Seeking diet/nutritional advice

Diddlydoubt

Hey all. Long-time lurker but first time poster on here.
I was hoping some of you may be able to give me some advice. I have read a lot of the threads within this section including most of the stickies and have incorporated a lot of the information into my own lifestyle.
Bit of background information. I am a 25 year old male, 5’9 and 73kg. I haven’t had my bodyfat measured since April at that time it was 11.5%. I would estimate that right now it is around 13-14%. I have a 9-5 desk job so I am sitting down for pretty much all of the day.
I play gaelic football for my club which involves 2 nights training per week plus training or a game on a Sunday. Along with that I usually go to the gym 2 evenings per week and sometimes on a Saturday morning too. Our training is largely skills based with mixed running drills throughout the season to keep up the fitness levels. In terms of gym work, I would do mainly maintenance weights to help with the football such as squats/bench(DB or BB)/pullups/chins/dips/DB shoulder press/Lat pulldowns. I would also do some core exercises on gym days and sometimes on rest days when I am not in the gym or training for football. These would include a mixture of jackknife/stability ball plank/bridge/sideplanks/rollouts/hanging knee raises/reverse crunches etc.
I work away from home so I live in an apartment from Monday to Friday and go home at the weekends. In terms of my daily nutrition and what I eat it would go along the lines of the following from Monday - Friday:
8am – 2 hard boiled eggs,black pepper,parsley(sometimes I would have ½ cup porridge oats mixed with 2 scoop promax diet although recently I have started using 1 scoop Ultimate Nutrition 93 due to higher protein content per serving)
10.30am – 1 apple/portion of mixed nuts/1 HB egg
12.45pm – chicken/turkey/salmon with fresh vegetables/mixed salad and sometimes bowl of soup
3.30pm – 1 apple/1 HB egg
6pm – 1 banana/1 apple with meridian almond or whole earth peanut butter/homemade protein bar(recipe I got from one of the guys on here – delicious by the way)
8pm(after gym days) – 2 scoop promax diet although recently have started using 1 scoop Ultimate Nutrition 93 with ½ cup greek youghart(glensisk), red grapes,raspberries,blueberries and mixed nuts
9pm – salmon/turkey with a mixture of steamed broccoli/cauliflower/green beans/mixed peppers/mushrooms/onion
9.30pm(on football training days) – I go home for training so whatever the mother does cook. Could be chicken curry/spag bol/shephers pie/stew etc. sometimes I would also have a protein shake or a homemade protein bar.
I often find that I overeat on certain foods namely greek yogurt, nuts and peanut butter which I love. I go home every weekend and this is where I tend to fall down. I try to keep my carbohydrate content fairly low during the week but at the weekend I always end up overeating on various things. I usually have a Sunday roast of beef/turkey or steak which is served with veg and mash. My mum loves to bake something nice for dessert on a Sunday such as an apple tart etc but I always find that I overeat at the weekends and feel like crap on a Sunday night. I don’t find it too bad to stick to my diet during the week as I normally don’t have any foods in my kitchen which will tempt me but at the weekend at home there is always various things lying around. I rarely eat chocolate, crisps or buns etc. in terms of alcohol, when I go out I normally drink beer(sometimes Guinness) and might move onto southern comfort/captain morgan/vodka mixed with diet coke. I always end up eating a dirty chipper meal after a night out such as chicken burger and chips which I know I shouldn’t but when the drinks in the wits are out as they say.
I would drink at least 4 – 5 litres of water a day and try to drink 2-3 cups of green tea per day. I would sometimes have a cup of coffee in the mornings.
Overall I am in quite good shape. I can see my abs and I am quite lean overall. The main problem I have and my reason for posting on here is that I am very self-conscious of my chest. My chest appears to be quite saggy and isn’t in proportion to the rest of my body. As a result I rarely wear tight fitting t-shirts and I am very conscious of what type of t-shirt or shirt I wear in terms of how my chest looks in it. This is affecting my self-confidence and maybe I am being paranoid but I would really like to improve this area of my body and firm up my chest and back. I have read through most of the stickies and I understand that it isn’t possible to spot reduce areas of fat on your body and that 90% of the time it comes down to nutrition.
Basically I am looking for some advice on this. I would appreciate if any of you guys could read the above information I have provided and give me some feedback in terms of what I am doing right or wrong and where I could improve etc as I know there are a lot of guys on here with great knowledge on this sort of thing.
Thanks a lot folks.

