John Hansens Training Diary Week of September 7th 2008

by: John Hansen - September 9th, 2008

John Hansen’s Training Diary – Week of September 7th, 2008

Monday, Sept. 8th, 2008
Wow, it’s been awhile since I posted my Training Diary. After my photo shoot on July 3rd, I decided to take it easy on my training and diet for a couple months. For the months of July and August, I cut back on the intensity of my training and didn’t push myself to go heavier and harder like I was in the months leading up to my photo shoot. I think this is healthy for the body to give it a break every so often as opposed to training all out 12 months of the year.

In addition to taking a break with my training, I also took a break with my diet. As anyone who has dieted hard and long can attest, a break is definitely needed from the diet when it is all over. I didn’t go crazy or get too fat but I definitely indulged in the treats that I denied myself over these last 24 weeks.

Ever since the beginning of September, I have been cleaning up my diet a lot and I started gradually training heavier. I am breaking into the heavy training one step at a time and not pushing myself too much. I am still having lots of problems with my lower back so exercises like squats, barbell rows and deadlifts are pretty much out of the picture or they will be performed much, much lighter in order not to seriously injure my back.

The Mr. Olympia weekend is coming up in about 3 weeks so I want to get a little leaner before I head out to Las Vegas for that weekend. My goal during the off-season is to keep my waist between 34”-35”. When I start dieting again next year for my next photo shoot, I should only have to lose a maximum of 1 ½ -2 ½ inches as opposed to the 4 inches I lost this year during my diet.

My waist reached its biggest measurement the day after Labor Day. After a weekend of barbeques and parties, my waist was at 35 ¾” with my weight at 216 pounds. This is in comparison to my photo shoot where my weight was down to 200 pounds and the waist was at 33”. After a week of eating good following the Labor Day weekend, my waist was down to 35” and the weight was at 212 pounds.

Today my waist was up slightly to 35 ¼” and the weight was at 214 pounds. This is ok because of the weekend where I went off my diet for a few meals. I was back at the gym in the morning to train chest, triceps and calves. The workout was sort of slow, just trying to get the strength back up and build some muscle in the off season without getting to fat in the process. Here is how the workout went:

Bench Press 225x12, 255x7, 255x6
Incline DB Press 100x10, 110x7, 110x6
Flyes 75x10, 80x8, 80x7
Tricep Pushdowns 100x12, 110x10, 120x8
Decline Tricep Ext. 100x12, 120x10, 130x6
Dips BWx10, 25x7, 25x7
Seated Calf Raises 100x20, 150x10, 170x8
Standing Calf Raises 320x15, 420x12, 520x10

As for my diet, I ate a good, clean diet today but when I added up everything at the end of the day, I realized that I ate too many carbs and not enough protein. The shortage of protein was because I missed a protein drink during the day and only had 2 instead of my usual 3. I know it’s the off season but I need to bring the carbs down a little in order to get a little leaner. I would like to get my waist down to 34 ½”. That would be lean enough without being too lean. Here is what I ate today:

Meal 1 – 2 eggs, 8 egg whites, 1 cup of oatmeal, ½ cup blueberries
Meal 2 – (Pre-Workout) – 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 scoop creatine
Meal 3 – (During Workout) – 1 scoop Vassive EA8, 1 scoop Vassive NO
Meal 4 – (Post Workout) – 2 scoops 2:1:1 Recovery, 1 serving creatine
Meal 5 – Protein Drink consisting of 1 scoop Pro Complex, 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 T. Udo’s Oil
Meal 6 – 3.10 oz lean ground turkey, 2 slices Ezkiel bread, 2.93 oz broccoli
Meal 7 – 6 oz marinated salmon, 1 cup green beans
Meal 8 – Mini-Bag of Popcorn (100 calories per bag)
Meal 9 – Protein Drink consisting of 1 scoop Pro Complex, 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 T. Udo’s Oil.

Today’s diet added up to 2953 calories with 290 grams of protein, 268 grams of carbs and 83 grams of fats. This breaks down to 39% protein, 36% carbohydrates and 25% fats. More tomorrow!

Tuesday, Sept. 9th, 2008
For some reason, my waist was up a little bit today to 35 ½” and my weight was down to 213 pounds. I was supposed to train legs and abs today but my sleep has been messed up over the weekend so I took a nap instead. I decided to train legs tomorrow and took today off.

Wednesday, Sept. 10th, 2008
My weight today was at 215 pounds and the waist is still at 35 ½”. I did go to the gym today to train legs but it wasn’t much of a workout because my lower back has been bothering me for the last five days. I tried doing deadlifts last Friday when I trained back and my lower back has been strained ever since. Here is what I did for my leg workout today:

Hanging Knee Raises BWx35, BWx25
Crunches – Bench BWx25, BWx20
Leg Curls 110x12, 130x8, 130x8
DB Stiff-leg Deadlifts 100x12, 110x8, 110x8
Leg Extensions (Body Master) 120x20, 160x15, 200x10
Leg Press 360x15, 540x15, 720x12, 720x12

I tried to do Front Squats but even 135 pounds was hurting my back so I didn’t want to push it. I think I’m just going to have to cut out Deadlifts from my workouts because even though I went light, my lower back has been strained ever since I did them.

