Lost 96lbs and made top 10 in physique contest...

zipnguyen

Wife is so over taking photos of me. If it ain't photos that need to be taken so I can send them to Layne, she's not taking photos anymore

lupa01

I would really like to see some of your before pics, when you were at your heaviest....you have clearly done an amazing job!!!

Here you go...

Left photo 271 lbs.
Middle photo 200 lbs.
Right photo 175 lbs.

WOOOOWWWWW!!!! YOU LOOK AMAZING! GREAT JOB!!:-)

zipnguyen

^^^Thanks - more work to do over the next year...

zipnguyen

Pizza :happy:

Silverkittycat

Can't see the pizza pic.

hello77kitty

whoa amazing! Oh, and where does one get that ice cream?

ninkdole

whoa amazing! Oh, and where does one get that ice cream?

This ^^^^^ Your transformation is amazing. But yes, need the info on the ice cream.

ninkdole

whoa amazing! Oh, and where does one get that ice cream?

This ^^^^^ Your transformation is amazing. But yes, need the info on the ice cream.

I see the Ralph's by me carries it. AWESOME.

stardust91

wow thats amazing!

zipnguyen

Can't see the pizza pic.

The pizza is actually in my profile/bio page. For some reason, it wouldn't pull. I'll fix it when I get back to my desktop.

zipnguyen

ICE CREAM is here... http://www.myarcticzero.com/ and I bought from Amazon.com

Purchased it on a Monday, and it arrived on a Thursday. I usually have a WHOLE PINT with 4 bananas and 1.5 scoops of whey protein post workout. And if I'm lazy, I throw everything into the blender, and yep, about a one-gallon shake to consume.

zipnguyen

I will have more photos uploaded as soon as I get a photo account and upload it all to their and then link using the

KristaWeiss

Congrats on the big contest!!!!

FlaLifeCoach

Wow that is amazing. You definately should brag about that!!!

zipnguyen

brag? Help by posting here - yes....but brag, probably not...

Ralph22 asked me why I don't share my food diary. I will write up an explanation later today and the reasons why. But I will share generalities and thoughts during the process.

zipnguyen

Let's try this again.....PIZZA

Macros are roughly 111c/13f/51p adjust the amount of toppings to hit your specific macronutrient totals. Basically I get to eat half the pizza now and half later at another feeding.

zipnguyen

Here's another PIZZA, uncooked. Macros are similar to the one above. 114c/13f/58p.... Again 1/2 now and the other 1/2 later. I usually make 2-3 for the wife and kids and freeze them so when they want to eat - BAM straight from the freezer to the oven.

The dough is from SafeWay Grocery Stores and per pizza usually costs about $3 that's with dough and toppings. The sauce is Prego Heart Smart Spaghetti Sauce.

zipnguyen

I cook the pizza's on this 16" pizza grate. Makes one crispy crust. 450-degrees for about 13 mins and it's done. If the pizza is frozen then 425 for 25 mins.

zipnguyen

You will also see this in my food diary. I am alotted an abundant of carbs (Thanks Coach Layne Norton), but my fat is kept so low that I end up eating so clean.

Here's a low-cost dish where most of the ingredients are from Costco. 1 package of whole wheat pasta, 1/2 jar of Costco-sized Prego Heart Smart Spaghetti Sauce. That's roughly 9 servings of pasta. The bread is actually that SafeWay dough that my family likes to cut up and dip into the sauce. The fats are kept really low in this dish. I use ground turkey and ONLY 22ml (yes milliliters) of olive oil for the whole dish. See it in my diary.

Macros are 84c/15f/48p

zipnguyen

Here's an example of my post-workout-shake - Jamba Juice now stands jealous and inadequate...

It's about 1 gallon of shake that I have to consume. Macros are 84c/2f/62p

adjust these ingredients to hit your specific macro nutrient totals: frozen strawberries, blueberries, two bananas, 1 pint of Artic Zero ice cream, and 2 scoops of whey protein, and lastly a lot of water; you will need to blend in two batches (trust me). YUMMY. Takes me about 20 mins to finish this, but I'm FULL after that. Now that's a post-workout-shake

zipnguyen

NOW for the Sweet Tooth'd........................

Again, NOW for the Sweet Tooth'd......................


Protein Pancake with frozen blueberries with GET THIS... WAIT FOR IT.... WAIT FOR IT... CALORIE FREE SYRUP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yeah, I said it. Calorie-FREE Syrup...

Macros are 73c/9f/48p - now eat up!!!

zipnguyen

Dont' believe me on the CALORIE-FREE SYRUP... Well feast your eyes on this as this was one of the main things that help me through my prolonged (and I mean prolonged) diet.

Macros are 0c/0f/0p - ENJOY

zipnguyen

For you cooks and chefs you will appreciate the play on this. A "deconstructed" post-workout shake. Includes 2 scoops of whey protein in shaker. Calorie-free chocolate with mixed fruit. This was actually pretty light for me.

Macros are 56c/2f/52p - ENJOY

zipnguyen

Can you diet and eat CHOCOLATE CAKE???

HECK YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!:bigsmile:

Special thanks to Jeff Alberts for this NO-BAKE, only microwaved cake recipe that takes about 7 mins to make

Adjust macros to fit your caloric needs, mine is usually 68c/8f/52p



And the recipe is on YouTube here >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joXoMTl5MPg

zipnguyen

And didn't forget about the meat lovers...

Turkey Meatballs with oatmeal filler - it's basically a meatloaf recipe. This is when I was "low-carb'ing" it.

Macros are 48c/16f/63p
Fat was a little high because of the cheese.

zipnguyen

AND of course I am NO stranger to bodybuilding staples such as tilapia, sweet potato, and frozen veggies. This dish is so low in fat that I have to add olive oil (10ml).

