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Stepping on stage at a bodybuilding competition is one of the most challenging, scary, and exhilarating things you can do. While the very act of getting on stage is a major accomplishment, the goal of competition is to win. So, if you are a personal trainer, gym instructor, bodybuilding coach, or simply a friend who is helping an athlete prepare for competition, you need a definitive game plan that covers every aspect of successful competition prep.
That’s what you’ll get with this article. I’ve been a personal trainer, gym owner, and bodybuilding coach for 35 years (that was back when Lee Haney was Mr. Olympia!). Over those decades I’ve prepared many athletes of both genders for competition. In the paragraphs to follow, I’ll lay out the exact process I use with the athletes I train to get them in peak condition on contest day.
For the purposes of this article, I will assume that your athlete will be entering a natural, drug-tested competition.
Here’s what we’ll cover:
- Your Role as a Bodybuilding Coach
- How to Know if an Athlete is Ready to Compete?
- How to Choose a Competition?
- Pre-Contest Diet
- Water, Sodium and Potassium Intake
- Pre-contest Training
- Posing
- 4 Weeks Out
- 3 Days Out
- Tanning
- Show Day
- Post Show Strategy
Your Role as a Bodybuilding Coach
More and more bodybuilders are taking on coaches to guide them to success in competition. Here’s what your role is in that position:
Accountability:
A bodybuilding coach keeps track of their clients’ fitness improvements, ensures that they are adhering to the customized plan, and motivates them to train consistently..
You’re there to help them stay motivated and get into the greatest shape possible so they can succeed in bodybuilding.
As a bodybuilding trainer, it’s important to maintain an impartial viewpoint that disregards any ongoing self-criticism that your client might experience. You are an impartial party, so you may assist them stay on track with their objectives by focusing on the fitness-related elements they might be ignoring.
Set objectives:
You’ll be in a position to create specific goals and targets for your client. These could include exercise routines, particular weights at particular times, dietary plans, the timing of nutrients, specialized workouts, and more.
Establish goals:
In accordance with your training, you’ll be able to establish goals for your client. These could include cardio routines, particular weights at particular times, dietary plans, the timing of nutrients, specialized workouts, and more.
How to Know if an Athlete is Ready to Compete?
The first question you need to answer with the athlete is what contest do they want to compete in. After all, you may not be ready for a state-wide contest but could be on track to do well at a local county competition. So, decide on the contest first and then analyze videos and pictures of the previous year’s winner and make a call as to whether your athlete has a shot.
It is important to note here that you also need to talk to the athlete about what their goal is in competing. Not everyone wants to compete in a bodybuilding show to win a trophy. For some people, it is a personal statement of accomplishment to simply stand on stage. There is nothing wrong with that.
A competitor may have the ‘worst’ physique onstage, yet may have made the most progress of anyone competing. So, if an athlete comes to you with the desire to compete in a competition for the experience, or as a major life accomplishment, like completing a marathon, don’t dismiss them because you know they won’t place. So long as you both go in with the same expectations, it can be a valuable experience for the athlete.
Because we are all different and genetics plays such a huge role in physical development, it is impossible to say how long you should be training before you’re ready to compete. You should start the athlete at a local or regional show. In general, he or she should be ready to do well after 2-3 years of consistent training.
Bodybuilding competition is a comparison of physiques to find the body that is the most symmetrically developed, muscular physique. The judges are also looking for the physique with the best genetically pleasing body. Factors that are largely determined by genetics are shoulder-to-waist ratio and calf development. While you can improve the shoulder to waist ratio to a degree, it is largely determined by the hip bones and clavicles. Similarly, some people just cannot develop big calves no matter how hard they train.
What to Look For in Your Athlete’s Physique
As the coach, you need to be able to analyze your athlete’s physique like a bodybuilding judge. Here’s a quick rundown of what you should be looking for with each part of the body:
Pecs — pec striations, separation between the pecs and front deltoids, upper, lower, and middle pecs, the split between the upper and lower pecs, the inner pecs along the sternum, the outer pecs where they insert under the deltoids, and the definition of the serratus.
Lats — the latissimus dorsi’s width and thickness, the length of the lats where they insert above the waist, the rhomboid and middle back’s detail and muscularity, the lower back’s spinal erectors, and the definition of the intercostals.
Deltoids — mass and thickness of the trapezius muscles; development and separation of the anterior, side, and posterior deltoids; separation of the rear and back delts from the traps.
Biceps — upper and lower biceps, width, length, and peak.
Triceps — development of all three heads of the triceps, thickness and length.
Forearms — development of both extensors and contractors; brachialis development at the elbow.