For my diet today, I kept the carbs pretty moderate for the off season and my protein was almost up to 300 grams. Here is what I ate today:

Meal 1 – 2 eggs, 8 egg whites, 1 cup of oatmeal, ½ cup blueberries
Meal 2 – (Pre-Workout) – 1 scoop of Whey Gold, 1 serving creatine
Meal 3 – (During Workout) – 1 scoop of Vassive EA8, 1 serving of Vassive NO
Meal 4 – (Post Workout) – 2 scoops 2:1:1 Recovery, 1 serving creatine
Meal 5 – 4.23 oz buffalo burger, 2 slices Ezkiel bread, 2.93 oz broccoli
Meal 6 – Protein Drink consisting of 1 scoop Pro Complex, 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 T. Udo’s Oil
Meal 7 – 6 oz marinated salmon, 1 cup green beans, Mini-Bag Popcorn
Meal 8 – Protein drink consisting of 1 scoop Pro Complex, 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 T. Udo’s Oil.

Today’s diet came out to 2896 calories with 294 grams of protein, 241 grams of carbohydrates and 83 grams of fats. This breaks down to 41% protein, 33% carbs and 26% fats.

Thursday, Sept. 11th, 2008
My bodyweight today was down to 213.5 pounds and my waist went down a little to 35 ¼”. I went to the gym today to train delts and calves. This was a better workout than yesterday. I am trying to slowly and gradually build up my strength and the intensity of the workouts each week. Here is how today’s workout went:

Seated Military Press 135x12, 175x9, 185x7
Side Lateral Raises 40x12, 45x10, 50x7, 50x7
Bent-Over Lateral Raises 35x12, 40x10, 40x9
Seated Barbell Shrugs 225x12, 315x10, 365x8
Donkey Calf Raises 190 lbs. plus 45 x 25, 190 lbs plus 145 lbs x 25x 2 sets
Face Down Calf Raises 260x10, 260x10

My diet today was similar to yesterday’s numbers. I tried to eat clean while still indulging just a little bit on carbohydrates. Here is how I ate today:

Meal 1 – Protein Drink consisting of 2 scoops Whey Gold, 1 T. Udo’s Oil
Meal 2 – 2 eggs, 8 egg whites, 3 T. salsa, 1 cup of oatmeal, ½ cup blueberries
Meal 3 – (Pre-Workout) – 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 scoop creatine
Meal 4 – (During Workout) – 1 scoop Vassive EA8, 1 scoop Vassive NO
Meal 5 – (Post Workout) – 2 scoops 2:1:1 Recovery, 1 serving creatine
Meal 6 – 3.21 oz lean ground turkey, 134 grams sweet potato, 3.10 oz broccoli
Meal 7 – Protein Drink consisting of 1 scoop Pro Complex, 1 scoop Whey Gold plus 1 serving instant oatmeal
Meal 8 – 3.81 oz sirloin steak, ½ cup green peas
Meal 9 – Protein Drink consisting of 1 scoop Pro Complex, 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 T. Udo’s Oil

Today’s diet added up to 3079 calories with 336 grams of protein, 251 grams of carbs and 75 grams of fats. This breaks down to 44% protein, 33% carbohydrates and 22% fats.

Friday, Sept. 12th, 2008
My weight and waist continued to drop today as my weight was down to 213 pounds and my waist was down to 35 ¼”. As long as I eat clean and avoid restaurant food or junk food, I can stay pretty lean even while eating more calories and more carbs than I do when eating to get lean.

I went to the gym today to train back and biceps. Just like my leg workouts, I am getting wary of going to the gym to train back because my lower back is always such a problem. I wanted to do Barbell Rows today but I knew that if I did them, my lower back would end up injured and strained and I would probably end up walking out of the gym all frustrated. As an alternative, I tried to do Barbell Rows on the Smith Machine today. I also did Hyper-Extensions in place of Deadlifts because I didn’t want my lower back to be strained all week like it was last week from doing Deadlifts.

Close-Grip Pulldowns 130x15, 180x10
Barbell Rows – Smith Machine 135x12, 185x12, 225x10, 245x8, 245x8
Seated Cable Rows 250x8, 250x7, 250x6
Behind Neck Pulldowns 120x12, 150x10, 160x8
Hyper-Extensions (Bench) BWx15, BWx15, BWx15
Incline Curls 45x10, 50x7, 50x6
Barbell Curls 95x8, 95x8
Hammer Curls 45x8, 45x8

I did the Hyper-extensions on a flat bench and had my training partner hold my legs. This is the old school way of doing Hyper-Extensions instead of the doing them on the angled hyper-extension machine that is in all the gyms today. The Barbell Rows were ok but the real barbell version is much better. I have to do what I have to do because of the lower back however.

My diet was good again today. I kept the calories at almost 3300 and my protein was at close to 350 with the carbs at about 275. Here is what I ate today:

Meal 1 – Protein Drink consisting of 2 scoops of Whey Gold, 1 T. Udo’s Oil
Meal 2 – 2 eggs, 8 egg whites, 3 T. salsa, 1 cup oatmeal, ½ cup blueberries
Meal 3 – (Pre-Workout) – 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 serving creatine
Meal 4 – (During Workout) – 1 serving Vassive EA8, 1 serving Vassive NO
Meal 5 – (Post Workout) – 2 scoops 2:1:1 Recovery, 1 serving creatine
Meal 6 – 4.3 oz buffalo burger, 2 slices Ezkiel bread
Meal 7 – Protein Drink consisting of 1 scoop Pro Complex, 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 serving instant oatmeal
Meal 8 – 6 oz marinated salmon, 1 cup of green beans, Mini-Bag Popcorn
Meal 9 – Protein Drink consisting of 1 scoop Pro Complex, 1 scoop Whey Gold, 1 T. Udo’s Oil

Today’s diet came out to 3284 calories with 347 grams of protein, 274 grams of carbohydrates and 89 grams of fats. This breaks down to 42% protein, 33% carbs and 24% fats.

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