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I love Clint Eastwood, America.  He has some of the greatest one-liners in movie history.  “A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do!” “Go ahead…make my day!”  And my personal favorite – “A man’s gotta realize his limitations!”  This definitely applied to me this past weekend at the Oregon St. Bodybuilding Championships.  Lemme ‘splain…

After the fiasco in barely getting there in time to compete (read the previous blog to get caught up on what happened…I’ll wait…), I walked offstage with my trophy.  I don’t know what I was thinking, but I spaced on the fact that I needed to go back onstage for the Master’s Overall.  I grabbed my glasses and started walking back to the pump-up room when one of the backstage helpers yelled… 

“Dave…where you goin’?  You’re up for the Overall!” 

“Is that now?  Man…I’m really out of it.”  So I put my trophy down on the ground, dropped my glasses, and headed back out.  I was up against Carl Washington, a friend who’d competed in the USA’s or Nationals a couple of years ago and done very well.  Carl had the classic bodybuilder’s body – shorter in stature, thick upper body, wide flaring lats, small waist, and great quads.  He won the Overall Master’s a couple months ago at the Bill Pearl Classic with a great look. Me on the other hand…tall and thin, no quads or calves, and a crooked back!  It was the Budweiser Clydesdale going up against the broke-down racehorse about to be put out to pasture.  It was Optimus Prime bringing it to Jerry Lewis, Jet Li against Bruce Leroy, Michael Jordan against…well…you get my point, America.  This was No Mas - No Mas all over again!  But I was up for the challenge in my own inimitable style…

“Carl, this is a joke, dude…a no-brainer!  Be ready for me to have some fun with you out there.”

“Hey man, I’m game.  What’cha gonna do?”

“I ain’t got a clue, but just go with it, okay?”

“”Man, I’m always up for havin’ a good time….”

So Turk calls us out.  Carl first, me second.  Once we hit our mark I just look at him and smile.  A few people in the audience chuckle.  Turk starts calling out the ¼ turns and we hit them on cue.  Then he calls out the mandatories…Front Double Biceps.  We hit it.  Front Lat Spread.  Hit that too.  Side chest…I kinda look at Carl and start laughing.  He laughs and says, “I’ma back up close to you for this…”  Now you can really see the disparity between us, as if one couldn’t notice as soon as we walked out.  The audience snickered.  Someone actually had the audacity to yell, “This is a beatdown” as if I didn’t already know it.  Back Double Biceps, Back Lat Spread, Side Triceps…all those went without incidence.  On the Side Triceps, I just start crackin’ up and shaking my head as we’re posing.  How bad was this beatdown?  The head judge must have given Turk the Overall winner slip in record time – less than 10 seconds after we walked out.  I don’t think he even collected anyone else’s votes, not that it mattered.  Turk called, “Front Abdominal/Thigh…”  I shook my head again, started laughing, hit some funky ab shot and glanced over at Carl as he finished his pose.  The audience was rollin’ by now.  Turk calls the last pose, “Most Muscular…”  I just stopped, looked at Carl and bowed in respect and deference to him.  HE stops and says, “My momma always taught me to respect my elders…you first!”  He got me, America!  I started to hit the pose, and just fell out laughing – couldn’t continue.  I jumped on him and pretended to beat him down.  We gathered ourselves, stood waiting for the call, and just as Turk was about to announce the winner, I started backing offstage pointing at Carl.  I blew him a kiss, the audience howled, and that was that! 

If y’can’t have fun with this, America, what CAN you have fun with?  Never take yourself so serious that you forget it’s just a contest, and in the big scheme of things, it really doesn’t matter, does it?  Because we win (or lose…) a contest doesn’t change the oil conditions in the Gulf, doesn’t fix New Orleans, and doesn’t solve world hunger and Aids.  This is coming from a guy who still competes to win, but keeps his priorities in order.  Okay…enough of the philosophical stuff…

Hey, ya’ll know I didn’t like my look Saturday.  Even though I was on task the body didn’t respond as it usually does.  Call it age or whatever you want, but I didn’t get the desired results I was after.  So I changed things up starting Sunday.  I dropped the bottom out of my carbs and went to 2 hours a day of cardio.  When I say dropped the bottom out of carbs, it means I’m down to just enough to function mentally…about 65-75 gms/day from all sources.  I don’t like this feeling, but it’s already working.  I feel like crap though!  I can see a difference and feel a difference in the body.  I don’t wanna do nuthin’ but sleep.  I slept through my 3 alarms this morning and was late for my chiropractic appt.  Recently I’ve been doing an hour and a half to an hour forty-five minutes of cardio each day and have dialed in nicely.  This time it didn’t work so I went back to 2 hours a day.  America, I ain’t got no hair, but I’m sure if I did it would be hurtin’ right now.  Ahh well…this too shall pass.  Oh…and I went back to total body workouts for Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.  Today’s workout was painful and I’ve still got tomorrow to go.  I wanted to slap Joyce ‘cause she was tellin’ me to suck it up, it’s my contest, you can quit if it’s too much for you, you can do this…all the crap I say to my people.  I hate it when my words come back at me…

I’m out, America.  Gotta eat my last meal for the night.  Just finished grillin’ some chicken breast.  Since I’ve eaten all my allotted carbs for the day, I get nuthin’ but chicken!  No veggies, no barbecue sauce, nada!  But hey…I ain’t complaining…I lied…I AM complaining!  Gimme a break, America – I got two more days of this crap…a brotha’s gotta be able to vent sometime.  And you know this to be true because after all…I am The Dr!  Peace…

David “Dr. Buff” Patterson

Personal Training Systems

“There Are No Shortcuts!”

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Whining???  There’s No Whining in Bodybuilding!

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