Dairy of competition prepping
#10weeksout
Well this week has been a challenge due to Christmas and all the temptations with food and beverages.
Christmas is a time for enjoying catch up with friends and family, usually involving meals and drinks. I had no problem with the catch ups, I just organized and cooked my meals so I was ready. My first two meals of the day were easy as our visitors hadn’t arrived till late morning, then I could have my poached chicken salad whilst my family had roast chicken and salad rolls, I had a protein shake before going out for an afternoon trip, and had a coffee whilst they all had beers and ciders. For dinner they all had street food, hot chips and sliders etc and I chose grilled fish and salad with no dressings. Like many situations – planning and organizing is the key to success.
Once Christmas was over, it was New Years to contend with. Having kids can help in these situations, after a day at the beach; we just rode down to the waterfront and watched the local fireworks at 9.30pm, then rode home.
Being around people that support you in any challenge you do is definitely a help. With this challenge you cannot afford to be around negative people or haters as they say because it’s easy to play with your mind. The diet that I have to follow cuts out a lot of calories, so your brain can go to mush and your thoughts become very dark at some stages. I lift out of this by reassuring myself that I can have special foods later – like in 10 weeks, which really isn’t that far away. Then your mind flips again thinking “can my body change that much in 10 weeks???”. Well let’s wait and see. I admit I see how I am now and always think I have a long way to go to be stage ready. But then looking at how far I’ve come in the last 12 weeks our bodies are amazing!
I trained everyday over the Christmas period, even a cardio session first thing Christmas morning, every other day was a weight session and cardio. I feel weaker in the afternoons, so my favourite time to train is completing my cardio session super early and then weights mid morning. Each weight session I am pushing myself to failure and feeling trashed after each one. I’ve made sure I practise my posing twice a week. I have a posing workshop in a couple of weeks to help touch up what I am doing, making sure I am practising the right way and also learning what else is expected on the day. We need to do a solo performance to the judges, so I’ll post that info once I find out.
Reading and looking at others on social media can in one way be inspiring, but again the other side to that is self doubt. Everyone progresses at different stages, we all have different body types, family life and work situations that all come into play. As a trainer I see this with my clients all year round, some can engage quicker than others, some have many weaknesses and take longer to let go of bad habits. This still applies with this prepping, so stick to your plan, listen to your coach, be honest with your coach, trust your coach and trust the process…..enjoy the journey!
