As feel alluded to a bit upthread, I'm a) not convinced this is true and b) even if it is, I feel better now than I did when I was powerlifting 7-10 years ago, and my work capacity and ability to do stuff with the kids is at least as good as it was then, if not better. The marginal increase in performance whatever hormone optimization stack might get me isn't worth the potential downside of not being around for the grandkids, even if those downsides are remote. It won't be the first time I'm wrong about something if I am wrong, and my opinion may change as I continue to age, but all we can do is the best we can with the info we have at the moment.

You're probably the only one in this forum familiar with his ouevre that's surprised, if this isn't just a turn of a phrase.

Correct.

I actually sent this to him maybe 6-7 years ago when he asked me (and I was still lifting like this). It's been quite a while since I've run it, obviously.

I wouldn't say I had any kind of remarkable unresolved trauma other than being a socially awkward twig as a youth, but for me it was as much about setting goals and making a plan and accomplishing those goals as it was about "hit five reps on this set or you're an irredeemable pansy loser." I think some methods of motivation are better than others, but it may be a mistake to entirely dismiss that sort of thing, as it was a product of my then-current life situation and hormonal milieu; of course I'm less likely to grind myself into the ground anymore, but I'm at a much different point in my life.

We need more people in the gym with this kind of mentality

[QUOTE=The Yugoslavian;58575515]The amount of 2p2ers who ever walked around "really ****ing strong" can be counted on like, one hand?

years?[/

‘Feeling’

Mostly loco for the years he had aeshetic goals. AFAIK you never even wanted to look like Rob Riches or w/e so PEDs would be pointless. But he would just go on and on about how aesthetic he'd be if he were on roids but copped out and refused because "health risks" and "infertility". You know any high level bbers who DON'T have kids? Ronnie has like 8 lol. But also you are wrong. https://thebarbell.com/do-pro-bodybu...-than-average/

Bear in mind this is only examining men's open pros. If we looked at just recreational PED users or other divisions or bodybuilders from older eras when bodyweights were much smaller, the gap would be even larger.

1. IDK where the line of "really ****ing strong" is, but I guess g4s, cobrastatus, realbusto, myself (?), KC (?), that jewish kid with the track and field and oly lifting who's name I cna't remember but he was a lil' tinybro beast. I seem to remember at least one very strong xfitter guy too. Probably a lot more that I'm forgetting, those are just names I can recall off the top of my head. I still talk to RealB on instagram once in a while, he's mostly untrained now and focused on dadding and been on dr's supervised TRT for the past several years. He's hoping to make a comeback as he's gotten out of special ed teaching and instead working some government job that is higher paying and might allow him more time to devote to training.

2. The Renaissance Periodization youtube channel with Dr. Mike Isratel. He has an affordable AI training app, but you could very easily construct your own program just from watching a few dozen of his videos. You don't need to do the FPSy periodization and scheduled deload parts, but the ways of organizing weekly training are imo superior to anything else whether natty or enhanced. Full body, upper/lower/, PPL, or Arms+Delts/Legs/Back+Chest. High frequency training with mostly dbs, machines, bodyweight exercises 3-6x/wk depending on schedule, high carb, moderate protein, low fat diet, ample amounts of steady state cardio or walking, some OTC stimulant usage like ephedrine, caffeine, and yohimbine, and you can look really good hormone free. I'm coaching these days and my roster is full of powerlifters who just need diet+PED programs and I'd love to have just normal natty lifestyle clients.

Have never heard of Rob Riches but that’s probably the physique I would aspire to. Albeit that would be a pipe dream at age 52.8 I’d guess

Does he claim natty?

Push workout last night went okay. My bicep/pec tie-in is almost healed. 0 pain on db incline presses, 3/10 pain on machine presses. I'm going to drop the machine presses for a while and do a fly+pushup superset as first exercise.