Diddlydoubt

Anybody got any feedback on this please?

Id really appreciate some information

Thanks

Any chance you could reformat the post? It's an incredibly daunting block of text!

talkinyite

it might seem like a weird suggestion but I'd recommend having a weekly fast day of just bread and water, also add a mix-up of pushups to your routine.

talkinyite

talkinyite wrote: »

it might seem like a weird suggestion but I'd recommend having a weekly fast day of just bread and water, also add a mix-up of pushups to your routine.

what? why?
what?

Diddlydoubt

Reformatted below

Hey all. Long-time lurker but first time poster on here.

I was hoping some of you may be able to give me some advice. I have read a lot of the threads within this section including most of the stickies and have incorporated a lot of the information into my own lifestyle.


Bit of background information. I am a 25 year old male, 5’9 and 73kg. I haven’t had my bodyfat measured since April at that time it was 11.5%. I would estimate that right now it is around 13-14%. I have a 9-5 desk job so I am sitting down for pretty much all of the day.


I play gaelic football for my club which involves 2 nights training per week plus training or a game on a Sunday. Along with that I usually go to the gym 2 evenings per week and sometimes on a Saturday morning too. Our training is largely skills based with mixed running drills throughout the season to keep up the fitness levels.

In terms of gym work, I would do mainly maintenance weights to help with the football such as squats/bench(DB or BB)/pullups/chins/dips/DB shoulder press/Lat pulldowns. I would also do some core exercises on gym days and sometimes on rest days when I am not in the gym or training for football. These would include a mixture of jackknife/stability ball plank/bridge/sideplanks/rollouts/hanging knee raises/reverse crunches etc.


I work away from home so I live in an apartment from Monday to Friday and go home at the weekends.

In terms of my daily nutrition and what I eat it would go along the lines of the following from Monday - Friday:

8am – 2 hard boiled eggs,black pepper,parsley(sometimes I would have ½ cup porridge oats mixed with 2 scoop promax diet although recently I have started using 1 scoop Ultimate Nutrition 93 due to higher protein content per serving)

10.30am – 1 apple/portion of mixed nuts/1 HB egg

12.45pm – chicken/turkey/salmon with fresh vegetables/mixed salad and sometimes bowl of soup

3.30pm – 1 apple/1 HB egg

6pm – 1 banana/1 apple with meridian almond or whole earth peanut butter/homemade protein bar(recipe I got from one of the guys on here – delicious by the way)

8pm(after gym days) – 2 scoop promax diet although recently have started using 1 scoop Ultimate Nutrition 93 with ½ cup greek youghart(glensisk), red grapes,raspberries,blueberries and mixed nuts

9pm – salmon/turkey with a mixture of steamed broccoli/cauliflower/green beans/mixed peppers/mushrooms/onion

9.30pm(on football training days) – I go home for training so whatever the mother does cook. Could be chicken curry/spag bol/shephers pie/stew etc. sometimes I would also have a protein shake or a homemade protein bar.


I often find that I overeat on certain foods namely greek yogurt, nuts and peanut butter which I love. I go home every weekend and this is where I tend to fall down. I try to keep my carbohydrate content fairly low during the week but at the weekend I always end up overeating on various things.

I usually have a Sunday roast of beef/turkey or steak which is served with veg and mash. My mum loves to bake something nice for dessert on a Sunday such as an apple tart etc but I always find that I overeat at the weekends and feel like crap on a Sunday night. I don’t find it too bad to stick to my diet during the week as I normally don’t have any foods in my kitchen which will tempt me but at the weekend at home there is always various things lying around.

I rarely eat chocolate, crisps or buns etc. in terms of alcohol, when I go out I normally drink beer(sometimes Guinness) and might move onto southern comfort/captain morgan/vodka mixed with diet coke. I always end up eating a dirty chipper meal after a night out such as chicken burger and chips which I know I shouldn’t but when the drinks in the wits are out as they say.


I would drink at least 4 – 5 litres of water a day and try to drink 2-3 cups of green tea per day. I would sometimes have a cup of coffee in the mornings.


