Well, after thinking about it for a couple days, I decided to drop the orals as @spinup recommended. I’ve been on cycle for 4 weeks and I have enough for 4 more weeks, I figured it’s a good stopping point as I will have enough for another run with them next year without having to buy more.
I am going to continue on the testosterone only for a total of 12-16 weeks, haven’t decided yet, will probably depend on my blood results and symptoms at 12 weeks.
For mass-building purposes, you just need way more volume. You would make a lot of gains from running a high volume PPL twice weekly (5-6 days per week) at proper intensity. 6-7 exercises per day is a good place to start. I get 34 sets of pressing/chest in per week, plus another 16 sets of dips for direct tricep work. 28 sets of squatting/pressing/extensions. 25 sets of hamstrings. Shit like that.
I am currently running a cutting cycle too. Just Test E @ 600 mg for 10 weeks, and Test E and Tbol 40 mg/day for weeks 10-16. I am cutting more on the front end as the test ramps up, and will enter a surplus around the half way point (I am hoping it will be closer to 5 weeks when I hit a good leanness).
I am doing a lot more volume than you though. I train 4X a week, and start each workout with 10x10 on a main movement (bench day I do 15x10). The squat day is brutal to say the least. Overhead press day is the second most brutal IMO.
After 1 week of cutting I am… checks notes… up 5 lbs. Pretty sure it is just water weight. I will try to keep it in mind while cutting on test that once I lower the test the bloat will go down.
But you haven’t done this while on gear. I have noticed a lot more recovery ability while on. First week I was really sore. Second week, the legs are a bit sore after squat session 2, but are much less sore than week 1 (only about 350 mg of test injected at the first squat session).
Thanks for the input @mnben87 @spinup. Would you say the general layout of my program is sufficient? I can add more arms and leg work, and increase everything to 5 sets across the board?
Do you guys train until failure? That’s where I’ve gotten myself into trouble in the past with overtraining really quickly.
The program just seems weird to me. Push/Abs, Rest, Pull/Calves, Rest, Push/Abs/Curls, Legs w/ a bit of shoulders, Rest. So you’re prioritising pressing movements above everything else, with rest days in between very light workouts. If you’re going to go every other day, you would probably benefit a lot more from a full-body or upper/lower split, which is what a lot of coaches would have you on at your experience level.
I auto-regulate this. For example, if I feel good on my first leg day I’ll take my hamstring curls to failure or very near. On the second leg day I’ll take it all the way to failure and then past with drop sets. Same with biceps. Once you’ve been doing this a while you’ll begin to get an idea of what your body needs and can tolerate.
At the weights you’re going to be moving, you would really struggle to actually overtrain yourself.
I think you should add in more posterior chain work, and more legs. Legs give a big bang for the buck.
The structure is a bit weird. What reps do you do for the sets? Do you ever vary the reps?
Currently what I am doing would look something like this (weights only listed for main lifts).
Monday
Overhead press 10x10 (135lbs)
Chin ups 10x6 (super set with overhead)
Arnold press 4x12
Weighted dips 4x8
Incline DB press 4x12
Curl (any type) 4x10-12
Wednesday
Deadlift 10x10 (315 lbs)
BB row 5x5
Chins 4x8-10
GHR 4x10
Good mornings 4x8
Curl 4x8
Friday
Bench 10x10 (225 lbs)
Narrow Grip Bench 5X10 (215 lbs)
Cable Row 4X12
Curl 4X8
Reverse Fly 3x10
DB bench 3x12
Sunday
Squat 10x10 (275 lbs)
leg press 4x15
belt squat 4x15
GHR 3X10
Reverse Hyper 3x10
This is just what my training looks like right now. It is about as much volume as I have ever done. I do different phases of training depending on what I am going after. Sometimes the main lifts are heavy for me and it is like 3x3.
I also wouldn’t suggest jumping right into something like this. I have built up my strength over a good period of time. These would normally be warmup weights for me, but they are hard after all the sets. If you start something with so much volume, start light.
It was designed to be a 4 day push/pull upper/lower. I added the rotator cuff exercise in leg day because I was having discomfort in my shoulders and that helped a lot with mobility.
My workouts don’t seem light at all, and they take a solid hour or a little more to complete. I usually go pretty heavy with 3-4 minutes rest between sets on the compounds, and 2 min on the isolations.
Can you clarify what you mean here?
Yes, I vary the reps each training phase. I try to do 6-8 weeks, then deload. For each phase I’ll do my compounds in the 4-6 then 8-10, then 10-12 rep range.
I would love to. I’ve got a deformed hip socket and squatting or deadlifting really jacks up my lower back. I spent about 2 years repeatedly working on squat and deadlift form, and repeatedly throwing my back out. I just had to remove them from my programming all together. Same with any weighted exercises that make me bend past 90degrees at my hips. I did the best I could by adding exercises I could do instead that work that area. Split squats, hip thrusts, barbell rows. Obviously none of those are ideal, it’s just what I have to work with.
Do you have access to a belt squat or leg press. Those are pretty good for adding leg volume. Depending on how you position yourself, you can work more quad, or more hamstring / glute.
Have you tried things like high box squats, or pulling from boxes for deadlifts? Maybe pulling from blocks with a hex bar.
