GYM 201: Training at 90% max and use of muscle relaxants

After a long long time, another small article.

1. Training at 90% of max:
This is one thing that you hear very often. What this means is you train at 90% intensity, not 90% of the weight. If say a guy can squat 135kg for 1 rep, then doing 122kg for 3 reps isn't training at 90% intensity, doing 122kg for 1 rep is. If his max squat is 135kg for 3 reps, then squatting 122 kg for 3 reps is training at 90% max.

Why training at 90% is so famous is, it has been empirically found that that weight requires just about 1-2 days of time for a decent recovery. Time required for recuperation and recover kind of grows exponentially with the training intensity (the entire article talks only about intensity and it relates to exercises being done in the 3-6 rep range. For 10-15 reps, its an entirely different issue altogether). If you train at just some 50-60% of intensity, then you can even workout some 4-5 times a day for some days without any problem at all. But the time gap between two attempts of your max should be a lot more. Our coach (the Olympic Weightlifting coach of our insti) says atleast a 15 day gap is needed between consecutive attempts of our max, but I guess something around 7-10 days should be fine, though it varies from person to person. But training at 90% does not need a 10 day break, 1-2 days is just enough. And then there's the funda of super compensation (google it up) that can be obtained in a planned cycle of over-reach and under-reach and training at 90% max for an extended period of time is a good way to over-reach.
If all the above is too much for you to read, 90% max is heavy enough to make you fight through the reps and it is light enough to allow for good recovery. 


2. Use of muscle relaxants
I've seen a lot of people use sprays (volini, volitra, etc) and other muscle relaxants when they feel some pain. I'm going to argue against using them.
1. Pain is a mechanism by which the brain knows that something's wrong somewhere in the body.
2. When the brain knows there's something wrong, it responds and initiates some repairing process.
3. The whole funda of strength and muscle gains is nothing but adaptation- when you load more than what you usually lift, the muscles get sore (or in case of low rep heavy training and Olympic Weightlifting, its the nervous system that has to adapt) and they tell the brain something needs to be done.
4. If the brain doesn't know something's wrong, it won't respond.
Take blood clotting for example. First something goes wrong (a cut in the skin), then there's a signal that something's wrong (some process happens at the place where the skin's cut) and then there's the response (blood platelets rush to create a clot).
All muscle relaxants/ pain killers/ etc.. They can do one of two things-
1. Suppress the pain
2. Initiate some healing action.
If it suppresses the pain, i.e., if it acts on the nervous system and doesn't let the brain know that there's a pain, the brain won't initiate any healing process (and obviously every muscle relaxant does this). If this is the only thing that it does, then it is totally useless coz it doesn't help in healing.
If it suppresses the pain and initiates some healing action too, then, since the pain signal doesn't really reach the brain, the action it takes won't be what it is supposed to take. I'd rather trust my brain and its natural way of healing (which has worked quite well for 20 years) than the chemical formula that some manufacturer has developed.
Bottomline, use muscle relaxants and any other way of treatment only if it is totally necessary. It must only supplement the natural healing process, not replace it. The only time use of such stuff is totally justified is just before a competition, when you want your brain to allot as much resources as it can to just the lift and not to any pain in the back or the shoulder. During training, if you train 3 days a week and on 2 days you have to apply some spray or gel on your back before you train, you have some serious problem with your back and need to attend to that immediately. Take some time out, strengthen it through stretching and light training and then hit the gym again.

3 unrelated stories

I'm writing 3 stories, totally unrelated, without drawing any conclusions. Whoever reads them is free to interpret them as he likes.

1. The first one is from a book called "The Right Stuff", by Tom Wolfe. The book was about "The Right Stuff" that the US pilots in general, and the astronauts of the Mercury program in particular had. Here I give a brief summary of what was written in the book.

The heroes of the single combat:
In ancient-medieval times, there was this tradition of single combat. When two armies go to war, they choose their best warriors to fight in a duel. Except rarely in movies, this tradition is barely remembered. In the medieval times however, single combat was a very good alternative to a full scale war. In ancient China, first the mightiest soldiers fought to death and then the armies fought, emboldened or demoralized by the outcome of the single combat. Before Mohammed's first battle as the warrior-prophet, the battle of Badr, three of his son's challenged to fight any three warrior's from the Meccan's. Mohammed's sons destroyed them and later Mohammed's entire force routed the entire Meccan force. In 5th century AD, when the Vandal and Aleman armies confronted each other in Spain, victory or defeat in the battle was decided based on the result of the single combat, since they believed that the gods determined the outcome of the single combat. The old testament of David and Goliath is on similar lines. David, an unknown volunteer commoner, kills the gigantic Goliath in a single combat. The Philistines regarded that s such a terrible sign that they fled and were pursued and slaughtered.
Naturally, the warriors chosen to represent the armies in single combats were treated as heroes, revered, praised, songs sung in their name. Even before they even fought for their army, they had all the glory and fame and honor. This was all in part an incentive to the all the warriors so that they may step forward and rise to the position where they were ready to lay their life on the line for their kingdom.

Everybody who's reading this would have heard of the name Neil Armstrong. Other names like Buzz Aldrin, John Glenn, Alan Shepard and James Lovell (portrayed by Tom hanks in the movie Apollo 13) must be well known to space enthusiasts. And a lot of Indians know the name Kalpana Chawla. Bet a lot have never heard the name Chuck Yeager (not Chuck Norris, Chuck Yeager), and even fewer would have known his other mates at the Edwards Airforce Base (btw, if someone thinks I'm putting a lot of American related stuff here and wants to shit about patriotism and all, they are requested to bug off) who were testing rocket-powered aircrafts. Chuck Yeager is credited to be the first man to break the so-called sonic barrier (flying at the speed of sound), in a rocket powered X-1 aircraft. He was a test-pilot, a pilot who flies aircrafts whey they are being tested. There were a lot of other test-pilots at Edwards Airforce Base and Naval station Patuxent river who were routinely (maybe everyday, even during peacetime) in mortal danger. A lot of them died testing aircrafts. Yet no one knows their names. They guys who become famous are those like Neil Armstrong. Not to take any credit away from the great man, but he was riding on a rocket whose performance was quite proven by then. He wasn't testing it. The seven astronauts of Project Mercury, Alan Shepard, John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Scott Carpenter, Wally Schira, Gordon Cooper and Deke Slayton, they were all turned into national heroes of America, just like the warriors of single combat were in medieval times.
And today, cricketers are celebrated in India. They are Gods, heroes. Not Football or Hockey or Kabaddi (needs special mention I guess) or Boxing or Weightlifting, but cricket. Why? Because they're so talented at hitting a ball with a piece of willow in a sport that requires no kind of physical contact (read fighting) with your opponent. They play the gentleman's game. They get all the money and all the goodies.
As I said, the reader is free to interpret the stories from their own perspective. I'm only making comments, not conclusions.