Overall I am in quite good shape. I can see my abs and I am quite lean overall. The main problem I have and my reason for posting on here is that I am very self-conscious of my chest. My chest appears to be quite saggy and isn’t in proportion to the rest of my body. As a result I rarely wear tight fitting t-shirts and I am very conscious of what type of t-shirt or shirt I wear in terms of how my chest looks in it. This is affecting my self-confidence and maybe I am being paranoid but I would really like to improve this area of my body and firm up my chest and back. I have read through most of the stickies and I understand that it isn’t possible to spot reduce areas of fat on your body and that 90% of the time it comes down to nutrition.


Basically I am looking for some advice on this. I would appreciate if any of you guys could read the above information I have provided and give me some feedback in terms of what I am doing right or wrong and where I could improve etc as I know there are a lot of guys on here with great knowledge on this sort of thing.


Thanks a lot folks.

Diddlydoubt

talkinyite wrote: »

it might seem like a weird suggestion but I'd recommend having a weekly fast day of just bread and water, also add a mix-up of pushups to your routine.

thanks for the reply. what would the reason for this be?

talkinyite

Diddlydoubt wrote: »

thanks for the reply. what would the reason for this be?

Just to give your body a rest day to deal with the high intake diet and weekend drinks. I find a good mix-up of pushups gives a good all around shape. I do 100+ consecutive pushups a day.

Diddlydoubt

what stage of the week would you advise just a bread and water day?

I wouldnt be drinking every weekend during the year but at this time of year I probably would be drinking most weekends as football has finished

Transform

Diddlydoubt wrote: »

Reformatted below

Hey all. Long-time lurker but first time poster on here.

I was hoping some of you may be able to give me some advice. I have read a lot of the threads within this section including most of the stickies and have incorporated a lot of the information into my own lifestyle.


Bit of background information. I am a 25 year old male, 5’9 and 73kg. I haven’t had my bodyfat measured since April at that time it was 11.5%. I would estimate that right now it is around 13-14%. I have a 9-5 desk job so I am sitting down for pretty much all of the day.


I play gaelic football for my club which involves 2 nights training per week plus training or a game on a Sunday. Along with that I usually go to the gym 2 evenings per week and sometimes on a Saturday morning too. Our training is largely skills based with mixed running drills throughout the season to keep up the fitness levels.

In terms of gym work, I would do mainly maintenance weights to help with the football such as squats/bench(DB or BB)/pullups/chins/dips/DB shoulder press/Lat pulldowns. I would also do some core exercises on gym days and sometimes on rest days when I am not in the gym or training for football. These would include a mixture of jackknife/stability ball plank/bridge/sideplanks/rollouts/hanging knee raises/reverse crunches etc.


I work away from home so I live in an apartment from Monday to Friday and go home at the weekends.

In terms of my daily nutrition and what I eat it would go along the lines of the following from Monday - Friday:

8am – 2 hard boiled eggs,black pepper,parsley(sometimes I would have ½ cup porridge oats mixed with 2 scoop promax diet although recently I have started using 1 scoop Ultimate Nutrition 93 due to higher protein content per serving)

10.30am – 1 apple/portion of mixed nuts/1 HB egg

12.45pm – chicken/turkey/salmon with fresh vegetables/mixed salad and sometimes bowl of soup

3.30pm – 1 apple/1 HB egg

6pm – 1 banana/1 apple with meridian almond or whole earth peanut butter/homemade protein bar(recipe I got from one of the guys on here – delicious by the way)

8pm(after gym days) – 2 scoop promax diet although recently have started using 1 scoop Ultimate Nutrition 93 with ½ cup greek youghart(glensisk), red grapes,raspberries,blueberries and mixed nuts

9pm – salmon/turkey with a mixture of steamed broccoli/cauliflower/green beans/mixed peppers/mushrooms/onion

9.30pm(on football training days) – I go home for training so whatever the mother does cook. Could be chicken curry/spag bol/shephers pie/stew etc. sometimes I would also have a protein shake or a homemade protein bar.


I often find that I overeat on certain foods namely greek yogurt, nuts and peanut butter which I love. I go home every weekend and this is where I tend to fall down. I try to keep my carbohydrate content fairly low during the week but at the weekend I always end up overeating on various things.

