Layne Norton's "Simply Shredded" Plan

[Drew]

for the past 2 months, I've been following Layne Norton's power/hypertrophy workout plan from simply shredded

http://www.simplyshredded.com/mega-feature-layne-norton-training-series-full-powerhypertrophy-routine-updated-2011.html

I had hit numerous plateaus on a lot of the different workouts and wasn't really losing weight or seeing much progress in the mirror so at the recommendation of a couple of friends, I started on the program back mid April and back then I would have to drop weight off most of the exercises each set.

After 2 months, I'm lifting/pulling an average of 10 to 20 lbs more weight than I originally started on and not dropping any weight off more or less all of the exercises.

I've noticed not only an increase in strength but an increase in energy as well. the different sets aren't as fatiguing and more than anything, the strength and energy in my legs has gone through the roof.

I've tweaked the lower body hypertrophy workout day to do not only everything on his list but also kettle bell swings, 75 lb kettlebell sumo squats and (worst of the worst) 20 rep sets of lunges with a 45 lb kettle bell in each hand.

I slowly added one set of each of those to the lower body hypertrophy days and noticed that I could slowly but surely do more and more each week. I doubt that I could have walked in the gym back in april and without doing anything, just grabbed a pair of 45lb db's and done 20 lunges... I would have collapsed.


the bad news though is that despite all the hard work and seeing big gains on the spreadsheet that has every day's workout and how much I've lifted for each set, despite all that, I still see no difference in the mirror or on the scale :confused:

I'm in there for an hour 4 nights a week (doing 1000~1500 meter row after each workout) and virtually nothing has changed when I look in the mirror.


any ideas? only thing I can think of is to get up in the mornings and start jogging or something. I absolutely hate running and I would have to wake up at 5AM to get up, run and have time to get ready for work on time.

[Grider]

You are cursed with being a skinny white guy. Cursed I tell you.... :p

Have you actually taken your measurements from your body to see if there are any real gains or even losses in your shape?

[Veedubtrek]

What's your diet like? Are you getting enough protein?

[Obike]

What's your diet like? Are you getting enough protein?

What he said, and your rough caloric intake.

[Drew]

coffee in the AM with a scoop of monster milk and about a cup of 0% milk

9:00 AM - 4 scrambled eggs, a pack of plain grits and 3 strips of turkey bacon

10:30 AM - Cup of 0% plain Chiobani greek yogurt, handfull of almonds and about a cup and a half of raw broccoli and plain hummus.

Noon - 3 grilled chicken thighs or a grilled turkey loin chunk (usually about the size of a chicken breast) or a beef tenderloin chunk (usually a little smaller than a chicken breast)

2pm - apple with smuckers natural peanut butter


Pre swole drink - NOXplode, BCAA, Creatine

Gym @ 5pm

Post swole drink - ice, water, 5~6 frozen strawberries, a frozen banana, a cup of the 0% chiobani yogurt and another scoop of the protein powder

Supper 7~ish - Grilled salmon fillet w/frozen asparagus microwaved in the steam bag then some spray butter and seasoned salt.


That's more or less it. I snack on sunflower seeds if I'm hungry between meals and on friday nights, eat a shrimp/chicken burrito at salsaritas as my cheat meal and maybe one night a week, get sushi.

[EM2guy]

How much protein is in your protien powder?... If its 20-30g I think you would probably benifit from doubling up post workout and maybe adding a small cassien shake right before bed. Also, more fats in your diet maybe try adding a tbs of macadamia oil to your shakes (you cant tell the oils in if you use a blender and it tastes great) Your diet break down seems great, it just looks like you may need a bit more fat and protein if you want to add muscle.

[Swine]

Want results? Work harder, eat less in each sitting. If your body consumes more energy then its taking in it has to pull it from fat. Continue down this path until you see results that you like.

That will be $150.

[TheWill]

I agree with swine, i have been seeing great results from turning it up in the gym and I am just following the basic bodybuilding principles/ routine;

Monday-chest/tri
Tuesday-Legs
Wed - Rest
Thurs-Back/Bi
Friday - Rest
Sunday - SHoulders/Abs

I try to do cardio twice a day every day as I am cutting but its tough. Also you probably need moar protein. I do 2-3 shakes a day. 1 as soon as I wake up (whey isolate) 1 within 5 minutes of wrapping up workout/cardio (whey isolate) 1 45 minutes before bed (casein protein). I have been shedding bodyfat and feel like i am actually getting stronger over the past 4 weeks.