Waist — upper and lower ab development and definition; development of external obliques and separation between abs and obliques.
Quadriceps — mass and separation of all four heads of the quads, outer sweep,
lower quad insertion at the knee; development of the adductors at the inside of the
quad.
Hamstrings—development of both heads of the leg biceps, separation between the hamstrings and quadriceps; development and striations of the glutes and separation between hamstrings and glutes.
Calves—development of the underlying soleus muscle and the gastrocnemius
muscle that lies on top; calf size, length, and peak.
How to Choose a Competition?
As mentioned, you should start an athlete at a local show. Be realistic and start at a level that will allow the athlete to feel good about their accomplishment. There is no point in entering them in a competition in which they end up not doing well when you could have put them in another show that they were likely to have won.
When it comes to choosing a specific contest, I recommend only dealing with a sanctioning organization that has a reputation for fairness, and friendliness. A good example is the AAU (Amateur Athletic Union). It has a reputation for judging competitions on their merits and treating the athletes with respect (which cannot be said for some other organizations). They have reasonable entry fees for athletes and ticket prices.
The next question to consider is what category does the athlete fit into. The competition categories have evolved rapidly over the past few decades. Back in the 60s there was just bodybuilding for men. Then along came bodybuilding for women. Next came categories within bodybuilding, starting with Men’s Physique and then adding Classic Physique. There are weight categories within each of these divisions.
For women, there are now five divisions:
- Bodybuilding
- Figure
- Physique
- Fitness
- Bikini
To help you decide which division to enter your athlete into, here’s a quick overview of each category:
Men’s Bodybuilding
This is the most muscular division, with no weight limit in the open category. The most muscular, symmetrical, defined body that is presented the best will win.
Men’s Physique
This division was started in 2013 for guys who were not as muscular as open category bodybuilders, displaying more of an idealized beach body physique. Men pose in board shorts so there isn’t so much emphasis on leg development.
Men’s Classic Physique
Classic Physique seeks to find a happy medium between open bodybuilding and men’s physique. It was inspired by such classic physiques as that of Frank Zane in the 70s and Milos Sarcev in the 80s.
Women’s Bodybuilding
As with the men, this category is for those with the most muscularity. The judges will reward the competitors with the best balance of muscle mass, definition, symmetry, and presentation.
Women’s Figure
To do well in this category, a woman should have a good amount of muscularity, while not being too defined. Judges are looking for wide shoulders and a small waist.
Women’s Physique
Physique competitors are not as bulky as open bodybuilders, with the judges looking for shape, symmetry, proportion, and muscle definition. The presentation and poise of the athlete are also taken into account.
Women’s Fitness
Fitness competition judges a combination of a tight, defined, athletic body with strength and fitness as displayed through a fitness routine.
Women’s Bikini
This is the most popular division. The women are not overly muscular, with the emphasis being on a small waist, curves, and shapely legs.
Pre-Contest Diet
How far out you start the pre-contest diet depends on how much fat the athlete has got to lose. The options are generally 16 or 12 weeks out. This also depends on the athlete’s body type and genetics. An ectomorph will lose fat more easily than an endomorph. A large framed person might need as much as 24 weeks.
For the first show, this will be a matter of trial and error. That is why it is important, as a coach, to keep track of everything that you’re doing nutrition-wise. Record the foods, macros, and calories each day, take weekly scale and body fat measurements, and take pictures regularly. That way you will have a lot of reference material to draw on for the next competition.
Throughout the pre-contest diet period, the athlete should be in a caloric deficit state. That means that he will be taking in 500 fewer calories than he burns off each day. Use an online calculator to work out the BMR.
Let’s take a look at an example of a caloric and macronutrient breakdown for a 190-pound male athlete with a BMR of 2500 calories.
In order to preserve muscle mass while losing body fat, the athlete should consume 1.5 grams of protein per pound of body weight per day. So, if he weighs 190 lbs, he should be consuming 285 grams of protein.
There are four calories in every gram of protein. So, our 190-pound athlete will be consuming 1140 (285 x 4) calories from protein per day.
We can now subtract 1140 from our 2000 calorie total to get 860 calories remaining.
When it comes to carbs, I recommend taking in 150 grams of carbs per day, mainly from starchy and cruciferous vegetable sources. With four calories per gram of carbs, that adds to 600 calories.
We are now left with 260 calories per day. Those calories should come from healthy fats. Get them from coconut oil, almonds, egg yolks and avocado.
Your athlete should space his meals two to three hours apart for a total of five or six meals. They should all be about the same size.
