Lifestyle editor Adrian Collins has just one short week left on his quest to get ripped, and the results have gone the wrong way for once. Now it's time to refocus and sprint for the finish line.
The final week is just around the corner and for the first time the numbers have gone the wrong way for me, as my body fat has gone slightly up. Now, we’re still in single figures, but I’m up at 9% from just under 8%, so the jump is a worry for me.
As Anthony at Raw Gyms told me, however, it could be from a number of things, and it can be altered very quickly, so there's no need to panic and start fixating on it. The goal was not for me to get too lean as I need to keep putting on muscle and gains with the rigorous new workout program, but the goal was not to be putting on much more body fat, so there need to be some adjustments made.
Unfortunately, that means the diet, and things are about to get very unpleasant again. For the next seven days, my meals are going to be very plain and dry, and I’m going to have egg whites coming out my ears by the end of it. There are no excuses really; on reflection I’ve simply not been dedicating myself to it as much this week as I have in every other week, and have let my preparation fall by the wayside because of other factors which I have deemed to be 'outside my control'. I’ve been all over the place, haven’t slept in my own bed yet this week and got around two hours of sleep on Monday night, which doesn’t help either, but I should have prioritised getting the food and workouts right over everything else. I need to take back the control over the situation.
With just one week left and the finish line in sight (as well as some photos to be taken) I’m fully refocused and ready to give everything for the next seven days. Here’s what I’ll be eating every day for that period, and if it sounds grim, then that's because it is. The best motto to follow is if it tastes nice, don't eat it.
There are no cheat meals left, and there’s absolutely no sugar allowed at all, so that means taking out the protein shakes that I would normally have had at 11am or any pre-workout supplements that I would have taken. I’ll have to find a way to bring egg whites with me to work, and that may be tricky, but I’ll find a solution for the few days. As I've learned this week, the preparation is where I will make the real muscle gains that I want.
Apart from the eating side of things, the sessions are now doubled up. Next week I’m hoping my rhythm (and sleep pattern!) will be back to normal, as I need to get a workout done in the morning including an abs session, and then I have to do some cardio in the evening in between my meal around 4pm and dinner later on that evening. Ideally that capitalises on the time when I'm feeling hungry and forces my body to use up the fat reserves, so it won't be a pleasant feeling.
The hardest part will be that evening stretch, as I will have a good few hours without food, and will be very hungry. I also need to up my water intake from what I was at (probably three or four litres a day) to at least six, in order to flush out any water that my body is holding on to. What I hope is that by next Friday I’ll be in magazine over shape, but there’s no doubting that I’ll finish in the best shape of my life, even if I make no further progress.
If you’ve started the program yourself, let us know your results and tweet with the #GetRippedOrDieTrying hashtag. If you’re thinking about making a change and getting fit, then don’t be afraid to drop me a line on Twitter for any advice or get in touch with the lads at Raw. They know their stuff, clearly.
Check out the blogs from the other weeks here: