John DelinAc Story

the

the secrets to winning the MAX’S Muscle Up challenge

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contentSQUIT THE EXCUSES SETTING YOUR GOALS IS THE CHALLENGE FOR YOUSTAYING MOTIVATED AND USING TOOLS PREPARING FOR THE CHALLENGETRAINING DIARYMY MUSCLE BUILDING WORKOUTSHEDDING THE FATSUPPLEMENTATION AND NUTRITIONFINAL WEEKGRAND FINALEFINAL NOTE

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Introduction,Hi everyone. I’m really chuffed that MAX’S asked me to write about my ex-periences with their 2011 Muscle-Up Challenge. I can’t actually believe I won this competition, that was never my goal starting out. In fact I can’t really believe I could build the body I’d always dreamed of – and it only took me 12 weeks. What an awesome journey it’s been. In this special report I’m going to tell you my story – how I did it. I’m going to give you details of how I trained, what I ate, the supplements I used and the sacrifices I made to transform my body in 12 weeks. I hope my story will help other people realise that they can do it too, it’s not that hard. You just have to make the decision and commit to follow it through. Here’s my story. I hope you enjoy it.

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Ever since I can remember from about the age of 5, my 2 older brothers (Steve & Leo, 9 & 11 years my senior) were al-ways into bodybuilding. As a young im-pressionable kid, and having to watch them pose in their jocks, doing double bicep pose, after double bicep pose in the mirror, there’s nothing you want more, than to just grow up and be, big-ger and better than they ever could be!

So over the past 15 years or so, I dab-bled with chasing that dream, forever trying to look like a fit, muscular, ath-

letic, natural body builder! All through my twenties I remember reading all my brothers old bodybuilding mags, as well as trying every new training meth-od, and supplement that came out on the market. They all promised amazing results in only a few days, weeks, or months, so I tried them all! Now that I think about it, in a way I had tried quite a few ‘personal 12 week challenges’ throughout all those years, wanting dramatic results in a short amount of time, but sadly never coming close to winning any of them!

Realistically looking back, I never had any clearly defined achievable goals, self-belief or real deter-mination to get anywhere near looking like I wanted to. It was always so much easier to go out and drink and party with friends, blame bad genetics, tell everyone you’re ‘bulk-ing up,’ year in year out, tell them you’re too busy with work and don’t have a spare 4-5 hours a week to train… the list went on!

In other words, there was always an “excuse” as to why I COULDN’T get the results I wanted, but this isn’t why I’m writing this special report. It’s to show you how I COULD finally get that fit, healthy, mus-cular body I had always

dreamed of! Better yet, “I” got to pose in front of my brothers, whilst they had to stand around and admire me this time… luckily for them I did it tactfully, and wore shorts! This challenge has changed my life for the better in more ways then I could ever have hoped or imagined. Never before have I received so many compliments on the way I look, nor asked by so many, how I was able to achieve such extraor-dinary changes in such a short period of time.

Well if you’re thinking the same thing, then in the following pages I hope to share with you everything I know about building the best body you can in 12 weeks. I’ll cover training, nutrition, supplementa-tion, goal setting, how to stay focused, having the overwhelming desire to succeed, and every other tip I’ve picked up along the way to winning a years sponsorship deal with MAX’S, a $6,000 Home Entertainment System and most impor-tantly being chosen as the 2011 MAX’S Muscle-Up Challenge Winner!

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You must stop every single excuse that’s held you back from looking and feeling the way you’ve always wanted. I also believe if you want it bad enough you need to start right NOW, not tomorrow, not next week or next month, TODAY!! Be it making your next meal a healthy one, going for a quick walk, clearing the pantry of all the rubbish you’ll no longer need and has stopped you from reaching that ultimate goal, anything, just do something that’s good for YOU… IT’S TIME TO CHANGE NOW!

Now I understand many people may be reading this and be thinking about signing up for the 2012 MAX’S Muscle-Up Chal-lenge. Well this is the time to make the decision. Commit and GO FOR IT! If you’ve already sign up you’ll never look back.