I usually have a Sunday roast of beef/turkey or steak which is served with veg and mash. My mum loves to bake something nice for dessert on a Sunday such as an apple tart etc but I always find that I overeat at the weekends and feel like crap on a Sunday night. I don’t find it too bad to stick to my diet during the week as I normally don’t have any foods in my kitchen which will tempt me but at the weekend at home there is always various things lying around.

I rarely eat chocolate, crisps or buns etc. in terms of alcohol, when I go out I normally drink beer(sometimes Guinness) and might move onto southern comfort/captain morgan/vodka mixed with diet coke. I always end up eating a dirty chipper meal after a night out such as chicken burger and chips which I know I shouldn’t but when the drinks in the wits are out as they say.


I would drink at least 4 – 5 litres of water a day and try to drink 2-3 cups of green tea per day. I would sometimes have a cup of coffee in the mornings.


Overall I am in quite good shape. I can see my abs and I am quite lean overall. The main problem I have and my reason for posting on here is that I am very self-conscious of my chest. My chest appears to be quite saggy and isn’t in proportion to the rest of my body. As a result I rarely wear tight fitting t-shirts and I am very conscious of what type of t-shirt or shirt I wear in terms of how my chest looks in it. This is affecting my self-confidence and maybe I am being paranoid but I would really like to improve this area of my body and firm up my chest and back. I have read through most of the stickies and I understand that it isn’t possible to spot reduce areas of fat on your body and that 90% of the time it comes down to nutrition.


Basically I am looking for some advice on this. I would appreciate if any of you guys could read the above information I have provided and give me some feedback in terms of what I am doing right or wrong and where I could improve etc as I know there are a lot of guys on here with great knowledge on this sort of thing.


Thanks a lot folks.

waht are you currently bench pressing, squatting, deadlifting, how many full range (start with arms fully extended and bring chin over bar and back to full extension again) chin ups can you do?

Diddlydoubt

Diddlydoubt wrote: »

what stage of the week would you advise just a bread and water day?

I wouldnt be drinking every weekend during the year but at this time of year I probably would be drinking most weekends as football has finished

never. ever. and sometimes never.

Your diet looks quite good, though perhaps you are eating a little too much on the fruit/nuts side of things.

You seem to know what you should/shouldn't eat, and more find difficulty in sticking to that path. If you can cut some more of the carbs out of your weekend, and keep lifting weights, I'm sure you'll get there just fine.

The bread and water thing is beyond bizarre.

Diddlydoubt

Transform wrote: »

waht are you currently bench pressing, squatting, deadlifting, how many full range (start with arms fully extended and bring chin over bar and back to full extension again) chin ups can you do?

Have been experimenting over the last 2 weeks sort of doing a shoulders/biceps/triceps day and a chest/back day. I have been doing a variety of exercises for these muscle groups but i have been focussing on trying to count out the time it takes in doing the exercises. Eg for the bench press, a 4 second count in lowering the bar, pause for 1 second, and lift for 4 seconds. i have been trying to do this for all exercises and have been doing 4 sets of 6 reps for each exercise.

to be honest i am not sure if this is the right way about going about building strength. i have read about people talking about 'tension' when doing the exercises and this was my understanding of what this meant. can anybody clarify this?

in terms of what i am currently benching, i was doing 4 sets of 6 reps with 50kg(including the bar). i could lift heavier weight than 50kg but wouldnt be able to use the 4 second principle for it. squatting i can squat up to 100kg in the past but havent done much squatting lately so currently around 60kg. again for deadlifts, in the past around 100kg - 110kg but not done much of this lately. my max chins would be roughly 10 - 12

Diddlydoubt

Deleted User wrote: »

never. ever. and sometimes never.

Your diet looks quite good, though perhaps you are eating a little too much on the fruit/nuts side of things.

You seem to know what you should/shouldn't eat, and more find difficulty in sticking to that path. If you can cut some more of the carbs out of your weekend, and keep lifting weights, I'm sure you'll get there just fine.

The bread and water thing is beyond bizarre.

yes i am quite good on the diet during the week as i live away from home so i am normally cooking my own meals. it is when i am at home at the weekends that i end up eating loads of stuff that i wouldnt even look at from monday-thursday. i have cut back a fair bit on the nuts and the fruit over the last month or so.

in terms of what sort of weights program to do in order to build strength has anybody got any advice? particularly around firming up the chest area?