Cliffs: Without the right training and diet its all worthless.

[Drew]

How much protein is in your protien powder?... If its 20-30g I think you would probably benifit from doubling up post workout and maybe adding a small cassien shake right before bed. Also, more fats in your diet maybe try adding a tbs of macadamia oil to your shakes (you cant tell the oils in if you use a blender and it tastes great) Your diet break down seems great, it just looks like you may need a bit more fat and protein if you want to add muscle.


I'm not looking to bulk (right now at least) I'm 5'10" and 180lbs and more than anything am interested in cutting but I know that cutting and losing mass are hard to separate from each other which is why I'm on layne norton's plan as it's supposed to help retain mass.

I'll try adding another scoop of powder though. I think each scoop is 50g.

[TheWill]

50g is enough, you can only absorb something like 30-35g per every 3 hours. Kris Gethin has an awesome plan on bodybuilding.com that is 12 weeks long and seems to have really changed some lives. And its fo free

[Drew]

link plox?

[EM2guy]

Leaning out is a horse of a different color. I saw the most results by supersetting my entire workout no rest and mix cardio in during the workout 6 days a week. Also very importent is water inrtake. They say shoot for a gallon minimum a day. I however just got a nagelene bottle and constantly drank everytime I thought about it. At one point I tallied up one day to almost 2 gallons... peed like a mofo. Doing this for about a month got me a decent six pack; keeping it up however was nearly unimaginable. :(

BTW this reminds me anyone who is working out hard and wants to really push themselves and have fun should join me in Dec. for the tough mudder run in Tampa.

[Drew]

yeah I drink about a quart of water a day at work and another 24+ oz at the gym.

[TheWill]

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/kris-gethin-12-week-daily-trainer-week-1.html
This is the program, some of his exercises are a little... well yeah but i know how to sub them out and do somethign that doesnt make me look like a crazy person. I drink about 3 liters of water a day and it really helps, any more than that and I feel like i am going to float away. Also with Kris if you like his fan page on FB you can ask him questions and he will reply personally to them to help you with the transformation. I did it for 6 weeks before i had a non workout related injury and I just couldnt get back into it.

[Drew]

I'm not sure how much it has to do with it and I know I'm probably breaking a lifting rule here but I train all 5 days of the week and take sat/sun off for recovery.

I really don't hurt that much during the week but man oh man my friday workouts are BRUTAL!

I seriously think that if he had put lower body anything on friday I would have re-arranged them so it wasn't.. Monday and wed legs is SO much easier to manage.

Anyways, I'm going to go through the end of july on Norton's program and then start Kris' plan and compare but WTF at legs being done back to back nights??

[TheWill]

hahaa, yeah that plan is TOUGH, i was hating getting up early on saturday just to go lift. His plan is a good guide to keep mass but also just cut down fat and weight. I really enjoyed it but it was tough. I am kind of doing my own thing right now based off of his program, same diet and cardio just different lifting. The FST 7 program that he uses on week 2 or 3 is AWESOME it has really help to strengthen my back and my arms.

[Drew]

LOLOLOL at dude's shopping list!!!!!!!!!

That's like $500 worth of groceries

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v212/fastredponycar/forums/dontcare.jpg

[Veedubtrek]

I'm gonna recommend the book pure physique

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0972410279/ref=redir_mdp_mobile/182-8295192-2173301

I'm not gonna say much about it but it may change the way you think about working out... such as how lifting 5 days a week can end up being counter productive unless you actually are a bodybuilder.

[1.8t]

I started leaning out 4 weeks ago and am already down 15lbs. It has been easy for now as losing weight quickly is easy when your fat. Should be sub 220 today and will be sub 210 in a couple more weeks. When I am done with this cut I will have shed more than 35lbs in about 10 weeks which is slow considering my college standard of 25lbs in 6 weeks, but I am older now and can't be as strict as I was then. Always fun to compare pre cut pictures to post cut pictures lol.