2. A lot of people were cribbing about how the Indian Kabaddi team was treated after they won the world cup, not even being provided with a proper bus to go home and all, contrasting it with the way cricketers are treated. This comparison happens a lot of times with other sports too. 
When the cricket world cup was happening, the students at IITM put lots of fight to get the semis and finals screened at OAT. When then team won, there were lots of facebook updates, gtalk statuses and all. Hell, there were pics of "I was alive when India won the 2011 world cup" (whatever that is supposed to mean, as if being born sometime in 1990s and not dieing for 20 years takes an infinite talent and hardwork). A 20 year old, totally unknown guy playing in the IPL makes some 30-40 lakhs per year. People watch test matches, ODIs, T20s, IPL, and then highlights too. Lots of people know the names of everyone in the team, and Sachin is a God. You are a true patriot if you are a fan of the Indian cricket team and if you share something related on facebook. "Every Indian must watch this" says some youtube video of some guy bowling out some other guy. Yuvraj Singh has lung cancer and it makes the headlines (not to mention some gult tv channel playing a 10 min video on how Dhoni's wife couldn't wear a sari properly and making totally arbit comments on that). Every small detail of what they do is published in the newspapers and lots of people read them. BCCI takes care of cricket. They have lots of sponsors, infinite cash.
Kabaddi is not a famous sport. Very few people play it (I don't think I have ever seen people play Kabaddi in our insti). They don't have sponsors, the players don't get paid much. When the worldcup was happening, nobody gave a s**t, let alone having it screened in OAT. I didn't even know the name of the captain (I didn't know that Kabaddi was an international sport). There was no facebook status saying "I was alive when the Indian team won the Kabaddi world cup in 2011). The best players in the team are not Gods. No one reads about any article related to Kabaddi. Makes me wonder why the Kabaddi world cup winning team was not treated on par with the cricket team when they won the world cup.



3. Guys placed in a company that develops apps get 67 lpa. It makes front page news. Nobody cares about who is placed in, say, ISRO, what they are paid, what they do. I wonder if an IITM graduate "getting placed" in, say, the Indian Airforce or the DRDO or some other organization, for a 5 lakh per annum salary, but about to work on a very critical subsystem of Agni 5 or Vikrant class aircraft carriers (or something like that) would ever get his name in the front page.

The Dream...

(This is a story I wrote sometime back. I made a few changes today... If you like it, please comment. And please say its nice only if you really liked it)

I am afraid they will change me back. What my wife told me when this all started is stuck in my head forever. If I ever find more than one reason to suspect, I must be very scared. One mistake can happen, but two things pointing in the wrong direction is too much of a coincidence, she said. Doctor Shruti, my charming wife, was a senior scientist at an organization that does not exist. Four days back, she died of brain hemorrhage. As a civilian, she has already been dead for 2 years now. Both of us died in a car crash on November 4, 2019. They said it was necessary that we die if we wanted to realize our dream. That was when she told me- Two things out of place in one of the biggest and most secret research facilities in the world cannot just be coincidence.

                So here I am, lying inside a dark tube, with the one person I love separated from me forever. And the only other thing that makes me want to live about to be taken away from me. A lot of people believe in evolution and fate and destiny. But what really decides the course of mankind is always a decision, one that is the outcome of a debate between two groups of people. The decision made and the group silenced makes all the difference. Shruti always talked about this and the two kinds of people there are- People with a great vision, willing to give away everything to realize it. Then there are the others around them who will do everything they can to stop these visionaries from achieving that goal. And they do that only because it was his friend or colleague, but not him, who shall make something wonderful happen and have his name etched in the annals of history for his contributions to science and mankind. This is not something very uncommon. Even a simple guy, who cheers for his favorite player and celebrates when that player scores a goal, would get frustrated if one of his teammates scores more goals than him and everyone start praising that other guy. It burns them when they see someone else become a hero when they have not. The worst manifestation of this jealousy is when policy makers, managers and head scientists envy a scientist who is about to make an incredibly great contribution to mankind. I never gave a serious thought to this. But now, that is all that matters. I stay here in this dark tube right now, struggling to make the ultimate decision.

                Ace pilot, Air Commodore Bharat, winner of the ParamVir Chakra. My biggest honor came when I was chosen to fly the Avatar- M2 for its first flight. The Avatar-M2 is the manned version of the hypersonic airplane that has been seen as a powerful and versatile alternative to NASA’s Space Shuttles. The shuttles had been pulled out of retirement to allow the US to be competent in space exploration, but the Avatar is sure to make them obsolete. Developed indigenously by ISRO and HAL, designed to put satellites in orbit more efficiently than any other existing launch vehicles, the Avatar M2 is an absolute beauty. The sheer power, the sleek design, the sharp controls and a design speed of Mach 35 (about 6 km/s at cruise altitude) - everything a pilot would dream of.

                The first test flight for the Avatar-M2 was scheduled for October 25, 2019. She was sitting on the longest runway of the newly commissioned air-force base in Thiruvananthapuram- “Kalam Airfield”. A 3 day count down, engine tests, equipment tests, hardware and software validation, space-suit pressurization, 20 minutes of waiting in the cockpit, cabin pressurization, a long checklist and a hundred other tests, I was finally ready for Take-Off. At 10: 13 AM, everything was ready and I was just waiting for the launch control to give me a “Go for Take-off”. This was it. In a couple of minutes, I would take the most advanced aircraft on its maiden flight, hopefully stay alive, break all speed and altitude records, perform its first sub-orbital flight and land in the same airstrip after a couple of hours. The press was there, taking photographs. Running on the back of my mind was the thought that among these photographs would be the one that would be celebrated by aviators for centuries. The moment was ecstatic. Air traffic had been cleared for several hundred miles along my planned flight path. You do not wait for take-off because of some air traffic when the Indian president himself is waiting for you to take-off. The mission control started counting me in.

                Earlier versions of the aircraft were carried to a 30,000 feet altitude in the belly of jumbo jets and “dropped” from them before the hybrid RAM-jet engines took over to propel the aircraft. But this has proved expensive and inefficient. After 4 years of testing and development, it has been finally decided to launch the aircraft from the ground, on an extremely long runway. A SCRAM-jet engine that would operate at speeds above Mach 5 (1,500 km/h) has replaced the hybrid RAM-jets. Solid rocket boosters had been installed into the rear fuselage to accelerate the plane to supersonic speeds. They would provide an acceleration of over 12-g for 15 seconds after which they burnout and separate. It was decided that mission control would fire the rocket engines instead of the pilot. Sitting in the cockpit, I understood why it was the best thing to do. I was taken over by emotions- pride, fear, ecstasy, happiness. 15 seconds to take-off, everything else faded and only 1 thing remained- fear. I knew that the next half a minute was going to decide the fate of the mission and my own life. The instructions were simple- after the engines fire, climb as high as possible. I would need all the altitude I can reach so that I would have time to respond before a crash. According to the flight plan, while the rocket boosters are firing, the Avatar would be controlled by the on-board computer and I would then switch to manual when the SCRAM-jets have ignited. In case of an emergency, I could always take over even when the Avatar is in auto-pilot with the flip of a switch. I had complete confidence in the computer, still, I held the stick very firmly, took a deep breath and sat listening to mission control’s countdown, waiting for the rockets to fire.

                THREE...... TWO........ ONE.... BLAST OFF! There was a violent jerk, the rockets had fired. The Avatar was fast accelerating and vigorously shaking. About 3 seconds into the flight, she lifted off the ground, the wheels left contact and were immediately retracted. She was making a rapid ascent. I suddenly felt a chill down my spine. I was totally shaken. The plane should have climbed to more than 600 meter at T plus 7 seconds. The altimeter was showing only about 400 meter. Before I could figure out what was happening, the nose suddenly dived. This is the part where everything they taught you becomes useless. Only your instincts and those hundreds of flight hours in the log book can save you. In just a few seconds, I fell down to only about 200 meter above ground, but I managed to level off. The beauty was revealing the beast in it. When I had been selected to test-fly the Avatar, I knew what was in store for me. I knew the odds of dying were far greater than those of staying alive. Yet I had total faith in the team of engineers that built the Avatar and ever since I saw her, I was always waiting to jump into her and take her for a ride.

