Ok so where do I start?...
Quick background I'm 44yrs old Male been competing in powerlifting and all round weightlifting for 10yrs before that I did your normal gym workout, and played rugby as a kid. And I'm a qualified strength coach, para powerlifting and weightlifting. So I keep my self active.
But the last 10yrs I didn't really keep on top of my weight I just thought as long as I was getting stronger thats all that mattered. But last year I went to a all time high of a bodyweight of 105kg with a waist of 45" (I'm only 5ft5) even my strength was at its highest. But I thought as I'm getting older I need to start thinking about my health. And that's when I crossed paths with Richard Smith founder of Keto-Pro.. we chatted about what he does, what keto is, etc.. and just like any other athlete I was like fancy sponsoring me? Hint! Hint!.. to which he replied well I am looking for people in the strength sport to show keto can build strength and muscle, and its not just for endurance athletes. So I was like yeah OK I'll be a ginnea pig. I got a few big comps coming up, it be a good platform to show off specially if I can loose the weight and keep or improve strength. So mid December 2021 I started changing my diet cutting out as much carbs as possible even during Xmas I tried to stay as low as I could. But didn't really go full on till January but never the less I still went down to 102kg so it was a start. By end of January I was full on keto or at least the best I could be eating only meat(any meat) cheese and eggs. By my next comp a/bpu pembrokeshire in February I was weighing in at 87kg energy levels was good but with the big weight loss small amount of my strength had dropped. So at this point I was thinking is it worth sticking to. Luckily I still made the British qualifying total. So thought I'll give it a few months and see if things change. Well two weeks after that comp I only gone and put myself in a local first timers strongman comp. Wasn't expecting much but I do love a strongman comp specially if the lifts are not loading or lifting over anything over 5ft 😂. So for this comp I didn't have to worry about my bodyweight so throwing caution to the wind I decided to spend a few days eating as much fat as I could with no carbs then last 48hrs load up on carbs with no fats to see what would happen. Well not much to be honest I only added 3kg bodyweight but energy levels was high I used Keto-Pro electrolytes, preworkout and bhb (just added them all in a big bottle and drunk during the comp) well what I found was my recovery rate was fast between rounds. Strength not much difference but recovery was good and as a bonus I didn't feel so badly beat up the following day so even though I came last overall but not last in every event thank god. I still thought maybe I just need to give this time. Give my body a chance to adapt.
So a few months on I'm now down to 82kg lightest I have been in over 10+ years and definitely lightest competing. So I'm now two weight classes down and strength is slowly coming back my bench press has come back quickest BW 97kg bench was 135kg. BW 82kg 125kg squats 175kg now 165kg and deadlift 210kg now 190kg so not that far behind. On June 5th I will find out for definite where I am strength wise when I compete at the a/bpu british powerlifting comp in Manchester.
There is a theory I have which I want to try which I have noticed looking back at my comps over the last 10yrs and the times I did good and what I did differently. Which is kinda keto but not keto and I think if I knew keto back then I think I would have done better. Its similar to what I did for the strongman but involved fasting kinda like I say I didn't know what I was doing back then but looking back it is similar but could have done better if I knew what I was doing. So I'm not going to say what that is and what I did till after the brits. As I have a theory on how the energy system works/plays as a strength/power athlete. I'm no nutritionist this is just how I see it in simple terms. But does involve carbs and keto working together.
Comments