Seems like we need to get the loc-huahua yipping around stage then.

Great pictures; very impressive progress.

I think I'm going to revise my opinion of how much the suit hides. You still look pretty jacked in the suit, but I would never guess the suit was hiding the dude posing in the most recent set of photos.

Amazing!

Do you have any pictures from the previous competition so that we can compare it?

looking thick, solid, tight

Solid 6/10

Evo,

Here's something I'm curious about. Let's say we magically converted you back into a 21 year old. You have all the knowledge that you have now. Your goal is to achieve the physique that you have now, but you have to do it completely natty.

Do you think you could do it starting from the physique you had at that age? If so, how long would it take and how difficult would it be?

This physique is not attainable natty. There may be a .01% outlier who can get to this minus 10lbs natty.


Natty is ****ing stupid and I get super tilted by ****ing ****** sheep who believe everything the MSM says about steroids when the science very clearly says basically everyone should be on TRT. Should everyone bodybuild or inject grams of gear? no. But even then professional bodybuilders are healthier than average American males as measured by all-cause mortality, even accounting for the worse mental health that would drive anyone into pro bodybuilding in the first place (https://www.reddit.com/r/steroids/co..._have_a_lower/)

Should everyone over 21 or so be on 125mg/wk and do some kind of resistance training with bodyweight or gym equipment twice a week for 20 minutes a day? Yes.

Know any bodybuilders who have had any difficulty conceiving? Even the king of Gear, Bostin Loyd? Nope! Me neither...

The only legit cop-out for not being on trt is a family history of heart disease or legal and accessibility issues. The rest are pure COPE and denialism of FACTS.


At 21 I was unconcerned with how I looked and was 100% focused on strength and olytard. I did not even fully quit olytard until the first few months of 2015, then kinda drifted along lifting for no real purpose. The thought of stepping on stage for bodybuilding had not even occurred to me until the very end of 2017, less than 3 years ago...

But let me get to your question more directly: If I'd focused on bbing at 21 and went enhanced at that age with the knowledge I have now, I could probably reach this physique in about 3-4 years.

If your followup question is "well how long do you think it would take you to max out liek natty?" my answer is "**** you, get on trt or don't even ****ing talk to me".

Yes... they're on page 5 of this thread....


I'm not expecting big improvements. These two years have not been productive for lifting largely because of crippling digestive issues that were only recently resolved and injuries that have only just now been resolved. There PEDs that I get the most out of were unusable for me due to those digestive issues as well. Can't outbodybuild poor digestion. Over these two years I had to do a lot of trial and error with different training styles and philosophies trying to figure out how to stay healthy, pain free, and make gains.

The improvements we can expect though are that I will be leaner than last competition at a similar bodyweight with much better legs and arms. That prep and leading up to it I was entirely unable to train quads because of knee issues. I was unable to train chest+delts until a few weeks ago this prep, but expect to regain a lot of strength and muscle in the area before contest day. The break I had to take from chest+delt training was also much shorter than the break I took from quad training back then. My posing skill has also improved drastically.

heh.... newbs won't get the reference to our loveable original orange friend.

TRT at 21 for all seems like the most piping of hot takes. I haven't spent enough time thinking about it, but I guess it's a logically consistent position with other things we know about TRT. How did you land on that instead of a bit older or younger?

If there is a son of Evoken, that kid is going to be quite the specimen. I assume you would also put him on some GH while growing up for some extra height.

Would read a FACTS wall of text. Up-to-the-date overview of the case for TRT on the stock HF'r: 35, some lifting experience, starting to get testcurious as middle age approaches.

Solid progress, evo. You look a lot bigger now.

I don't know much about roids, but I'm not sure linking a study where professional bodybuilders having a lower mortality rate than the average American male means much. Small sample size among BBers and high obesity rate among males seem like problems to this study. The key question is whether BBers have a lower mortality rate vs regular gym goers.

What a lot of the medical field has done over the years is just move to goalposts and define the need for TRT is terms relative to other men in that current time period that some objective level. Couple that with rapidly falling average testosterone levels and you have a public health crisis on your hands. The risks have been greatly overstated based on faulty evidence from 7 decades ago while the benefits have been understated and are just now starting to be understood.

https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/...apy-2009031141


https://bigthink.com/sex-relationshi...osterone-today


But then the really alarming thing is the effectiveness of testosterone in a psychiatric context for depression. We know how hormones can deeply affect mood, feelings, and thoughts. As males, our hormonal equilbriums have been ****ed with since the day we were born and it was entirely outside of our control. If it were any other hormone, like thyroid, nobody would bat an eye at the idea of restoring equilibrium alleviating depressive symptoms. But because of a ****ing dumbass Ben Affleck after school special from 1991, Joe Biden 1992 idiocy, and the actions of literal brain damaged pro wrestlers being blamed on steroids by popular media, the idea of using testosterone in a psychiatric context has been taboo up until now.

