RAW UNITY 5- Post-Weighin, Meet Day, and the Week After Diet

Apparently, my incredibly detailed run-down of my meet prep and meet were insufficient.  As such, I'll expand upon them further.  To be covered: my meet day diet, post-meet diet, the reasoning behind my use of reverse grip bench press, and why I eschew the use of a belt.

Sodium, carb, and glycerine loading leaves me looking like I haven't slept in 6 weeks, apparently, but big as shit- I weighed in at ~180 and weighed 198 in this pic.

Diet
I began planning my post-weighin meal at about 1PM the day before my meet.  I arrived at the weigh-in with 3 one-liter Powerade Zeros and a G2, all of which had about 3 oz of glycerine in them.  Within minutes of weighing in, I'd drunk 2 of those, then sat down to eat a 6oz burger and drink a Diet Coke.  In the next 3 hours, I alternately napped and watched the girls and lightweights compete, and in process consumed half a box of Cinnamon Life and 4 packages of Trio-Plex cookies.  Somewhere in there I drank the G2 and another liter of water.  I then went to Sonic and got a large popcorn chicken and tater tots with a humongous Diet Coke, and shortly thereafter to Landry's for another burger, since I despise seafood.  Interesting to note is the fact that I'd drunk well over a gallon of water by the time I got to dinner, but didn't actually piss until my fourth or fifth Diet Coke at dinner.  Before going to bed, I ate half a large thin crust pizza topped with pepperoni and sausage and drank the last Powerade Zero.

Unfortunately, I had a fat, congenial, mustachioed Mexican Dominos delivery person rather than this broad.

Upon waking, I ate the other half of the pizza, had a Monster Milk shake, and went downstairs.  During the meet I ate a few Titan protein cookies and a roast beef sandwich and fries.  I was attempting to get as much in the way of calories, carbs, and sodium into my system, all while keeping my protein higher than a fratboy at a Dave Matthews concert prior to his obligatory festival of date rape and douchebaggery.

Even made some bulgogi maki for a marathon of Call of Duty (since I don't take pics of my food I just stole that from Flickr).

Following the week of the meet, I took a sort of "regain my sanity week".  I only lifted three times, ate whatever I wanted each day, and relaxed a lot.  The only thing I ensured during the week, diet-wise, was that my protein stayed extremely high to ensure full recovery.  Before you ask, that means above 300g a day, and within shouting distance of 400g.  I've been dieting hard and training between 5 and 12 times per week nonstop since last May, so I felt it was time for a bit of a vacation.  This week, I'm probably as lean as I was, having awesome dreams at night and sleeping like I got snuck with a sack of wet pennies.  Additionally, my strength is good and I'm acting like a fucking animal in the gym again instead of doing the clock-watching I had been for the last couple of weeks prior to the meet.

The Reverse Grip
Initially, I started doing reverse grip bench presses because my left shoulder was bothering me.  As it turned out, there was no real injury there- I simply had the most incredible knotting radiating from my armpit to my wrist that anyone's seen since the Incans tried to calculate the circumference of the Earth (google quipu if you aren't nerdy enough to get the reference).  In any event, I found I progressed rapidly in the reverse grip and actually doubled 375 once a couple of weeks out from the meet, which I'd never come close to doing with regular grip.  Additionally, I'm a bigger proponent of making a spectacle of myself than Caligula, so going reverse just kicks that up another couple of notches.  Fuck, if fatassed Anthony Clark could succeed with it, I sure as fuck can.

The Belt Issue
A couple of years ago I had my belt stolen out of Mark Bartley's gym, SC Barbell.  I rarely used the fucking thing for anything other than heavy partials, and quickly came to realize I didn't need a belt for them, either- I've gone over 1200 lbs for back squat lockouts without a belt, so I'm relatively confident that the only thing that could injure my lower back or abs is a low-yield tactical nuke.  Given that one rarely encounters those in  powerlifting meets, I felt that the use of one would be superfluous.  Additionally, I found in a meet at SC Barbell (the first time I deadlifted over 600 in a competition or without straps) that I actually deadlifted less with a belt than without one.  As such, fuck belts.

This guy.

One dude, Jason Manenkoff, with whom I chatted during the meet actually made a fairly witty comment with which I didn't totally agree, but thought was hilarious- he compared having my belt stolen to getting his track cleats stolen.  To him, just saying "fuck it, I don't need it" was akin to him saying "fuck it, I'll just fucking run barefoot" at the NCAAs.  In that scenario, though, I'm pretty much akin to a Kalenjin runner competing barefoot in the Olympics- they don't fucking need shoes.

There you have it.  Simple enough, right?  Eat a shitload, and fuck everybody.