|
|
![]() By: Wendy Page
Before
After
I am 5 ft 8 1/2 inches tall. When I began exercising I weighed 150 lbs and had 30% body fat. I began training just to feel better about myself and get some physical activity in my life. I work a desk job so I felt the need to boost my energy levels at the end of the day. My new trainer, Terry Stokes, told me that I had the potential to become a figure competitor. He is the best figure coach and the only figure specialist in the Buffalo NY area. I decided to take a shot at it. I placed third in my first figure show. My end weight was 126 lbs and 14% body fat. In the three months that we dieted and the six total months we exercised, I lost 24 lbs and more than half my body fat. I am currently training for upcoming figure shows and I am studying to become a personal trainer.
Working with Terry has changed my life in more ways than just competing. I have discovered a passion that I did not know that I had and a motivation and drive inside me unparalleled to anything I have ever felt before. My plan is to enter my next competition leaner and more muscular and I know that it will happen.
People ask me what my motivation is, why I am training for this. I am going to try to explain a little bit what this process means to me. This entire process is one of amazing self-discovery. I learn every day more and more about not just my physical capacity, but of the strength of my mind.
Click Image To Enlarge. Every Day I Learn More About The Strength Of My Mind. Bodybuilding.com Beanies Here. I have discovered that your mind has an amazing power to push your body beyond the limits that you ever thought you could go. Your mind pushes you when you are beyond exhausted. Somehow, that "one more set" always happens. I break things down into increments for myself. When we are super-setting a particularly difficult series, I always tell myself one more set, then it is one more set, then it is one more, until that time that it really was one more! And getting up at 5 a.m. has become a ritual for me too. I am out before the sun comes up, and back at home probably before most people with a 9-5 schedule are even out of bed. I have already done intense cardio time. I will do it again in the evening after an intense training session.
I eat, sleep, and breath exercise now. Every day begins with my workout schedule. Everything else gets scheduled around it, family, friends, and even sometimes significant others.
I don't spend nearly as much time with my family and boyfriend that I want to, but I have to push for the greater good. I cannot eat dinner with my family and going over to people's houses for meals is very difficult. I bring my own food; I have to. Going out to eat is forbidden.
One of the hardest things about this journey is that as soon as people know what you are working for, you are being scrutinized. Most are complimentary, but you never feel like what you do is enough. I have been watched since the beginning and probably not taken seriously by a lot of people. Eyes are on you, whether it is people watching your weight loss progress or questioning why you are going to lunch with them. "You can't eat that," they say.
The satisfaction of the change in your body though is the most worthwhile part of the entire process. Every pound I lose, every point of body fat that goes is a point in the direction of success. But let's face it; success will only be determined at the end when I stand up on stage with numerous other women who have expelled the same amount of blood, sweat and tears and guess what? We all expect to win...
Below are two of my diets. The first is from early on in my precontest preparation. The carbs are high, I'm full after every meal... Life is good! The second diet is from the final weeks. Carbs are low, I'm never really full and I realize why my trainer told me this was going to be the most difficult thing I have ever done!
Protein: 38% Meal #1: Meal #2: Meal #3: Meal #4: Meal #5:
Protein: 58% Meal #1: Meal #2: Meal #3: Meal #4: Meal #5:
My trainer has developed workouts that reduce the amount of cardio needed to get ready for competitions. They are a combination of resistance training and cardio. Below is one of the workouts that stripped 25 lbs. of body fat off me and dropped my body fat percentage from 30% to 14.5% in 12 weeks!
I literally roll off the bench onto the floor after doing flys and immediately began doing plyometric pushups. Rest 15 seconds and repeat 4 more times.
This is a very intense superset; I sometimes have to drop the dumbbells half way through a set in order to reach 12 reps on my jump squats. Good luck trying to stand up after this one!
As soon as I am finished with lat pull downs, my trainer hands me a pair of dumbbells and I begin shoulder presses. I do my shoulder presses standing up so that I can use my legs to push out those last few reps. I rest 30 sec. in between supersets.
The hamstrings curls are done in a drop set fashion: I start each set heavy (with a weight I can only get 3 or 4 reps with) and my trainer lowers the weight stack by ten lbs. every few reps until I squeeze out at least 12 reps... Tough!
2 minutes of jump roping, followed by 2 minutes of hitting the heavy bag, followed by a 2 minute sprint on the spin bike (no rest in between these exercises).
Wendy Page Recommend this article to a friend by e-mail here! Visitor Reviews Of This Article!
Related Articles
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||








Click Image To Enlarge. 










Diet #1 (early in precontest phase)









