Not that I'm saying it's a good idea to blast gear in your late 30s/40s, but you could always focus on getting bigger while under 10% BF. That way your body is much less stressed.
Oh yeah, I intend to get bigger, just not planning to get huge or compete. Couldn't in any case unless I have a couple surgeries to remove excess skin.
I have a blast coming up, but I'm late to the blasting and cruising party. In retrospect, I stayed "natty" way longer than I should've spending most of my 40s not making any progress in the gym for lack of recovery. In addition to having a great appetite for tossing back clean food, I also seem to tolerate big doses of anabolics as well.
Could you show me?
Aside from internet tough guys feeling insecure over GLPs, is there any evidence that long term use of them for overweight people (most of the world at this point) is bad?
Recently there's some news articles on GLP1 receptor agonists extending lifespan. That's based on a deduction rather than hard science. The presumption being that any given individual will live longer and be healthier with some caloric restriction.
However, there's a growing body of evidence showing benefits related to the metabolic effects of GLP1 RAs like better ASCVD outcomes, improvement in sleep apnea and so on, the kind of thing you would expect with when obese people begin to lose weight.
For example, they apparently help with addiction disorders:
Drug, alcohol and tobacco use disorders are a global burden affecting millions of people. Despite decades of research, treatment options are sparse or missing, and relapse rates are high. Glucagon‐like peptide 1 (GLP‐1) is released in the small ...
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
There, the belief is that there is some effect on dopamine signaling which carries over to other addictive behaviors.
Various GLP1 RAs work to different degrees to treat NAFLD which is wonderful as that's becoming epidemic in the US.
Very quickly, there's also other potential benefits like lowered blood pressure, reduced risk of kidney disease, reduced cognitive decline, and lowered systemic inflammation.
If you care, I can find studies substantiating these claims, but I'd take them with a grain of salt. These drugs are worth many billions of dollars to the companies producing them and each additional medical use makes it easier for them to milk insurance companies for their extraordinary profit margins. It is quite literally a goldmine for them and so they are heavily incentivized to produce these studies.
Many of these benefits are simply the product of improved metabolic health, but others, like the addiction thing are a surprising and novel discovery. Incentives notwithstanding, the benefits appear plausible and the results simply need to be replicated on a larger scale.
In terms of harm, there appears to be none so far outside of the side effects associated with the use, mostly gastrointestinal effects. There are few compounds with as much attention as these have to establish safety and thus far nobody has discovered anything of merit.
The only thing I'm aware of is the almost universal elevation of resting heart rate by about 10 beats per minute, which may or may not have negative lon g term consequences. The only context that I'm aware of in which it matters is for endurance athletes. HR for a given power output also increases by 10 bpm which may impact absolute power output and potentially VO2Max. The easy work around would be to cycle on and off when needed.
