of protein and we kind of realize at a certain point you don't

need that much like a gr per pound is plenty you don't need to go I've seen better digest I've seen better digestion

I've seen smaller waistlines and I've seen just as just as much muscle tissue being preserved if not

even growing into the sh you don't need as much right as we used to think you know in the 90s and 2000s yeah um yeah

so then with you know managing all those other things so something with you mentioned magnesium before so magnesium

is obviously very important for everyone all the time no American is not deficient in magnesium you can't use

vitamin D without it and using things like tremone cause more depletion in magnesium it's one of the reasons why

sleep gets so disrupted so you can use more you know when you're using harsher 19 ores and things like

that to kind of improve sleep with magnesium people ask about dosing there is the RDA is too low and there is no

exact dose like I couldn't tell you what your dose is you basically have to titrate it up until your stomach gets a

little weird and then you pull back down a hair and that's right that's do with everyone that's I do myself that's I do

with my wife you just figure out what your stomach can tolerate and that's what you run and you want to use the

glycinate or the glycinate form is at night because you're GNA get the glycine benefit to sleep as well 100%

oxide you don't want to use the oxide form it's a bigger molecule so it's more it's like using test suspension versus

test sypon yeah but it'll destroy your stomach yes oh yeah that laxative effect like no tomorrow so and with citrate the

bigger because those are bigger molecules you just don't want to touch those you don't have to and they're

cheap yes exactly so I'm sure you're the same way I spend a lot of money on supplements I use what I deem to be the

best quality supplements I can find um because it's your health you only get one set of organs you only get

one yeah when it comes to magnesium I'm always usually going to Thorn products that's I

use Thor's definitely going to be the leader and and and typically single ingredient um but you know we will be

doing that very soon because we actually use the same we actually use the same manufacturer as Thoren so we're doing

the same um quality control is Thorn too so I I said if I was going to start doing single active ingredient

supplements it has to be because I'm I've always been a huge fan of thorn so we're going to always you know make sure

that we're on the same uh Level Playing Field as them so yeah Thorn is phenomenal um but yeah man magnesium is

a game Cher like you said the majority of people if not everybody is absolutely magnesium deficient and then of course

trimone and those 19 or drugs are going to definitely drop that down even lower so really good point there Kurt it's

it's it's definitely a game changer and again sleep I always tell guys if you aren't sleeping then we've missed

everything because we're just not going to get the results so we need to it happens every time if I have a guy that

is you know uh maybe a different type of shift worker and he's only getting four to five hours we never see progress

until they're finally getting that night off and then they sleep eight to nine hours and I'm like there you go there's

the body's natural response which is another thing that I always do is I always start gauging around four to six

weeks out the night weight to the morning weight I like to see naturally what the body does overnight how much

does it dump overnight that way leading into the final week we collect that data and we can see before any type of um

diuresis inducing supplementation or any nutritional protocols or any pharmacological diuretics how is this

body occurring naturally overnight and then we can basically add on that variable so I start engaging someone's

night weight and then I know if they dump you know 10 pounds say overnight if they're drinking two gallons of water

taking in seven grams of sodium with six meals in then I know if they're going to bed super super light that night before

well I know typically we're going to be waking up much lighter I do that because that sets my mind up okay I kind of know

what's coming tomorrow so I'm going to start setting my mind up for this client or this athlete doesn't always happen

because you know your your night could be disrupted by children your kids it could be just a bad night's of sleep or

or even if you sleep sleep super deep and you didn't urinate as frequently which is good but you didn't dump as

much water so you you collect this data as a coach and we're getting into um what people would say these are kind of

semantics guys but this really isn't I mean this is this is valuable data because what we're dealing with on the

bodybuilding level is the human body is a phenomenal thing that we're we are still and you know this Kurt because

you're in the medical field we are still learning every single day about its mechanisms and how it works so this data

is so important to really collect and assess the person each and every day and like you said pictures alone and even

scale weight alone is not going to give you the whole story you need every bio feedback

marker yeah exactly I was pulling up I was going to share this because I think people get a kick out of this the

um because people ask about when people talk about human metabolism let's see so you can

see can you see this here so I can see it yeah so this is how complicated let me see if I can get a closer view of

this um of course it made it smaller um you get a sense of how complicated

these are all charts human metabolism so a little bit um the diagram didn't work quite as

