- [Broadcaster] London Real,
sponsored by Bulletproof Coffee!
- I mean if you've got the 27 guys on stage,
I mean will the best guy ultimately win?
Or place in the top three?
- Well, you know, who is the best guy?
- Yeah, eh-- - It's a matter of opinion
right because it's subjective
you have seven people judging there,
and what they'll do is they'll have seven scores
and they'll eliminate the highest and the lowest
so you end up with five scores from five people.
And we have a criteria, you know,
for the judging process that you know it's body building
so you're looking for, obviously looking for muscle mass
but the muscle mass should be proportionate
so it should be proportionately distributed
and of course contest condition in body building means
very low body fat, extremely low body fat.
- What kind of percentages are we talking?
- You know I'm not sure that there's really an accurate way
to measure body fat, I think under water weighing
is probably the most accurate but I never had access to that
we used to use skin fold calibres.
I found that once you get below a certain level,
they don't read that well anyway
and ultimately it's like you've got judges and a crowd
sitting there and looking at you on stage
and they don't know what you're body fat is,
they can't measure it.
But I would guess that my body fat was somewhere around
getting down to three percent.
It was super low. - Jesus
- I remember a couple of contests when I was a professional
at first I was walking around back stage and you know
back stage is a wooden floor like this, right?
And literally my feet were really hurtin' me
and I was limpin' and people are like you okay dude?
You crampin' up or something?
You dehydrated?
I'm like no, my fuckin' feet are killin' me.
And I coupldn't understand why my feet were really
hurtin' me until I looked in an anatomy book
and I saw there's a fat bad under the heel
and under the ball of your feet there's a fat,
a pad there, a cushioning
and I guess my body fat was that low that this pad of fat
on my feet was actually gettin' depleted.
- How insane is that, dude?
- So dangerously low levels, aren't there?
- Yeah, I mean it's a temporary thing though
you're not tryin' to maintain that for any period of time
that definitely wouldn't be healthy,
you're peaking for a contest,
probably take 12 or 14 weeks of just specific dieting
and training to get your body fat down to that level
and trust me it doesn't stay that low for long.
You know, I mean a week after the contest most guys
have gone up 10, 15 pounds, easily.
- What was the one meal that you looked forward to the most
or what was the one that you always wanted to eat
the most at the end of the contest.
- It was nothing exotic,
it was usually a really good steak.
Which you know, most all the contests are in the states
so you can always find a good steak there, right?
You know, here you can't, but--
- True - In the states you can.
Good, basic steak and fries and a good ice cream
and stuff like that, you know.
But, that's what I had but you know your mind plays tricks
with you, I used to fantasise over all kind of strange food
that I never really would eat and even when I'd finish
my diet I didn't, I don't want it now, you know?
I guess because your dietary fat intake and so on is so low
that you start craving spicy, fatty foods and stuff.
And I used to have dreams, I remember one day wakin' up
and just in a panic in the middle of the night
'cause I had a dream that I went downstairs
and ate a load of sausages.
I thought no I didn't really, did I?
(men laughing)
It was impossible, I didn't have sausages in the house
but you know, that's the kind of tricks your mind plays
on you and night time is very tough when you're dieting
for a bodybuilding contest because it's hard to sleep
properly because basically you go to sleep,
your body wakes--
You know if your blood sugar drops below a certain level,
it's like an alarm system.
Gotta wake up, you gotta eat!
So, the sleep is very you know,
it's kind of broken sleep
because you get that throughout the night.
- What's your diet like when you're cutting?
Like those last four weeks?
- Well keep in mind that when I was competing I was around
260, 270 pounds,
so if I looked at my diet
that I was eating for a contest,
it was probably more calories than I would eat
on a daily basis now.
But, we're talkin' about 4,000 calories
but in the off season I would be like six, 7,000 calories,
so it's quite a drop gradually from that level.
And of course, you know you carry massive amounts
of muscle tissue and you're workin' out and everything
so there's a lot of demand on your body.
But it's over a period of time,
I generally try to lose two or three pounds a week
over about 12 weeks or something like that, you know?
Typical diet was mainly lean proteins like egg whites,
chicken breast, protein shakes, maybe a lean beef,
those were the protein sources.
And then the fats were fairly low.
Some carbohydrates from oatmeal, brown rice
and a lot of vegetables obviously, broccoli, spinach,
things like that, little bit of fruit but not too much.
- [Broadcaster] London Real,
sponsored by Bulletproof Coffee.