I remember a study seeing a dose dependent response in alleviating depressive symptoms in men where they consistently found 'more is better' even as they crept into bodybuilder doses that were well beyond replacement (500mg/wk). I believe I posted in LC thread somewhere a few months back and I'm having trouble digging it up.

Speaking from personal experience: the impacts on recovery and muscle growth were tiny from trt by itself. But what TRT allows you to do is take various oral steroids, prohormones, and SARMS without nearly as many side effects. If you took those without TRT, you'd shut down your natural testosterone and have all the low T symptoms outside the gym but great performance inside the gym. Since you're already on trt, this is no longer a concern so you can do all sorts of low dose oral anabolics to get some huge enhancements in performance. In a clinical setting, 125mg/wk of test and 10mg/day of anavar outperformed 600mg/wk of just testosterone for building muscle and strength.

TRT's effects are EXTREMELY noticeable with regard to mood, emotional state, and behaviour. Things that used to scare me just didn't anymore. An important job interview, an interaction with a stranger, approaching a girl, or public speaking were just no longer fear or anxiety inducing. It won't get rid of that sort of "existential, why am I here? who am I? what am I doing with my life?" kind of anxiety, but the social kind just ****ing evaporated within the first few months of being on HRT. My sex drive was already really high since I was the type who had moderate testosterone but high estrogen natty and (when sufficient testosterone is present) high estrogen in men is associated with high libido, counterintuitively enough. If you are low T AND low e, you'll probably have a very large libido boost. If you are low T and high E, probably a smaller libido boost but still there. If you are moderate or high T and moderate or high E, you will probably get no libido boost or even a decrease if you don't manage aromatase inhibitor use properly.

I see what you're saying and agree, but it definitely demonstrates that enormous doses of roids+healthy habits>no roids and unhealthy habits, yet this is very counterintuitive and runs contrary to 90s MSM myths about roids that are still prevalent in people's minds in 2020 and contrary to what a typical general practitioner who hasn't really looked into trt would say.

It'd be even more relevant and interesting to see sane/reasonable doses of roids (not olympia stage doses as in the previous study) +gym vs gym and natty, and I expect the difference in all cause mortality would be tiny.


arjun, I'm not tryna fire shots, but based on your very poor acquisition of snatch and clean and jerk technique, body composition, physical phenotype, and generally much lower than average response to physical training, you should be SPRINTING to the local shady HRT clinic that will write a script for virtually anyone.

Oh yeah I trained. My pec is feeling better but still not 100% and I'm taking things slow probably until contest is over and not going to train chest super hard

incline db: 30kgx10,5 26kgx10
flat db: 26kgx10x2
machine press: rest pause set 17,6,9 twelve deep breaths between sets
Cable side raises: 5 sets
Prone rear delt raises: 4kg dbsx3 sets

calf raises (!!!!!)

cardio AM fasted 25 minutes, post workout 20 minutes intense around 145HR. Will do 20 more minutes after last meal of the day.

Gotta amend one thing... Two more reasons NOT to do TRT

1. Natty test > 800ng/dl, literally nobody on this forum and probably less than 10% of the male population 18-25
2. Want to compete in tested federations for whatever sports. In Aidan's case, I can totally understand. Untested powerlifting is fairly fragmented with lots of feds. Even the best ones have VERY questionable judging and generally low levels of professionalism (see the 800lb bench misload). IPF has legit and consistent judging, is a unified community, and, while they do have some corruption issues, are generally much more professional than most untested powerlifting feds.

Don't delude yourself into thinking xfit is natty LOL. All you have to do is look at the athletes to realize this is not the case.

No gh definitely. If there's a PED who's risks have been understated, when used for performance enhancing or height reasons, it's GH.

If I have one, my son or daughter will lift twice a week for 20-30 minutes from age 11 or 12 and learn basic barbell movements. If they really hate it after a year or so I won't try to force them any further. If they want to pursue bodybuilding or strength sports, great, but I won't encourage it. It'd be cool to vicariously live my oly dreams through a child, but certainly not in their best interest given how much of a dead sport that already is.

Only thing I'm going to "force" is growing up with 2 languages after having experienced the pain of foreign language learning as an adult. Given that I have literally never dated somebody who was a monolingual English speaker, I think this problem will solve itself.

Assuming some common preferences:

Physical > getting to around 80% of natty potential is the end visual/performance goal. (Discipline to train/diet isn't an issue.)

Mood, emotional state, and behaviour > Develop the underlying qualities that control these internally. (TRT can't improve your ability to calibrate over the expectations of others, or control how you frame events. Hormonal confidence might create a circular benefit, it would still be much better to do this on your own, removing any external reliance while creating a foundation for further improvement.)

From the article, it seems like falling T rates are effectively a lifestyle choice, a gap that can be filled without TRT in most men. This leaves the only benefit an increase in some sort of missing vigor/energy/libido that can't be reached naturally.