The dive and fall were not totally unexpected however. It always happens when you accelerate to supersonic speeds, but never at just 400 meter above the ground. I was riding the most complex machine ever built for the first time and the unexpected was bound to happen. Two challenges had been overcome, the final one, the take-over of the SCRAMJET from the rocket motor still remained. Two decades of research and testing could not totally eliminate the starting problems. I needed every bit of luck I could get.

                The airspeed was still going up, the Avatar climbed to 900 meter. The rockets started to regress, the monstrous sound made by them was dying out. At that moment I prayed, for the first time in 15 years. “Go for main engine start” I heard over the intercom. I had enough speed to start my SCRAM-jets. I looked at the readings on some of my gauges, flipped a switch and pressed a couple of buttons. In a second the SCRAMJET sprung into life. I turned back and over the razor-sharp shining wings saw the reflection of the exhaust jet, slowly but surely building up. Shruti's words before I climbed into the cockpit started to echo in my ears, "It's going to be alright". I re-checked my gauges, all systems were normal. It was indeed alright. There wouldn't be another loss of control. The only issue now was the intense heating, but I knew I could take it. A tiny explosion and the rocket boosters separated from the Avatar. She climbed and accelerated and in less than 20 minutes, I was flying at 80 km, Mach 34. The hundreds of sensors around me started beeping and buzzing. I had to stay at the altitude for 50 minutes and then start my descent. At T plus 137 minutes, I was scheduled to land at the same landing strip I took-off from.

                I was cruising at an 80 km altitude. The atmosphere was too thin. Without the protection of the atmosphere, the blazing sun was unbearable and I had to use a screen to block out the sun’s light falling directly on my face. The stars, more than a 1000 times of what you could see from within the atmosphere, were all clearly visible now even when the sun was shining brilliantly in the sky. They were not twinkling little stars, but very sharp, bright spots in the sky. I was flying way above the clouds and could clearly see the thunderstorms at the equator. The vast blue ocean was now not totally blue, but had infinite shades of blue, white and gray due to the waves and the ocean beds and the currents. I crossed over to the darker side of the earth. The earth was still dimly lit by the sunlight reflected off the moon and the other planets. The sleeping cities of the west glowed in yellow with all their light bulbs. Major highways could be seen as streaks of yellow. Glowing cities below, bright stars above, the moon with its thousands of craters, the sun setting behind me and just about to rise ahead of me over the horizon. If there was anything more beautiful than looking into the happy eyes of the person you love, this was it.

With still more than an hour left before to land, with the danger of a crash landing still very probable, sitting inside a cockpit at 50 celsius, I started to wonder if all my dreams had come true. I flew every kind of airplane there is, from the piper cubs to the Supersonic fighters and occasionally even the jumbo jets. Aviators and scientists from all over the world would now be waiting for me to land. My name would go down in history. Chuck Yeager, the first man to break the sonic barrier, would be infinitely envious of me. I was expecting to be promoted to the rank of Air Marshal in a month, they always did that to “National Heroes”. I was married to the best girl I ever knew. We did not have kids yet but were planning to have some soon when we feel we can spend enough time with the kids. There was still something missing, something I had always wanted but took to be impossible. All those years, I had been living in rejection. Hidden beneath the desire to fly higher and faster with more and more powerful machines was the dream to be soaring in the skies, feeling the wind on my face, without any fancy instruments over my shoulders- this is what freedom now means to me. It was this dream that made me start flying airplanes. I convinced myself that I could never fly like a bird with my own power. But now I feel most desperate to do that.

                While all this was going in my mind, a small talk I had with my wife only 2 weeks earlier emerged clearly- it was like destiny calling me. For 8 years, she had been working on an idea that could make my dream come true. She said she could give super human-like power to a simple human being. The idea was simple. In normal athletic activities such as running or playing football, about 450 kcal or energy is spent per hour. By making some alterations in the muscular structures, introducing new kinds of cells and cell elements and adding a certain kind of catalyst, she said she could make a certain group of muscles 20 times more powerful than it normally is. It could make a sprinter run 100 meter in 3 seconds, or even make a man fly, she said. And then it was all very clear to me. I would persuade her to make a man fly, make me fly. I would do everything I can to get this project approved and funded. Being the first man to fly a hypersonic plane, I knew I could make good use of this fame to get things done.

                I was flying at 10 km at Mach 14, all this going through my mind, when I heard a voice over the intercom "Avatar M2 100, Power down to idle and descend to level 150. Repeat Power down to idle and descend to level 150 (15,000 feet)". I was back into reality. I put the engine to idle and descended. I was back to the airfield on schedule. The engine shut down long back when the speed dropped to Mach 1.8. I had been gliding since then without power, with only a very small emergency engine for course corrections. I approached the airfield and could see a huge crowd near the runway. I was cleared to land even before I took-off. I finally landed, the wheels and the braking system did well and the plane came to a stop without any issues. I knew a lot would happen in the next few days and I would meet a lot of people, but the only thing I thought of was to get my own wings and fly. There were compliments, interviews, photographs, documentaries,… The whole world was stunned. India was now the world leader in hypersonic flight. And without doubt it only meant India was soon going to be the world leader in space exploration. The president congratulated me. There were high-fives everywhere. Shruti was there, waiting for me, in tears. At that moment, all I wanted was to go to her and hug her tightly. But I was not allowed to get in contact with anyone till some quarantine tests were done. I waited it out. I then ran towards Shruti and gave her a hug. I couldn’t stay with her for long and was dragged away by the administration for congratulations and interviews. That night at 10 PM, I finally got to go back home and spend time with her in peace. It felt great to be together again.

                The next morning, she was getting ready to get back to work. The past few days she was with me all the time, watching my last minute preparations, going through the safety procedures, giving me strength when I was worried. I asked her to sit down beside me and said, "Tell me everything about your research". She was blank for a moment, she did not expect that to be the first thing in the morning after that sensational flight of mine. She looked at me for a while and then smiled; showing that she understood this was no casual question.

                The muscle fibres may be classified mainly into 2 types- 'slow twitch', which supply small amounts of strength for extended periods of time and the 'fast twitch', which can be very strong but cannot hold out for more than a few seconds. Shruti said it was possible to increase the count of the fast twitch fibres through surgery and a training and diet routine. A special kind of tissue embedded into the muscle group would serve to rapidly break down and oxidize the glycogen stored in the muscles. This also required large amounts of some extremely pure platinum-based compounds which served as a catalyst for some of the reactions. This new tissue would be connected to the nervous system so that the subject could decide when he needs the extra boost. To fly, I only needed artificial wings attached to my arms. This was all on paper and was yet to be tested on human beings, though the standard rat and monkey tests gave positive results. The biggest bottleneck for the project was the extremely high cost. The oxidizer tissues had to be replaced very frequently and the catalysts sufficient for only about an hour's boosting could be injected in the body without poisoning the blood of the subject. The subject would have to undergo a very painful surgery every time either the catalyst or the tissue had to be replaced. The project was very ambitious and its implications were ground-breaking.

