Looking to Add to my Stack

Diet and Nutrition
1

Like many of my fellow tmuscle readers I’m in the middle of trying to shed that body fat for summer. My goal is to lose as much body fat as possible while retaining as much muscle as humanly possible. (where have you heard that before, lol)

I’m modifying my training and diet to help the process along but I’m looking for input on my supplement stack. Never juiced and never really have I gotten too serious with taking massive amounts of over the counter ergogenic aids, but I want to up the ante a bit. I think the pipe dream of maintaining (or even gaining) muscle while increasing lipolysis requires it. I have to note that I suffer from panic attacks and chronic mild depression. I tend to be very sensitive to anything I consume (some of this may be psychosomatic) but I’ve never really pushed the envelope in terms of consumption of legal (or illegal) aids for this reason. I recently had a friend who passed from what looks like steroid abuse so one more reason I won’t be going down that road.

Not on an RXs for the anxiety at the moment but the reason I mention it is that I’m trying to spring for non-stimulating thermogenic aids here. I haven’t messed with high dose caffeine, amphetamines or the like, but I know most of that stuff would send me swinging through the rafters like a chimpanzee on crack.

Currently I’m taking:

Fish Oil: 2-8g per day, cycling from low to high then tapering down

CLA: 3-4g per day for several month stints

ALA: (picked it up for the first time in a while) 1-2x day 300mg with food

Vit D: 2-4000IUs per day

Wanna add: (never used any of these)

Prima Force “Lean Green” Green Tea Extract (500mg) (50% EGCG) - suggested use: 1-2x daily

Metabolic Response Modifiers L-Carnitine 500 (500mg) - suggested use: depends on reason of use

Finest Natural Garlic Oil (3mg) - suggested use: one pill per day

Rez-V (thinking it could negate any prolactin increases that I may have experienced from SSRI use on and off over the past few years - also general testosterone support)

ZMA (general recovery and testosterone support)

Questions about these:

First and foremost anyone’s subjective experience would be awesome…but more specifically:

Has anyone found EGCG to be stimulating? (in a bad way). The literature often shows a positive correlation between anxiety and the L-theanine componenet of green tea, not the EGCG itself. If anything, I’ve heard that EGCG can be detrimental to anxiety…

L-Carnitine - same question as above and, additionally does anyone think this is just plain worthless? No one I’ve talked to has given it rave reviews…

Garlic oil - would this be the same as “garlic extract”? I don’t remember the exact mechanism but I’ve seen garlic extract mentioned for fat burning purposes…

What’s everybody’s take on Rez-V and ZMA? Stimulating? I’ve only ever used Biotest Superfood so I can’t vouch for any of their other supplements but they seem to make solid products.

Alpha-GPC? Never taken this and haven’t done a lot of research … what’s the skinny?

Thanks for the input.

2

The first step to successfully losing bodyfat is to keep or build muscle, which will keep your metabolism elevated. It looks like you’ve treid to list every possible supplement that has any potential to assist in fat loss without even addressing LBM preservation. I’d recommend sticking to the basics, and busting your ass in the gym.

Metabolic Drive
BCAAs
Flameout (and CLA at night <-what I do)

While you can’t make use of any type of stimlant based burner, I’m sure you could benefit from something like Receptormax which should allow your body to make better use of the nutrients you pack in.

S

3

I appreciate the advice.

Like I said I’ve got my training dialed in not to mention nutrient timing, macro ratios figured out, etc. so I’m not too worried about that.

I’m currently using Optimum Nutrition’s Pro Complex Powder and I tend not to switch up my powders all that often. Do you think the Metabolic Drive is comparable (or even better) than ON?

Do you have any personal experience with Receptormax?

Thanks for your input.

4

[quote]The Mighty Stu wrote:
The first step to successfully losing bodyfat is to keep or build muscle, which will keep your metabolism elevated. It looks like you’ve treid to list every possible supplement that has any potential to assist in fat loss without even addressing LBM preservation. I’d recommend sticking to the basics, and busting your ass in the gym.

Metabolic Drive
BCAAs
Flameout (and CLA at night <-what I do)

While you can’t make use of any type of stimlant based burner, I’m sure you could benefit from something like Receptormax which should allow your body to make better use of the nutrients you pack in.

S[/quote]

hey stu i’m really curious on this. i’m currently trying to do the same as OP and so far have gotten pretty good results. i’m thinking of adding some CLA but i don’t know what’s the dosage that’s useful. how much CLA do you use and do you take them all at the same time?

btw i’ve been pulse feasting and it seems to allow me to drop fat really quickly while maintaining muscle