I thought it would um so yeah like you it's incredibly complicated and we don't know everything there is to know and

it's constantly moving no and what I tell too uh you know and we may get some push back on this but this is what I say

because you know we we do know and and and we should collect data from long-term controlled clinical studies

right but these clinical studies are not being done with 260 pound shredded bodybuilders so there is is

evidence-based stuff which we do need to take into consideration but there's anecdote as well through experience we

have to understand that we're dealing with a different type of human body even if you're 180 pounds ripped to shreds

we're still dealing with something that's a little bit different right so you know again and I've said it on paper

bodybuilding doesn't always make sense it doesn't always add up because you could tell someone I've cut my cardio

I've cut all my fat burnner out I'm eating 600 grams of carbs a day and I can't stop dropping and you know at that

point it's almost like well where's the explanation for that you know even from a scientific approach obviously you

could you could correlate it into you know you're super insulin sensitive your T3 free in total is Sky High but you

know at the end of the day man there's more than than that there's just that cannibalism is super high you know all

these things are happening in the body so just remember guys that you know don't get too analytical on paper with

bodybuilding but always go with your biof feedback your sleep your your digestion and bathroom usage your

overall look your pumps in the gym which also will fade on specific days but pumps strength progression and overall

body weight but fat loss I have a guy that I've been prepping for six years we've always tried to make weight to to

turn pro we turned Pro last year as a middle weight in uh I think it was Masters Nationals over 35 he's doing his

Pro debut and we're in a different realm now because we don't have to make a weight cap he's been at 202 for five

weeks so on paper a trainer would be like what's going on you're not L he literally looks better almost every day

he's harder he's leaner he's more separate the scale doesn't always move so then then we have to go by the

appearance we have to go by you know we're losing fat but obviously not only are we retaining tissue we have have to

be gaining it yep as well yep yeah there just there's so many variables that we don't understand here so then we're

enter in um then we kind of get to peak week so typically for Peak again it it changes

I'm just going to give like a rough you know what I typically injectable stuff I would probably pull so I would consider

Peak Week starting generally the so if a show is typically on a Saturday I would consider it starting on the Sunday

before typically sometimes on the Saturday before I would remove this is where so going back to two weeks two or

three weeks out is where I would start to ramp up things like Winstrol yes so I'll I'll leverage Winstrol harder than

most guys would run I know you and I are similar with that I think there's there's a lot of magic there when you

get past the the standard on that and then you know going into PE week I usually rep pull incbles there is some

level of inflammation there is some level of uh and things like testosterone even if you're managing estrogen to some

degree there's still aromatization you gota got to get estrogen as low as possible at this point yes a lot of the

water issues if you have any are going to come from estrogen agre like tasaran are not going to fix the problem it's

not a Ross issue um this is also times possibly fat burner might be removed right because if you're going to start

carb loading it kind of makes it a little difficult too insulin usage gets a little funky here too depending what

you're doing with it because the food is low the body Fat's low depending on what you're doing with refeeding you don't

want to use things like insulin when you're on a low carb diet because that's kind of recipe for disaster yeah um so

there's a lot of variables like you said growth hormone you know I I hate to bad mouth I think there's a there is

definitely use for generics but it's unpredictable right I mean if it just has a black top on it and a clear glass

bottle and a white box I mean who knows what's in it I don't like unpredictability at the end I want I

want predictability yeah so if you're gonna use it at the end you want to use something that least you can verify is