Full ROM squats and DLs are pretty demanding of hip flexibility. Removing just 6" of ROM can do wonders for many people. I am unaware of how bad your hips and back are. Sometimes when I feel I have beat up hips or back, I reduce ROM a bit.
I bet leg press would be perfect. I have a garage gym and no leg press at the moment. I actually don’t know what a belt squat machine is.
Rack pulls, yes. Box squats I didn’t give a good enough try, I am able to go deep in lunges and split squats so I’ve always opted for those instead. I’ve been trying to get a good open ended hex bar since April, but everything is sold out right now.
If I stand tall with my feet pointed forwards, my whole torso naturally rests 45 degrees twisted to the left. It’s pretty messed up.
The one my gym has looks like this.
Some people just buy the belt part, get a chain and two boxes and make do.
They take a lot of the load off of the back.
Worth a try IMO. I prefer using boxes instead of the rack for pulling. It seems nicer to the bar.
2 minutes rest between heavy compounds, 30-60 seconds on iso work. More sets, more exercises.
You’re not lifting heavy enough weight for enough volume to overtrain yourself.
Except I have over trained myself several times— On this program and others. Even Starting Strength. Every time I add volume I plateau in a matter of a week or two, then after that I get weaker, feel like shit and can’t sleep. I really don’t know what the solution is, unless I significantly drop intensity for volume, which seems to be a no no. Maybe if I slowly add volume over time before each deload, then drop it down again at the beginning of each training phase?
Something is off for sure. What do you mean by plateau? What about weaker? Are you failing on lower reps in succeeding weeks? If so, that happens sometimes, especially if you’re training to failure in a kcal deficit. You just grind through it. If your nervous system is getting shot that quickly and you really have that much systemic fatigue from this kind of program on over a gram of gear, something is just wrong. Especially when you’re not even programming squat and deadlift, which are the two that have the capacity to tax you the most.
One of the approaches to hypertrophy is to prioritize adding volume before adding weight, so to progress through a mesocycle you would do exactly this. Add reps to sets and sets to exercises over the course of 6-8 weeks, and progress your weight only when it’s obvious you need to.
I would drop the stimulants, drop the gear, and add food. Jordan Peters talks about adding dozens of pounds of stage weight to his athletes in their first 12-16 months with nothing but a few 400-500mg test cycles and proper nutrition.
For example, on bench press, I get get up to about 185lbs for reps, then after that I can’t hit as many reps anymore in subsequent workouts, week by week I have to drop reps or weight or just deload. I pretty much always just end up deloadong. And once deloaded it takes about a month to work back up to that weight again, then the same exact thing happens. This has been going on for 6 years of training.
The first two years of training I tried to force through it. I was doing a lot more volume than I am now. Eventually my body pretty much broke down and I haven’t been able to sleep very good since. I spent a lot of time at the doctors office, tried anti depressants, sleep meds, and talk therapy. I settled in Trazodone and ambien, and that’s literally the only way I can get decent sleep at night, and it’s still restless. On average I wake up 5-15 times per night.
I took about a year off the weights to try to fix my sleep issue with no luck. For the next 3 years I played around a lot with volume and intensity. I tried my own programming based off of “practical programming for strength training”, tried starting strength; I even saw a starting strength coach. I tried the strong lifts 5x5 routine, and Jonny Candito’s strength hypertrophy program as well.
When I was seeing the starting strength coach, I did so on their diet protocol, which was essentially a dirty bulk. Drinking a shit ton of milk. Even then, I literally stalled at the same exact spot, and I weighed the most I have on my life, 225lbs of pure fat lol.
When it came time to cut, I would lose all my gains almost immediately. Didn’t matter how fast or slow I cut. It just meant losing gains either fast or slow. And by the end I would be back to square one.
After a couple more years of training like this, doing countless hours of research and trying different things I got my testosterone checked. It came out reasonably low so I started TRT. That was about a year ago. I took some time off the gym because I was just really demotivated. Once Covid just started to hit, I decided to get back to it. My strength came up quicker than ever this time, but I still plateaued at the same damn spot, over and over again, just like before. And that’s about the time I said “fuck it” let’s try gear. Just seemed like my only option. 6 years is a long time with nothing to show for it. I’m getting older now, and my dreams of having a good physique while I’m young are starting to not look to optimistic.
On top of that I’ve got the deformed hip issue and also full blown Thyroid disease. I have no idea to what extent the thyroid disease hinders my progress.
No offense, but if you can’t train for progress what’s the point in running such an aggressive cycle? Seriously I mean no offense. I’ve just never even run half that and I have no limitations. Seems you could do equal progress with test and clen without throwing a Molotov cocktail at your lipids… (winny, var, and evening mast)
No offense taken. If you missed it, did drop the orals. I’m just going to chug along on the test only for a while.
Planet fitness is $10/month. May be worth it just for that plus you get to walk by all the girls on the thread mill and have them see how jacked and tan you are.
Bro I don’t know what to tell you. I wish I could be of some use but I’m just another hobbyist at the end of the day. I was going to bring up diet but it seems like you have that sorted out. FWIW I find very low fat, high protein/carbs to be best for energy and mass. The Starting Strength guys shouldn’t be telling anyone older than 20 to drink milk. I love Rippetoe but he can be dogmatic.
If we were close by I would offer to train with you - partners can be a big help.
Good luck getting this sorted. Just don’t give up!