                After she explained to me all that, I knew she expected me to tell her why I was so keen. So I said, "Listen dear, I know this is really surprising. But I want to volunteer for your project. I will help you to get all the clearances and the funding. I want you to make me fly. That is the one thing that keeps me awake most of the nights. Do this for me." She knew I was very serious about this and she knew I thought this over. She was quiet for a while and then said she was too glad to hear that. Being a first star officer and a test pilot for the Indian Air Force, I had to spend long periods of time away from her. This would again let us stay together. More than anything, that was the reason that convinced her to consider this. More over, she needed a brave man who would really commit himself to the project. She needed someone she could trust. For me, it was a dream.

                The next two months, I spent pulling strings, persuading policy makers and scientific advisors to give this project a go ahead. I told my commanding officer all about my dream and how desperately I wanted this to happen for me and Shruti. I knew he would understand but was still worried since he would not want to lose an officer, now a celebrity, if the project started. But he encouraged me. I even managed to get a message from the president himself recommending the project. And so it was finally approved. No one could know of our existence once the project started and so on November 5, 2019, newspapers around the world reported the death of Air cdre. Bharat and Dr. Shruti Bharat in a car crash. That evening, both of us got our first official briefing at the "Agency for Scientific and Defense Research", the most secret research organization in the country. 

                In movies, you could become an insect or an animal by just being bitten by a radioactive insect or through a random genetic mutation at birth. In reality, it does not happen that way. The project was to go on for 4 years and in the end I would make a 45-km flight with my own wings. The first three months went on well. Shruti was going through even the most minor detail and was getting a grand schedule ready for the project. I was taking lectures on anatomy of humans and birds, the dynamics of flapping flight and strengthening my pectorals (the muscles in the chest). Every once in a while, me and Shruti would have a pep talk, grab a cup of coffee, have lunch together and see how each other's work is going. It had been a really long time since we were so close to each other for full days.

                In March 2020, the painful part of it started. The surgeries and tests started. Almost every day I would be injected with sedatives and some part of my body would be examined. In time I started developing resistance for some of the sedatives. I could not sleep, sometimes even breathing had to be forced. Shruti had a tough time too, working throughout the day and watching me take all the pain. But I trusted her, I knew she would never let me down and there was absolutely no danger to me. She did everything she could to see that nothing would happen to me. My shoulder joint was replaced- the natural joint is not flexible enough for flapping flight. Then after a week's time to recover to normal, the skin over my chest was ripped off. The muscle fibres had to be converted. Some old ones were cut, new ones developed, allowed to grow, the skin allowed to heal. The whole thing took 3 entire days before I was unconscious for 5 days. A specially developed titanium-aluminium alloy was integrated to my arms. Something resembling a hook was inserted in my arms, abdomen and my feet. These would be used to hold the wing and the tail. An extremely strong and light armour was also being designed to protect me in case of crashes.

                On July 4, 2020, Shruti woke me up. She softly kissed on my forehead, took hold of my hand and whispered, "You are now ready". I could see from the look on her face that she had been crying every night since this started for me. The work was also becoming too heavy for her. She was not taking the break she was long overdue. Neither of us could now turn back. The only way was to make this work. That is our dream.

                I was not allowed to do anything for the next few weeks, my body had to recover from all the violence it was subjected to. I spent my time watching Shruti work, examining all the facilities, going through the schedule planned for me and being briefed for the training that was to start later. This was no more a dream. It is for real, happening. A group of 30 strongly committed people were giving their best to make me fly. In August, my training started. My diet was strictly regulated. I started working out on machines, specially designed strengthen the muscles required for flight. A pair of wings was made out of an extremely strong titanium alloy. I was put in wind tunnels to learn balancing myself.

                After 4 months of indoor training, the time finally came for me to fly outside. My dream was about to come true. My armor was mounted on me. The wings were carefully attached to my arms and my legs. I took my new boost and got my tissues changed just the night before and had a good night’s sleep with Shruti on my side. I was all set. A tower, about 20 meter long, was built beside the pond in the facility. I was to dive from the tower. That would be my maiden flight. I climbed it up. I could feel a gentle breeze over my face. I waited to feel the moment. Waiting on the ground was my wife, nervous. And proud. There had been an instruction manual. More like a “Flying for dummies in 30 days”. I went through it a hundred times. I did not care about the manual. I wanted to do it my way. After all, it was me who flew every kind of airplane, including the only manned hypersonic airplane, not the guys who wrote that manual. And I dived, arms stuck to my body, feet pointed, not extending my wings. For almost a second, I was just making a free fall. Everyone was shocked. They did not expect me to be so stupid when it came this far. It was like time had slowed down. I could feel the wind on my face. I could see Shruti standing there, totally surprised. I smiled at her. I looked down at the water. And then I stretched out my wings, turned my ankles, made a 90 degree turn and I started gliding over the water. I was only about 8 meters over the water surface and I could clearly see the water ripples. The joy I felt when I was flying over the pond with my wings spread is beyond words. I flew towards Shruti to look closely into her eyes. I had not seen her so happy in years. The dream has started to become reality, for me and for her.

                The training was not, however, without any incidents. There was a day when I almost died. I was told that I could only take a limited amount of the catalyst into the body, the optimum concentration. More of it would intoxicate my blood. Less of it would give me lesser flying time. Each time I needed a reload, the skin over my shoulders had to be ripped off, the existing catalyst was sucked out from the tissue and a fresh paste was deposited. The first few times it was long and painful. But later on, as they got more efficient at it and I got more used to it, the surgery took only about 20 minutes. Each reload gave me about an hour of flying time. But Shruti never allowed me to push for it. She said that as I fly longer and longer, my energy levels drop down as most of the glycogen is used up and I would get dizzy or even unconscious as the catalyst products diffusing into the blood circulate through the brain. I did not really understand everything she said, but the look on her face told me I was never supposed to let that happen.

                February 12, 2021 was the day. We had moved from diving from towers. Sometimes, they use a launcher that would push me to speed of about 30 km/h. Sometimes I would dive from small airplanes from about 500 feet. I got about 10 minutes of flying time this way compared to the 1 minute from the tower. I always had to carry a parachute for safety. I had already made 4 flights that day and this was going to be my last. I jumped, stretched my wings and started heading towards my landing point. 100 feet off the plane, a thermal storm came out of nowhere and hit me. I had no experience with violent winds and this was my first. Opening out my parachute would only blow me away. My only option was to try flying, as hard as I can. I never flapped- no experience, no instincts to save me here. I was trying hard to stay in the air. I must have fought hard for atleast 5 minutes. The next thing I knew, I woke up with Shruti sitting beside me, holding a bouquet of flowers and a card. We never really celebrated Valentine’s day, nor any other such days. But this time it was really special for her. When that wind blew and I tried to flap hard, I lost consciousness and crashed to the ground. The armor I was wearing reduced the impact, but I was very severely wounded. It took me 2 days and I woke up with 2 broken joints. For 2 days she was sitting there with some flowers, waiting for me to wake up. And finally, I did.

