Written by Team MD
31 August 2017

17dallas-qa-4

Dallas McCarver Tribute Week: Q&A #4

 

 

Why I do this

Dallas, what drives you to go to the gym every day?

The constant thoughts of never being good enough, the feeling deep in the pit of my stomach that absolutely hates not being the best, and the fear that somewhere someone is out working me. These are the reasons I've pushed myself to this point! And every morning when I wake up I realize these feelings are still present and greater than ever. I know I have a long way to go before I reach my full potential, but every good workout gets me another step closer.

 

What else are you interested in?

Outside of bodybuilding, what other sports and studies your interested in?

The Mayor of Bodybuilding

I love football. I am a diehard huge Bama fan. Being a farm boy from Tennessee, I also love to hunt. That and football are my two hobbies, along with my training of course. To me training isn't a hobby. It's way more serious. My field of study in college was psychology. I have taken a year off, but hopefully in time I can pursue that once again. I'm pretty much just like any other 21-year -old minus the usual excessive wild partying.

 

I was wondering what is a good body fat percentage to have while bulking. I am just trying to build up mass to eventually do a show. I know when I do a show and start dieting, the muscle will go away very quickly. I am 220 right now at 15% percent body fat and I am 5'11". Some people say that is way too high and I should keep my body fat around 10% while bulking. I know this is a lame reason not to want to keep my body fat that low, but honestly I just really hate eating a lot of clean food.

That is a difficult question for me to answer as first off, I don't think I have EVER checked my bodyfat percentage. I honestly believe the caliper tests are rather unreliable. Anyway, for me personally even in my growth periods I prefer to keep my abs somewhat visible and not turn into too much of a bloated mess. Why add all that when I'll just have to diet longer and harder to get rid of it when the time comes? As for not liking to eat clean, well that is sort of contradictory for this lifestyle. I mean even if you do have cheat meals and whatnot, you still need some way of keeping up with what and how much of what you are eating. That way you can adjust accordingly to your goals and what you want to do with your body. Even in my heaviest calorie times, all of my nutrition minus cheats comes from grilled meats, high quality healthy carbs, and good healthy fats, not just eating random junk all the time. I would guess that at 15% bodyfat, you can not see any of the ole abs and you are pretty soft, but I could be wrong! If that's the case you might want to tighten up just a tad before trying to put on much more weight and size, just to simply avoid becoming a nasty ball of fat and bloat after you reach whatever goal weight you have. Weighing a certain amount means nothing if you look like a bloated sack of crap.

 

Favorite quote of the month:

"There is no reason to have a plan B because it distracts from plan A"
-Phil Heath

I love this! It sums up my entire mentality when it comes to my life. I had so many people, even so-called "friends" that called me stupid and foolish and even talked behind my back about my 'pointless' goals. Still to this day, some of those people are still talking; saying I need to find something else, a "backup plan," because I'll never be a successful pro. Maybe they are right, maybe they aren't! But I believe in myself and my dedication and work ethic. Only time will tell what I can and can not achieve, but when it's all said and done I will know I focused every piece of energy and devotion into one goal! Even if I fall short, I can say I gave everything I had to chase a dream. That's something most people will never be able to say!

 

 

Hey Dallas, when did you start actually training in a gym? Also what helped you pack on so much muscle so quick at that young of age?

I started with the basic power lift movements in high school with football (bench, squat, deadlift), and that went on into college. However, I didn't really start with lifting, eating, and living the bodybuilder lifestyle until about two years ago. I would say just the mentality that it is so, so, sooooo much harder to under eat than it is to over train played a tremendous part in me putting on size so quickly. As you see my diet above is a good amount of food, but those numbers go up as I feel my body begin to adjust in the off-season and I begin to feel like I can handle more and more food. Also, I think too many people worry about conditioning in the off season. I mean. I keep visible abs year round, but who gives a damn about a little water retention and bloat? I mean look at all the off season pics of greats like Jay, Ronnie, and Dorian when they were still growing. They didn't worry about being shredded all year!

 

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