A couple of weeks ago, I was talking to Brian Carroll about his epic man lust, and some of the stuff he was doing with his nutrition. Man lust aside, I noticed from talking to him via text and phone, and stalking him on Facebook, that he was all about his nutrition and stuff like that now, and how he was getting stronger. Also saw the pictures he would post every so often showing him getting leaner, but not losing weight on the scale. He also told me that he wasn’t really counting calories, paying attention to macros, or anything else that pretty people spend their time worrying about. Stay away from carbohydrates during the day, and go wild at night. Eat whatever you want after you train. Sounds like a horse that I can hitch my wagon too. Eating like total shit is a HUGE past time of mine.

After about 5762987 trillion text messages and half as many emails back and forth between Kiefer and myself, we came up with a plan. For those of you who are unaware of Kiefer, he has a Masters degree in Physics. Attention to detail is the name of the game. This is, in parts, VERY simple. It also requires a bit of reading of his blog on my part, which is fine, and a bit of application knowledge on my part, which is also fine. I work at a gym, and lift weights and do stuff. Im not going to completely outline it, but some changes we made, things we added in, and other things we dropped follow

1. Quit eating breakfast and start drinking coffee. The breakfast part was easy. My first meal was usually anywhere from 5-7 hours after I woke up in the morning. Yes. 5-7 hours. Apparently I was getting jacked without even realizing, and to that end, caring. I just want to be strong as fuck. Should I happen to look good and smoking hot chicks wanna bang me? I’m cool with that too. The coffee was MUCH more difficult. I HATE coffee. I don’t know how you sick fucks drink it. I really don’t. Kiefer and my girlfriend BOTH swear it is some sweet nectar from the gods, however I thought, and still think, it tastes like piss. From the Gods, perhaps, but its still terrible. I usually managed to ALWAYS burn myself with it too, and I just have a general disdain for warm drinks in general. Tea sucks too. Claire hooked me up though, and we defeated the heat with a coffee cup in the freezer, handfuls of ice cubes, and the pot its self in the freezer. As for the taste, heavy cream and some Splenda are nice.
2. Added in leucine to everything. Apparently the stuff is pretty amazing. I know Shelby and Justin Harris have been firing off and raving about it for years, and I used it sometimes, but was woefully inconsistent with it. I’m now finding out that I spent all of that time pissing up a rope, as it seems to definitely be helping me get jacked and swole, brah.
3. Added some supplements at every meal. Now, in addition to what amounts to normal food, I eat a scoop of Anaconda or Mag 10, leucine, and low carb Metabolic Drive. All of these are Biotest supplements by the way. Then, I eat whatever the hell I want. Usually a sammich. My favorite food group. Tastes like amazing. A word to the wise. DO NOT MIX ALL OF THIS TOGETHER. It tastes like DEATH. I would rather drink hot black coffee than hydrolyzed casein. It’s seriously awful. Do like the bottle says, and mix it alone with the flavor stuff. It’s a million times better, and you don’t end up vomiting it into the trashcan like some washed up fitness bunny.
4. Kept the Gangster Anaconda protocol the same. It actually works VERY well with Kiefers’ system. This is a plus for me. Did I mention I eat like total shit after I train?
5. Do some walking around or random sprinting on the treadmill. Also do some prowler work. This will piss all of you off: if I run on the treadmill, I wear Vibram Five Fingers or I do it barefoot! My hips, knees, ankles and lower back also feel like a million bucks all of the time. Feel free to express your hatred for me taking part in a “fitness trend” and feeling awesome in the comment section below. I can also run for at least 60 seconds at a 6 minute a mile pace. This is infinitely better for me as a person than dragging a sled like a mindless idiot back and forth. Both help with heart attack aversion.
6. EAT LIKE TOTAL SHIT AT NIGHT. This is the best part. It wasn’t really a change (Ask Wendler), but how fucking awesome is this? Seriously? Its like a sore pecker. You just cant beat it. Ice cream? Pizza? Pop by the gallon? M&Ms? I eat all of this shit, from about 1030 at night until I fall asleep at 3-4am. Ill give you an example of what I ate last night. I could probably produce a receipt for all of this stuff, but really don’t care if you believe or not that much.