                June 13, 2021. I was having dinner with Shruti. She had been working too hard and I kept telling her that, she wouldn’t listen. She wanted to create more efficient tissues and cleaner catalysts so that I wouldn’t have to go through a surgery every other day. She had already made a lot of progress. I can now get more than 2 hours of flying between reloads and the new solution she recently made might give me 3 hours. The pressure from the managing group also started to build up on her. The project was getting too expensive. Despite the encouraging results, they wanted to shut this down as soon as possible. She started talking about the two groups of people. That would be the last time. I could see she wasn’t comfortable. She said she keeps getting headaches quite often due to all the stress. I was rested very often, but she, she never took a break. She started to feel a little dizzy, I said I would take her to bed. As she got off her chair, she suddenly collapsed. I immediately took her to the hospital. They said she was no more.

                I did not move or talk for 5 days. Then I finally woke up. I could not take Shruti’s death. She mattered the most to me. Even after 5 days, I was in a shock. I refused to do anything for about a week after she left me. A week before that, I was realizing my dream and Shruti was the biggest part of it.

Now I felt totally empty inside. I slowly started to recover from it. I had been informed that the schedule for the project was changed. It was condensed to only 3 years instead of 4 years they said. I was to attempt flapping flight in a month’s time, while the original schedule had it only after 8 months. I could see the first thing that was out of place.

I was taking my reload. The surgery took 45 minutes this time. And the next time too it took about an hour. The second thing going wrong. And the biggest of all, Shruti wasn’t with me now. I knew these bastards were now after my wings. The officers, the policy-makers, they were jealous of my Shruti’s work. They just would not let her or me or our team realize this dream. They would not allow anyone else to become more famous or more important than them. I could feel this in the air. I knew I had to make a decision.

So, here I am in this dark tube, the launcher that would launch me. What was once a dream has now become real. Going back to the old times is only a nightmare now. Everything Shruti did for me, all the sacrifices she made, all the tears she shed, all the nights she stayed awake, just to give me these wings to fly. All of that going to be wasted. The person I loved the most is not with me now. The dream I had been living is about to be snatched away. After everything I have done, what would matter to me now without Shruti and without my wings? I am not even alive. The newspapers declared me dead 2 years back. Right now, the only things I have are my wings. But I am afraid they will change me back. I will not let that happen. There would be the STOL (short take-off and landing) airplane scheduled to take-off only 500 meter away from my launcher. It will be taking off very soon. That is my only means to escape from here. I have pushed my launch so that I could catch that plane. Last night, I asked them to load on the new solution Shruti had developed before she died. It was not tested, but it may give me 3 hours.

What shall I do even if I escape? I cannot go anywhere. Do I want to go anywhere? If I fly on course, I would have my wings for a few weeks, or may be months more. Then they would be stripped off. I would not get any reloads. I will have artificial shoulders and alloys in my arms. If I go for the plane, I may get sucked into the engine. The plane may hit me hard. I may not make it on time. I can never fly again after the 3 hours. If I push for the full three hours, I wouldn’t even know what would happen after that. Shruti always warned me, if I try to push for more time, I will lose my consciousness and if the team does not happen to find me, I would die in a coma.

I could hear the voice on my earphone asking if I was ready to go. I can hear the engine of that plane starting up. It would take it about a minute to warm up and get clear for take-off. I would take about half a minute to reach the airfield. This is it. I make my call now. To stay or to escape. After all, I have been waiting for years just for this moment, to fly like a bird, free in the skies, flapping my own wings. I close my eyes. I take a deep breath. “Okay doc, I’m all set to go free from here”, and the sea is just about 3 hours from here.

.

My current routine

Working out in the gym at my office. No spotters, so I decided I'll not do any classical olympic lifts. Even heavy squats feel a little risky coz of the very little space, no power rack, no proper spotters, but I'm just going at around 5kg less than what I'd do with proper spotters. I don't go to the office on weekends and I wanted to work 4 days a week so got a 2 on, 1 off, 2 on, 2 off schedule... I'm going really low on volume..



Monday




Snatch pulls (moderate weight): 1 warmup(WU) set, 2-3 gen sets, 8-10 singles or doubles

Back squat (heavy): 1 warmup set, 1 at moderate intensity, 3 workout(WO) sets (was only 1 till last week)

Behind neck press(light) 1 warmup(WU) set, 2 workout(WO) sets

Dumbbell rows (heavy) 1 WU set, 2 WO sets

Step ups / split squat (heavy) 1WU set, 2 WO sets

Calf raise (light) 2 light sets

Forearm curls (light) 2 light sets









Tuesday



Clean pulls (light weight): 1 WU set, 2-3 sets to build up intensity, 10-12 singles or doubles

Push press (heavy): 1 WU set, 3 WO sets

Weighted pullups(light): 1WU set, 1 WO set

Close grip weighted pushups (moderate): 1WU set, 1 WO set

Barbell rows (light): 2 light sets

Upright rows (moderate): 1 light set, 1 WO set









Thursday



Snatch pulls (light): 1 WU set, 2 sets to build up intensity, 10-12 singles or doubles

Back squat (heavy) 1 WU set, 1 gen set, 3 WO sets

Inclined bench (moderate): 1 WU set, 1 WO set

Dumbbell rows (light): 2 light sets

Weighted Bar dips (moderate): 1 WU set, 1 WO set

Dumbbell raise (moderate): 2 light sets

Good mornings (lightmaxx): 20kg, 30kg









Friday



Clean pulls (heavy): (same as other days)

Romanian Deadies(moderate/heavy): 3 WO sets, starting at clean pull last set weight

Military press (heavy): 1 WU set, 2 WO sets

Weighted pullups(heavy): 1 WU set, 1 WO set

Close grip bench(light): 2 light sets

Barbell rows (heavy): 1 WU set, 1 WO set
 
 
Squat, all presses in the 2-5 rep range
Rows, pullups, pushups, bar dips in the 4-7 range
Dumbbell raise and forearm curls in 6-10 range

Reasons for working out...

I usually workout 4 days a week... Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday. And atleast once every week I think of 'retiring' from Weightlifting (If only I can understand what that means). I'm bad at managing my time and every time I have some assignment or some report I start thinking of the 3 hours that go into Weightlifting on four evenings and the time I spend on doing some research, or the pain and injuries due to Weightlifting. The last two days have been really bad. I got some problem with my lower back and every now and then it gives me too much pain when I sit in class. I was thinking too many times to quit Weightlifting and focus totally on acads.

What I said was only one part of the story. The other side is what matters. The lower back pain I got right now is bcoz of what I did on Sunday - 160kg Sumo Deadlift for 4 reps, after doing 107.5kg squat for 3 reps. After squat and deadlift, I did a bench press of 74.8kg for 3 reps and then military press of 60kg for 3 reps. I go to our institute fitness centre only once a week, the other three days we practice in our Weightlifting Hall. The one day I go to the fitness centre, I start with something that really feels like a weight- 160kg deadlift and 100+kg squat isn't a small weight. There would be loads of guys who wouldn't even think of 160kg deadlift. And today was a good day too.. Last thursday I attempted 80kg power clean and couldn't do even one satisfactory rep. Today, I did 80kg power clean for 3 sets of 3 reps each, all of them quite good. And then I did 70kg snatch from the hang. After that, I did 90kg push jerk for 2 reps. These numbers are too good at the IIT level (considering the kind of lifts that happen in inter IIT). And by the way, my maximum deadlift is right now 170kg. And in the olympics, kids younger than me, of the same weight as I am, would peacefully clean and jerk that weight. That is what a body of my size is capable of. So I know I still have a long long long way to go before I can call it a day and retire.