Machine press: 62.5kgx16, 6, 5 rest pause ~40 second rests
Incline db: 25kgx12x4
prone delt raises: 7.5kgx4 sets failure, first set couldn't even manage 20 reps which I'm normally around 25+
Pushdowns: 5 sets failure barely counted
Steps 17k

I gotta drop the condemned labz arsynist DMHA fat burner product. It's just too damn strong and causing too much volatility in my energy levels throughout the day. I felt exhausted and wanted to sleep all day despite dosing first thing in the morning, then as soon as the sun went down after I was done with training I felt tons of energy and couldn't sleep. I'm getting 0 stim effect from the clen by now and only a little bit from caffeine, but that's just how it goes near the end of a diet. I wish I could get ephedrine here to be able to split my stimulants between clen+ephedrine, but its like turbo illegal jail time both here and in Thailand. If anyone knows any alternatives, I'm all ears. Synephrine was too weak and did nothing, DMHA was too strong.

I think he has never commented or answered anything about steroids.

This is not at all a pipe dream at 52.8; check out Paul K. Barnett on youtube/instagram. He's a massive superheavyweight bodybuilder prob going to go pro at Master's Nationals at age 50. He was a bber in his 20s, totally stopped training for many years from 29-44, then started getting back into it and lept past his old best and has still been making good progress with smart, safe, conservative hormone usage and training. Easily my favorite bodybuilding youtuber. I absolutely plan to keep doing this well into my 60s and 70s, even if the PEDs side of things necessarily must get much more conservative past mid 50s or so.

Obvious thought is obvious to the extent that you must have thought and dismissed it but you can’t sub with an OTC medicine with pseudo ephedrine?

Pseudoephedrine also illegal here. Basically anything that can be used to make meth because there was actually a huge problem with triads and dealing meth that got mostly swept under the rug but was kind of a big deal in the early 2000s.

I'm assuming this is a troll? Confounding variables aside, I'm neither a pro bodybuilder nor an average male, and I'm only concerned with downside risk, as my QoL is quite sufficient, so even if that article weren't amazingly ******ed and irrelevant it wouldn't really matter.

Hmmm...video thumbnails are off-putting but typical youtube. I'll look into this and hopefully can motivate myself.

Nice that the yearly subscription is only $300 but you get over $3,000 worth of value. I might have to buy 10 at that value.

The videos are often very funny and pretty informative. If he's not your cup of tea, Jeff Nippard is another YouTuber with pretty good content. So is Milo Wolf.

I would just do a generic PPL split 3x a week and start light. You'll get those glorious newb gains without having to push yourself too hard for at least 3-6 months. If you're still going strong after that, you can start to ramp up volume and intensity.

This is not about Montecore. We must be arguing two different things.

My claim is that the risks of PED use are greatly overstated and that pro bodybuilding lifestyle is no less unhealthy than an average american male lifestyle, not that it is no less healthy than average recreational endurance athlete lifestyle (your lifestyle). Bear in mind of course this article is using data from highest level men's open pros; if we can see that their risks of all cause mortality are lower than the average male, we can very easily conclude that amateur bodybuilders or this in divisions like men's physique or classic physique are taking even less health risks than living like an average American male. We should also bear in mind that when the pros being observed in this article were active, knowledge about PEDs, prophylaxis, and optimizing offsetting behaviours was a fraction of what it is now. In particular, nobody was regularly monitoring blood glucose, nobody was using prophylactic insulin but rather kinda dice rolling spazzoid insulin protocols, nobody was using telmisartan, nobody was using metformin, cardio in the offseason was far less common, some athletes were still consuming tons of saturated fats (unheard of today) and in some cases they weren't even doing bloodwork regularly. Every pro of the modern era is doing all of those things, and it's not at all unreasonable to speculate that the trivial gap in mortality rates between average American male and Olympia Stage bodybuilder will widen.

