Longer Cycles (20-24 weeks) ?

Pharma
1

This isn’t something I’ve seen discussed in any great detail here - but something I’ve grown increasingly interested in (purely out of curiosity). Just a little disclaimer: I certainly don’t utilise or usually recommend long cycles.

It is a generally accepted truth that AAS users suffer from diminishing returns (you eventually stop growing even though the dose has not decreased.) It’s evident from one of Bill’s articles that this is not via ‘androgen receptor down regulation’.

Is this reflective of relationship between the amount of androgens in the blood stream and the amount of lean mass that you can maintain? Or is it through some other mechanism? (I’ll put my hand up and say I’m not clear on this).

Regardless…it still leads us to the challenge of trying to elicit further growth when one desires continued growth past the anecdotal ‘cuttoff’ point of say, 10 - 12 weeks of use.

I’ve read of some potential benefits of extended and larger dosed cycles, namely:

Greater capacity for protein synthesis by increasing fusion of satellite cells to existing fibers - satellite activity is a prerequisite for hypertrophy.

Increased the capacity of the muscle to grow in the future by leading to the accumulation of myonuclei which are required for protein synthesis

Maybe even encourage new fiber formation!

To achieve any of the above requires IGF-1, so an aromatising drug should be used throughout an extended cycle (not to mention many other reasons).

But how does one go about creating an effective ‘long cycle’ to fight diminished returns?

Some of my basic thoughts (I’m no expert):

Start of with a relatively low dose of Testosterone (alone or with other compounds), and slowly raise the dose throughout (this would have to be slow and gradual).

OR

Change your goals periodically - some may call this a ‘blast and cruise’ setup

This is how I would do it…

The first 8 weeks would be for hypertrophy, using say, Test and Anadrol - I’m very fond of these together

The Following 4 Weeks I would taper down the dosages significantly (enough for muscle maintenance) and you try to shed body fat (with calorie restriction, and anything else may help with body fat reduction). This will hopefully re-sensitise the body (not ARs) for further growth.

Further 8 Weeks of hypertrophy, this time using different AAS with different AR affinities â?? (Low dose test, high tren and Dbol could work well) - HCG will be of use here.

These compounds are just examples but are designed to demonstrate how you can choose them based on how tightly they bind to the AR or create growth via different mechanisms.

I would probably use stasis taper for PCT - presuming that 100mg p/w allows for some recovery.

What does everybody else think?

2

Well, let’s assume:

  1. You’re not going to drop dead 24 weeks from now, but rather at some time point rather far past that.

  2. There isn’t anything particularly special about the 24 week point in your life: e.g., there’s no contest at that time, and how you look and how you can lift at other time points is just as important as the 24 week time point.

  3. That we should make comparisons as equal as possible, changing only thing (duration) while holding other things constant (amount of steroids used per year, and percent of time “on” per year.)

Note, there is nothing magic about the yearly time figure either: it is just a convenient value to work with when wanting to look at long-term effect. We don’t have to use exactly 365 days in any given evaluation.

So, a comparison to be made then would be a 24 week on, 24 week off annual (or nearly annual) plan to a three-cycles-of 8 weeks on, 8 weeks off annual plan.

Rather than tell you typical outcomes and likely reasons for them, how do you think these compare?

3

I think that staying on for extended periods of time, although posing risks to recovery, in terms of muscle growth is going to yield better gains. Since you will lose strength and mass at the end of each cycle, the path you are taking is a two steps forward, one step back type path. If you string the three cycles together, at the end of each 8 week period, you won’t be taking any steps back. However, I am no expert on this…

4

Not considering whether three 8 week cycles or one 24 week cycle yields better gains, is there a more difficult recovery after a 20-24 week cycle in healthy young males? It seems like only certain information is available on the internet to keep people from taking risks and possibly doing damage.

Could there be a risk, not of permanent shutdown, but of permanent slightly lower baseline testosterone?