And after the lifting, we (me, Vikrant, Asif, BalaG) went and had a nice chicken biryani. And now I'll peacefully crash. THIS IS LIFE....... Wake up early in the morning. Attend classes. Have a nice lunch. Go to classes again. Then a proper workout session. Then chicken biryani to eat. Come back to room and crash.

Now I think of a lot of guys I see in the gym.... They go there every day. Lift the same weight for months. Take the same 5kg dumbbell or 10kg dumbbell every time they go. Keep working out for 1 hour.. 2 hours.. Barbell curls, leg press, dumbbell press, lateral raises, arbit machines- 5 sets of each exercise, 10-12 reps of each. And they never make any improvement. Coz I've been seeing guys in that gym for an year or more and they still never seem to think of any real exercise or any heavy weight. The big guys lift bigger weights, small guys lift smaller weights. But whatever weight they lift doesn't really change. The first few weeks, they can lift more than what they could earlier (this improvement is what we call the "Noob gains"). And what drives them to waste 2 hours of their time every day? There seems to be no pride or any kind of gain in what they're doing.

We go into the gym. Load a hundred kg on the bar. Squat it like we're going to die if we can't do that one rep. Keep puffing each breath. Shout our lungs out. Totally exhaust after each heavy set. That's some real intensity. It's not like lifting a 5kg dumbbell 10 times. And the pride and the feel that comes after squatting a 100kg is not something you can get easily. Beating your previous max after building up for that one heavy rep for 2 weeks is something that these people miss.

Every time I see people do dumbbell curls or calf raises or some other stuff, I'd want to go to them and say "Stop this shit. Put 70kg on the bar and squat."  These dudes workout for months and years and have great biceps and they cannot deadlift 110kg (Which some of us, weighing less than 60kg, did in our first year). They are too damn scared to squat. But who's to blame? Everyone around is doing the same old dumbbell curls and the lats pull downs. 200 guys go to the gym and less than 10 guys ever squat or deadlift. Only for one hour in the entire week can they get to see the bar loaded above 100kg. And people say all kinds of crap- squat is bad for your kness, deadlift is bad for your back, bench press is bad for your shoulders, you should sit down and do military press, you should not do squat and deadlift on the same day..... That's what people say when they cannot face those exercises because they're too damn weak to do them properly and look for ways to escape the exercise.

Whatever "the dudes" do in the gym is their personal choice. But ask any guy who does some heavy squat or some heavy deadlift what they feel after beating their personal max. It's the pride. It's that feeling that you have conquered something and that feeling of being rewarded after a lot of fight. People watch movies and think about all kinds of adventures, about how the hero would get up after being dangerously injured and all. For me, my adventure is right there in the gym. Getting up with 110kg on my shoulders is a challenge and every time I live to that challenge I feel that my character has been testified by the iron that I lifted.. And IRON NEVER LIES.

Arbit

This is just a short note. A small message.
I see a lot of people take pride in everything except themselves. People who take pride in Sachin Tendulkar, taking his century to be their own, taking a hit movie of some actor to be their own, taking some singer's success to be their own. People boast of the greatness of their country and proudly say that they are great because they're citizens of some great country. What I think is, people start doing this when the have no reason to think good of themselves. Sachin doesn't have to boast to his friends that he opens the innings with Sehwag. He has enough reason to believe that he deserves everything.
It will make a huge difference when people start taking pride in themselves rather than in their idols. When they think that their own work commands even the smallest respect rather than the whole country bowing to their idols. For instance, one guy might live his entire life saying he's a fan of Sachin Tendulkar and just paining some Dhoni fan or a Yuvi fan. These guys think a Yuvi fan is an inferior creature and just being a fan of Sachin makes a person great. But when this guy starts thinking that his batting or his bowling is what makes him superior to the other guy and not being a fan of Sachin, it'd be an entirely different thing.

Atheism

I'm an atheist, but I believe in God. You rarely hear that statement. Atheism is something that is very often misunderstood. These days you see a lot of people claiming they're atheists and they comment on theists being superstitious and all.

What the 'so-called' atheists say is, no one has ever proved the existence of God. They take superstitions, traditional faiths, mythical stories and folk tales as examples and say that people have been made to believe in things such as worship and spirituality and that logic and reasoning will say that most of that is not true. If we consider whatever is part of most religion, we can straight away say that a lot of it cannot be true. I'll take several cases and talk for and against religious ideals.

For instance, the sun is worshiped in a lot of religions. He's called the 'Sun God'. Now we "explain" that the sun is just a lot of hydrogen and helium, undergoing nuclear fusion and held together by gravitational forces. The notion of Sun being a God is out of question. But then, no scientist can ever say that life on earth is possible without sun. The sun powers the earth. Then it becomes our obvious duty to worship the Sun. Just like they say you must respect your parents, elders and teachers, you must worship the sun that made our life possible. In one way, worshiping the sun, or similarly worshiping the moon is justified, as long as it only means to have a little appreciation of their importance. But you often see things blown out of proportion- pujas and sacrifices and a lot of things being done to 'please' the sun. This is where religions go wrong. Then, we can also argue that that's not religion- it's just superstitions or a group of people faking religion to deceive others and get benefited. But forgetting these superstitions that are not really an integral part of a religion, most traditions are driven by good reason, like respecting the sun for powering the earth, the moon for giving light during the night, parents and teachers for looking after you and for making you what you are, friends for their company and all, nature for everything it presents. Most things seem justified. The idea of God, I presume, came up because people knew that something was very important and beyond their control but they could not explain why it happens. Now, we know how it rains and what causes rain, and we can even 'make it rain'. Yet people pray for rain because it's too important.

Second, the question of fate. Atheists firmly say that man controls his fate and there's no divine intervention and all, and theists firmly say that's not true. Consider this- Say there was a very small speck of dust that fell in Sachin Tendulkar's eye when he was a small kid and was playing a very important match. He might have got out that ball and he might have been disappointed and frustrated or whatever. There is every chance that his life could have completely changed if a series of such small events happened. I'm just making an extreme case. But things like this 'can' happen. Or consider a small piece of paper that's carried along with the wind and a guy finds that that paper is some love letter or something that someone he knew wrote to him or someone else and then a lot of things may happen after that small thing. What I'm trying to say here is, very small things can have a major influence in life. There are a lot of things beyond a man's control.

Then about our consciousness itself. Atheists say science explains everything and all (that's because they know nothing about science. I don't remember any great scientist who did not believe in God. There are just too many things science as we know now cannot explain). From what we know right now, the brain is a network of neurons. When there is a certain electrical signal at the end of a neuron, it responds in a certain way. The brain is just a very complicated network of these. Now, the response of a neuron depends only on its structure. How it should respond is already 'programmed' in it. For a given signal, at some certain conditions, its response would be unique, or that is what the whole of science says. Cause precedes effect. The brain is a huge network of these cells. Now, one can easily deduce that the response of the brain depends only on two things- on its state, and on the input signal or whatever you feel. Essentially, what we think as 'control' or 'consciousness' turns out to be just a function mapping our response to our current state and the input. The state of your mind changes when your brain responds to something. To me, it feels like I'm only a very sophisticated robot with an algorithm that decides how I should react to something and I have turned into what I am because of everything that happened to me till now. Ultimately, there's no control. I cannot put this thing clearly in here, but you should reflect on this- think about how your brain may react to something.