Foot long from Subway with a bag of Doritos, big bag of peanut M&Ms, 20oz bottle of pepsi, and a 4 gallon can of monster. Made it back to Wendlers house and ate some of his M&Ms and 2 of his Klondike bars. Then I drank 2 cans of pepsi, ate some more M&Ms, had 2 scoops of protein powder, and went to bed. Whats not to love? My pancreas absolutely hates me, but in this day and age, whose doesn’t? Really? Shelby, put your hand down.

Also, Ive been having a hard time forcing food during the day. I might eat 1-2 times before I train, 3 at most. Kiefer added a super gangster shake that has a ton of stuff in it. Going to start with it probably on Monday, as I plan on consuming more calories than I should all weekend. ALL HAIL NACHOS!

Obviously, it is more involved than this, but, its Kiefers stuff, not mine, and I’m not going to give it to you. He might, if you ask him nice, and paypal him some cash.  I will say that you can pick up a ton of it from his blog at http://www.dangerouslyhardcore.com , and for those of you who are interested, his blog definitely has the information you will need to get started on your journey to be as awesome as I am.

Monster Milk by Cytosport

This is the first of what hopefully becomes a list of reviews. There are two reasons that I do this. The first one is for my personal training clients. I have a lot of younger athletes that come in, and, unfortunately, kids are seriously swayed by the advertising they see. They ask me all the time my thoughts and input on a HUGE range of supplements. Huge! It also happens that the same kids that I am training are also asking about a product they saw in a magazine. The second part of this is purely selfish. For whatever reason, as long as I have been lifting weights, I have had an almost obscene obsession with supplements. My views on them have changed quite a bit, but I am still really interested in the industry. Sometimes they pan out, sometime they dont.

I bought this Muscle Milk at the GNC in the mall here in town. But wait, Jason, you hate GNC! You’re right, I do. I was in a pinch, and didn’t have the days to wait for some shipping. Also had some stuff coming from another company already. The Monster Milk was “On Sale” for 35 bucks for 2 pounds. This was the cheapest that they had in the store. And now, I know why. At least I think I do. It was kind of surprising, as I remember being a fan of the original Muscle Milk.

Individual product specs aside, there were some things that I HATED about this, and the reason I give it the review that I am. First, and for nearly everyone, was the taste. While the label promised it would “taste like a REAL milkshake” I fund the opposite to be true, unless you are into gasoline flavored milkshakes. okay, i did use a bit of exaggeration here, its not quirte gasonline, but it is chemical. I don’t know specifically WHAT caused this taste, I think it was the MCTs in it, but it was an overpowering chemical taste. Absolutely awful. Wondering if it was just my palate, I mixed it a few different ways. I used milk, and I used water. Used a lot and a little od both of them. I used more powder, and I used less. Every time, the same result. Sweet flavor dominated by a nasty chemical taste.

Mixability was also a big issue with Monster Milk. Monster Milk was actually able to defeat my Blender Bottle. This is a first, ever, and I have had these blender bottles for almost 4 years. I seriously think that these could blend raw meat. They’re awesome. That being said, Monster Milk showed them who was boss. I tried using room temp water, hoping that would improve its ability to mix up. Nope. No change. I even sat and shook one shaker cup full of the stuff for literally 3 minutes. STILL had clumps. In this day and age of instantized proteins, this is ridiculous. I thought maybe it was due to the product being compressed inside the scoop, so I just limp wristed a scoopful. Same thing. CLUMPS.

The nutrient profile was the one redeeming factor in my eyes. 25 grams of good protein a scoop, and only 2 grams of sugar. Actually has fiber in it too, which was nice. That’s about it though. I eat well enough and with enough variety I dont worry about the vitamin or mineral content of the product. It also has aminogen in it, which is an enzyme that helps digest protein. This is always nice, especially if you are eating TONS of protein. Muscle Milk also contains Creatine in the form of Kre Alkalyn. The amount per serving is only a gram though, so I dont think it would really make a noticable difference.

All in all, I was pretty disappointed in this supplement, and the purchase in general. I know that it was only 35 bucks, but still. This product just didnt do anything for me, outside of having an impressive label. All told, however, I wouldnt recommend this to anyone. The taste and mixability were bad, and I just cant justify dropping another 35-60 bucks to find out if i just got “a bad can.” Sorry Cytosport. Only going to get me once.