SettinG My GoAlS When it comes to goal setting, making your goals small and achievable work best. Weekly or monthly goals, help make the overall task at hand seem far less daunting, whilst also making it less likely that you’ll throw in the towel.

For me I had broken down the 12 weeks into 4 smaller goals or milestones. This way I felt that they would be easier to reach, and also more fun and rewarding at the same time! My four goals were:

Goal1: Make the decision to change, take that dreaded before picture and announce it to the world, so now you’re accountable, and have to follow it through to the end. No more failed attempts like the last 15 years… been there, done that, all too often, it’s now time to do everything in your power to make this challenge your priority for the next 12 weeks.

Goal 2: Weeks 1-6 making quality muscle gains, this meant getting back to basics! Lifting heavy, using basic true, tried and tested compound exercises that are re-nowned for putting on size and strength. Eating as much quality protein, carbohy-drates and fats as possible, to feed those muscles after the grueling workouts. Finally resting whenever possible, having 2 days a week to allow muscles to recover and grow, and getting a good nights sleep every night!

QUit the eXcUSeS

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When it comes to goal setting, mak-ing your goals small and achievable work best. Weekly or monthly goals, help make the overall task at hand seem far less daunting, whilst also making it less likely that you’ll throw in the towel. For me I had broken down the 12 weeks into 4 smaller goals or milestones. This way I felt that they would be easier to reach, and also more fun and rewarding at the same time! My four goals were:

Goal 1: Make the decision to change, take that dreaded before picture and announce it to the world, so now you’re accountable, and have to fol-low it through to the end. No more failed attempts like the last 15 years… been there, done that, all too often, it’s now time to do everything in your power to make this challenge your priority for the next 12 weeks.

Goal 2: Weeks 1-6 making quality muscle gains, this meant getting back to basics! Lifting heavy, using basic true, tried and tested compound exercises that are renowned for put-ting on size and strength. Eating as much quality protein, carbohydrates and fats as possible, to feed those muscles after the grueling workouts. Finally resting whenever possible, having 2 days a week to allow mus-cles to recover and grow, and getting a good nights sleep every night! Goal 3: Weeks 7-11 shredding the fat, and exposing all those hard earned gains. Bye, bye, cheat meals and simple carbohydrates, sugars, white flour, starchy carbs etc. Hello cardio, burning those extra-unwant-ed calories, but knowing where to draw the line and not go overboard and eating into those new formed muscles!

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SettinG My GoAlS

SettinG yoUr GoAlSNow obviously your goals may vary a lot from mine, but the basic fun-damentals are the same “if you fail to plan, you plan to fail”. What you look like today, and what you want to look, and feel like in 12 weeks time, will be worlds apart. As I’ve experi-enced every meal, rep and sacrifice no matter how big or small, once you reach your goal, it will reward you ten fold!

So let’s spend a moment on defin-ing goals. When I signed up for the Challenge I wasn’t thinking about winning it, I was thinking about using this competition to help me set a deadline and some goals to which I could be held accountable. I let as many people as I could know that I had made this commitment so that I

felt quitting was not an option. When you set your goals make them realis-tic targets that you honestly believe you will achieve.

Don’t make them silly. For example, if you weigh 130kg with a high body fat level it’s probably not realistic to aim for a 6 pack in 12 weeks. But a goal of increased muscle mass and a fat loss of 20kg could be quite realistic. Your goal might simply be to train hard and consistently and eat a clean bodybuilding diet for 12 weeks. I’m sure that if most people did this they would see some impressive changes. Whatever goals you set, make then important to you, don’t just copy other people’s goals.

Goal 4: Week 12, finishing tweaks and touch ups, re-scrutinizing every single part of my eating and training schedule, and determining which parts have worked best and which haven’t, to be looking my absolute best for the final shoot! Utilizing every single bit of knowl-edge and research I’ve ever done on pre contest bodybuilding prepa-ration, to help bring out every muscle fiber, striation and vein that I possibly could. Finally and most importantly… look nothing like I did in the before photo, but rather what I’ve always dreamed about looking like

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???iS the chAllenGe For yoU?