Then the pride 'atheists' take in talking about all the stuff science explains and all. That's all wrong. First, a lot of phenomena still remain unexplained, that is, they do not have governing equations. A lot of governing equations do not have general solutions (for instance, the Navier stokes equation). And even if we can write equations for everything and also find general solutions for each of those equations, the uncertainty principle straight away proves that infinite accuracy is not possible, that is, you can never supply perfect boundary conditions to the equations, and hence can never predict anything with infinite accuracy.

Now turning to religions. As I've already said, worshiping to 'please' god makes no sense, atleast when people worship the sun and the moon or the rain. Second, we can make a lot of arguments to say that most religions preach false stuff. Let's take Hinduism for example. In all our myths, there was only one country, India and everything that even the so-called gods knew was in India. How could the gods not know about the rest of the world? Even Christianity has this problem, how can the entire world be just Europe? Why would god not know about the rest of the world? And then, these religions say that the earth is the most important place in the universe and the Sun and the moon and the stars exist only to light the earth. Why would there be millions of huge stars so far away, some some thousand times bigger than the earth, to just give some little lighting to the earth?
And then there is this idea of heaven, hell and all... If the so called god knows everything and is everywhere, he obviously knows about what any guy is doing, and he is controlling that guy. If you are playing 'mario' game and say you don't play well, it's totally your mistake because you screwed up. You can't say it's mario's mistake for not playing properly. And if everything else in the game is also under your control, then there seems to be no obvious reason for anything to possibly go wrong. They say god tests you.. what's he testing if he knew everything already and is controlling you? And man is the best thing god ever created- and yet birds fly and man does not. Just a look at the multitude of life and you can draw conclusions. Physically, man is far inferior to a lot of other creatures. The best part of religions and of belief in god is, people tend to act 'morally' out of fear for god or hell or whatever. Then there are also rules that govern social behavior. There are a lot of positives that can be drawn from religious knowledge. But blindly following them is definitely not a good thing.

There are a lot of incompatibilities in religions and any atheist forum will point these out. But the fact remains that a lot of things are still not properly known. The most science has done till now is to relate things. The whole of science and math is based on certain axioms that you must accept if you are to proceed. You cannot question those axioms. There can only be a 'what has happened' question, but not the 'why has it happened that way' question at the fundamental level. If you can know 'what has happened' at the fundamental level, you can explain 'why has it happened' at higher levels. The idea of a God is merely our lack of knowledge and incompetence. And I would accept the idea of a supernatural force, one that made nature be the way it is, made the big bang happen if it ever did, and yet I would reject most things that religions say. I call myself an atheist because I do not approve any religion. But I must believe in God because a lot of things are yet unanswered. Noticed how I used 'God' in all paras except the previous and the one before where I used 'god'? It's because I don't believe in religious gods.

Any comments are welcome and I'd love to have a healthy debate on the topic.

Build up to the 'Best Physique' competition

Tomorrow, 5th February, Saturday, we have the "Best Physique" competition at IIT Madras. I competed in the competition in the last two years too, without winning it. Probably because I'm not bulky or because I still have a lot of fat on me. But this time, being the Powerlifting captain, I'm responsible for organizing the competition and this makes the competition a little more special. This time I put a little more fight for the competition that I did the last two years and I'll briefly tell what I think did right and what I did wrong.

The conventional training style for pro-bodybuilders has two phases- a bulking phase when they grow muscle and mass, and a cutting phase when they lose most of the fat( and a little muscle too). Typically these phases last for some months. I tried to follow the same, though in a different way- I scaled down the months into weeks. I had to do this because I had only a month before the competition. Till December 16 I was busy doing Olympic Weightlifting, and then a 2 weeks off from Weightlifting, and all the time I had left was January. So, any pro would just laugh it off if someone say's he's going on a 3-week bulking phase. Hopefully, no serious bodybuilders are reading this, so I'll just go on.

Bulking: From Jan 2nd to Jan 23rd.

The routine: 20-rep squat program.
The routine is kind of self explanatory, I do 20 reps of squat with a weight and each session I add 2.5kg. I started at 75kg for 20 reps on Jan 2nd. 2 weeks into the program, I started giving up on reps. I managed 20 reps of 82.5kg. Then I did 17 reps of 85kg, 14 reps of 87.5kg and 17 reps of 90kg, the last one on Jan 23rd. I did a total of 7 sessions in 22 days, so almost 1 session in 3 days (And I also did 6 sessions of Olympic Weightlifting in the 22 days). Other than the squat 'my' routine had 10 reps deadlift, weighted pushups, military press and barbell rows, all high reps.

The diet:
Probably the most I ever ate.Breakfast had 8-10 bread slices, 1 glass of tea and 1 glass of milk (I usually eat only 5 bread slices and drink 1 cup of tea). Lunch had 8-9 rotis, with curry , and 2 cups of curd (Usually, it's only 4-5 rotis and 2 cups of curd). Dinner remained almost the same- dosa or puri or whatever was available in mess. In the evening, I drank 2 glasses of milk (earlier only 1 glass of tea). After workout, a glass of fruit juice, and before sleeping, another half litre of milk. Other than this, I was eating some 3 eggs a day. And this was all the food I ate, no chips, no biscuits, no pizzas and stuff.

The result:
Probably the most important part is this. Apart from the strength gains, I gained a little more than 2.5kg. I started at 62.8kg and ended at 65.5kg. And the fat I gained wasn't all that much, atleast 20% of the weight I gained could have been muscle.


Cutting: Jan 26th to Feb 4th

The routine isn't any special. I got back to doing Olympic Weightlifting 3 days a week. The fourth day, I did some heavy squat for low reps, military press, etc... The last 4 days I have been pumping up- Doing a full body routine with 3 exercises for each muscle group except the biceps (I'm not allowed to grow my biceps coz it'll later pain in Weightlifting), 3 sets of each exercise to 10-12 reps. I usually am a big fan of jogging, but a minor ankle injury prevents me from doing it. I hate to do cardio on those cycling machines and stuff in the gym, so haven't been doing any cardio except for the high-rep workout.

The diet:
This is the major part of the cutting phase. I drastically cut down on food. 
For 3 days, I was at home (during Saarang). Those three days my diet was too awful- breakfast was 150g of boiled chicken, lunch was 3 omelets, 2 more in the evening, and another 150g of chicken in the night. Other than this, 1-2 laddoos a day (couldn't resist, was just craving for anything sweet I could find. This part screwed up my entire diet).
Then, after coming back to insti,
Breakfast: 4 slices of bread and 1 glass of tea
Lunch: 3-4 rotis with curry, 1-2 cups of curd
Evening: 1 glass tea. No fruit juice after workout. No milk after dinner.
Dinner: 1 plate of chilly chicken or chilly beef.
Before sleeping- 2 or 3 eggs.
I cut down on my diet, but the volume of my workout remained the same.

The result:
Cut down weight from 65.5kg to 63.5kg. Not sure about the strength losses, hopefully I haven't lost much.

