Jamie Eason's LiveFit Trainer - Your 12-Week Transformation Plan!

Jamie Eason's LiveFit Trainer - Your 12-Week Transformation Plan!
As a fitness professional and Bodybuilding.com spokesmodel, I'm often asked, "How do I get in shape? How can I improve my muscle tone? How can I look more like you?!" I always try to offer answers and some encouragement, and I've received so much inspiration back in return from all of you. But as much as I love those opportunities to help people transform, they're one-on-one interactions. Now, to answer the thousands of questions I've received over the years—and to reach those of you I would never otherwise meet—I've come up with one great program: my 12-week trainer. Your transformation guide; our partnership in fitness. Who is this program for? Anyone of any age, of any sex, and from any walk of life. Including you. It'll produce great results and lead to lasting success for everyone. You're all starting from a unique place; no one has perfectly matched genetics, metabolism, hormones and lifestyles. But the beauty of this program is that you start at your own level and work at your own pace. Everyone's body is different, but the same training, diet, and supplement principles work for nearly everyone. Jamie Eason's LiveFit Trainer Your 12-Week Transformation Plan! Watch The Video - 05:40 LiveFit with Jamie Eason Writing, modeling, public appearances, and speaking engagements make up my full-time job. It's a busy and unpredictable lifestyle, but I wouldn't have it any other way! I'm thankful for the opportunity to share everything I've learned about training, nutrition, and supplementation over the years in this 12-week program. LiveFit means what it says—adopting a healthy and fit lifestyle. 3 LiveFit Phases Free Tools To LiveFit! LiveFit A 3-Phase Approach The LiveFit trainer is a simple 3-phase program for transforming your body and your life in 12 short weeks. My science-based approach combines exercise, nutrition, and supplementation for results that far exceed what any of those tools could produce on their own. Better yet, you'll leave this program knowing how to pursue the fit lifestyle even without my guidance! Apply This Program In BodySpace Apply This Program in BodySpace Daily Programs For Phase 2 Here's an introduction to the Phase 2 workouts you'll be following. Each day has a printable guide complete with that day's workout, meal plan, or both: Take It To The Next Level In Phase 2 Now that you've finished Phase 1, healthy eating, working out, and taking the right supplements should be a regular part of your daily routine. Hopefully your commitment is revealing positive change and increased energy. As this phase comes to a close, prepare yourself for intense muscle-building in Phase 2 and the introduction of cardio, to kick-start the fat-burning. Training: Week 5 & 6 Moving into Phase 2, the focus continues to be building muscle, courtesy of a 6-day workout split. The repetitions in this phase fall between 8 and 10, with the exception of certain exercises, where really taxing the muscle requires more volume. Work at 85 percent of your maximum effort, which means your last rep in each set should be a struggle but still doable. Don't sacrifice form for strength, and ask for a spot as you progressively lift heavier weight. Safety is key! Lifting heavier means you'll need longer rest periods between sets. For some exercises, you'll feel ready to continue after one minute; other exercises might require two. Regardless, the rest period should be long enough to allow you to tackle each set with as much exertion as possible. The one exception is when you encounter exercises grouped as a superset. This means performing an exercise set immediately after a different exercise set with nearly no rest taken between exercises (sets)—only enough to position yourself for the second exercise. While we're on the topic of definitions, you'll also need to know what "lifting to failure" means. On your last set of an exercise, instead of lifting to a set number (rep), continuing to lift until the muscle is fatigued and another full rep can't be performed. Though lifting heavier will increase your heart rate, at this point in the program, we will begin to incorporate 4 days of medium-intensity cardio, done in 30-minute increments. Forgoing the cardio in the first phase allowed your body to use all of the "clean" calories it consumed for everyday activities and building muscle. By introducing medium-intensity cardio in Phase 2, we'll begin to facilitate fat burning, while minimizing the risk of losing any hard-earned muscle. Training: Week 7 & 8 These are your last two weeks to achieve as much muscle gain as possible. So work it! These workouts are intense—you should use as much weight as you can safely muster. Instead of consisting of 3 sets, many of these exercises will increase to 4, albeit with fewer repetitions (e.g., 4 sets of 8 reps). As during the last few weeks, you'll be incorporating supersets and taking your sets to failure. With maximum exertion required, you might need to rest longer between sets. Two or three minutes should suffice for most of you. Your workouts for these weeks might take longer to execute with the increased volume and rest time. If you feel like you need to, reduce the outlined 4 days of 30-minute-cardio sessions to just three. Once we move into the final and third stage, the workouts will shift from an emphasis on weight training to a greater emphasis on fat burning and cardio. Nutrition: Weeks 5-8 Because you're doing even more activity during this phase, you might find yourself becoming hungrier. No worries. Eat up, as long as you make healthy selections! You need more fuel, and your Phase 2 nutrition plan will accommodate your body's newly developing needs. You'll still be eating a meal or snack every 2-3 hours, focusing on healthy food choices rather than the easy grab-and-go