true uh and anyone who's used something like sarasin before can tell the difference immediately between

that and something else like it's not even to me there's zero confusion there it's not like oh they're similar they're

not similar um the so that so that might right that gets manipulated testosterone typically depending on the Esther and

how the person is looking the fullness the water retention test I might even have pulled before that point I

depending on how hard and how dry they need I might even pull test of two weeks three weeks I do the exact same 100

there are guys that run test all the way in I I can't I I don't have any idea

I'm yeah no honestly you know we talked about this off camera and I'm sure that there would be a lot of uh Fitness

influencers that would highly disagree with this I'm only going to go by the many years that I've been putting people

on stage in top shape and that is I have more comfortability crashing someone's estrogen the last 10 to 14 days because

we are only trying to achieve the best look possible from an aesthetic standpoint gnarly conditioning separate

ated head to toe for one day we can fix that right after the show's over very very fast two weeks but I want to pull

that as low as possible so if I got to pull testosterone at the same time two weeks out I'm doing it and and what I've

seen only from that happening is the person continuously each and every day gets better and then the volume of oils

comes down so then that systemic inflammation from pinning goes down as well so I'll pull injectables depending

on the individual could be 10 days could be 14 days total sometimes I'll run it seven days again it's all dependent on

the individual but I'd rather have less oils floating around in the body and just utilize my orals my AIS growth

hormone if the person's really responding well to it they're still dry on it if not we're pulling that too and

then uh yeah crashing that estrogen at the very end as long as they're not getting overly flat from that so we we

definitely have to see the response with that but again Kur like you said that's day-to-day stuff there could be days

that you know if the person is is is really flat I'll say okay today no thyroid if they're using thyroid no

clenbuterol no AI today we may Implement a small dosage of Anadrol or something just to anavar could be Halo testin

could be anything exactly it'll bring that back exactly if you're lucky enough to be able to run growth in to some

degree generally can keep some level of fullness like I stay Fuller on growth than I do without right there's a couple

pounds of fullness that's that's in there uh test I mean depending on the person I lose seven to eight pounds and

I pull test fully out so like I can usually be a little heavy going in and pull it and like and then I can usually

make up that weight with carbs but it is amazing when you pull it and it drops out you wake up in the morning and

you're like a whole different person but C like a lot of people they not going to grasp what you just said you lose what

did you say seven to eight pound a lot I mean just it's fluid and garbage information fluid it's not muscle tissue

mus tissue yeah so of course why on Earth would we want to keep that there if that is that fluid coming out from

the subcutaneous layer and you'll see all new layer offf

crazy exactly like you see the tendons between things right like you see your lat tendons when you hit like your back

you can actually see the tendons between your abs like when you move your armpit is so deep that you can't really shave

in there hard yeah like that's what you want it's and that's the thing is like we we mentioned this in the last video

the level of leanness you see in guys like you know AJ and I are are leaner than most humans walk around on a normal

basis but that's not show lean the stuff you see on Instagram that's not that's not cont contest lean is disturbingly

lean like I remember one summer decade ago I guess I did a bunch of shows in a row I I had done okay for me I'm not I

don't have fantastic genetics I'm not gonna ever be a great athlete but I did done okay for me and my wife was very

supportive of my return to this so she was like why don't you keep going so I decided i' would do a couple shows in a

row so I held that condition for two months like you talked about before you can hold it once you once you figure out

how to hold that look you can keep it I can hold that look it's painful but you can keep it and I remember I went to the

beach once with my kids my kids were little and like people would like stop what they were doing to like stare at me

because they just never seen that before it's a different it's not like it's not like a fashion model lean it's like

freakish yeah I mean I remember things you like oh my god oh yeah ripped yeah I remember having uh because I was very

naturally vascular so I remember the mid middle part of my back I can post a picture today through my traps and upper

back I had vascularity running through all so it's just this level of transparency when you're really that

