When I first started training I was doing your conventional compound movements. Usually doing 3-4 sets of 10 -12 reps. Now for me, that worked out great. I was blessed and lucky enough to have a bodybuilder and personal trainer as a father to help me get started. But not everyone is as lucky as I was when I first started training. I trained with only compound movements for around 6-7 years, but there was a problem around the last 6 months or so. I was looking the same. No improvements in strength and no improvements in my physique either. I was getting annoyed with it as well. And I think my dad could tell. So one day when we went to the gym my dad looked at me and said, “Time to try something new!” And let me tell you; that workout is still the hardest training session I have ever done. It was back day; he picked 9 different exercises for my brother and me and said, “Keep training until you hit 1,000 reps!” Can you imagine going from 4 exercises doing 3-4 sets of 12 reps to 9 exercises and only getting a 30-second break between each circuit? I was completely soaked in my own sweat. You could actually ring out my stringer and it would have looked like I jumped in the water with it! That’s how much I sweat that day, but afterward, I was hooked. From that point on that’s when I started doing more and more research and developing my training over the years. In 2008 my whole world changed. I was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes, I had no idea what that meant at all. I honestly didn’t really care about it. But little did I know that it would change just about everything that I do and everything I eat. When I was first diagnosed I thought my world turned upside down! I thought to myself that this was going to be such a huge disadvantage to my fitness lifestyle and it's going to hold me back so much. But as the years went on I learned how to control my blood sugar levels and how to use my diabetes to my advantage. I had to look at it from a different angle. I had to think to myself, “God let this happen for a reason but what is that reason?” After a few years of trial and error, I have used Diabetes to my advantage and it has become such a strength of mine now. I don’t even consider it a disadvantage for more a strength!