5

[quote]Lover95 wrote:

Could there be a risk, not of permanent shutdown, but of permanent slightly lower baseline testosterone?[/quote]

I think “normal” gear using lowers your baseline test levels too, so would a longer cycle lower them more. Does it really matter if your going to use gear any way…

6

[quote]Bill Roberts wrote:
Well, let’s assume:

  1. You’re not going to drop dead 24 weeks from now, but rather at some time point rather far past that.

  2. There isn’t anything particularly special about the 24 week point in your life: e.g., there’s no contest at that time, and how you look and how you can lift at other time points is just as important as the 24 week time point.

  3. That we should make comparisons as equal as possible, changing only thing (duration) while holding other things constant (amount of steroids used per year, and percent of time “on” per year.)

Note, there is nothing magic about the yearly time figure either: it is just a convenient value to work with when wanting to look at long-term effect. We don’t have to use exactly 365 days in any given evaluation.

So, a comparison to be made then would be a 24 week on, 24 week off annual (or nearly annual) plan to a three-cycles-of 8 weeks on, 8 weeks off annual plan.

Rather than tell you typical outcomes and likely reasons for them, how do you think these compare?[/quote]

Thanks, Bill

I don’t need convincing that an 8 on 8 off will be superior to a 24 on 24 off protocol when all things remain equal. I certainly agree with you on this point.

This is my understanding of why:

It’s attributable to diminishing returns, and ‘tip off points’ where additional time ons impact on the length of recovery, outweigh the potential of muscle gain benefits of continuing the cycle (considering diminishing returns).

I would certainly not run a 24 week cycle personally. My intention was simply to stimulate discussion on how you could optimise such a cycle if the user was intent on doing so.

So let’s assume that 2) the user has a social event in 24 Weeks and is hoping to put on as much lean body mass in that time frame.

‘My’ thoughts can be found in the OP.

7

Ah, okay, so in this case the 24 week point is a special time point.

Now, most of my consults have been non-competitors but some have been competitors and thus faced this situation. There winds up being selection bias in that anyone seeking my advice, as opposed to oh say Dave Palumbo’s (no disrespect intended to him) is probably looking for what I’m known for anyhow, and so would tend to more agreeable to the below advice than what might the average preference.

But in each case in this situation my view has been that there is probably very little difference in final outcome between running say 24 weeks straight, or running 8 weeks, having that transition very quickly to the “off” state by using short-acting esters at the end of it; then 3 weeks off; then in this case 13 weeks on, peaking at the contest.

If anything the body might respond better.

No one ever thought that this sort of plan worked badly for them or said afterwards that they wished they’d gone the entire time straight on.

On the ideas in your original post, I don’t think it’s productive to slow potential gains in the earlier weeks of the cycle by holding back if the goal is maximum results in the relatively near future such as 24 weeks. Or even not if the time frame is longer yet.

I would do every single “on” week at what was judged to be the best stack for the individual situation, with that situation really not changing as the contest draws nearer except that there could be a preference to go to “drier” steroids towards the end, though personally I think that’s irrelevant if estradiol levels are controlled and even moreso if on top of that, diuretics are going to be used for the contest anyway.

8

[quote]LR wrote:

It is a generally accepted truth that AAS users suffer from diminishing returns (you eventually stop growing even though the dose has not decreased.) It’s evident from one of Bill’s articles that this is not via ‘androgen receptor down regulation’.

Is this reflective of relationship between the amount of androgens in the blood stream and the amount of lean mass that you can maintain? Or is it through some other mechanism? (I’ll put my hand up and say I’m not clear on this).

[quote]

Bill would you be kind enough to clarify this for me?

9

[quote]LR wrote:
This isn’t something I’ve seen discussed in any great detail here - but something I’ve grown increasingly interested in (purely out of curiosity). Just a little disclaimer: I certainly don’t utilise or usually recommend long cycles.

It is a generally accepted truth that AAS users suffer from diminishing returns (you eventually stop growing even though the dose has not decreased.) It’s evident from one of Bill’s articles that this is not via ‘androgen receptor down regulation’.

Is this reflective of relationship between the amount of androgens in the blood stream and the amount of lean mass that you can maintain? Or is it through some other mechanism? (I’ll put my hand up and say I’m not clear on this).

