Bodypower 2012

Are you coming? Now, in the UK the model by which all other bodybuilding lifestyle expos compare. Numbers, year on year, have grown and with the added extra day, Friday, included I'd expect to see some 40000 over the three days (10k up on last year). In similar set ups industry has focused on the Friday and the retail side on the weekend.

These events are, for me (even with me working there), great fun. They really are what you make of them. So some guys turn up in their tight MMA style shirts, all skin tight on their arms and pecs... so what they're having fun!

The key is to come in and interact. So try testing your strength, pose with model or a pro, try your luck on the challenges and get a full to the brim goody bag! 

I've already said I'm working there but here's a reminder. Come and say hi on the Ultimate Grip stand. I'm piss poor at names so introduce yourselves!!

Sunday 13th May workout

Saturday
Volume work with HG300 followed by Argos catalogue tearing practise and finished with nail bending

Sunday
early for me @ Beefs Gym
Leg press
f/plate x 20 reps, 120-kilos x 20 reps, 240-kilos x 20 reps, 360-kilos x 20 reps, 500-kilos x 10 reps

Leg ext
35-kilos x 15 reps, 80-kilos x 15 reps, 120-kilos / stack 2 x 11 reps

s/s

Leg Curls
35-kilos x 12 reps, 50-kilos x 12 reps, 75-kilos x 9 reps

R/W/Curl
7.5-kilos x 12 reps, 12.5-kilos x 10 reps, 20-kilos x L9/R10 d/s 10-kilos x 10 reps @

Matrix Nutrition + Supplement Centre

In as short as possible = one and the same. Nowt wrong with that. But first the info:

The Matrix Nutrition website gives their address: 

Matrix Nutrition
Unit K3, Snowdon Road,
St Annes,
Lancashire,

FY8 3DP

The IPO office gives the address as the same and states that the proprietor owns The Supplement Centre trademark as well. It's the same address and owner:

Adam Latham
Unit K3 Snowdon Road, Lytham St. Annes, Lancashire, FY8 3DP

I'm told that if you ask SC claims to be a distributor. Hmm, of your own products. Nowt wrong with that but it does sound vague.

Anyway, lets look at the product.

One thing which confuses me is the Glutamic acid content. In both the product description and nutritional breakdown it states that it contains (approx) 24g per 100g of protein. Which would be very nice. Except that a quick look at the ingredient list thus:

Confirmation of key ingredients: Whey Protein Isolate, Whey Protein Concentrate (WPC80), Micellar Casein, Whole Milk Protein, Pea Protein Isolate, Natural and Natural Identical Flavouring, Natural Colouring, Stabilisers (Citric Acid, Malic Acid) Contains Sweetener. Sucralose. Protein analysis declared as dry matter, this is determined in the absence off water which may compromise up to 6%

Shows (in bold as per me) no protein which contains more than 19.1 percent as Glutamic acid (info taken from a rival company's PDF test results). The highest source listed is the Whole Milk Protein. Oh and that's the exact same ingredient as Micellar Casein. They are one and the same. 

The protein content is listed as 80% (80g per 100) with the WPI being (as per the standard for these things) 90+, the WPC, as listed, 80. The WMP/MC is usually around 90 and the pea protein around 84%. Throw in flavours etc and I can see the drop off of a few percent - no problem. 

It's the use of the 'key' word which makes me ask was anything else not listed? Clarity, as always is 'key' here. Companies should list what's in their products and if it varies say so and use * along with some blurb to say why.

Dear supplement company owners please get your labels right

In the past I wrote on how it has been a little frustrating for me when, on occasion, I see what looks like a daft error from an otherwise good to go supplement company on their product labels. I've added that I'd like some basic nutrition knowledge from those purporting to sell products of some nutritional value.

Previously we saw what amounted to some very good sales people answering the helplines & customer service desks at pretty big nutritional companies. In particular Bill Phillip's EAS as was (not now he's sold it on some years back). As a potential customer I'd have wanted to know that the person was a little more on the ball than just reading from the catalogue and spouting the company line.

Equally, while it's not 'knock-able' to be able to say that an owner of said company is great at marketing, awesome at getting staff and so on - and so a good business man and company owner, yet knows less than useful amounts on his product line. Of course running the ship, a la a captain, does not require you to know how to service an engine, fix a sail and so on. Yet most bodybuilding supplement companies are started and employ people with a passion for the sport who they are servicing with their products.

I'd also like to add that I am by NO MEANS any sort of expert. I do however, have a PC with access to a shed load of info and SOME EXPERIENCE. My memory, especially as I get older and or more busy, is not to be relied on so I'll keep files, refer to references and the like. Two minutes of searching via Google nearly always throws up a snippet of info I'll need. If it's a defining bit then copy, paste and save = job done.

As an example of experience myself, my then business partner and a buddy of ours had on one occasion popped down to a company which we were looking to get flavoured Whey Proteins with. We do the usual hellos, drink a welcoming coffee and so on then pop into their developing kitchen / lab. I'd last seen something like it when I worked (many years ago) with the Quality Control and development team at the now defunct Hygrade Meats of Peckham.