I really enjoyed the Challenge. I loved the training and the discipline of dieting because I finally realized a life-long goal of getting in great shape. But I’ve always loved going to the gym and following a bodybuild-ing type of diet, even though I may not have looked like a bodybuilder. But there will be many people out there who might be reading this thinking – it all sounds pretty hard. And it is. You have to be prepared for 12 weeks of hard work, discipline and sacrifice. You need to be honest with yourself – have I got the will, the guts, the determination, the commitment, whatever you want to call it, to see this through.

Another important point that I think everyone needs to consider is, can I fit my life around the demands the Challenge will make for the next 12 weeks. It has to be your number one priority. Maybe you are starting a new job or have a very demanding job, or you’re about to go on holi-days, or maybe you’re a single parent with kids to look after, you might find you can’t put the Challenge first, which will make it a lot tougher.

If you break it down, the training is probably the easiest part. All my re-sults were achieved by going to the gym for a total of only 84 hours over 12 weeks! This equates to an average of just an hour a day or only about 4% of your daily time spent weight training and or doing cardio! So for those that say they don’t have time to train.... well you get the point. I’d suggest anyone who is serious about getting themselves healthy, looking good and feeling great can spare 4% of their day.

The harder commitment to me is the nutrition side. Every morsel of food and every drop of drink you put in your mouth for that 12 weeks is vitally important. You must be really disciplined for the full 12 weeks to make this work prepared to be really disciplined with nutrition,

I know from the 2011 Challenge that many people who started didn’t fin-ish for whatever reason. So if you are thinking about doing this, you need to ask yourself the hard questions – I know I did.

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StAyinG MotiVAteD AnD the toolS to Get the BeSt oUt oF yoUr 12 WeeKS

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As I’ve already mentioned, the next 12 weeks should now take precedence over everything in your life, well, within reason of course. This means completely changing your mindset from what it has been and hasn’t worked for so long, to now being confident and determined to achieving that ultimate goal, a more muscular, fitter, leaner and happier you! The excuses have been dealt with and left in the past, it’s now time to move forward and make it happen!

From the moment you take that first step, everything you now do in your day-to-day life should somehow relate toward your Challenge goals. This will help cement the thought patterns in your mind and motivate you to suc-ceed. Before you know it, all the things

you thought once seemed impossible, now just become part of the norm for you, here are some examples I used:

• Every meal now counts towards bettering yourself, so make sure every meal is healthy, nutritious, and feed your body regularly. Don’t look at healthy food as a bore, but as a qual-ity fuel to keep that metabolism firing 24/7.

• Up your day-to-day cardio, start tak-ing stairs instead of lifts whenever you can.

• Park your car a little further away at work, gym or at the shops. You’ll have a little further to walk each day, and burn a few extra calories along the way.

• Walk, jog, run, skate, roll-erblade, swim, row or ride whenever you can as ap-posed to taking the car for short trips... not only will you feel better, you’re helping the environment too, the tree huggers and mother nature will love you for it.

• Clear out the pantry, kitch-en, fridge and any secret stashes, of anything you know is bad for you and may tempt you.

• Keep your daily meal, work, rest, train and play times as consistent as possible for a steadily firing metabolism. It will also help your days be-come far more structured, and productive, making it less likely that you’ll skip or miss your meals, sleep, or training. Once you do it for a couple of weeks, it will be-come habitual, being fitter and healthier will finally all become routine!

• If you have to go out for drinks with friends, do it, but just cut the alcohol content completely. No one will ever know that there’s no vodka in your lime and soda, or no scotch in your diet coke, and you’ll save a fortune. You can then put those extra $$$ to-ward a nice gift for yourself when you complete your mission!

If you want this bad enough, and YOU SHOULD, there’s always a way around any scenario without you feeling like you’re ever missing out on anything! Just think out-side the box, and those that know, love and care for you will support you and your de-cisions anyway, and 9 times out of 10, they’ll join you on your ride, EVERYONE WANTS TO LOOK AND FEEL GOOD!