[ActiveAero]

I started leaning out 4 weeks ago and am already down 15lbs. It has been easy for now as losing weight quickly is easy when your fat. Should be sub 220 today and will be sub 210 in a couple more weeks. When I am done with this cut I will have shed more than 35lbs in about 10 weeks which is slow considering my college standard of 25lbs in 6 weeks, but I am older now and can't be as strict as I was then. Always fun to compare pre cut pictures to post cut pictures lol.

Hey man what is your typical daily calorie intake when you cut like this?

[1.8t]

1500~2000/day with a jump to 2500~3000 every 4th day. Weekends I don't count, but probably 2000~2500/day. Weighed in at 217 yesterday and while visual progress continues, my weight is "sticking" at the moment. I seem to do this around 215lbs(not so bad) and again around 205lbs(stick pretty hard here). Once I am over the hump, weight loss resumes at a decent pace again, but my body has done this everytime I have done a large cut.

[ActiveAero]

1500~2000/day with a jump to 2500~3000 every 4th day. Weekends I don't count, but probably 2000~2500/day. Weighed in at 217 yesterday and while visual progress continues, my weight is "sticking" at the moment. I seem to do this around 215lbs(not so bad) and again around 205lbs(stick pretty hard here). Once I am over the hump, weight loss resumes at a decent pace again, but my body has done this everytime I have done a large cut.

Oh ok, good to know. Right before I moved to Tokyo I was doing Insanity and I kept around the 1700 calorie mark. In the first 3 weeks I dropped 8lbs but the next couple of weeks after that I seemed to be at that "stuck" phase. I always wondered if I was depriving myself a little too much and in fact triggering my body to slow down my metabolism as I was keeping to the 1700 calories every single day. Is that why you kind of cycle with a 2500-3000 calorie day thrown in there every 4th day?

I'm the fattest I've ever been right now, maybe not in terms of actual body weight, but in fat percentage and I'm in the "planning" stages of taking care of that.

The funny thing in Japan is that compared to the normal diet of an average American the average Japanese diet is a whole lot healthier (aka American fast food vs Japanese fast food equivalent, etc) which is why a lot of people lose weight when they move to Japan. However, I ate pretty damn healthy back in the states, home cooking easily 80% of my own meals in a given week, so I came over here thinking that the better Japanese diet would allow me to slack off. Um yeah....no lol. I'm gone 10 months without even a microwave if that tells you how convenient it is to eat out here.

That said my first purchase will be a nice rice cooker like I had back in the states. Top 5 most useful purchases I've made in probably the past 5 years. If you are a single guy it is a god like device. You dump water and rice into the cooker and that's that. Perfect rice every single time....and it keeps it heated and perfectly moist that way for 12hrs or so. Mine also had a delay start timer. With this after I finished up dinner in the evening I would just dump another couple of cups of rice in and set it to have it ready for breakfast. With 1 minute of work you can basically have the majority of your cooking done for the entire day as you can just make a huge ass pot of rice that you can keep coming back to.

Yes that was a random rice cooker rant. Deal with it. :cool:

[Drew]

yeah I want a nice rice cooker myself. I make my own sushi about once every other month but the sushi rice takes SOOOO long to prepare correctly :/

[1.8t]

Is that why you kind of cycle with a 2500-3000 calorie day thrown in there every 4th day?



Correct.

Remember though, even if a scale doesn't show a net loss, it doesn't mean you aren't burning fat. My clothes continue to fit slightly more loose every day even when my weight is at the stick point. I honestly can't entirely explain it, but this phenomenon has happened for going on 10 full cuts now so I have just accepted it and stuck with my routine and it always comes around after a week or so(depending on which stick point I am at). The funny thing is once I am "over the hump" so to speak, the loss picks up with serious pace and I have to actually bump my calories to keep from losing weight every day, even when I have eaten to my perceived maintenance.

[Drew]

I've got 1 week left of this plan and I haven't lost a single pound but I'm moving SO much more weight in virtually every type of movement.

[1.8t]

Weighed in at 215 today. Has been really hard to run since it has been so crazy hot/humid here lately. Probably going to have to start hitting up the treadmill until we can get some decently cool evenings.