Water, Sodium, and Potassium Intake
When it comes to water intake leading up to the contest, many people believe that you should reduce intake in order to hold less water and look more defined. The reality is that when you’re reducing your hydration, the body reacts by holding onto more water. It does this to avoid dehydration. That can make you look less defined.
The point here is that you should not tamper with your water intake leading up to a contest. Keep drinking around a gallon a day as you normally would. Any excess water will not be held onto – it will simply be excreted from the body.
I also advise against taking a diuretic leading up to the contest. Diuretics don’t discriminate as to where the water comes from – it could be from under the skin but it may also be from within the muscle – you have no control over that!
If it comes from the muscles, they will look smaller. Diuretics will also see you excreting electrolytes. This could lead to muscle cramping.
There have been some infamous incidents where pro bodybuilders have totally cramped up on stage as a result of taking diuretics. At the 1994 Arnold Classic, Paul Dillet had to be carried offstage like a statue, unable to move a muscle. He was lucky not to have died!
Sodium is kept more in the skin, while potassium is kept more in the muscle cell. So, I recommend having your athlete cut out salt six days before the competition. At the same time, he should start taking a 99 mg potassium capsule daily. The result of this will be that there will be more water in the muscle and less under the skin.
Seven days before the show, you should drop your carb intake to zero. At this stage, you will only be eating protein and a small amount of fat. This will deplete your muscles of glycogen. Then, three days out you are ready for supercompensation. Begin loading up on such carbs as rice and potatoes.
You will now be getting an oversupply of glycogen into the muscle cells. Your body will overstore the glycogen. A single gram of glycogen holds four grams of water. This will contribute to the swelling of the muscles and the tightness of the skin.
The exact number of days before the show that you should cut carbs and then overcompensate is a matter of experimentation. If the athlete looks better the day after the show (as often happens), it is a sign that you should have stepped back a day in each case, starting the zero carb eight days out and the loading four days out. Often this mis-timing is due to the athlete’s stress levels on the day. This is another reason to keep accurate records of everything you’re doing for future reference.
Pre-contest Training
The contest preparation process begins with being methodical and focused on the workouts. Ensure that the athlete isn’t missing out on any body parts, such as the serratus or erector spinae.
Workouts up to a week before the show should be similar to your off-season training routine. Here are seven extras considerations during this phase:
1. Concentrate even more intensely on isolating muscles during training.
2. Use increased intensity training techniques and a greater range of workouts.
3. Intensify the training by adding more sets and heavier weights.
4. Switch up the speed of the workouts by performing supersets and tri sets.
6. In the gym, the athlete should constantly pose and flex in between sets.
7. Pair the athlete with a training partner who is slightly ahead of him in terms of strength and development.
What About Pre-contest Cardio?
There is quite a bit of debate about whether you should do cardio before a workout to get as ripped as possible. While both weight training and cardio both burn glycogen and fat for energy, they do so in different ratios. A weight training workout will typically burn about 70% glycogen and 30% fat, while a cardio session will reverse that to 70% fat and 30% glycogen.
Our bodies adapt differently to cardio exercise. Ectomorphs will adapt more quickly to it, meaning that they will not burn as many calories. An endomorph will get leaner with aerobic exercise. So, you will have to experiment to see whether cardio is beneficial for your athlete. For the first contest, I recommend having the athlete do high-intensity interval training, alternating one minute fast and one minute slow for 20-30 minutes. This should be done during the last six weeks leading up to the show.
As the coach, you should also ensure that your athlete is getting 7-8 hours of sleep every night. If not, burnout is likely to occur.
Posing
Back in the 70 and 80s, posing was judged and formed part of the final score of the athlete. Today it isn’t. But that doesn’t mean it’s not important. Posing is the means by which the athlete presents the results of their hard work to the judges.
So, how do you do it well?
As a coach, you need to understand that everyone has different strengths and weaknesses and you need to work with your athlete to accentuate the positives and hide the negatives. You need to teach your athlete the mandatory poses with the nuances to accentuate their strengths. For example, the side chest pose is often done nowadays with the athlete in a more crouched position than in former times. This accentuates the thickness and striations in the side quads. So, if that is a strength for your athlete, teach him to do the side chest in a low position. But, if he doesn’t have much to offer in the way of quad thickness, have him do the pose in a more upright position.
The transitions between the poses are also critical. Your athlete should look good every second that he’s on stage. There have been many infamous bubble gut pictures taken on the Mr Olympia stage where top pros look as if they are about to give birth. That’s because the photo was snapped between poses when they were breathing out. That should not happen to your athlete.
