Bulking and van driving

[bc1]

Hi guys. Bit of a different one here. Any tips for staying awake at the wheel whilst bulking? During a cut it’s not as hard, but whilst bulking I find staying awake at the wheel really difficult as a van driver.

I work out at 6.15am to avoid the rush and by the time I’ve trained and got a few meals in me, whilst driving my van I find it very difficult to stay awake. I’ve also trained in the evenings with less food through the day but still struggle to stay awake.

Got a good physique, Im currently bulking at 3500 cals training day (around 400-450 carb) and 2800-3000 on rest days. This has me gaining slowly at around 0.1-0.2KG per week currently. I’m 5FT8, 170LBS at around 10-12% bodyfat. Train hard 5 times per week and hit minimum 10k steps per day. 6-8 hours of sleep per night with very good sleep scores.

Any supplements that could help with this other than caffeine? (I have some around 10am). I also try move as much as possible post meals to increase insulin sensitivity but as soon as I’m bulking staying awake at the wheel is very hard.

Cheers

 

[tennille]

@bc1 This sounds pretty dangerous you shouldn't be finding it hard to stay awake if all is going well. It sounds like you need more sleep, if I got 6 hours sleep I would be a zombie.

Alternatively maybe you're training too hard and you're exhausted, take more rest days or a deload week.

Listen to your body, supplements aren't magic they won't fix something like this.

 

[bc1]

@tennille All lifts are progressing. I recently took a weeks deload. My average sleep score is 85/100. My resting heart rate is 42BPM. This has always been an issue for me. I’ve heard fouad and the boys on his podcast saying they can’t drive long haul with food in there system as they fall asleep. It’s deffo a thing. If I was doing multi drop I’d be fine, but a lot of mine is motorway driving. I’m quite interested in whether nootropics might help but I’m not too clued up on them.

 

[leena2016]

@bc1 You might have to do something slightly dramatic, as in having literally half your carbs in the evening after work. Carb timing doesn't really matter when you're in a calorie surplus so this should be fine.

 

[bc1]

@leena2016 This is how it’s set up currently. Around 100 pre, 130ish post then every meal after that is around 50 (5 meals per day).

 

[kvolm]

@bc1 Initially I thought this could be a blood glucose regulation issue, but given that you’re pretty lean, timing your carbs later in the day, and walking after meals there has to be something else going on here.

You could try using betaine hcl and digestive enzymes (I like NOW super enzymes) with meals to see if the food volume and mechanical digestion is the issue.

If that doesn’t help, maybe drop the caffeine and use Modafinil instead. I really hesitate to recommend that, but the current situation is a hazard to yourself and everyone else on the road.

 

[bc1]

@kvolm Hi Paul. Yes plenty of steps and I do regular cardio too. I’ve considered digestive enzymes before but never used them so might give that a shot, or maybe some berberine? Although I’ve heard berberine may blunt muscle growth? Most of my carbs are now in the morning around my workout, but even when they were in the evening when I trained later on I still had the same issues. As soon as I feel I’m drifting off, I also pull over straight away and have been doing this since I started 5 years a go so feel I have a pretty good handle on this but you are right.

 

[kvolm]

@bc1 Berberine will only help if it is indeed a BG regulation problem. It’s worth a shot. It’s not going to blunt hypertrophy to any meaningful degree if you’re hitting your other variables properly.

This is a bit left field, but do you keep the cabin air recirculation on your truck’s heat/AC system on while you drive?

 

[bc1]

@kvolm Cool will have a look at both.

There’s no air con in my van it’s just a merc sprinter, but I keep it as cold as possible without being uncomfortable. I think being too warm makes me drift off faster.

 

[kvolm]

@bc1 Where I was going with the recirculation thing - if you keep the cabin air recirculation on it can slowly reduce the amount of oxygen in the cabin and make you drowsy

 

[bc1]

@kvolm I didn’t even know this was a thing. Will have to check tomorrow

 

[kvolm]

@bc1 Btw, be careful with the Berberine dosage and watch for signs of going hypo

 

[bc1]

@kvolm Meal 1 - 100g carb rice, 40g protein chicken + fruit
Meal 2 - 120g carbs cream of rice + fruit 50g whey
Meal 3 - 50g carbs pasta + 40g protein lean beef and veg
Meal 4 - oats 40g carbs + fruit + Peanut butter 15g and 40g whey
Meal 5 - sourdough 40g carbs + x4 eggs and fruit

Around 3400-3500 cals has me gaining slowly. Good performance in the gym. Feel very good day to day minus the time when I’m still for extended periods of time.

 

[bc1]

@kvolm Think I might of figured out what this is but still not 100% sure as its only been a few days but feeling less sleepy and lethargic in general. Obviously the high carbs maybe having an effect but I think I may have been salting my meals too much which alongside those carbs which were just knocking me out. I've always stuck 1-2 gram of sea salt in each meal. A gram upon waking and a gram in my pre workout. Last few days I've lowered it to literally just a couple of grinds per meal of sea salt with some potassium salt and I feel a lot more energetic. Need more time to know if it's that for sure, do you think this might of been it? I've seen no one mention sodium anywhere when I looked it up and tried to get advice.

 

[mwinga]

@bc1 I used to have issues with eating and drowsiness too, and they stemmed from carbs and lack of cardio. Your steps are good so I’d just say eat very low carb until you get off work. Maybe try drinking more calories because I also get drowsy from physical fullness. Of course, this is all just specific to me and may be useless for you.

 

[bc1]

@mwinga Did you ever try upping the cardio but keeping the carbs similar to see how much of a difference there was?

 

[mwinga]

@bc1 It helped but I just felt better cutting out carbs during the day. I’ve developed a lot of food intolerances in the past few months that make it so I barely eat any carbs now, and I think my issues with drowsiness stemmed from the developing stage of whatever digestive disorder I have now, so I don’t really know how applicable my situation is to you.

 

[fr33indeed]

@bc1 Was this happening before you started ashwagandha? I tried that for a couple weeks, taking it before bed.
Every day around 6pm I would get uncontrollably sleepy, like I absolutely could not keep my eyes open and needed a 1-2 hour nap, recaffeination be damned.
Didn't happen to me before I tried ashwagandha and stopped as soon as I threw it out.
From that experience I'd recommend taking a break from it to see if that helps.

 

[bc1]

@fr33indeed I’ve always had this problem but only recently started taking ashwagandha. Hasn’t seemed to make a difference either way.

 

[godsdaughter97]

@bc1 Go to the doctor you might have a deficiency.