Today and tomorrow:
Today, I started to dehydrate. Today, I had 2 glasses of tea in breakfast and in the evening, and 3 slices of bread in the morning and 2 rotis in lunch, and 4 egg whites in the evening. And till the evening, I drank not more than a 100ml of water. And I'm going to dehydrate a lot when I go to pump now. My dinner will stay as usual, 1 plate of chilly beef. Tomorrow morning, I'll probably go jogging. In the afternoon, I'll thulp at lunch, will load up on carbs. And just before competition, I'll eat a full pack of glucose. I won't be drinking more than may be 200 ml of water till tomorrow evening. Just for comparison, I usually drink 3-4 litres of water a day.

Just to mention, this time we have two body weight classes- under 65kg and above 65kg. The first guys in both classes compete for the 'Mr. IITM 2011' title. I am quite optimistic of putting first in the under weight category. And if I can get very lucky, maybe I'll win the title too....
The workout was pretty much fine, but the diet part was too painful. No rice, eating less than half of what I ate last month, no extra stuff like chocolates or chips or biscuits or anything else. Now pro-bodybuilders do this thing for months during their cutting their phase. And they almost totally stop drinking water for atleast 3-4 days before competition.

Bodybuilding isn't as easy as people think it is. It isn't just about going into the gym and lifting a couple of dumbbells. It's about control and character. People say those big guys like Arnold and Ronnie did drugs to build that body, but they forget about all the pain they go through when they workout and when they stop eating all the junk and eat very specific food.

Secrets to mass gain

"Everybody wants to be a bodybuilder, but don't nobody wants to lift no heavy ass weights"
- Ronnie Coleman

Before I proceed further, I'd make two points-
1. I came from 62.8kg on Jan 2nd to 65.5kg on Jan 25th.
2. I started my 20-rep squat program at 75kg for 20 reps on Jan 2nd and ended at 90kg for 17 reps (Gave up on the 18th rep) on Jan 23rd. (Fortunately, I thulped that night at Daawat... Nothing better than loads of chicken after a heavy squat session).

The two things happening together was NOT a coincidence. If you think gaining 2.5kg in 3 weeks is very easy, this post is not for you. I am a Weightlifter ( actually, the sport is called Olympic Weightlifting) and I do Olympic lifting atleast 2 days a week. The Olympic lifting routine doesn't help much in mass gain. The effective mass gain workout I did was only for 2 days a week. And I gained mass at the rate of about 100g a day. And I can still see my abs so a significant amount of the 2.7kg I gained was muscle.

Disclaimer:

I'm no professional bodybuilder. I'm still a beginner and that too an Olympic lifter. All the bodybuilding I do is only for our insti competition. Most stuff I talk about is from the research I do on the net, from what I see from others, what makes sense to me and what I learnt from my experience. I do all this out of my passion for the sport and not for money, so you can trust what I say.

This post isn't about what I did, a lot of info on my routine is in my previous post. This is for junta who go to the gym everyday and want to gain a lot of muscle and mass. That my routine worked for me is too obvious from the numbers I put. I see a lot of junta working out in the gym, with a couple of dumbbells, lifting them in every arbitrary angle they want to and looking into the mirror after every set, expecting their arms to grow by a couple of inches. Junta do a lot of crunches and look back in the mirror expecting a 6-pack. Fortunately, it doesn't work that way. When I started this blog I put in a lot of posts about how to workout, but I'm doing this again.

First, I'll write about 2 things that everyone should know about getting a ripped body, especially the abs. 

1. The abs
The abs, or abdominals, is a muscle group that every one has. There are two layers of fat above and under the muscle, called the subcutaneous and visceral fat. The abs can be seen only if the subcutaneous fat is reduced. When the body stores fat, it first start storing it over your abs. When you try to cut fat, first the fat deposited in all other parts of the body is last and finally fat over your abs starts decreasing. So, the only way to visible abs is fat loss. If you try doing a lot of crunches or leg raise, you only build the abs, which is the muscle inside. The size of the muscle grows, but the fat over it still remains. Your tummy gets bigger because of increased abs, but it doesn't get ripped because of the fat.

2. Fat loss
There are only 2 healthy ways to do this- 1. Diet control and 2. Cardio.
Diet control: Carbs and fat are used mostly as energy. When you don't use the calories you eat, the extra carbs and fat get stored as adipose tissue (which we call fat). Protein is mostly used for building muscle, though it is also used for producing energy. When you have higher protein content and lower carb content in your diet, the amount of unused carbs and fat will be lesser, hence less adipose tissue. The amount of protein consumed by the body as energy will be lesser than your protein intake and hence your muscle size either remains the same or grows. Fats found in oils, cheese,etc.. are useful for the body. Taking them is totally important, but you shouldn't take too much of them.
Cardio: When I say cardio, it means any endurance workout, anything that lasts continuously for more than 20 minutes or so. When the blood glucose in your body is used up, it turns to stored fat (the adipose tissue) and the stored protein (the muscle) for energy production. Blood glucose is exhausted only after you do cardio for a significant time, say 10 minutes. The rate at which fat is converted to glycogen is slow, hence you cannot keep jogging at a high speed. The body consumes a higher percentage of fat and a lower percentage of protein. If your only aim is to lose fat, like that over the abs, cardio is the best thing to do. But the side effect- muscle loss because of burning protein is always there, so it's not a good idea to do cardio if you're trying to build muscle. But this can be negated by eating protein (such as egg whites, meat, etc.. ) before and after workout.
You cannot lose fat and build muscle at the same time.


Now getting into the actually secrets of mass gain. To put it simply in a single line, it's the first line in this post. You've grown into what you are depending on your genetics, your diet and the lifestyle. The first thing is something you cannot help. The diet and lifestyle can be changed. If you want your muscles to grow, the only thing you can do is to make them grow. They should have no other option. This can be done in only one way, load them up to a point where the muscles know they cannot take that load unless they get bigger and stronger. So, everytime you go into the gym, you must lift more than what you lifted the last time. Even an increase of 1kg or 1 rep is sufficient, but the increase must be there, or else you're going no where. For mass gains, you need to do these 4 things:

1. Compound exercises: The almighty squat, the deadlift, bench press, military press, pushups, pullups, bar dips and barbell rows, all in proper form. No half squatting, no cheating in presses, no dancing in pullups. If you do it, you do it properly. Compounds involve more muscles at the same time since the weight has to be stabilized and pushed, and this induces a higher hormonal response which results in greater gains. Also, the entire system, joints and the bones also feel the weight. The movements are more natural as opposed to the stuff you do on the useless machines you find in the gym.

2. Rest and recovery: Just remember this. Workout for only 3-4 days a week, only 1 hour a day, only 4-6 exercises per session, 2-4 sets per exercise and only 5-12 reps per set. Sleep for atleast 8 hours a day.

3. Diet: The only way to gain mass is to eat a lot more. Eat a lot of 'healthy' food. No chips and pizzas and burgers. Eat healthy food, maintaining a high protein content. Never miss breakfast or lunch or dinner.

4. Intensity and progression: Don't work at your maximum intensity. You must go through a progression. If your max is 60kg bench press, start at around 50kg for 3 reps. The next session, go for 52kg of 3 reps, after that 54kg for 3 reps, keep going like this till you stall. Say you stall at 58kg, you could do only 2 reps. Then start again at 54kg or 55kg for 3 reps. Go for 2 kg or 2.5 kg more in the next session. Only when you keep progressing in each session, you can expect a regular gain.