Stephanielynn76's Blog

Well I hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving holiday. By Friday evening I had eaten too much to wear pants... and when I say that I mean I literally retreated away from my family to another room and hung around pants-less. LOL I don't remember feeling so fat or full in a long time. By Sunday I was having to dig out my old "fat clothes" that I hadn't worn in 2 years just to find something to wear. Oy. I was back in the gym today and didn't DARE step on the scale. I will share the obligatory picture though...

 Yes I'm thick but I still feel ok about my bulk. There ARE some good muscle gains under the fat... there had better be! :D I started my new routine today. I'll give it a few weeks and share how it's going!

 So we took our yearly family pictures (for our Christmas cards) on Sunday and here are a few of them...

^^Yes, much photoshopping occurred here...  :D

So here I am... several months in to my bulk (started officially in August) and I'm up a whole 20lbs! As you can see I'm thickening up everywhere... it's part of the process! While outgrowing my clothes is a little disconcerting, the progress I'm making in the weighroom has been worth it! I'm currently 145lbs. Can you believe? I started this journey at a "fat" 140lbs and have now pushed past that on the scale... and look BETTER! Picture proof:

So, that brings me to another issue I want to touch on... overtraining. If you follow my blog you know I've been using the PHAT training template which is very high in volume. While I have made great gains on it, I've also struggled with recovery. The heavier I lift, the harder it is for me to keep up with so many exercises and days in the gym. While my muscles seem to be repairing fairly well, my CNS (central nervous system) is struggling to keep up. Upon the advice of my coach I've decided to switch over to something else that is intense but lower in volume. This new training template is based on the DoggCrapp (DC)  training principles. See here:

 http://www.thepumpingstation.com/doggcrapp.html

Starting next week I will run this new program for a at least 8 weeks and re-evalutate. I will be training 4 days per week and rotating through 3 different workouts diviided as push/pull/legs. I am excited to try something new and further challenge myself. I'll update here with my thoughts and progress.  

Now...  the holidays are here people... eat up!  :P

So last time I introduced one of my besties Dominique... here is another... Renee! I LOVE these girls. They are awesome!!

First up... SQUATS!

Renee: regular free-weight barbell squats

Me: free-weight barbell box squats

Next up... DEAD LIFTS

Me: regular barbell deadlifts

Renee: SLDL (still-legged deadlifts)

Renee does pull-ups/lat pulls. This chick has an amazing back!

Me... showing off my bulking body :P

Goofballing...