lean where it hurts to sit down on the toilet y because you don't have any fat anywhere man so it it yeah so what

basically what we're saying is getting into that final week real quick synopsis so we're pulling injectables for the

most part test is going could be even three weeks with people have no issues with that whatsoever really don't and

whatever not but again that's why you don't want in my opinion you don't want to use long exra test if you pull test

anth test sionate you don't know when it's coming out it might be in a week it could be in three weeks it could be in

it'll just drop and it's like you wake up one day and it's gone that's the way it works but like you won't know what

day and then their coach doesn't know what day to deal with that either I don't know how to change that look if I

don't know when it's coming out faster asers are so much so much more manageable so again predictability is

going to be key right and then orals are going up the specific orals are going up because we're only getting about two

weeks of high oril usage and we know how the liver functionality Works repairs itself and I've even seen Labs the day

after the show or two days after with hardly any elevation whatsoever so that the general consensus with people that

don't truly grasp it or understand and they'd be like well you know we'll do Trend at a th000 milligrams for 10 weeks

but you're talking about 150 milligrams of wind St are you crazy and it's like wow you I mean if you're really weighing

that out I mean really what what works you know I'd rather drop Trend you know four weeks out and run that high wind

strw you know which is going to be again we've talked about it that's that DHT derivative that's what we want that's

the look we want it does everything that we need it to do so what I see happen not only does that water come off we

which I believe obviously we know that that's we're managing estrogen better but we're also getting a reduction of

systemic inflammation from constantly pinning so we're getting an inflammatory response of coming down cortisol to me

goes down as well and then the body just starts looking better and better each and every day and the person too I think

too from a psychological standpoint the fact that they're like I don't have to pin literally almost every day man this

is phenomenal so the mood goes up and just again your your mind will carry the body so the better the mind is the

better the body will function when you're calm cortisol is down and you'll see this on show day people can have

this huge cortisol all uh Spike on stage you I've seen it happen they start sweating profusely hypoglycemia happens

on stage they're shaking you know they're like I didn't have enough you know honey and rice cakes backstage it's

like no you couldn't control getting into fight or flight and then you had this huge Spike and cortisol glucose

shoots down then you just get this crazy watery look because now you've sweated everything out and just it's a mess on

St vasular is gone yeah vascular is gone absolutely so all these issues need to be mitigated through the Mind first and

now I will Implement certain supplements like rora ashwaganda riola there's certain things we can do to really C

magnesium is one of the best so we utilize these things to bring cortisol down in a modin that I talked about as

well last week uh last week which is not the not a modium not bad no it's a modin so it's totally antia medicine for yeah

so we we want to control cortisol and then after that it comes down to how much glycogen replenishment does this

person need how long do they need it for how much can they hold before they spill out of the the um you know intracellular

layer into the subcutaneous layer how much can they hold and maintain and I think me and you do the same thing Curt

is we're going to literally go meal by meal I mean at the last couple days we're going to take it meal by meal and

you get the raw data from where we get it from weeks and weeks and weeks of working with this person I know how many

carbs you can handle I know when you spill over I know when your guts distended and I know what food you can

handle you see these coaches do these weird things introduce a cheeseburger on De of show like if you have not had

first of all you have no idea what the content of that beef is right you have no idea how it's cooked what oil they

use you it's gonna be a disaster right these are all things you haven't had in at least 20 weeks if you're working with

me at least you're not eating cheeseburgers and fries I'm not giving someone cheeseburger and fries in the

middle of you know in between the morning and the Night Show like that doesn't let me tell you let me tell you

one of the last times I ever did that was over a decade ago with my wife who uh she went undefeated as a women's

physique competitor so after the show I pretty much knew she had already won so I was like well let's go relax you we

went to Denny's and uh I gave her a burger and Fry this was over a decade ago again learning and understanding

what we really need right rather than what the normal people were doing right the the Bro Science aspect of it um

