Post Comp Diet

Here is an example of a four-month recovery diet outline that will help your metabolism recover by adding some much-needed calories. This works great not only post-contest, but for anytime during the year that you're overtrained and overdieted.

Weeks One and Two
Stay at your pre-contest diet calories with very low carbs, and remove stimulants and other hardcore supplements from the diet. However, Flameout should still be consumed liberally, as well as your multi-vitamin of choice. Exercise should be restricted to walking and other non-training-related activities.

Weeks Three and Four
Increase calories slightly by adding carbs such as Surge back into the plan as part of your post-weight training meals. Weight training should be introduced three times a week (or four if you just can't help yourself), with light cardio on the off days.

Month Two
By now, your appetite should be catching back up to you, which is a good sign that another increase in calories is called for. Add roughly 200 (or slightly more) calories each day, in the form of carbs and protein, and a little bit of fat.

All of your more hardcore supplements should be added back in with full force. They'll now serve to increase your metabolism and muscle mass while your food levels increase.

Things like Creatine , BCAA's, Hot-Rox Extreme, Se7en, and a whole host of other staples should be taken regularly. Think of them as useful for building and recovery, instead of fat loss. Your energy levels will go up, thus enabling you to train harder. This will set you up for then next increase.

Month Three
Start out with an additional 200 calories between the two meals following training on weight lifting days. An additional 100 calories on cardio days is also a good start. It may be time to add some interval training at the start of your cardio sessions again.

Just be careful not to over do it. In the off-season, there's no reason to do more than 10-15 minutes of intervals at any one time.

Month Four
By now, you'll have added roughly 500 calories back into your daily diet. You'll be gaining a sense of pride about how you've trained your body to want more, and you can actually feed it without losing your hard earned results.

Your appearance will not be the result of a post-contest rebound, or a long drawn-out diet that resulted in post-burnout binge. Your mood should be fantastic, and mentally, you should be stable and satisfied! At this point, you can increase your activity levels and food even further, depending on when your next event is.

The Most Important Part

Once you get to this point it is crucial that you don't turn around and diet again. You should revel in this new state of homeostasis. Let this be a time to increase PR's in the gym, eat lots of clean foods, and maintain your bodyweight over a period of time.

Let your body enjoy being "normal" for at least a month before going back to a more strict diet. This will serve as one of the best physique decisions you ever make. And that, my friends, is a promise.

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