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PrePArinG For the chAllenGe reASeArch the FActS.. The more you can learn about any aspect of health and fitness, the better and easier your results will come. Books, magazines, Inter-net, The MAX’S website, Personal Trainers, athletes, this report, they all have an abundance of relevant information you can use.

You should have done most of your research before you actually start your Challenge. That means you should have planned out what you will be eating in some detail day by day and week by week. If you haven’t really followed a disciplined program like this before it’s a great idea to practice before you start the Challenge. By that I mean try follow-ing the diet plan you will be using for a few days to make sure it works for you. Work out what should you buy and when. Practice preparing and cooking your meals in advance. Work out the best time to do this. Have you got all the containers you need. What about an esky and freezer brick. Don’t leave anything to chance.

If you’ve already started your Chal-lenge, you’ll have to do most of this on the fly, but don’t stress, it’s all part of the adventure! The only thing I strongly suggest is, once you make a decision about how you’re going to go about your eating and training for the 12 weeks… JUST STICK TO IT!

Everyone will have their different opinion on what they think is best, so taking too much info in from eve-ryone, or every source will simply confuse you and more likely than not, throw you off track and back to point A. Just trust your instinct, and don’t let anything or anyone put you off. After all, you’ve researched what you’re about to do, you’re the one showing the true commitment, dedication, and you’re the one that can truly say ‘I told you so’ in the end.

Stick with your plan, however if you find after a few weeks it’s not work-ing quite as well as you anticipated, (and you have faithfully followed it ALL to the letter) then maybe shake things up and change your approach somewhat. I can tell you though, if you do follow most programs or eat-ing plans that come from reputable sources, then there’s a fair chance it will work, and realistically you may have been cutting a few too many corners???

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trAininG DiAryA training diary, or one of the many great computer and phone applica-tions you can now get now are a must. As long as you can enter the basics such as, type of exercise, weight, sets and reps completed, you’re well on your way to making noticeable improvements, and here’s why…

Progressive overload is defined as, the gradual increase of stress placed upon the body during exercise train-ing. The technique is recognized as a fundamental principle for success in various forms of strength training programs.

Quite simply this means, EVERY workout you do, MUST be harder than your last. This could be as little as increasing the weight on a particu-lar exercise, decreasing the rest time

between sets, increasing the repeti-tions in a set, increasing the speed of movement etc, the list goes on! It ensures that you’re never just going through the motions whilst training, allowing your body to simply adapt to lifting the same weights day in day out. Without the progressive overload principle in place, your body never has the need, or stress required to GROW and IMPROVE!

So if you log your entries, the next time you go to train you’ll know exactly where you left off, and won’t be left guessing what weight to use, how many sets or reps to do etc. It’ll all be there right in front of you, so you can shock and challenge your-self, and your body, into new growth by surpassing your previous workout. Your body will then have no excuse and will have to grow!

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• It came highly recommended by my older brother and mentor, Steve. He had tried it and it worked well for him, and a number of other people he knew. • It was something completely new and I hadn’t tried it before, so either way it’d be a good shock to the system, and hopefully a great shock to the body to stimulate whole new levels of growth.

BUilDinG QUAlity MUScle – My MUScle BUilDinG WorKoUtS

Now there are hundreds of tried and tested programs that claim to gain muscle quickly. Over the past 15 years or so I’ve tried many with varying degrees of effectiveness. Below is the program I used during the Muscle Building Phase of my Challenge. I decided to try this particular program for a few different reasons:

• The exercises are all hard and effective compound exercises. They have always been the basic fundamental exercises for all programs, and have shown time and time again since the dawn of bodybuilding to help build good, big qual-ity muscle.

• The science behind it seemed quite sound. Al-though many may view it as over training, because the same muscle groups are hit each work out. It’s actually different muscle fibres that are activated each time that makes it effective for maximum growth. The 5 set x 5 rep days are done with explo-sive contraction, which really target the fast twitch muscle fibers. The 4 sets x 10 rep days work the muscle within the hypertrophy range which again is great for stimulat-ing new growth.