Macros are 68c/12f/53p

The two photos is pre-mash up and to make it easier to eat, I mash it all together.

Tarah1218

Food porn first thing in the morning is not good. I am checking into that ice cream and cake today. I am fitting that cake into my macros, or at least some form of a protien cake, I want CAKE!!!!

zipnguyen

Food porn first thing in the morning is not good. I am checking into that ice cream and cake today. I am fitting that cake into my macros, or at least some form of a protien cake, I want CAKE!!!!

That chocolate cake recipe is actually quite satisfying. Notice that I made it two-layers. If you make it with 1/2 the ingredients the macros will be 1/2 of what I've stated. But then again, my optimal macronutrient composition will be different than yours.

I'll tell you when I was first dieting I went at it COMPLETELY WRONG... I had a low-carb mentality and I was dieting on 30-90 grams of carbs per day. Then my weight loss plateaued.

I then started to work with Layne and my carbs were increased dramactically from when I was dieting "my way"

I then proceeded to have more energy to put into my cardio sessions and weightlifting sessions.

I've been reverse dieting for 3 months now to stay maximally lean while having my carbs increased very methodically by Layne. Now, I think I'm tolerating carbs well. And with luck I will be in the 400g-500g range while only gaining 1-2 lbs per month.

This means the next time I diet to dwindle down to low-low body fat levels, I will start from a higher carb number. Which means I can then slowly take them away little by little and lose fat progressively.

So, assume I start at 500g of carbs at the beginning of my next dieting phase, this means I can start dieting at 250g of carbs lets say. Judging by most of my friends and cohorts here, that's still a lot of carbs to be "dieting" on. That's so cool to me.

From 250g let say and as my fat loss plateuas the next time I diet, then I can reduce another 30 grams and be at 220g and still lose weight. If I still have fat on my body, then I drop it another 20 grams and be at 200g, so on and so forth.

I think the problem I had before I worked with Layne was I started my carbs so low that when I hit a fat loss plateau I really couldn't lower them anymore. If you start at say 60 grams per day, and then drop them to 30grams, the next drop is 0 grams....and what happens when weightloss stalls at 0 grams of carbs??? Can't go negative.

Currently I'm maintaining weight and I'm eating an abundance of carbs. But since my fat macro is so low, I end up eating so clean. I can eat beef (as I'm a meat and potatoes kinda guy), but to make "room" for my fish oil pills and my olive oil, I end up not eating beef as much.

It's been outstanding so far finding out "what" does "what" to my body.

:bigsmile: And yeah... cake and ice cream helps you get through the tough dieting ahead.:bigsmile:

zipnguyen

Here was my bloodtest results from October 2011... It's out-freaking-standing, my current results vs. my old results.

So basically I eat 4x per day spacing meals out 4-5 hours with doses of BCAAs in between. Not promoting supplements or anything, but I use Scivations Xtend BCAAs because it tastes like Gatorade without the sugar that would cut into my carb allowance. In spacing meals out like this I find that I flatten out between meals now, which means my metabolism has sped up, which means MORE CARBS, YEAH!!!!!!!

Also attached is some of my blood test results; you will notice that my TSH levels are 1.52. This is the lowest it has ever been. The lower the TSH the faster my metabolism. I believe looking back at older blood work, I had it at 2.24 or something in the mid-two's. As that number gets lower and lower my metabolism is faster and faster. Also, notice my cholesterol, yep it's 110 and the ratio is of HDL/LDL is 0.789; which is out-friggin-standing as anything above 0.4 is "good" according to the Mayo Clinic is more than optimal as seen here http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/cholesterol-ratio/AN01761 and here http://cholesterol.emedtv.com/hdl/hdl-ldl-ratio.html

And to boot, my triglycerides are in the low-low range for someone eating the amount of carbs I'm eating. My physician can only conclude that my diet and exercise regimen is "optimized" for my metabolism such that whatever it is I'm eat and however it is I'm lifting, the effort-in and the food-in is yielding some sort of "output" that is NOT adding to higher triglycerides. The "conclusion" from my progress photos and relative leaness at higher weights would portend to the conclusion of gaining muscle OR "filling out" muscle glycogen. In either case, IT's WORKING!!!

My physician was like, "...dude you are a completely different personal physiologically..." Yes, he said "dude."

Here's the article: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22013195 and there's tons of research to back this up, including my coach's Ph.D. dissertation on the same topic which can be downloaded here: http://www.yourfilelink.com/get.php?fid=719503

And although I'm still working with my coach to continually test variables like diet, macronutrient composition that "would" optimize my metabolism, and exercise protocols the end result can be seen in (1) how my physique changes and (2) what my blood test results are revealing every 4-6 months or so.

My physician was so impressed that he actually wanted to get a hold of Layne's info so he can refer some of his morbidly obese patients over to Layne

Good stuff...

Now as to what is "optimal" for me as I progress, I don't know Layne and I are still testing

Tarah1218

That is my biggest worry with my coach. She has me on so low carbs, even when I had fruits at 20 weeks, that I am always under 100g, higher end until yesterday, yesterday around 60g. When I hit 18% bf what is she going to do to get my body to let it go? More cardio? I am a hard fat loser but a great muscle gainer. She seems to be throwing me into her cookie cutter program and cutting out anything I can't have due to my medical issues and it is leaving me so flippin' limited. Can you tell I am frustrated. I think for my real prep at 8 weeks, or maybe I will just start a 12 week right after this 12 weeks, that I might pay her out the rest of my contract to get away from her and just get a better, more realistic, weathered coach.

And look at your Cholesterol levels ! Do you supplement with folic or is that just from your diet?