We sampled various concoctions at differing levels. They spoke, if briefly, of how some flavours are very hard to mimic (butters for example) talking about biscuit flavour, butterscotch, mint and so on. The high level of flavouring consumption as well as finishing off a pint of a pre-made mix (cos I was hungry) left me farting for England. While there our buddy spotted, as did I, some samples being made up for another company. A mental note was made. They probably shouldn't have left it out (perhaps it was there deliberately for some reason).

Anyway, all those years at Hygrades, more of using supplements and then the added experience of trying to market and sell our own products leads me to be bale to, if not with a degree or certificate, to at least spot what seem like schoolboy errors. 

If, for example, I know that 99% of artificial flavourings are simply chemical mixes with zero fibre content and that the same can be said of most protein powders then when, as was pointed out to me, I see a product apparently coming back with a test result (on the companies own website so they are not being sly by hiding said info) with a 7+ percent fibre content one asks why? It might be a lab error - the decimal point moved. One the main nutritional panel it states 210mg of fibre - not high at all. But on the ILS lab report it says 7%. Now in some lab tests the test itself is done separately for each bit of info and for others it's 1 test for several. Hence some test results are averaged out for the size of the sample (lets use 100g as an average). 

If the fibre content is 7-percent then that's not 210mg but 2.1g or 2100mg. If it was 0.7% that'd be the 210mg. Schoolboy error see? As would be using a lot of cocoa powder in a chocolate protein product and then using the same info on all the flavours. Even, as has been said, giving the lowest result, so as to show better results if the products are tested outside the company's lab of choice by an independent it would seem better, if only in my opinion, to give accurate results.

In the example given it seems to suggest a fibre content of 7% on a toffee flavoured whey protein. It's possible but very unlikely to contain, if any, fibre and having said it does, as per an ILS test, one asks how? 

This then results in no holes to pick at. Given the work being done by many concerned consumers and by the businessmen themselves in a touch market during a recession having an excuse to doubt a product is not going to be good. I completely understand that if said company has, as has been claimed (I've no reason to doubt it), many hundreds if not thousands of products lines it can be hard to keep track of everything being sold nutritionally but I suggested two things which are, I hope, useful.

1) Any product developed in house and sold under the company's own label should, one might hope, be one of the few that they, said company, know everything about and 
2) Just asking for and keeping copies of ALL nutritional info on each product as added to the 100-1000 product line. Give one person responsibility to check over said lines (don't add 20 a week otherwise he'll never catch up!!) and produce an in-house file for ALL working there, esp customer service, to refer to. An idiots guide if you will to Product X. 


Simples.


Finally, if at all unsure just hang fire and bollock the person who developed the product or does the test or prepped the info for you so you, company owner, don't look daft when questioned by a simple gym bunny... with access to google.

Friday 11th May 2012. Last Rolling Thunder workout before Bodypower

Friday
The mind set was that this is one of the last few proper sessions I'll get in over the next 3 weeks and one of the very last before Bodypower - more so for the Rolling Thunder event.

CG Bench Press
bar  x 12 reps, 60-kilos x 8 reps, 80-kilos x 8 reps, 112.5-kilos x 6 reps - d/s 60-kilos x 15 reps = pump
 
LPD
75-kilos x 8 reps, 95-kilos x 8 reps, 125-kilos x 7 rep - d/s 60-kilos x 8 hard pumping reps

DODL
60-kilos x 8 reps, 100-kilos x 6 reps, 140-kilos x 3 reps, 180-kilos x 3 reps, 200-kilos x dizzy/stopped/failed

RT
B/H: 80-kilos x 6 reps @, 100-kilos x 3 reps @, 115-kilos x 1 rep @, 120-kilos x 1 rep @, 130-kilos x 1 rep @ (nice for left hand). 140-kilos x F (right only), dropped to 100-kilos x 8 reps @ (was more there but stopped).

Thursday 10th May 2012 workout +

Thursday

Sent of a shed load of bumpf to Muscletalks James regarding the protein scandal yesterday. 

Spent sometime this morning sorting out stuff for the 3 working weekends coming up.

Had a crack at a couple of Argos catalogs - did them but need more speed and flare.

V/Gripper

Could have been better.

Finished with HG300 for a few higher than usual rep sets

L/H: 1, 6, 6, 6 reps - all no set

R/H: 1, 8, 8, 8 reps - al no set

Rolling Thunder at the Bodypower 2012 expo

Hi all, as per last year there will be a pro/am Rolling Thunder event following the strongman competitions on Sunday.

The following was taken from the Bodypower Expo pages:
Sunday @ 2.30*

• Sign up & ref briefing for Amateur Rolling Thunder.
• Followed By: Amateur Rolling Thunder.
• Sign up & briefing for Pro Rolling Thunder
• Pro Rolling Thunder. Last man standing**

** Mark Felix will attempt to break his own world record 301lbs, along with other pros that have been made aware of this competition.

Will you have a go at the amateurs event? Last year 20+ competitors did and in front of between 400 and 600. Feedback from the expo organisers was good and the crowd liked it. the winning weight last year, from memory, was around 90-kilos. Can you better this. In the pro event Mark pulled 123-kilos on an 2011 handle and Brian Shaw and myself, Steve Gardener, tied with 118-kilos. Brian hurt his bicep at the Arnold... will he compete, can I beat him? It should be fun - I must make a note not to overdo al the lifting I'll be doing on the Ultimate Grip stand (come and say hi). 

*subject to running order not changing, alterations etc.