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WORKOUT #1:

SQUATS 5 sets of 5 EXPLOSIVE repsBENCH PRESS 5 sets of 5 EXPLOSIVE repsCHIN UPS 5 sets of 5 EXPLOSIVE repsSTIFF LEG DEADLIFTS

4 sets of 10 reps

CHEST DIPS 4 sets of 10 repsWIDE GRIP SEATED ROWS

4 sets of 10 reps

WORKOUT #2:

SQUATS 4 sets of 10 repsBENCH PRESS 4 sets of 10 repsCHIN UPS 4 sets of 10 repsSTIFF LEG DEADLIFTS

5 sets of 5 EXPLOSIVE reps

CHEST DIPS 5 sets of 5 EXPLOSIVE repsWIDE GRIP SEATED ROWS

5 sets of 5 EXPLOSIVE reps

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For me the workout was split over 5 days / week:Mon - WO #1Tue - WO #2Wed - RestThu - WO #1Fri - WO #2Sat - WO #1Sun - RestMon - WO #2 and so on…

That’s it, pretty simple but it really worked for me. When combined with a good muscle building nutri-tion plan that I’ll talk about a little later, this program really shocked my body into growing. I followed this program for 6 weeks. As I men-tioned, my main focus during this phase was to build as much muscle mass as possible. While I didn’t keep detailed records of my weight and body fat levels, during this period I gained over 4kg of muscle and l was able to drop my body fat percentage from 16% to 5% and as a result I lost 10kg of body fat.

Some people asked me if I had any times during The Challenge when I lost a bit of direction or motiva-tion. The truth is it’s very hard to stay on track 24/7 for 12 weeks. I’ll admit I had the odd slip up here and there, but I think it’s what you do after you stray from your plan that’s important. In my case, I had an attack of the guilts which made me get back on track with even more determination. It’s human to slip up, so get over it and get back on track as soon as you can.

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SheDDinG the FAt AnD eXPoSinG thoSe GAinSAfter dedicating the first 6 weeks of my Challenge to building maximum mus-cle mass it was now time to start honing my body to expose the muscle gains. Once again my brother Steve was a great source of information and helped me put together the following program. I planned to follow a 3 day split program for my shredding phase. The thinking behind this approach was:

•Breaking up the workout and muscle groups into three differ-ent days allowed far more recov-ery time for each muscle group trained to grow and repair. This was of great importance, as I knew I was going to start cut-ting back on calories consumed, so any extra help they could get would help a lot with recovery.

•It also helped raise the inten-sity of the work outs, so burning those few extra calories each workout helped shed that little more fat each work out.

•It helped bring up any weaker muscle groups that hadn’t been directly targeted during the first 6 weeks, such as arms, calves and shoulders.

•Quite simply it was just nice to have a new routine, new exercis-es, and new PB’s to start setting. A change in routine always helps stimulate the mind and muscles, ensuring you don’t become com-placent or bored and ultimately give up!

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My MAintenAnce AnD hyPertroPhy WorKoUt

WORKOUT #1 CHEST/BACK

Bench Press 4 sets of 8-12 repsIncline Press 3 sets of 8-12 repsCable X-Overs 2 sets of 12-15 reps

Wide Grip Pull Downs 4 sets of 8-12 repsClose grip Seated Rows 3 sets of 8-12 repsDumbell Pullovers 2 sets of 12 -15 reps

WORKOUT #2 LEGS/ABS

Squats 4 sets of 8-12 repsLunges 3 sets of 8-12 repsStiff Leg Dead Lifts 4 sets of 8-12 repsLeg extensions 3 sets of 8-12 repsSupersetted with:Leg curls 3 sets of 8-12 repsCalf raises 4 sets of 12-15 repsProne and side holds Max effort x 2Crunches and kickouts Max effort x 2

