One of our personal trainers, Armando is training for a bodybuilding competition. We thought we’d catch up with him, see what he’s up to and how he’s fairing for his first ever body building competition.
“It’s my first time doing body building and it’s my first competition. The competition is in August, so I have a few weeks of training left. It started more as a personal challenge, I wanted to learn more about the sport since it’s quite a strict discipline. I wanted to experience how you can stretch your body and change it, take it to an extreme, get the knowledge on how to do that and then apply it to my clients and the people I work with.”
When you’re training to become a body builder, you’re not just doing normal training. Every time you train, you’re challenging yourself to see what works for you, what does not work, the food that works, and how your body is actually working under stress to reach its full potential.
So how did Armando’s bodybuilding journey start?
“I got this urge about 3-4 years ago, did my research and I decided to act on it. I’m not going to lie, at the beginning, I was mostly doing it for aesthetic reasons; I mean everybody wants to look good, but few people can actually go through what they go through in bodybuilding training to get there.
“After a while, my reasons changed on their own… it became about so much more than looks. I obtained more knowledge, the way I felt about food changed, the training was just something else. I learned how to really challenge myself more than anything.
“I now strongly believe that it’s not just your body and muscles that you can train, but also your mind. If you don’t train your mind for anything, and I’m not just talking about bodybuilding, but any kind of competition or challenge you might face, you will not succeed. You need to be extremely focused with both your physical and mental training – the food you eat, the amount of times you eat and what you eat.
The Bodybuilding diet
“The diet is quite strict. I mostly meal prep chicken, vegetables, rice, and fish to eat throughout my day. My diet is very protein rich, when it comes to carbs, I typically switch between green beans, rice and sweet potatoes.
“I try to eat my carb allowance in the morning as much as I can. Carbs are energy so it really helps me train. My second meal is mainly protein and green beans. For my Pre-workout, I eat a few carbs so that I have more energy, together with protein and good fats – olive oil, avocado peanut butter.
“During my post-workout I eat the last carb meal of the day so that it helps recovery and as for the meal before I sleep, I make sure it’s high in protein and good fats. These foods are slowly released, which keeps my body working throughout the night, but I don’t usually include carbs in it, because you don’t need carbs throughout the night. That’s basically the food routine. Any veggies with colour has unnecessary sugar, so I try to avoid them as much as I can.
Training at Cynergi
“In terms of my diet and training, my coach has really helped my athletic goals fall into place. Since he’s competed before, he has experience in the area and the knowledge he’s imparted on to me has been extremely helpful.”
Workouts are on a total other level of intensity, so if you want to get into bodybuilding, you’ll need a coach to help you reach your goals.
“Now as for Cynergi, my flexible working schedule has allowed me fit in all the training I need. The support they’ve been showing me has been beyond this world. I truly feel like I’m a part of a fitness family, with everyone looking after and supporting one another.
“The equipment at Cynergi has probably been one of the things that has helped me the most throughout this journey. The quality is just amazing and saying there’s variety of equipment is an understatement. I’ve tried out different gyms in the time I’ve been living here, and I can honestly say that the equipment here is one of the best there is in Malta. All the machines, cardio machines, everything I need to train for the bodybuilding competition, I can find under one roof.”