ATTN: Kelly Baggett

Kelly, correct me if I misunderstood, but I read in one of your posts that you arent big on using thermogenics during fat loss regiment. Could you explain your reasoning? I thought thermogenics resulted in a higher fat to muscle loss ratio.

I’m not Kelly, but I understand where he is coming from. This is my take on the subject. Thermogenics make it easier to lose the fat versus doing it naturally. The thing is that if you do it naturally, you are more likely to maintain the gains as you have adjusted your lifestyle to accompany this change rather than relying on thermogenics as sort of a safety net. Chronic use of thermogenics may also suppress the thyroid so when you get off the thermos, a lagging thyroid might make it difficult to maintain your new body composition. Personally, I think thermogenics have their place. I’m using them right now, but like I said, they are a safety net for a cutting cycle. MD6 increases energy expenditure and cuts down on carb cravings and appetite in general. For the long run, I know that I will have to adjust my lifestyle factors to maintain my target body composition.

Thanks for your input. I’m satisfied with that answer :slight_smile: Here’s another one for you. Is there a better loss in fat to muscle ratio while on thermogenics, assuming all other aspects of training , nutrition stay the same.

What would you do when coming off these supps. Would you decrease cals or increase cardio. I am taking the old T2 and MD6 for a 3-4 week cutting phase. I also have a pretty slow metabolism. I am thinking of taking the new T2 to help my thyroid recover.

Ephedrine has been shown to assist in lean body mass preservation during periods of caloric restriction, so ephedrine would not only assist with fat loss but also with lean body mass preservation.

Definately increase the cardio. Lowering cals further will only increase thyroid suppresion and will lower resting metabolism thus making a rebound fat gain more likely. If you increase cardio, you will increase caloric expenditure and increase resting metabolic rate and avoid any further thyroid suppression. Also the increase in activity should help a lagging thyroid. T2-Pro will also help as it provides the precursors and support for T3 and T4.

Jason did a good job of explaining my take on the subject. I would also like to add that it is more or less an individual thing, depending on ones tolerance to stimulants. They can deplete the adrenal and thyroid glands and how fast one bounces back from their use is highly individual. Some guys can take stimulants every day or every workout for weeks on end and come off with no problems whatsoever. Personally I find if I use them for any length of time whatsoever (more then a couple of days in a row) I feel like crap when coming off and my metabolism is definitely compromised during this time. Also I think people tend to look at them as a quick fix and their use would be better to assist in those last few “hard to lose lbs” or whenever fat loss from moderate diet and cardio has stalled. They seem to work better during short periods of time so this makes more sense to me. As an example say you’re trying to go from 12% bodyfat to 6% bodyfat. I think you would have better maintenance of metabolic rate and a better chance of maintaining and achieving a lower bf % if you only started using stimulants once you got down to 8% bodyfat vs using them from the outset at 12%.

Also I forgot to mention the negative impact of stimulants on insulin sensitivity. I haven’t done any research on this myself but according to John Berardi the use of stimulants such as ephedra and caffeine has a very negative impact on insulin sensitivity. I think it’s essential one tries to keep insulin sensitivity as high as possible so this would also support limiting their use to a short duration.

With regard to Kelly’s post on stimulants messing with thyroid (in general): would this just apply to ephedra, or would that also be caffeine (i.e. coke and coffee would mess with thyroid also … ?). I am a big coffee drinker, and I am trying to get my body fat under control. So, I am wondering if I need to pay attention to my caffeine intake…?

–Zippy

Caffeine will do it too. If you find that you need to drink many cups of coffee per day just to function then it’s a good bet you’ve compromised your adrenals already. Try weaning yourself off of it and your fat loss will eventually be better.

Kelly, thanks a LOT for that pointer. I was begining to wonder why my fat loss was slowing down…

I’ll start weening from caffeine and see how it goes right after the end of this 2 week first time keto diet thing…

Damn, I can’t get over how much I learn in this forum…

–Zippy