Lastly, although many people greatly underestimate the IQs and overestimate the genetic variation in high level professional athletes in sports like football, even the staunchest BBC worshipper like loco would acknowledge a large portion of the NFL (and MLB, but probably relatively smaller) is on PEDs. Why would we observe such a low rate of all cause mortality if steroids were so unhealthy and being widely used by professional athletes in these sports? It follows a similarly illogical pattern of "don't play football because you could end up with CTE". While this is true, playing football even at the highest level leads to habits that will overall reduce all-cause mortality, because it turns out being athletic and highly physically active more than offsets whatever health risks are imposed by PEDs?

Would I ever make the claim that, ceteris paribus, PEDs will make you healthier if you are already active and following a healthy diet? No. Am I saying YOU should use PEDs? given your goals, no absolutely not. As you said, if you're satisfied with your QoL and athletic performance, why add even a minor amount of downside risk?

loco worships BBC?

Had an excellent workout yesterday. I was smart to drop the Condemned Labz Arsynist OTC fat burner. I think it was just messing with my recovery so much that whatever fat burning I was getting from the stim was probably offset by the sleep deprivation/lower sleep quality. Live and learn. Clen+yohimbine+coffee only next go around. Next go around I'm also going to be starting extremely lean from the getgo so I can probably diet on something like 300p/350-400c/20f and 15k steps and get the job done with minimal stims.

Pull
Pullups strapped: bwx15, 10, 8 (3 minute rests)
Unilateral pulldowns: 2ppsx7, 1.5ppsx12, 10
Underhand rows (strapped): 60kgx13, 10, 8
EZ curls: 20kgx30, 4 more sets to failure no myo reps
17k steps

54 minutes done nice and quick.

Slept from 8:30pm to 6:11 and reached a new post-Thailand trip bw low of 91.8. 3.5 weeks so I should probably be seeing sub 90, that'll please my inner teenage girl.

Gonna try to get legs done tonight in less than 55 minutes today even if it means not doing calves. Hip thrust, leg press, hamstring curl+leg extension. Just gotta pray the equipment isn't occupied by trainer zerglings. If leg press is in use I'll straight up sub in FFESS to get done earlier. Normal people are totally fine with working in but trainers need to make sure they converse with the client while they're sitting in the machine idly for 6 minutes between sets. Wgaf about calf training when you're already walking 15k+ steps, that's basically enough calf training and my calves already look pretty good.

Any time a black athlete who is obviously enhanced claims natty, he says they're natty and attributes it to genetics and many people (not sure about him in particular) like to also imply they'd be too dumb to do PEDs.

We got crossed up somewhere, obviously; agreed that it's not for me and that the entirety of the bodybuilder lifestyle may be no worse than the typical SAD alcoholic American male. I'm still skeptical that, all else being equal, the juice (so to speak) of an AAS stack and blood monitoring protocol like the one you outline is worth the downstream squeeze of potential side effects holding everything else constant, but different strokes and all that. Like Latino Frank Yang.

oof - nice combo

That's reasonable. There's enormous variation in response in terms of side effects; I've been extremely lucky in that regard and tend to get far more ****ed up from caffeine than testosterone. I definitely get a lot of acne, but my bloodwork looks fantastic even in the middle of a contest prep cutting cycle and I don't seem to get other common side effects like hair loss, insomnia, aged looking features, etc. If my hair started falling out, I'd be singing a very different tune about PEDs and would stop them immediately (or invest a lot of money and time into a hair transplant).

The subjective amount of enjoyment you'll get from exercise and from having an elite physique is totally up to each individual. Just like the amount of enjoyment a person gets from eating a very high saturated fat diet filled with very psychologically pleasing foods is extremely subjective. I don't find it all that fun or rewarding to feast on unhealthy but hyper-palatable food, but some people might. For some people, they'd get far more enjoyment eating McDonalds 4x/wk than they would looking like a greek statue. I am a guy with strong vulnerable narcissistic tendencies so I tend to thrive on lots of positive external validation, so for me it's very worth it. A little short chubby colleague I barely speak to more than once a month randomly complemented me on how much better I look from my weight loss over the past ~7 months and that lit up my brain pleasure chemicals more than any extravagant cheat meal ever could. But people who have more stable self images might not give as much of a **** about that sort of thing, so I wouldn't fault them. Some of the women I've been able to date as a result of looking good naked date are just amazing looking and there's almost no way I'd be able to if I were a lil' chubby Eric Helms offseason looking guy.

