Bodybuilding Bikini Competition Phase 1- 20 Weeks Out

Okay, this post is way past due and I’ve been meaning to keep you posted for actually the past five months of my prep, however, as I will explain to you competition prep is very labor intensive, EXPENSIVE, and time consuming so adding that into my already crazy life didn’t give me anymore free time.

Here goes nothing.

I decided I wanted to do a competition in January (New Years Resolutionish) and given that I’m already a trainer and was in somewhat decent shape, I knew it wouldn’t take me long to get competition ready. The show I chose is the Oregon Ironman which is May 17th (yes one week out!) so that gave me 20 weeks to prepare. Because I’m a trainer I also decided to do the show without a coach, but if you know little about fitness or nutrition I would recommend against this. I somehow convinced my friend to do the competition with me which has been a tremendous help, I really can’t imagine doing it alone. So the first piece of advice I can give you if you are going solo is to find someone who will be just as committed as you are (the hard part) to join you. Having someone to train, vent, and practice posing with is invaluable, I don’t know how I would have done it without her! <3

I will now walk you through the past 20 weeks of my prep.

20 WEEKS OUT: BULKING

When starting this far out from a show, you get to start with the fun of bulking. At this point you should be lifting heavy, heavy, heavy and eating, eating, eating. I can’t stress the eating enough, too many women get caught up on calories without realizing how much they actually burn when training hard. Without food, you will NOT gain muscle. Don’t get me wrong, this doesn’t mean you can eat cake all day and expect results, you need to keep your meals balanced, but now is the time that you will be creating the oh-so-valuable curves needed for a bikini competition (even if its a little hidden at the moment). That being said, you will not gain muscle if you don’t lift heavy. It will not make you bulky and it will certainly not make you look like a man, it will make you look like a badass chica. So do yourself a favor and get some weight on that bar and keep your reps low!

Meal prep will be your best friend throughout this entire process, the earlier you start the easier it will be when crunch time comes. Start on Sunday and make 15 meals for the week, breakfast, lunch and dinner, and this will allow you to maintain while finding healthy snack options for in between. I began using MyFitnessPal later on in my prep which is an amazing app that allows you to calculate the amount of calories, as well as the breakdown of nutrients, water intake and even exercise. If you are anywhere in the bikini prep process I highly recommend you download it now that way you can be sure your body is getting what it needs.

As far as workouts go, I strength trained 5-6 days a week as well as incorporated some CrossFit workouts into the mix sometimes doing AM & PM workouts. My reps were low (3-8) and weights heavy. I strength trained lower body Mon and Wed, upper body on Tues and Thurs then Friday was usually a heavy leg lift or Olympic lift then a full body interval workout with plyometric exercises (box jumps, lunge jumps, etc). Saturday was usually either a hike or something else fun because you've gotta keep it enjoyable:)

Here is a meal plan sample just from one of the days in this phase...like I said I wasn't tracking too closely here, just ate when I was hungry.

BREAKFAST: ROASTED POTATOES + 2 FRIED EGGS + 2 PCS BACON + 1 PC TOAST

SNACK: FRUIT SMOOTHIE W/ PROTEIN

LUNCH: SPAGHETTI SQUASH W/ GROUND BEEF MARINARA

SNACK: APPLE + ALMOND BUTTER

DINNER: PORK ROAST W/ ROASTED VEGGIES

So as you can see lots o' protein, medium carbs, high fat. Love this diet!

This picture was my very first one. Here are my measurements:

HEIGHT: 5'8"

WEIGHT: 146lb

WAIST: 28.5"

HIPS: 41"

CHEST: 35.5"

BODY FAT: 19-21%

#fitness #health #lift #photo #strengthbikiniprep #20weeksout #gym #mealplan #diet #bulking