Plan for my second cycle; critique/adjustments are appreciated

[Necessary Evil]

Hello guys, I'm new to this forum and this is my first (or second if you count the introduction post) post ever.

A little information about me regarding AAS usage and my previous cycle. My first cycle was somewhat a year ago. Since it was my first time using gear I decided to go as simple as possible in order to gauge and monitor the effects on my body. So my first cycle was:

Testosterone Enanthate @250mg twice per week [pinning every Monday and Thursday. As far as AI goes I opted for Aromasin @12.5mg on pin days. I did bloodwork prior to cycle, after 4 weeks on the cycle, to check if the gear was legit and then 4 weeks after the cessation of my PCT to check if I recovered correctly. Generally everything was perfect apart from some slight increase in blood pressure when on cycle and some anxiety.

For my PCT then I used a combination of Nolvadex & Clomid. I took 20mg of Tamoxifen and 25mg of Clomifene ED for 8 weeks. I also threw in Ashwagandha to help with the stress and increase testosterone [there are some studies suporting it]. As I wrote above it worked great since I had a full recovery.

Generally my first impressions were mixed to good. I expected to see more gains than I did. People noticed and commented but I expected more. I did put more fat that I wanted though so that I have to keep in mind on my next cycle.

Currently I'm in the army and I will return back home in 20 days. So now that I have a bit more free time I decided to plan my next cycle and I was hoping if you could give me your insight and suggestions.

To begin with I will start the cycle at around September. I want first to do a recomposition phase since I gained some fat and lost some muscle mass. Generally my goal is to have a low stress cycle since it will be the first time I will use more than one compound and make some lean gains, so nutrition wise I will got at +5-10% Caloric surplus. So far I have come up with this:

• Testosterone Enanthate/Cypionate @250-300mg twice per week [Every Monday/Thursdsay]
  Duration: 1-16 weeks.
• Boldenone @300-500mg twice per week [Every Monday/Thursday]
  Duration: 1-14 weeks.
• Dianabol @40-50mg ED.
  Duration: The first 4-6 weeks.

For AI I will opt again for Aromasin which will start after the first week of the cycle. And for PCT I'm thinking of doing the same as I described above, since it worked wonders.

So here are my newbie questions:

• Will I see results with that dosage of Boldenone? I have heard that the effects are minimal unless you go to something like 1000mg per week. Is this true? I would go for Deca but I don't want to even have the slightiest chance to mess with my prolactin levels plus as I mentioned above I aim for a stress free cycle.
• How should I dose my AI? As I mentioned above my Estrogen levels were on point whilst using 12.5mg twice a week on my old cycle. However, due to the addition of 2 compounds will I have to increase it? Something like 25mg on pin days? I know that the answer is to get bloods done and adjust from there, but I would prefer not to let sides appear and then react.
• What's the optimal dosage for Dianabol? For how many weeks do you guys recommend it? When should I take it? From what I have searched so far there isn't a definitive answer to this, every person I ask gives me a different opinion. Would love to hear yours.
• Do you think that this PCT program would be enough for a complete recovery? Should I change/add anything?
  • Nolvadex: 20/20/20/20/20/20/20/20
  • Clomid: 25/25/25/25/25/25/25/25
• Would you change any compound in favor of another? If so could you explain why?

I think that that's it for now. Can't currently think of any other question, if anything comes up I will post on the thread.

 

[Apexvallen]

Hmm, you might get some benefit from the EQ at that dosage. Most people recommend 600 for a first time user so I suppose 500 isn't that much lower. Generally EQ is used for the longest of long cycles, upwards of 18 weeks, but I think that you'll still be okay with a 14-16 week cycle. You could even start injecting it a few weeks before the rest. Thats what I do. Its very mild and won't really give you any physique based negative side effects.

Its strange that you want to use dbol and EQ together though. Dbol is known to cause gyno and water retention and aromatise quite easily whereas EQ is more of the lean gains style steroid. Also recomping isn't usually the best use of steroids. If you're going to bulk, then bulk in my opinion. Keep your AI the same and watch for symptoms, especially nipple tenderness. Feel free to throw down nolva if you're paranoid about gyno from dbol.