But by this logic, I should probably be less judgemental about people who go out and have 7 drinks and a whole meat lover's extra large pizza on a Friday nights; they're doing the exact same thing I'm doing in exchanging health for pleasure. They just derive pleasure from different sources than I do.

Legs
Hip thrust: 2ppsx16, 12, 10
Leg press: 4ppsx20, 15, 12 but faster and with less pausing at the top
Leg extensions and hamstring curls: 3 sets failure each about 90-120 second rests

48 minutes.

Only 12k steps today but I had some digestive problems and was on the toilet a lot. It's only 7:30 so I can probably get up to 15k before bed at 9:30.


Going up to 6x/wk was a good choice because it's forcing me to not go too hard in the weight room and stick more fastidiously to time limits which will probably help me with staying healthy and injruy free in the future.

I'm 3.5 weeks away from the end and I can basically conclude I didn't get as lean as I wanted to or hoped to. That Thailand trip derailed things and I probably undid 2 weeks of dieting. It was okay to do 1 or 2 big refeeds but I definitely ended up going outta control more than a bit. I refused to do crazy extreme dietary restrictions or anything that would make me feel actually hungry and I'm sure if I had I woulda gotten to where I wanted to. But my entire hypothesis is that you can still get to that inside out peeled and shredded conditioning without ever doing extreme and uncomfortable things during the actual cut by just starting the cut from a leaner state. There's genetic variation, but Milos Sarcev was a good example of somebody who did exactly that... never went below 500g carbs on his precontest diet and even left in the insulin. Never needed to do more than a 12 week prep to be in shape, competed in 70+ pro shows. Roman Fritz, same thing. Their approach was very similar... 6x/wk training often 2x/day, heavy usage of insulin, low dietary fat and lots of carbs coupled with very high daily output mostly from training and very low intensity LISS. It's gonna require a lot more dietary control in the offseason, but I'd way rather limit myself to gorging on enjoyable food only twice a week in the offseason but be able to get peeled even by the standards of bodybuilding judges in just a short 12 week prep where I never have to limit my food drastically then pig out like a fatass several times per week in the offseason and have to white knuckle and/or do super long diets precontest.

I pick the number 12 because after using it many times, I've concluded that's the magic number for clenbuterol. Is the receptor downregulation thing a myth? Yes, clenbuterol is still acting on beta 3 receptors to liberate fat stores even when "you no longer feel it", but I think most of the actual fat loss and weight loss from clenbuterol is from its stimulatory effects. And about 12 weeks in is where you just stop feeling the stim effects, even if you've gone slow with escalating the dosage. The pics I posted from BPC Gym Thailand a few pages back... I want that to be my everyday walking around offseason body composition and I strongly believe that if I diet down hard enough and maintain good habits as far as steps, diet, bulking phase duration, and training 6x/wk I can absolutely have that level of leanness at the peak of my bulks. If I do a 16 week prep, caffeine+yohimbine only in the first 4 weeks, add clen at 12 weeks out.

Lines up perfectly with my schedule. Flying to BKK is a shorter flight than to many cities in China where I might otherwise compete... maybe.

I have to admit I haven't been following your log, . Are you following some/alot/none of his advice?

It's ok. You're not missing much.

I don't use his app. I just am running a generic PPL routine 5-6 days a week (although I started 3x/week) that I found somewhere online and tweaked over time to include exercises that feel good for me and are generally good for hypertrophy, and cut out ones that cause pain or are unnecessary. For me, that means no barbell bench and no dips, because they cause shoulder pain for me. No overhead pressing at all because I'm getting enough front delt work with other pressing movement.

I follow a lot of his general advice, which includes slow eccentric, a big stretch at lengthened portions of the lifts, lengthened partials on occasion, myo rep matching on occasion, and I train closeish to failure.