where she would have been better just going back and eating uh flank steak at that time jasmine rice with a little bit

more salt on it and taking a nap and would have been phenomenal the problem is is she got food poisoning between

prejudging and finals we get to the night show she wins she does her routine but at at the same time and she won't

get embarrassed because she tells people that she was holding in this explosion of you know gastric distress so she

barely made it through Awards and ran to the bathroom so just imagine just I was backstage Fanning her down she couldn't

even eat any food after that you just do not take the risk you always cook your own food cuz guys will ask me like after

pre-drive they like coach you know we're we're looking good man we're going to win let me know my family wants to go

out let me know what I can eat I'm like dude you're going to eat your own food you're not going out in fact you need to

go back to your room take a nap so we can get a a droing cortisol and relax get off your legs you can go out with

your family after the show this is not the time not in between you know we you've worked way too hard to blow it on

food with your family in between prejudging and final so yeah none of that nonsense at all no and and you

don't and don't listen to people right I I had a personal experience long time ago competing where I listened to a

friend of mine he had competed I not particularly successful but you get in this place where you're you'll take

anyone's advice right think you're hungry and you're tired and you he had me eat a bunch of salt before the

prejudging and not drink any fluid and then in between the I did okay in prejudging like luckily your placement

is generally determined in the prejudging unless you totally blow out the night show yeah um in between the

two he was like here have a Diet Coke well I had add like three tablespoons of salt so as soon as we had a Diet Coke to

that I could watch my body fill out like a log like the water just like went down and I put on Mi with sod yeah that was

it yeah I couldn't even check I remember Steve Weinberger was like pull your abs in D buddy that's that's all yeah yeah I

mean at the end of the day and we we will touch on this real quick and we'll probably go into part three on this

about mineral shifting and fluid shifting and you know we we touched on the potassium and why it's so important

it's kind of the main driver into the cell of the muscle where we know that sodium as well as a driver to more water

into the subcutaneous layer causing baso dilation through an acute blood pressure increase does it help Drive glucose

where it needs to go yes it does but what what are we trying to achieve on stage we're trying to achieve a shift in

fluid from subq intracellular muscle volumization and potassium is also one of the main drivers in muscle

contractions as well so that's why if you have too much potassium your heart stops because you're getting too much of

a contraction right hyper hyperemia right so we need just enough again it's it's all down to balancing electrolytes

but people really can overshoot sodium thinking that that's the main driver of everything and then they just look worse

and worse and worse and it actually can cause even more of a sweating effect on stage because it's just it was too much

and the fluids didn't shift where they needed to shift because they left out potassium for the most part even if

they're using a pH pharmacological diuretic dizide being tripterine being the pottassium sparing aspect so you are

sparing potassium but are you taking in a certain amount of potassium now I don't like to carb up people with high

potassium foods we talked about that but there still needs to be a certain level of potassium in there for proper

functionality and balance between if you want to touch on that CT yeah it just I think the problem is over time we've

just gotten away from what the sodium potassium pump is so pottassium is on the inside sodium's on the outside

sodium gets kicked out of the cell that's why if you eat Chinese food or something that's like very salty the

next day your skin is Puffy so there you can definitely overdo it yes carbohydrates are moved on the sodium

potassium pump and then they enter through glut but that doesn't mean that sodium is not actually taking it in that

requires pottassium so like we can like you said we could probably do a whole we should probably do a third part just on

the mineral stuff I think there's a lot to go there but I judge someone's final look a couple days out based on like

what I'm going to do with minerals if I'm going to touch minerals based on what their look is right they flat are

they vascular are they you know are they soft there's a lot of things that go on and then it's it's a different technique

right is it aldactone is it diuretic is it um is it adding more sodium it adding more pottassium it's not just one thing

and I think in Fitness now it just seems everyone wants to just use sodium and then everyone's using pottassium it's

like then they're using arbs that are causing high potassium it's like they're skewing everything artificially it'd be