Question for Cy - ATD

Cy,

What is your opinion of ATD (1,4,6-androstatriene-3,17-dione)?

Is it safe? Effective?

Thanks for your help.

[quote]Stern3657 wrote:
Cy,

What is your opinion of ATD (1,4,6-androstatriene-3,17-dione)?

Is it safe? Effective?

Thanks for your help.[/quote]

I don’t know that I can answer either of those questions. I will say this however. Likely limited by first-pass metabolism, and again something which it seems these companies which keep coming out with these products are forgetting, is that these steroidal aromatase inhibitors have two major drawbacks which is why you saw the shift in the pharmaceutical industry towards non-steroidal aromatase inhibitors, and those drawbacks are related to both lack of selectivity and in the case of someone who is using it post cycle in the hopes for increased recovery, these steroids, this one in particular, are androgenic. You can look in to the literature and find relatively easily, studies regarding this. One concluded that it may be an androgen antagonist, another concluding a likely metabolite binds to the AR acting as an agonist. Obviously, neither of these are what you want. Also, if it works as well in humans as it did in animal models, you could also expect a decrease in HDL.

If you’re going to use an aromatase inhibitor, you’re much better off using anastrozole.

How does it manage to restore the size of your testicles while on cycle, and not stop your gains? Sort of like HCG. Also I’ve seen people’s blood work after using it along with other trib, or fenugreek type products for pct and their test levels aren’t suppressed.

I’m not arguing, and you know that I know that you know you know alot more then me Cy :wink: I was just shocked at how quickly my nuts came back, and bigger then I ever remembered. On top of that aside from a slight decrease in sex drive (I could still get hard, just didn’t have much of an urge) when I was on at 75 mg, I’ve never had a better pct.

WideGuy…why can’t you take everything I say as fact?! It would be so much easier. :slight_smile: I’m kidding of course.

Well, I wouldn’t speak of it restoring testicular size as such a matter of fact. I’ve had guys e-mail or tell me in person that they swear their testicles atrophied the day after they initiated a cycle with testosterone. Similarly I’ve had them tell me their testicles get larger during a cycle. As you know, the testicles aren’t going to atrophy that quickly. I think the main part of confusion stems from guys evaluating the size of their scrotum, rather than actually palpating the testicles and getting a physical measurement. Just to give you an example of what I’m talking about, after 6 months of taking testosterone enanthate (normal men) at 300 mg/week, testicular size remained within 0.5 centimeters of pretreatment measurements. That is why I don’t put much stock in to such reports as I’ve never met a guy who actually measured his testicles, nor was able to eye such small changes. Rather, they simply look down here and there.

I’m not sure what you mean about it not stopping gains. There’s no data which supports the statement that any aromatase inhibitors decrease gains. I’ve heard of guys claiming that they use one drug over another because one doesn’t affect IGF-1 levels, yet unbeknownst to them, there are just as many studies showing a decrease as there are showing no effect. Psychology plays a large role.

As for the effect upon testosterone levels. I don’t doubt you there, but that’s not what needs to be measured. Rather, LH needs to be measured. Depending upon which analytical method is used for testosterone, that steroid you’re using or a metabolite thereof could be mistaken for testosterone. This is why it’s so important to have LH assayed, yet, coincidentally or not, the highly publicized pilot studies for these steroidal aromatase inhibitor supplements lack an evaluation of LH. An evaluation of LH will truly allow one to know if “recovery” is taking place or if the steroid being administered is cross-reacting with the standard immunoglobulin. Bill Roberts has addressed this thoroughly. http://www.t-nation.com/readTopic.do?id=557245

Last, you said that these people were using other supplements when they had their blood drawn which really makes it difficult, if not impossible to differentiate which was responsible for what.

Keep in mind, I’m not saying you’re imagining things or that you’re wrong, I’m just pointing out why some people could be making such claims. In the end, if it worked for you, by all means, keep doing it.

[quote]WideGuy wrote:
How does it manage to restore the size of your testicles while on cycle, and not stop your gains? Sort of like HCG. Also I’ve seen people’s blood work after using it along with other trib, or fenugreek type products for pct and their test levels aren’t suppressed.

I’m not arguing, and you know that I know that you know you know alot more then me Cy :wink: I was just shocked at how quickly my nuts came back, and bigger then I ever remembered. On top of that aside from a slight decrease in sex drive (I could still get hard, just didn’t have much of an urge) when I was on at 75 mg, I’ve never had a better pct. [/quote]

LOL, yeah that would be easier. Btw I hear ya on the hype about testicular atrophy. To be honest I thought I was about the same as I always was. Then I realized after being on the atd for a few weeks in the shower while I was “palpating” that they are definitely larger. However I ran a 20 week cycle with things like tren, drol, test (from 1 gram to 500 mgs), and npp.

I know that when it really comes down to it, bloodwork is really the only way I’m going to know. Unfortunately, I am in my senior year of college and have ZERO health insurance. Everywhere I’ve found online to do my bloodwork is both very expensive ($500), and on top of that the few of them I have checked out seem to mention that New Jersey doesn’t participate in these types of online labs. So I just try to make a point of staying off for a solid amount of time.

On a somewhat unrelated rant, I can’t wait to have good health insurance. It blows my friggin mind, when I speak to people who have good health insurance and make NO effort to use it like they could.

Sorry Cy, but I need to revive this one just 1 last time: Do you have any recommendations for someone who made the mistake of using ATD for the past approx 10 days?
Haven’t seen any negative effects as of yet, but do you have any supplement recommendations that could counteract potential problems? Also, should I immediately cease the use of the ATD, or taper off of it?

Thanks in advance!!!

Hi,

If you no longer wish to use the supplement, I would simply discontinue use. No need to do anything else.

[quote]JammieBane wrote:
Sorry Cy, but I need to revive this one just 1 last time: Do you have any recommendations for someone who made the mistake of using ATD for the past approx 10 days?
Haven’t seen any negative effects as of yet, but do you have any supplement recommendations that could counteract potential problems? Also, should I immediately cease the use of the ATD, or taper off of it?

Thanks in advance!!![/quote]