Back
Rows: 85kgx17, 7, 6 brutal... best during this prep was 21 so I've lost 4 reps.
Plate loaded pulldowns: 110kgx11, 90kgx11
MAG bar pulldowns: 2 sets, stack not labeled
dumbbell chest supported rows: 16kgx13, 10

Cardio: 20 minutes bike, seriously dragging... Going to do 2x 20-30 min sessions later throughout the day.

Appetite is going down. Energy levels and performance plummeting. Back to work tomorrow! maybe that will paradoxically energize me.

80kg+ class from a recent comp in Shanghai. And there's a guy who could stomp all of these dudes who got 2nd place last year. So yeah I'll be thrilled with a top 5 in 80kg+ class placing.

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had to make some adjustments b/c starting work. Did arms yesterday and doing legs today

arms

DB hammer curls: 16kgx18,12,9
Dual rope pushdowns: 30kgx16, 18kgx12,9
Cable preacher curls: 2 sets failure
Single arm cable kickbacks: 14kgx15,12,10
Cable curls: 30kgx2 sets failure
Overhead unilateral cable triceps: 14kgx12,10,8 each side

posing ~15 minutes

cardio 33 minutes post workout, 17 minutes at home on my bike

calf raises 3x 20

bw 92.0kg even

Skipped my loading day and not doing it today either on my leg day. I might put it on back day instead because I always have problems with my biceps not being fully recovered come arm day, despite normally having 3 full days between workouts and 4 days this week.

Got some new shots in half natty lighting but don't look much different from last week. My upper body is as lean as it will ever get at this point and we're just stripping fat of glutes, quads, and hams currently.

Leg workout yesterday. Knees were extremely sore so I started with fluff and they felt much better. I didn't feel comfortable pushing the split squats today, but leg press felt fine

Leg extensions: weightx20x5
Hamstring curls: weightx20x5
Leg press: 120kgx20, 170kgx20x3
Rear foot elevated split squats: 10kg dbsx10x2

Literally forgot to do hyperextensions because my mind is so used to doing 4 lifts on leg day hahaha. NBD I'll do them on back day this week.

Leg Press seems to be working a lot better for me for quads (than hbbs), but much worse for glutes/hams. I'm still experimenting with different stances and foot positions. It seems medium close with feet pointed straight forward is best for quads, though it's harder to get a good ROM with this stance. I still feel it the most doing it this way and will proceed as such. The RFESS seems to hit hips/glutes really well. I wanted to do that first but my knees just felt like **** so I didn't this week, maybe next week we'll see.

Chest+delts

Incline db: 30kgx10x2, 26kgx10
flat db: 24kgx10x2
machine press: 3 sets around 15-20 reps

cable side raises: 5 sets to failure, first one 26 reps with 7kg
rear delt raises: 4kgsx 3 sets failure, first one 16 reps

cardio: 33 minutes incline treadmill

Still "lifting scared" on chest and worried about something popping/ripping again. I probably won't really try to push it about the 3rd week after the show.

The guy who got 2nd place the last 2 years is e-famous on chinese social media with half a million followers on their equivalent of instagram. He's totalled 930kg weighing 120kg in powerlifting with wraps at about 5'7. Dude is massive but lost the past 2 years because he doesn't get that shredded and has not the prettiest shape. He has an incredibly unhealthy look to him like somebody who has been running 4-5g without breaks for years on end devouring kfc (chinese kfc is way worse than american) every day during offseason. Still mirin; it's cool that on my first and probably second outing I share the stage with a guy who squats 360kgs high bar with wraps offseason. Motivates me to diet harder since I auto-lose on mass.

He lost to "thoroughly unimpressed" guy 2 years ago. Conditioning and better bone structure/muscle insertions can and does beat mass a good amount of the time, otherwise Markus Ruhl would be the best bodybuilder of all time.

Had a Chinese colleague who doesn't understand bodybuilding ask one of my other colleagues who does understand this "Is Evoken okay? He lost so much weight and it looks like he's doing everything in slow motion..did he have some health problem over the summer?"

It's so weird I never facking feel hungry, it's just an energy issue. It's like my stomach shrank... I kinda dread these loading/cheat days now because I get physically uncomfortable from eating so much, but then it's amounts of food I could crush in the past without issue. Did a loading yesterday complete with a pizza.

yesterday
Back
Rows: 85kgx18 (last one cheat), 70kgx9 paused at the chest
plate loaded pulldowns: 2ppsx6, 1.5ppsx9,6,4
Plate loaded row machine: 1ppsx19, 12, 8
DB CSR: 14kgx19, 12

no cardio on this day b/c tryna get glycogen stores filled.

It worked, woke up covered in veins the next day. Got a post workout pic I'll eventually upload where i look just crazy. I am basically ready to step on stage...but I have 7 weeks left. My time to do cardio has gone down b/c of work, but that's okay because work is also more energy expenditure.

Sat/Sun I'll try to do 90 minutes fasted AM cardio to compensate for less during the weekday, where I might only do 30-35.

You’re so veiny, you probably think this post is about you.

You look great G