WORKOUT #3 SHOULDERS/ARMS

Pull to Push Presses 4 sets of 8-12 repsLateral Raises 3 sets of 8-12 repsRear lateral raises 3 sets of 8-12 repsTricep Dips 3 sets of 8-12 repsTricep Pushdowns 3 sets of 8-12 repsStanding D/B curls 3 sets of 8-12 repsStanding cable curls with Ez-bar

3 sets of 8-12 reps

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Again these workouts were split over 5 days / week:

Mon – WO #1Tue – WO #2Wed – RestThu – WO #3Fri – WO #1Sat – WO #2Sun – RestMon – WO #3 and so on…

Along with this program I started incor-porating Cardio training in the mornings, and always on an empty stomach. This helped dramatically shift some of those extra few stubborn kilos of fat, as well as increasing my metabolic rate for the day, burning off any extra calories my body didn’t need.

My cardio generally consisted of either using the treadmill, bike or going for a walk, every morning! As I hadn’t ever been much of a fan of cardio in the past, I knew I had to start off slowly and work my way up to going for a reasonable amount of time and intensity. Before I knew it though, I was actually loving it and looking forward to it each morning, even if it meant getting up at 5.20am, because the results became noticeable almost daily… the abs were coming!

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The following is a guide to how I built up my cardio (as well as the intensity) over the last 6 weeks…

WEEK 1: 20min Cardio / Day

WEEK 2: 25min Cardio / Day

WEEK 3: 30min Cardio / Day

WEEK 4: 35min Cardio / Day

WEEK 5: 40min Cardio / Day

WEEK 6: 40min Cardio / Day

I never did cardio for more then 40 minutes a day, as I felt if I did any more than that, then I’d probably start catabolizing some of the quality muscle gains I had made. Besides that, the results were speaking for themselves anyway, I was losing about 1cm from around my waist each week (first two weeks saw 2cm each week, as the body got a bit of a shock shifting into a whole new gear). This rate of fat loss had always been my goal, as I knew at this rate it was mainly fat and fluids being lost, and little to no muscle at all!

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SUPPleMentAtion AnD nUtritionAs I’ve already mentioned, this part of the 12 Week Challenge for me is by far the most important, and where I believe 70% or more of your results are achieved, the other 30% being training and rest/recovery!

Here’s a look at my diet plans for the 3 different aspects of my 12 weeks…

WEEKS 1-6 MUSCLE BUILDING EATING PLAN6.00am - Wakeup, immediately have a glass of Berocca with a tea-

spoon Crea8 carnage and Glutamine.

6.30am - Oats mixed with SuperWhey protein powder, 50:50 skim

milk and water.

9.30am - Eggs served anyway on sour dough or light rye, or sand-

wich on sour dough and light rye, with salad and quality protein

source (200gms) chicken, tuna, beef etc

12.30pm - Sandwich same as at 9.30am, or again a quality pro-

tein with salad and rice, potato, pasta etc any carbohydrate.

3.30pm - SuperWhey protein shake, with water only

5.00pm - Train using an intra workout BCAA drink

6.00pm - Immediately after training SuperWhey shake,

with water, cre8 carnage and Glutamine

7.00pm - 200 grams of a quality protein, chicken, fish,

beef (no processed meats), salad, or steamed veg, broccoli,

brussel sprouts, and 100-200grams of carbs brown rice,

basmati rice, sweet potato, chips (occasionally)

9.30pm - low fat, low sugar yoghurt, or cottage cheese

100-200 gram serve

10.30pm - Bed time

* important note: water was kept at, at least 3-4 liters / day

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WEEKS 7-12 LEANING UP EATING PLAN

5.20am- Wakeup immediately have a glass of Berocca with a teaspoon of

Crea8 Carnage and Glutamine

5.20am- Cardio session

6.00am- Oats mixed with SuperWhey protein powder, 50:50 skim milk

and water, or 5 egg whites with two whole egg omelete.

9.30am- Eggs served anyway on sour dough or light rye, or sandwich

on sour dough and light rye, with salad and quality protein source

(200gms) chicken, tuna, beef etc

12.30pm- 200grams of quality protein, with salad or steamed veggies

only, or MAX’S Super Shred protein shake with water.