Teach your athlete to learn how a pose feels, rather than just how it looks in the mirror. On stage, there is no mirror to provide feedback. So he needs to know what it feels like when his elbows and forearms are angled ideally and when his abs are tensed. To achieve this, have him pose in front of the mirror with his eyes open until you both agree that the pose looks right. Then have him duplicate the pose with eyes closed, going by feel.
Your athlete’s posing should be a reflection of their personality, without being too over the top. So, if your athlete is the type of person who moves with a certain amount of pizzazz, perhaps with flowing arm motions, they should show that in their transitions. You do not, however, want them to do this if it is not their natural way of movement. If they do, it will come off looking stiff and awkward. Neither should he copy someone else’s poses because he thinks they look cool.
Posing consists of the mandatories and a free posing routine set to music. During the free posing round, branch out beyond the mandatories; the judges have already seen them. This is the opportunity to show the judges and the audience something they haven’t yet seen.
To find poses for your athlete, you should watch videos of other bodybuilders who have a similar body type. Don’t pore over videos of a mesomorph if your guy is an ectomorph. When you find poses you like, think about how they’d look on your athlete. Then try them out in front of the mirror. If they work, keep them, if not go back to the drawing board.
Over the course of a 60 seconds routine, the athlete should hit 15-20 poses. At least 10 of them should be variations of the mandatories. You can do this by doing ab crunches with the torso in an S shape, showing the obliques more. If your athlete has more of a classic Frank Zane physique, have them do a crab pose with their hands on their hips. This will bring out more definition.
Whatever pose the athlete is doing, he should always be conscious of flexing his quads, glutes and hamstrings.
The posing in the free posing round should be synchronized to the music. The two should complement one another. Choose a piece of music that is a natural fit for your style. It then needs to be choreographed so that you are hitting the pose on a beat and moving with the music.
The first pose should make a dramatic statement. It should tell the audience. ‘Here I am.’ So, begin with the athlete’s best pose. Don’t have them transition directly from front to back and then back to front. It is better to hit a couple of front poses, then do a side pose before naturally transitioning to a back pose.
Rather than shuffling around, the foot position on one pose should set the athlete up for the foot position on the next pose. That will help the routine to flow more gracefully. The athlete needs to practice the routine so much so that he never looks awkward or stumbles, especially when rising up from a kneeling pose.
The athlete should end with a strong pose.
4 Weeks Out
There is a lot of debate about how heavy you should train leading up to a show. The reality is that you can train heavy right up to the day of the show. The belief that you should be doing compound moves in the off season and then switch to isolation moves leading up to a contest is completely off base. It’s based on the false belief that higher reps create definition, which they do not. That will only come about from a calorie deficit.
You cannot choose to be leaner in one area than another. That is a result of genetics. Back in the 80s Rich Gaspari set a new standard in glute development. But that wasn’t due to how he trained his glutes. It was because he was genetically predisposed to losing body fat in that area of his body.
If you’re not happy with a body part in proportion to the other muscles four weeks out, there’s not really anything you can do to balance it within that window. You will have to work on displaying your body in such a way through posing to accentuate your strengths and hide your weaknesses.
Four weeks out you should have all the muscle you need on contest day. Your focus now should be on getting as lean as possible.
3 Days Out
I recommend that your athlete stops working out three days before the show. There is no fear of any loss of muscle mass or definition unless he doesn’t train for closer to two weeks. You may get some panicked resistance from the athlete, thinking that he’s got to keep training right up to the moment of the show, but that is simply not the case.
The key thing is for the athlete to step on stage as fresh as possible. That means he should be normalizing his sleep/rest pattern so as to get as much recovery as possible from his training in the days leading up to the show.
The day before the show, the athlete can have a light workout to get the blood pumping through the muscles.
In those last few days, the athlete should be regularly flexing the muscles in the poses of his routine so that the body is accustomed to that movement and not liable to cramp up.
Tanning
The lights on a bodybuilding stage are very bright. So, when it comes to tanning you need to account for this. A tan that looks too dark off-stage will look a lot better under stage lights. Conversely, a person who is under-tanned will look smaller, and less defined on stage.
Your goal with tanning should be that the physique is dark enough to optimally display the muscles onstage under artificial light. I recommend a combination of natural and applied tan. Lie under the sun for 15 minutes on each side, 5-6 days per week leading up to the contest. By getting as much natural tan as you can before competition day, the result when you add artificial tan will look far more natural.
A badly applied tan can be an on-stage killer, so it is worth it to hire an experienced tan applicator. This person will know how to apply the tan evenly, making sure that the elbows and knees don’t get too dark. You don’t want anything about the tan to distract from the physique.
You should also apply baby oil to the athlete’s physique so that the muscles don’t look flat. Don’t overdo it or the oil will combine with sweat on stage to make the athlete look too shiny.
