Articles | Page 18 of 21

From Fluffy to Ripped, Sans the Obsession: Chris Brown’s Transformation

Back in February, I recall getting an email from a guy by the name of Chris Brown who was interested in some fitness consulting. He found my work through my friend Google, and claimed to have devoured many of my articles since his discovery.

“Ever since I read your No-BS Approach to Looking Great Naked, I’ve been hooked”

is what he said in the opening email.

He went on to explain his experience in athletics growing up, which ultimately led to playing some professional baseball for a short time, before going back to graduate school to further his studies at Salve Regina University.

I knew from the beginning that I’d be able to work with Chris due to his experience in athletics, but his passionate desire to learn and grow he expressed in our email exchange. I’ll never forget the last line of his first email that read “my work ethic is ridiculous and I love the gym, so I’m ready for the challenge.”

At first, I thought “okay, we’ll see how determined he is” and we continued our conversation which resulted in him starting the official JCDFItness training and diet protocol on Monday, March 7.

I was extremely pleased with his familiarity of the major compound lifts and willingness to let go of the reigns.

While I won’t go into his exact training protocol, I want to highlight a bit of what we did to get the results presented below. To start off, Chris had been doing the popular Stronglifts 5×5 program. I was already a fan of this guy – no bro-training to speak of.

Chris’ starting weight was 205lbs and ending weight was 186lbs. He is right at 6 foot tall. The time frame in between photos is about 16 weeks. So on average, he dropped just over 1lb per week. I think you’ll agree the difference in appearance is fairly drastic. He transformed from a soft look into a very lean, athletic appearance.

My Life in Training – A Reader’s Story

by JC Deen

As many of you may or may not know, Facebook (add me!) is taking over the world. While it’s easy to get lost in the sea of apps, games and other ridiculous stuff on the site, I’m incredibly happy that I’ve decided to be more active on there as of late.

It’s mainly because I’ve gotten the chance to develop some pretty cool relationships with my readers and other fitness enthusiasts – more so than I have been through just my writing and email.

I’ve been incredibly busy the last few weeks with work, finishing up my academic semester at MTSU (I’m actually typing this from the library right now), planning for the summer travels and other fun stuff I have planned for the site.

So today’s guest article is by a young guy I’ve been getting to know as a result of being more active on Facebook and I couldn’t be happier to publish this post on his behalf. I see a lot of myself in Jordan – mainly his drive and open-mindedness at such a young age, as well as his minor obsession with psychology and personal development.

So, without further rambling, here are some words of wisdom from the up and coming Jordan Syatt who now writes a ton of awesome articles at SyattFitness.com.

Clean Eating is a Scam and Why You Should Abandon It

by JC Deen

Please watch this video as it’s the follow-up to all three of my clean-eating articles:

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Photo Credit: epSos.de

Clean eating – it’s a term we’ve all used and have surely heard a million times. We’ve stumbled upon it in the magazines, seen it in our favorite diet books and have probably even heard it on TV. Heck there’s even a magazine titled Clean Eating.

Now I have no problem with the magazine – the recipes are great(love them, by the way) and the pictures are something I enjoy looking at. I do, however, have a problem with the negative connotation it presents to the minds of many health and fitness enthusiasts and even some professionals unwilling to consider other ideas.

The first thing I want to ask is this: what exactly does clean eating mean?

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Hypertrophy Training: Rules to Live by When Muscle Hypertrophy is Your Goal

by JC Deen

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Hypertrophy training – in an untamed pursuit to build a better body, we’re rarely concerned about the long-term or how we plan to get from point A to point B; we simply want to experience a transformation. We want maximal muscle growth in minimal time and we’ll do anything to appear how we believe we’re supposed to when gazing upon the reflection staring back at us.

The pursuit may seem vain to many, but to those who can relate – it goes much deeper. The maximal muscle hypertrophy we desire is often a result of our competitive drive to reach new heights or the unconscious self-doubt (gasp) we impose upon ourselves.

Sure, for some it’s pure vanity and that’s fine too; there’s nothing wrong with a little textbook narcissism now and again. However, to understand something fully, we sometimes must start at the end result and work backward. Therefore, to better understand hypertrophy training, in this case, from an anecdotal standpoint, we’re going to look at a few trainees who’ve made major strides despite slightly different training philosophies and approaches.

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