3.30pm- MAX’S Super Shred protein shake with water

5.00pm- Train using an intra workout BCAA drink

6.00pm- Immediately after training, MAX’S SuperWhey Protein

Shake, with water, Crea8 Carnage, and Glutamine.

7.00pm- 200grams of quality protein, with salad or steamed vegetables

only.

9.30pm- ZMA tablets

10.30pm- Bed

* important note: water was kept at, at least 3-4 liters / day

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Coming up to the final week I was really happy with my progress. I had kept a lot of the muscle I’d built during the first 6 weeks, but after 5 weeks of discipline, I was getting pretty lean and muscular. The final week before my photo shoot was an opportunity to really go all out to look as good as possible. The plan I followed is fairly extreme and is used for body build-ing comp preparation, I won’t go into specifics of how much of anything I ate or drank etc, as it would vary from indi-vidual to individual. It would also be at this time that I’d recommend you get guidance from a qualified PT, MAX’S support staff or Sports nutritionists etc to help you with you final week prep. Here’s what I did: DAY 7, 6, 5: No change to Diet, training or Cardio

DAY 4, 3: Completely cut out all

carbohydrates from my diet. As I was now running on whatever carbohy-drates and fat I had left in my system, there was nowhere near enough fuel to feed my muscles during the work-outs nor enough to replenish them and help them recover afterward, so I also stopped training completely too. Not training also ensures the muscles wouldn’t go into catabolic state break-ing down valuable muscle tissue to use as fuel. This is that last thing you want when you’re running on the bare mini-mum calories. You need to do all you can to keep the gains you’ve made.

I also started flexing and posing all the different muscles, for an hour or so each day, just to help bring about a little more separation between muscle groups, and hopefully make the poses on the final shoot look a little more natural too.

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FinAl WeeK

DAY 2: The day before the ‘after photo shoot’, I began water load-ing. This meant I consumed an extra litre or 2 more than I had for the previous 5 days, and did so all before 5pm. This helped somewhat trick the body into thinking it’s getting plenty of fluid so it starts expelling all the water from your system, so I was sure I stayed at home and very close to the bath-room!

Then from 5pm I only sipped on a little water whenever I felt thirsty and would continue to do so through to tomorrow. By doing this it helps give you that hard look, as you’re not retaining any extra fluid, because your body has rid most of it for you.

By this time my muscles were start-ing to look a little flat and stringy, as there were no carbs to fill them out and help them look pumped and full. So as of 5pm I also finally re introduced carbs back into my system every hour for the next 4 or 5 hours. This was great fun and meant pizza, chips and chicken wraps were all back on the menu, for the next few hours at least! This almost immediately started to have noticeable effects. The veins began popping out as they transported all those much needed carbs back into the bellies of the starved and deprived muscles and the sure enough the muscles started look-ing pumped, full and alive again!

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For breakfast I had some rice

crackers and nutella, and sure

enough by the time I went to see

Gary Phillips for my shoot at 10am

that had all helped with extra

vascularity and muscle fullness

too! I couldn’t have been happier,

I knew I’d done everything I could

to be my best today, and now just

relied on Gary’s fantastic photog-

raphy skills to help show off some

of what I had achieved!

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DAY 1: The day had finally arrived and I had made it and completed my goal of being my best and doing all I could to look my best for the final shoot! The carbs had continued do-ing their job overnight, and the muscles looked even better than the night before and even better then I’d ever seen them in my whole life, and I finally had A SIX PACK!

After the final shoot was done I got the photos back from Gary, picked the best after shot I could and sent it through to MAX’S. By this stage I truly felt like a winner, I had the body I had always wanted, had got it in the time I had set out to, and had the time of my life doing it all!

The next phase of the Challenge for me was to try and get as many public votes as I could. This meant bugging friends and family via face book, text messages and emails for the next few weeks. I was overwhelmed by the support of everyone, even friends of

friends and family, complete strangers etc, it seemed my change had hope-fully inspired many others, and they felt I was worthy of their time and votes, so much so, I received the most votes by the final!