Show Day
Make sure that the athlete eats a good meal the night before the show. Stay away from meat as the stomach has to work harder to digest it. Fish, chicken, and eggs are relatively easy for the body to digest. You should also be taking in some high-glycemic carbs and healthy fats.
When you get up on the morning of the contest, give your athlete a breakfast of eggs and toast. Put some butter on the toast to supply fats. Just serve a moderate amount – maybe 2-3 eggs and a couple of slices of toast.
Now make your way to the competition venue and go through the checking in process. Your athlete will then be given his competitor number and will hand over his music on a USB stick. They will probably be asked if the athlete wants the music to start when they get out on stage or beforehand. This is something you should have discussed and made a decision on. In my experience, having them start the music when the athlete is actually in the middle of the stage is the safest way as the music man is less likely to muck it up.
Your athlete will then probably be given a schedule where you’ll both be able to see where his contest appears on the schedule and how long he’ll have before going on stage. It is more than likely that he will have to wait around for several hours. You should be prepared for that eventuality by having some food prepared for him.
What the athlete eats backstage is a matter of personal preference. It should be something that is high in protein to fill him up quickly and also contains a bit of fat and carbs. Hard-boiled eggs, peanut butter sandwiches, rice cakes, and protein bars are all good options.
There will be an area backstage containing weight for the athletes to pump up. This is designed to engorge the muscles with blood to pump them up and bring out the vascularity of the muscles. The athlete needs to find the balance here. He doesn’t want to do so much that he exhausts himself or gets all sweaty. Five to ten minutes of relatively light weights and high reps on dumbbell chest presses, curls, shoulder presses, and push-ups is about right.
Just before your athlete’s division appears onstage, the backstage expediter will line the competitors up in numerical order. On a signal, they will all march out onto the stage. This will be quite a nerve-racking experience for your athlete, especially if it is his first contest; so you should prepare him for it.
The first part of the competition is the pre-judging. This is usually done without an audience. This allows the judges to take their time looking at the competitors without the audience getting bored. Your athlete should expect to get moved around in the order of competitors and compared with different people in the mandatory pose that the head judge calls out.
When the pre-judging is done, your athlete will have a few more hours to kill before the finals show. You need to prepare your athlete for the fact that when he next appears onstage the audience lights are going to be off and all the stage lights are going to be on. That will be a different experience than during the pre-judging. There will be a lot more light shining in his eyes and he probably won’t be able to see into the audience.
The show can drag on for a long time depending on how many competitors and divisions there are. Make sure that you have enough food, water, and entertainment devices to keep your athlete from going stir-crazy during the many hours of waiting.
Post-Show Strategy
After the show, you and the athlete should gather as much information as you can and reflect on the experience. You could encourage your athlete to approach a judge and ask what they need to work on to improve. However, the reality is that, after a long day of judging and now seeing you in clothes, the judge probably won’t even remember what the athlete looked like on stage.
You should take plenty of pictures and videos of the athlete after the show. They will be in their peak condition and so you need to record their achievement. Encourage the athlete to get some professional studies photos to commemorate the accomplishment.
The more photos you take of the athlete, the more points of reference and comparison you will have for future contest preparation.
Your athlete will be totally exhausted after the show. He will be dehydrated, have low electrolytes, minimum blood glucose levels, and be mentally fatigued. It is appropriate for the athlete to reward himself with some form of binge eating. In fact, the thought of junk food is likely to have been a driving motivator for him over the past few days.
As the athlete’s coach, it is your job to guide him to binge smartly. If you let him go crazy at the buffet table, it could negate all of the hard work that the two of you have been doing over the last three months.
In the 24 hours following the contest, you should allow the athlete to eat whatever they want. Let them fill up on junk food. But only for a day. After that, they should focus on protein and vegetables. If you allow the athlete to keep eating junk for more than a day, they are likely to develop an addiction-like reliance on it. That’s because, post-contest, the body is in a pretty vulnerable state.
From the second day of the competition onward, get the athlete back to drinking a gallon of water per day. This will help to fill them up while rehydrating and preventing bloating. Over the course of the week post-competition, you should transition the athlete back to how they were eating four weeks before the show. They should be eating six to eight smaller meals per day spaced 2-3 hours apart.
It is normal for an athlete to regain weight post-contest. But a man should not put on more than 20 pounds post-show (10 pounds for a woman).
Summary
In this article, I’ve laid out a comprehensive guide to preparing an athlete for a bodybuilding competition. If you want to take your knowledge to the next level, consider gaining a certification as a bodybuilding specialist through the ISSA.
