[quote]Dr. Pangloss wrote:
[quote]SHARKinafishbowl wrote:
If you don’t mind me asking - were you taking any sort of chemical assistance to see that swing? How about supplements? Seems like a pretty awesome shift…but then again maybe we all experience similar fluctuations without knowing it. My levels have always hovered around the same area WHEN I’ve tested them, that is (I’ve even done the math to get a proper comparison when doing tests with different ranges). Who knows about other times. Leaves a lot of room for both speculation and study, though.
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No chemical assistance at all, not even an OTC test booster. The supplements I do take are totally unremarkable ie: fish oil, Vit D, etc.
In spite of the fact that we think we may not notice differences in how we feel, I think the potential for a shift in levels to influence us in ways we are not aware (and then to create a positive feedback loop) is, at least, a cool idea. For instance, let’s say theoretically you look back on your week and you realize that you had a fucking AWESOME day on Wednesday. Well, sure there is a confluence of things probably at play here, but what if a lot of it was driven by testosterone? Maybe a combo of things caused an increased level, which made you feel confident/strong, which increased your level, which…(positive feedback loop).
Like I said probably above, I know I’m just isolating tesosterone here, but even if we expanded the perspective a bit and looked at all anabolic/androgenic hormones, it’d be intesting (although very hard to measure) how directly success/confidence correlates with those hormones.
We’ve all seen the studies about winning increasing levels and the theory (for humans and in other animals) is that victory makes the victors strong so that they can continue on and upward to see further victories and allow for natural selection to take place. Meanwhile, the loser experiences a downregulation of certain key hormones and these make them more inclined to take a break “sit on the sidelines” so to speak, so they can recover, not experience another immediate loss (that would really weaken them big time) and instead bid their time before getting out there again (or resign themselves with being “beta” for a while).
You gotta think that when you’re “on the ball” “in the zone” or just having a great series of life events, T is at play, and when you’re not, that slump you’re in isn’t helping your levels - and it’s a vicious cycle either way, for better or worse.
The thing is, I don’t think it’s an awesome shift. I think it’s perfectly normal variation, but we tend to focus so intently on the number that we don’t see the forest for the trees.
The one article I posted showed a nearly %10 drop in TT just from morning until afternoon. Does this mean that if we all worked out in the AM, we’d build %10 more muscle, or build it %10 more quickly? I don’t think it does. I believe there are too many other variables that mediate protein synthesis, both directly and indirectly. For example, we know that cortisol is catabolic and is also highest in the AM.
Think of it this way. When on a cycle, people routinely see TT results of 3,000, 4,000, even 5,000 or levels %1000 higher than normal. Do they build %1000 greater muscle or at a rate %1000 greater than normal? No, of course not. Therefore, I believe that variation of %10 or %20 is nearly indistinguishable and that the effects on protein synthesis in vivo is unmeasurable for our purposes, ceteris paribus (that is, if we could theoretically hold everything else equal.)
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