It was in the midst of this voting time that I received a somewhat, life chang-ing call from the MAX’S Master Coach Fred Liberatore. I remember hear-ing Fred’s voice for the first time and being overly excited, but anxious as I wasn’t quite sure why he was ringing, but I was ever so hopeful to hear it would be good news… and it was!!

He called to say that I had made it to being one of the top 10 finalists! I remember as soon as I heard this, I had goose bumps all over, and could not wipe the smile off my face! To know that not only was I impressed and overly pleased with my results, the team at Max’s also felt the same, it was recognition I honestly hadn’t even really thought about or ever expected, but when I received it, it was completely flattering because even the experts thought I was worthy!

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the GrAnD FinAle

That call alone triggered a new spark in me to continue to train and eat right from that day forward. Not only did I want to keep in shape for the up-coming final, but it now felt so good and right living the fit, healthy and rewarding lifestyle I’d always dreamt of!

The night before the grand finale, Max’s had organized for the top 10 finalists from all over Australia to get together and meet and greet one another, as well as run through the next days proceedings. We each had a few minutes to talk about our experi-ences and the journey that got us all there. That in it self was amazing to hear, so many diverse and unique and wonderful stories, but all with the

overwhelming desire to want a fit and healthy lifestyle, which EVERYONE in life deserves!

The night of the finale we got to meet some of the MAX’S amazing team and sponsored athletes and partners, all of whom had reached some level of physical greatness in their pasts, and of course present, and I remember so hoping I would soon become one of them too.

It came to the pinnacle of the night, each finalist was presented on stage and before I knew it place getters were being called out one by one, and next thing I knew there were 3 of us left standing on stage.

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The butterflies really kicked in now, I had always hoped I’d receive some recognition for what I’d achieved, but never in my wildest dreams had I ever thought I’d be standing in the top 3! With that Ben Goodwin was handed the 3rd prize, again I was so overwhelmed I just remember turn-ing to Adam Gee shaking his hand wishing him best of luck, next thing I knew the discus gold medalist at the Sydney Commonwealth games Scott Martin was announcing my name as the 2011 MAX’S Muscle Up Chal-lenge WINNER!!!

With that my life was changed for-ever, everything I’d worked so hard for to achieve and succeed in this Challenge, I accomplished. I now have the honour of being a spon-sored MAX’S athlete. Not to men-tion I now get to watch The Final DVD and upcoming MAX’S Muscle TV appearances with yours truly on my new $6,000 home entertainment system. Life couldn’t be better… sure beats watching my brothers posing in their jocks!

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Being part of the MAXS 12 WEEK MUSCLE UP CHALLENGE was without doubt one of the best and most rewarding experiences of my life. I am completely humbled and hon-ored that MAX’S have let me share my story with you. I hope it inspires you to kick start your own Challenge this year, and become the next Challenge winner, or at least better your health and life style… it’s far more rewarding and fun than it is hard work, I assure you!

I would also like to thank my amazing fam-ily and friends who have supported me throughout the 12 weeks and beyond, their selfless encouragement and support has helped me fulfill a life long dream.

In particular a huge thank you to my big bro Steve, a fantastic, mentor, motivator, and coach, always there to lend a hand and sup-

port… despite having his hands full with his commitment to a full time job, 4 amazing kids and his wife, I owe you a protein shake or 50!

Massive thank you to the MAX’S team, Keith Ellis and Paul Kirkham, for not only putting on the Challenge, but also taking me on board as part of the MAX’S team!

Last but not least Fred Liberatore. A fantas-tic down to earth individual, with an amaz-ing source of knowledge and experience, as well as a champion in his own right (current Australian NABBA Masters over 40 Champi-on). Fred was there for all 500 odd original competitors. A massive task to undertake, yet he made himself available 24/7, as well as taking the time to give us all daily sup-port, advice and informative text messages. Without Fred’s help I don’t think anyone would have completed the challenge!

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FinAl note..

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