Rising Men’s Open star Hunter Labrada is eager to redeem his 2022 Mr. Olympia performance after falling to seventh. In a recent YouTube video and Instagram post, Labrada revealed his weight of 277.6 pounds and offered fans tips on maximizing performance through exercise selection.
It’s been an exciting IFBB Pro League career thus far for Hunter, son of IFBB Hall of Famer Lee Labrada. Last year, fans deemed him an early Olympia favorite given his mass and conditioning levels displayed throughout the off-season. However, when he traveled to Las Vegas for the show, he was met with heavy resistance on stage in the form of his rival Nick Walker, Samson Dauda, and many others.
In the end, Labrada would secure seventh at 2022 Mr. Olympia, three spots below his performance the year prior. Processing the aftermath, he was transparent about the seemingly botched prep and peak. Labrada’s coach, Ben Chow, later suggested that Hunter carried excessive weight too close to contest prep which exacerbated the peaking process in the days leading up to the show.
While Hunter’s placement consumed him with anger, he says he’s now using the setback as fuel to further his success. Lee’s father spilled the beans in Feb. on The Menace Podcast with Dennis James and revealed his son Hunter was aiming to compete at two bodybuilding contests before even considering another Mr. Olympia. After throwing his hat into the 2023 Tampa Pro and Texas Pro, Labrada provided a recent update on his progress as well as some exercise selection tips.
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Hunter Labrada Shares Impressive Update at 277.6 Lbs & Tips on Exercise Selection: ‘Avoid Joint Pain’
Labrada reported that he and his team have begun pulling food in preparation for the 2023 Tampa Pro, scheduled for Aug. 3-5. In addition, he provided a comprehensive diet plan consisting of six meals.
“Inside of 13 and 15 weeks out from Tampa and Texas, respectively💪🏻 277.6 fasted this morning.
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Made our first aggressive pull on food 3 days ago, so definitely just now starting to see/feel that! We also removed all whey protein from my diet, so we will finally see what that does💀🤣😅 Really looking forward to seeing what winning another week will look like running things more aggressively like we are!
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Other than that, no real changes to report! Still training on the same split with no modifications to volume or intensity, and still doing 30 min on the stairs at level 5 fasted for cardio👊🏻
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Really looking forward to seeing my @npcnewsonlineofficialpage / @ifbb_pro_league family this coming weekend in Pittsburgh, as well as all fans coming out to support all the incredible pro and amateur athletes competing!
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Current nutrition:
Meal 1
170g Lean Beef
220g Rice
50g Green VegMeal 2
170g Chicken Breast
220g Rice
50g Green VegPre workout
20g EAAs
5g CreatineMeal 3- Post
220g Lean White Fish/Cod
220g Rice
50g Green VegMeal 4
170g Chicken Breast
220g Rice
50g Green VegMeal 5
220g Lean White Fish/Cod
220g Rice
50g Green VegMeal 6
170g Lean Beef
300g Potato
50g Green Veg” Hunter Labrada wrote.
In a separate YouTube segment, Hunter Labrada discussed the significance of exercise selection. During the video, he said lifers should look through a metaphorical ‘lens’ while exercising. He demonstrated the process he follows for selecting his workout routine and when changes are necessary for advancing progress.
“The first thing that comes down to exercise selection in my mind, and this is going to be like a filter that we’re going to work our way through and pick – pick our exercises and why I would switch them out afterward. The first filter I’m looking through for exercise selection is what is the main priority for the day or what is you know the main bang for your buck that we could get out of that day. A smaller body part, something like arms or shoulders or something like that, there might not be a ton of variation to which you can do but a larger body part like the back or legs, quite a bit of prioritization that you could do, that’s where I would first start.”
“Let’s use back day for example and I’m trying to bring up my lower lats at all costs. Knowing that in my back session, I’m going to A prioritize exercises that hit my lower lats, and B prioritize them lower in the session. That’s the first lens I look through for the exercise selection what am I trying to bring up and improve the most on any given session in this day.”
“The next lens that I’m looking through is, what is the best exercise to accomplish this with? Best is a relative term and it’s one you can really define in a lot of ways; I’ve boiled it down to meeting criteria. A best exercise in my opinion is the one that offers the best alignment, the best resistance profile, and the best bracing ability. Alignment, everything is lined up there’s not any weird tork on any of the joints involved, resistance profile, it’s heaviest where it should be heaviest and drop off where it should drop off, and bracing this how well I can brace this.”
According to Labrada, once an exercise is no longer garnering results, it’s time to change movements to facilitate substantial progress.
“There’s telltale ones [signs of when you need to switch your workout] that I’ve gotten from my personal experience and talking with others. The first one is that your no longer making progress in it. You’re running it into the dirt a while, two or three sessions have gone by where you were not taking steps forward or even taking steps back, that’s a good sign that you’ve used that runway and progressed that lift as much as you can at that point,” Labrada said.
“The last reason and this is one that hopefully doesn’t surface a lot especially if you know, you’re doing your leg works on terms of looking at those exercises through the lens and meeting the criteria we talked about earlier. They’re starting to put you in pain, you’re doing exercise XYZ and it’s really making joint XYZ here, that needs to come out, the worst thing you can do is push through joint pain.”
This wasn’t the first time Labrada has offered guidance on pushing past workout plateaus. He shared that he encounters this problem during preps from time to time. In order to remedy the problem, Labarada implements a ‘plateau breaker’ or ‘intensity technique’ at the end of his workouts to maximize results.
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Given his lineage, comprehensive nature, and work ethic, fans believe it’s only a matter of time before Hunter is pushing for Mr. Olympia gold. The bodybuilding community will get a sneak peek of his physique soon as Labrada is scheduled to guest pose at Jim Manion’s 2023 Pittsburgh Pro next weekend.
Watch the full video below from Hunter Labrada’s YouTube channel:
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