"Optimal dosage" of your dbol is user dependant. 40mg per day is fine for most but you need to experiment and see what works for you. I would take it PWO daily if it were me. Some people recommend taking half in the morning, half at night. At your level, you won't notice a difference either way.

Your PCT could be shortened if you wish. I would do:
Clomid: 50/50/25/25
nolva: 40/40/20/20
Others would have a different opinion on this. Some guys do 100/100/50/50/25/25 on the clomid but I find that a bit much,

Wait 8 weeks after your last pct dose to get bloods though, not 4.

 

[Apexvallen]

Also if you had lacklustre results last time, maybe start a log and show us your diet and training routine and we can make sure you're not missing something.

 

[picholas]

Age?
Height?
Weight?
BF?

1.) No, I am running Test E and EQ for the second time. Test E at 500 mg a week and EQ at 600 mg a week. See how your body reacts, if you are still growing at a decent rate from a lower dose, no reason to go higher. However I will say, EQ takes awhile to really shine. The people who don't like it don't run it long enough. 8-12 weeks isn't enough. 14 is the cusp of acceptable. You can push it to 16 with the Test E for way better results. If you want to run the Test E after for another 2 weeks by itself you can push it to 18 if you want. (Long cycle)

2.) I use Arimidex 0.5mg EOD. The equivalent would be Aromasin EOD 12.5mg EOD. This part is different for everyone, feel out your body. If you don't have the same rate of aromatization of androgens into estrogens as me then what I do isn't prevalent to you. Don't crash it. You can always up the dose if side effects of high estro appear. That being said, either get bloods or wait for sides LOL

3.) 50mg ED should be fine for 4 weeks. You're adding 2 new compounds to your cycle. Don't push it to 6 this time, see how your body reacts to it. Also protect your liver taking an oral.

4.) PCT looks good but I only do that for 4 weeks. Some people double the dose the first week or two. I don't but just giving you options.

5.) Maybe change your oral. What are your goals for this cycle?

 

[picholas]

Maybe use Turinabol to start instead. Or Anavar at the back end?

 

[Necessary Evil]

Hmm, you might get some benefit from the EQ at that dosage. Most people recommend 600 for a first time user so I suppose 500 isn't that much lower. Generally EQ is used for the longest of long cycles, upwards of 18 weeks, but I think that you'll still be okay with a 14-16 week cycle. You could even start injecting it a few weeks before the rest. Thats what I do. Its very mild and won't really give you any physique based negative side effects.

Αt the dosage I wrote the minimum of EQ that I would gain on a per week basis is 600mg so I'm right in the ballpark as you said. Good to hear.

Its strange that you want to use dbol and EQ together though. Dbol is known to cause gyno and water retention and aromatise quite easily whereas EQ is more of the lean gains style steroid. Also recomping isn't usually the best use of steroids. If you're going to bulk, then bulk in my opinion. Keep your AI the same and watch for symptoms, especially nipple tenderness. Feel free to throw down nolva if you're paranoid about gyno from dbol.

The thought process behind it is that since both Test E and EQ are slow esters I would need an oral to kick start the gains. I don't want to wait for like 12 weeks to see the first results as I did in my previous cycle [Keep in mind that gear was legit and training/nutrition were on point as far as I know]. So dbol was the first that popped in my mind. Is there any other oral to help kick start? Also since dbol will only be used for like 4-6 weeks I don't think that it will be a problem with aromatization, as a precaution could I increase my AI from something like 12.5mg on pin days to 25mg in cojunction with Nolva? Yeah I'm paranoid as you can tell, haha.

"Optimal dosage" of your dbol is user dependant. 40mg per day is fine for most but you need to experiment and see what works for you. I would take it PWO daily if it were me. Some people recommend taking half in the morning, half at night. At your level, you won't notice a difference either way.

Gotcha.