Regardless…it still leads us to the challenge of trying to elicit further growth when one desires continued growth past the anecdotal ‘cuttoff’ point of say, 10 - 12 weeks of use.

I’ve read of some potential benefits of extended and larger dosed cycles, namely:

Greater capacity for protein synthesis by increasing fusion of satellite cells to existing fibers - satellite activity is a prerequisite for hypertrophy.

Increased the capacity of the muscle to grow in the future by leading to the accumulation of myonuclei which are required for protein synthesis

Maybe even encourage new fiber formation!

To achieve any of the above requires IGF-1, so an aromatising drug should be used throughout an extended cycle (not to mention many other reasons).

But how does one go about creating an effective ‘long cycle’ to fight diminished returns?

Some of my basic thoughts (I’m no expert):

Start of with a relatively low dose of Testosterone (alone or with other compounds), and slowly raise the dose throughout (this would have to be slow and gradual).

OR

Change your goals periodically - some may call this a ‘blast and cruise’ setup

This is how I would do it…

The first 8 weeks would be for hypertrophy, using say, Test and Anadrol - I’m very fond of these together

The Following 4 Weeks I would taper down the dosages significantly (enough for muscle maintenance) and you try to shed body fat (with calorie restriction, and anything else may help with body fat reduction). This will hopefully re-sensitise the body (not ARs) for further growth.

Further 8 Weeks of hypertrophy, this time using different AAS with different AR affinities �¢?? (Low dose test, high tren and Dbol could work well) - HCG will be of use here.

These compounds are just examples but are designed to demonstrate how you can choose them based on how tightly they bind to the AR or create growth via different mechanisms.

I would probably use stasis taper for PCT - presuming that 100mg p/w allows for some recovery.

What does everybody else think?
[/quote]

10

[quote]LR wrote:

[quote]LR wrote:

It is a generally accepted truth that AAS users suffer from diminishing returns (you eventually stop growing even though the dose has not decreased.) It’s evident from one of Bill’s articles that this is not via ‘androgen receptor down regulation’.

Is this reflective of relationship between the amount of androgens in the blood stream and the amount of lean mass that you can maintain? Or is it through some other mechanism? (I’ll put my hand up and say I’m not clear on this).

[/quote]

Bill would you be kind enough to clarify this for me?[/quote]

A large part of it is as fundamental as how a person uses words.

Let’s say that Joe Lifter is 190 lb in lean condition. He uses anabolic steroids and fairly rapidly reaches 220 lb in lean condition.

He does another cycle and now reaches 230 lb in lean condition.

He now claims that his 230 lb in lean condition is “less returns” than what he achieved previously, and now the steroids just aren’t working as well anymore as previously.

Well, okay, if that’s how he wants to use words…

Anabolic steroids are not a rate control. Achieving yet higher muscle mass albeit at a lower rate is not a lesser return.

As to why end result, as determined for example as of the last week of the usage, will typically be better if breaking for example 16 weeks of steroid use into two 8 week cycles rather than running them back to back, this likely has to do with how the body grows in general, in any circumstance.

A growth spurt leaves the body less able to have another growth spurt, till some time has passed. This just seems to be the nature of the biology, though I don’t know specifically why.

It does make sense though that normal growth would be this way, so perhaps it’s not strange that assisted growth is this way as well. After adding some number of pounds of muscle, apparently the body is better able to grow again if it has some time before it has to do so again rather than proceeding straight into rapid growth again.

12

Does increasing the dose of drugs used go any way towards countering the bodies tendency to stop growing?

In other words, if you were intent on running a 24 week cycle, would ramping the dose at each 8 weeks, or perhaps adding other compounds, allow you to keep growing? I ask because I am about 9 weeks into my first cycle of 400mg test cyp and 300mg deca, and I had originally planned it to be a minimum of 16 weeks.

I guess its early days, but although I have put on a lot of mass, so much that people are asking me what I’ve been eating (lol), I’m still getting stronger at almost every workout. Plus I have recently added some dbol which is only just starting to kick in. I had planned on just holding the dose where it is for 16 weeks, but I do want to get the most out of this cycle I can, so I was considering either,

  1. upping the test at week 10
  2. adding in primobolan at week 10

Is it worth doing either of these or both? Or is there a better way. I was also considering throwing in 4 weeks of anadrol at the end.