appeal of fast food, but you'll learn how to adjust your calories so you're not starving at day's end. During Phase 2, I want you to start reducing your carbohydrates, since the goal is to lean out. The best way to taper down is to begin eating fewer carbs later in the day, or at least exchanging starchy carbs like potatoes and grains for vegetable carbs like broccoli. I don't want to be as rigid as saying, "Now, after your 3 o'clock meal, no more starchy carbs!" But you definitely need to reduce them. Your total calorie intake during Phase 2 actually won't change a whole lot from Phase 1, even as we remove some of those starchy carbs from your diet. Your macronutrient mix will change a bit, as those carbs are replaced with a bit more protein. You're starting to add the cardio, which we didn't have before, so you're naturally going to be burning more calories. I don't want you changing things drastically. You still need to support your muscle, and that's going to be key going all the way to that last phase. Are you ready? Let's do this! Here's an introduction to the Phase 3 workouts and meal plans. Each day has a printable guide complete with that day's workout, meal plan or both: Apply This Program in BodySpace Daily Programs For Phase 3 Phase 3: Burn Unwanted Fat, Save Hard-Earned Muscle Let the fat-burning fun begin! By this stage of the program, you're no stranger to hitting the weights with intensity, and you have quality muscle to show for your efforts. Now, in Phase 3, the training goal changes from muscle building and fat burning to strictly fat burning, while preserving as much muscle as possible. You worked hard for that muscle. You want to keep it even while burning blubber. Why not add even more muscle even while burning fat? Simply put, it's difficult to continue to grow while simultaneously creating the sort of calorie deficit needed to burn fat. We're not drastically reducing calories. However, to create enough of a deficit, we are increasing the intensity of the workouts by adding high-intensity interval training (HIIT), plyometrics, supersets, and active rests. Some of you might be familiar with those terms, some not. In either case, I'm including a glossary of terms at the end of the write-up for this phase. Just scroll down to the bottom as needed! The information will be refreshed on each day's program as well, just so you don't forget. I'm excited for this phase to begin! It's intense, but with the finish line now in sight, you can do it! WEEKS 9 & 10: TRAINING The Phase 3 workouts emphasize techniques designed to enhance the cardiovascular benefits of training. As a result, you'll often use a lower weight for higher repetitions. Several notes to keep in mind: Equipment-wise, I recommend purchasing a jump rope. You will use it often. These workouts are more intense than before, so if you have any joint problems, please respect your limitations. Don't perform any exercises that cause pain. I recommend taking 1-minute rests between sets during this phase, except as noted. If you need more time, please take it. These workouts should take an hour to an hour and half to complete, depending on the traffic at your gym. WEEKS 11 & 12: TRAINING For each circuit, perform the allotted number of reps for each exercise consecutively. Rest 3 to 5 minutes before repeating the routine twice more. After completing the entire circuit, choose an option for cardio to perform for 30 to 40 additional minutes. Aim for medium intensity. This means breaking a light sweat and exercising at a rate where you could still converse with someone, though you'd rather not. In contrast, high intensity would force you out of that comfort zone, and it can only be maintained for short durations, anyway. As an upper limit, keep your heart rate beneath its maximum capacity (220 minus your age). So for me, it would be 220 minus 35 (years) = 185. We're in the home stretch, so it's important not to miss these workouts. That way, when you reach your goal date, you'll have leaned out as much as possible. Glossary of Phase 3 Terms WEEK 9 NUTRITION Week 9's nutrition plan is basically a continuation of Week 8's. WEEKS 10, 11 & 12: NUTRITION Beginning on the first day of Week 10, you'll be "carb cycling," a process that you will continue to follow through the end of the program. Carb cycling takes the macronutrients (the proteins, fats and carbs) of your meals and manipulates them to reduce body fat to very low levels, with as little muscle cannibalization as possible. Here's the theory: Because carbs are the body's preferred source of fuel, cycling those carbs - eating lower amounts some days, higher amounts other days - confuses the body by not giving it a constant and dependable fuel source. When we reduce the intake of carbs on lower carb days, we'll replace those calories with protein and healthy fats. That way you'll have an adequate number of calories and maintain as much muscle as possible as you continue to exercise. This technique isn't for the faint of heart; following it to the letter takes discipline. You'll need to count and weigh every meal, taking care to consume the proper portions of macros from day to day. This carb cycle will last only 3 weeks. Any longer and you might lose too much hard-earned muscle. So here's how it works: To determine your carbohydrate requirements, take the lower number of calories you determined at the start of Week 7. For example, my calorie range was 1300-1800 calories, so the number I'll use for the carb cycle will be 1300. Only 20% of your calories will be from carbohydrates. LOW-CARB DAY CALORIE CALCULATOR Enter Your Weight Select One Pounds Kilograms Total Calories: Carbs: Protein: Fat: We'll again use the total daily calories that we determined for Week 7 (the lower number), only this time, 50% of the calories consumed will come from carbs. Original article and pictures take http://bbcom.me/1nA4YDn site