I feel very fortunate that SideSteel selected me to participate in his online consulting project.
During my first meeting with SideSteel he listened to my background and current goals while explaining his background and thoughts for helping me achieve my goals. My goal was purely aesthetic, I wanted to see my abs. Last year I lost nearly 50 pounds but didn't have much muscle. I started barbell weight training about 6 months before meeting SideSteel. I had made some strength gains but wasn't happy with my physique. At 40 years old I had never been "lean" and asked SideSteel for help.

With SideSteel's advice and recommendations I adjusted my diet and exercise plan and was able to meet my goal. He recommended honest/accurate food diary logging with a slight calorie deficit and additional accessory exercises. Through weekly Skype sessions after his review of my diet, weight, and lifting videos he provided thoughtful insight and proposed direction for continued progress. After 6 weeks I lost about 8 pounds and began increasing my calories. Also thanks to SideSteel's review of my lifting and tips I had made form improvements that resulted in more confidence with adding weight to the bar. At this point I was very grateful to have SideSteel's help and encouragement because I was feeling insecure with what to do.

After 12 weeks I was in the best shape of my life. SideSteel taught me so much not only about diet and exercise but also about myself. He provided me with the tools and guidance to continuing living a healthy and happy life. I am forever grateful and would recommend anyone wanting to make healthy lifestyle changes to utilize Patrick's expertise.

Here's a little more about me:
I turned 41 on March 30. I'm 5'10.5", after Thanksgiving 2012 I weighed 192, my highest ever. I've always had chicken legs, at 192 I had moobs and a muffin top. I decided before I turned 40 (March 2013) I would be damned if I was going to be in the worst shape of my life.

A little "back story": I was very active and fit up to my early 30's, played college football (@160lbs) in Ohio and moved to the beach after graduation. Gradually I started to gain a little weight in the winter but always lost it in the summer. Lifted weights off and on, never worried about what I ate. Moved off the beach and got married in 2005 and bought my first house in 2007. That's pretty much when my weight just kept creeping up and muscle disappeared. Additionally, my cholesterol had slowly crept up to "unhealthy".

My wife knew I was miserable with my body and mentioned a friend lost weight with Medifast. I googled it, bought it and dove headfirst on 12/2/12. I stuck to it for 4 months including no alcohol (except one Xmas/New Year binge and one or two glasses of wine near the end) and by 4/1/13 weighed 144 but had little muscle, no idea what my BF% was but had no visible abs. Thankfully my cholesterol was/is now fine. I was happy to have lost the weight but needed to gain some muscle. During my transition from Medifast to regular food my Medifast coach had me start an account here so she could see my food diary.

I started to piece together a modest home gym and did some body weight exercises. Through reading here and associated links I decided to try intermittent fasting and immediately fell in love with skipping breakfast. Finally in August 2013 I found a home-made squat/power rack and olympic weight set on my local craigslist.

I started Strong Lifts 5x5 8/1/13 but struggled to figure out my macro and calorie needs. Fast forward to earlier this year, I'd made some strength gains but had questionable form and had not made any "lean gains", weighing ~160-165.

I applied to SideSteels's group offer and hoped he could help me see my abs, help my compound lift form (specifically Squats and Deadlift), and establish reasonable macros and calories for my goals.

I started with SideSteel on 2/18 with the following stats:
Weighing 161.2lbs
~12-14% body fat
Waist @ navel =32", below navel =32.75", and Hips = 35.25"

And this is worthless without pics right?
Here's my "Before's"


















My low weekly average weight was 150.7 after 9 weeks.

And After 12 weeks (with 5 of those weeks reverse dieting up to maintenance) my measurements:
151.2 lbs @ ~9% Body Fat
Waist at Navel 30", Waist below navel 30.5", and Hips 35.25"











For the last 3 weeks my goals have been 2,800 cals (315g Carbs, 75g Fat, 215g Protein) but my daily average intake has been closer to 3,000 cals/day due to weekend "binges" but my average weekly weight has stayed ~154. I'm trying to bulk so I'll be upping calories.

I could go on and on about all the things SideSteel did to help me. Feel free to ask.