So given I have ready access to other drugs, and am open to running a 24 week cycle, what would be the best way to proceed, given that I have only two goals for this cycle; strength and mass.

And I greatly appreciate any advice or help offered.

13

[quote]razii wrote:

[quote]Lover95 wrote:

Could there be a risk, not of permanent shutdown, but of permanent slightly lower baseline testosterone?[/quote]

I think “normal” gear using lowers your baseline test levels too, so would a longer cycle lower them more. Does it really matter if your going to use gear any way…
[/quote]

this

14

The defeatist assumption that effective steroid use must result in long-term lowered natural production is just that: a defeatist assumption.

Though is true that too many turn it into reality. But that’s quite unnecessary.

15

[quote]razii wrote:

[quote]Lover95 wrote:

Could there be a risk, not of permanent shutdown, but of permanent slightly lower baseline testosterone?[/quote]

I think “normal” gear using lowers your baseline test levels too, so would a longer cycle lower them more. Does it really matter if your going to use gear any way…
[/quote]

That’s a good point, but many don’t want to have to run cycles for the rest of their life. Consider what will happen during the next world war, civil uprising, or natural disaster. It’s a common, well-known fact that every 50-60 years there’s a major re-shifting of power. The delicate supply lines on which modern life depends could be destroyed. During the new martial government, luxury items such as androgens won’t be available, let alone necessities. The solution is there needs to be a stronger grass roots movement to stop the formation of the global government and preserve our modern way of life.

1 Like
16

Dude, if there was another world war, my testosterone levels would be the last thing on my mind!

And just what is wrong with a global government anyway? Global government is the only logical progression forward from the current global political system, and would likely put an end to wars and conflicts.

17

So do you want for example a billion people of some particular group voting that you must adhere to their religious requirements perhaps, or that you should be taxed 100% of your income beyond some amount that they consider the most you should have, with them of course getting benefits from those taxes and thus being motivated to vote that way?

18

I’m with you on both points there, religion should be irrelevant to government and the socialist model of taxation leaves a lot to be desired. But a global form of government need not be at a level that dictates such things to people. I think a type of world republic, founded along the lines of the original constitution of the USA would be the way to go, with the aim being to protect individual rights and freedom from heavy and unnessessary taxation. With the correct constitution drawn up, I think that a world goverment could bring the most prosperous time that mankind has ever seen.

19

[/quote]
As to why end result, as determined for example as of the last week of the usage, will typically be better if breaking for example 16 weeks of steroid use into two 8 week cycles rather than running them back to back, this likely has to do with how the body grows in general, in any circumstance.

A growth spurt leaves the body less able to have another growth spurt, till some time has passed. This just seems to be the nature of the biology, though I don’t know specifically why.

It does make sense though that normal growth would be this way, so perhaps it’s not strange that assisted growth is this way as well. After adding some number of pounds of muscle, apparently the body is better able to grow again if it has some time before it has to do so again rather than proceeding straight into rapid growth again.
[/quote]

Yeah, this makes sense. The body is always looking for homeostasis.

This is why i thought it may be a good idea for the 4 week ‘cut’ period where you not only reduce the dose, but reduce calories maybe and increase cardio. Hopefully the body’s catabolic switch being ‘on’ for a period of time will prime the body for further anabolism. Combine that with a change in androgens and increased dose…

I’ve got nothing to support any of this however…if i ever did a longer cycle i would probably follow your protocl Bill.

20

[quote]MassiveGuns wrote:
Dude, if there was another world war, my testosterone levels would be the last thing on my mind!

And just what is wrong with a global government anyway? Global government is the only logical progression forward from the current global political system, and would likely put an end to wars and conflicts.[/quote]

Every generation with its proponents of Utopia, every generation with its painful, bloody, disillusionment. Part of the human condition, I guess.

I’m with BBB, people appreciate conditioning much more than a few more pounds, since the eye catches proportions more than absolute size. Also, vascularity hints at muscularity.