The first thing you need to do in order to achieve a competitive physique is to build up real muscle density during your downtime rather than during the preparation phase. This involves carrying out progressive overload every week, consuming adequate calories, and sticking to a structured periodization plan which takes you through the hypertrophy, strength, and contest prep phases.
To begin with, your diet should enable you to build up muscle; afterwards, as you gradually lose weight, it should help you lose fat while at the same time keeping the muscle. Each week you should record your weight, take photos, and note your performance so that you can always make your decisions on the basis of facts.
Build the Muscle Density Competitors Actually Need on Stage
Rather than increasing your muscle density when you’re preparing for a competition, do it during the off-season, since that’s when you have adequate calories, sufficient recovery time, and can maintain constant progressive overload to produce the structural changes that you observe on stage.
If you take to the stage with the idea that your fitness level will be sufficient for you, you will soon find that judges disapprove of contestants having thin, underdeveloped bodies. In order to develop bigger muscles you have to work out regularly and properly over a period of months, not just weeks. You must determine which muscle groups are preventing you from looking good on stage and then concentrate on building those groups during the long off-seasons when you can eat properly and recover adequately to gain muscle.
It will not assist you in achieving your aim if you are trying to lift heavier weights without first learning how to control them; instead, you should apply a planned and structured volume over time.
Periodize Your Training for Peak Competition Condition
If you are to perform at your best when on stage, it is necessary to do more than simply train hard; you have to train intelligently, using a series of different stages, each of which has a specific purpose. Periodisation of your training splits up the year into a series of planned sections: the growth phase is concerned with increasing in size, the strength phase with becoming stronger, and the contest preparation phase with retaining your muscles as you lose weight. Each stage forms the basis for the one that follows.
When you’re preparing for a competition, you’ll reduce the number a little in order not to become too tired while at the same time maintaining a high intensity to tell your body to retain the muscle. It is very rare for players in preparation to gain a lot of size, which is why your summer training blocks are so important.
If you plan your training programme a year in advance you’ll end up being leaner, fuller and more fit when you go on stage than if you try to do all your training at once.
Nutrition Strategies That Support Stage-Ready Muscle Growth
The way in which you train as time goes on provides your body with a structure within which it can grow, but this structure won’t work unless you have the correct nutrition; your eating habits should correspond to the stage of your training. In the off-season a moderate caloric surplus aids muscle growth without causing a excessive gain in fat. In order to promote healing and growth you should try to have about 0.7 to 1 gram of protein for each pound of your body weight every day.
Rather than rapidly reducing the number of calories when you start your preparation, reduce them slowly. It is important to maintain a high level of protein and to train hard if you want to retain your muscle while losing weight. In order to keep your efficiency, consume carbohydrates around your workouts.
Each week you should record your weight, your measurements and any changes in your appearance so that you can alter your diet according to facts rather than making guesses. Your food shouldn’t remain the same; it should change in response to your body’s changes.
Track Your Competition Prep Progress Like It’s Your Job
You will soon forget your objectives if you don’t keep record of your progress, so treat your preparation for the contest as a business. Rather than responding to the daily fluctuations in your weight, make a daily record of it and then use the weekly averages to identify actual trends.
Each week you should take photographs of your progress using the same lighting, angles, and conditions. You need to record the number of calories you consume, the amount of protein you take in, and the quality of your training so that you can tell the difference between losing fat and losing muscle. The data you collect will make it clear to you exactly what adjustments need to be made should your strength decrease significantly, your training stop, or your recovery deteriorate.
It is necessary to make sensible choices rather than make guesses if you are to achieve progressive physical development. The numbers you keep record of will show whether your plan is working or whether you need to alter it before the problems get worse.
Adjust Your Training and Diet Before the Plateau Hits
If you want to avoid reaching a plateau, you should be ready for it before the time comes rather than postponing action for weeks without making any progress; if there has been no change in your strength, your measurements, or your body composition over a period of two to three weeks, then something has to change before your progress comes to a permanent halt.
Start by going over your progressive overload once more. When you increase the amount of load, volume, or technique, are you actually making the training more demanding, or are you merely going through the motions? If the training doesn’t seem to be leading to adaptation, then it probably isn’t.
With regard to nutrition, make the necessary changes in calories before the scale has even stopped moving. Small adjustments—such as increasing them during the growth phase or decreasing them during the prep phase—can get progress going again without the need for major modifications. By making small changes at the right time you will keep making progress and avoid getting stuck, since being stuck can waste weeks of progress.
