Testosterone and Nutrition by Jerry Brainum 5/22

 

 

Testosterone is without a doubt one of the most anabolic hormones in the body. Anabolic steroids, which are known to greatly promote increased muscle mass, are just synthetic analogs of testosterone that have been structurally manipulated to resist premature breakdown in the liver in the case of oral steroids. The injected forms are often in ester form, which likewise provides an extended activity. If you ingested a pure testosterone pill, nearly all of it would be rapidly degraded in the liver. It's no secret that anabolic steroid usage is rampant in competitive bodybuilding, yet the largest users of the drugs are not competitors, but rather those who think that drugs will produce larger muscles and more muscular definition. That they will although results can vary enormously. I've seen men who respond to steroids in spectacular fashion. Two examples of this were Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny Padilla. Both champion bodybuilders, although Arnold needs no introduction unless you've been holed up in Antarctica for the past 30 years.  I've witnessed both men metamorphose from being completely out of shape with not much muscle mass to elite-level physiques in as short as 6 weeks. They did that through a combination of training and steroid regimes. Their bodies would literally change from day to day once they began using the steroids. This is in contrast to others I've seen over the years who embarked on "champion-level" steroid regimes, yet never displayed any champion-level muscles. They didn't respond to the drugs that much and also lacked the necessary genetics required to attain elite status in bodybuilding.

Recent studies have found that the training-induced rise in testosterone that occurs right after training offers little or no anabolic effects. How can that be if testosterone is one of the most potent anabolic hormones in the body? The reason for that is that the rise in testosterone shortly after training is too short-lived to provide any significant anabolic effects. For that, you would need an extended release of testosterone. This is what happens when you use anabolic steroid drugs. But what does all this mean for a natural bodybuilder or anyone else who chooses to not use any anabolic drugs, but still wants to build more muscle? Does natural testosterone count at all? Actually, it does. Again, recent studies conclusively show that testosterone levels have a direct relationship with the degree of muscle mass in anyone. That means that having lower levels of testosterone will inhibit muscle gains and also adversely affect body composition, as in higher body fat levels. In studies where natural testosterone levels have been lowered by drugs in young men, the men were not able to make any muscle gains despite engaging in resistance training. The power of testosterone in this regard is also underscored by a famous 1996 study that provided 600 milligrams of testosterone or a placebo to men also engaged in . . .