Your PCT could be shortened if you wish. I would do:
Clomid: 50/50/25/25
nolva: 40/40/20/20
Others would have a different opinion on this. Some guys do 100/100/50/50/25/25 on the clomid but I find that a bit much,

Wait 8 weeks after your last pct dose to get bloods though, not 4.

Believe it or not my first PCT experience was extremely positive didn't notice a single mood swing or any of the negatives that people reported. I'm all about safety so I might do the higher end of the Clomid one to be honest.

Also if you had lacklustre results last time, maybe start a log and show us your diet and training routine and we can make sure you're not missing something.

When I start I will log the shit out of everything, will post my excel spreadsheets for my routine, diet, weight log, everything. I want to get the most out of it.

Speaking of which would an Lower/Upper 4x week with specilization cycles to improve certain lackluster bodyparts be ok? Should I opt for a more higher frequency routine?

 

[Necessary Evil]

Age?
Height?
Weight?
BF?

Well the reason I didn't add stats is because currently due to military obligations my diet and training are fucked up. All kinds of gains were lost whilst fat stayed the same. I was planning to add these stats after I end my recomp followed by a minicut which will end right before I start the cycle.

1.) No, I am running Test E and EQ for the second time. Test E at 500 mg a week and EQ at 600 mg a week. See how your body reacts, if you are still growing at a decent rate from a lower dose, no reason to go higher. However I will say, EQ takes awhile to really shine. The people who don't like it don't run it long enough. 8-12 weeks isn't enough. 14 is the cusp of acceptable. You can push it to 16 with the Test E for way better results. If you want to run the Test E after for another 2 weeks by itself you can push it to 18 if you want. (Long cycle)

To be honest I don't mind extending the cycle. My initial plan was to have two solid cycles a year in a 4 month interval. I guess some extra weeks won't negatively matter that much.

5.) Maybe change your oral. What are your goals for this cycle?

Well my goal is to add quality lean mass so I have a solid base to cut and work from there.

Well this part is what I'm completely clueless. I know nothing about orals, to be honest I would appreciate if you could give a few pointers on different ones. As I said to another post I want to use at least one oral just to kick start the cycle, since I won't like to wait for like 12 weeks to see the first noticable gains.

 

[Apexvallen]

Yeah theres a tonne of orals out there. You could do something mild like anavar or tbol. Even try sometihng like winstrol which has some more apparent side effects. There's nothnign wreong with dbol but its just weird having such a mild compound in conjunction with a wet af compound. Although diet plays a big part in it of course too and you can customise your cycle however you like, theres no right way. Generally it would be like test/deca/dbol or test/eq/anavar i.e a heavy bulk cycle vs a lean cycle (to use some vernacular). But if you have the dbols, then sure. Its no biggie. Just an observation. Like I said, you MIGHT need to up the AI. I wouldn't till I saw issues though.

If uour PCT works for you, then stick with it. Fuck what others consider the norm. Don't change a damn thing if it works for you brother.

Couldn't help you on the routine though, I'm not a bodybuilder. I'm sure others will be happy to chime in who are much more qualified. For clarity, you want a maximum hypertrophy routine right?

 

[Necessary Evil]

@Apexvallen With a very fast research I'm leaning towards tbol. Still have to figure out the length of the dosage. Is 40mg ED for 4 weeks like dbol fine? Have you used it? Your thoughts on it?

Also yeah I agree it was a bit weird, speaks a lot of my ignorance regarding orals, lol.

Hypertrophy is all I want. Fuck strength. Although it's generally accepted that in order to have better hypertrophy gains you have to have some strength gains.

 

[Apexvallen]

@Apexvallen With a very fast research I'm leaning towards tbol. Still have to figure out the length of the dosage. Is 40mg ED for 4 weeks like dbol fine? Have you used it? Your thoughts on it?

Also yeah I agree it was a bit weird, speaks a lot of my ignorance regarding orals, lol.

Hypertrophy is all I want. Fuck strength. Although it's generally accepted that in order to have better hypertrophy gains you have to have some strength gains.

Yeah 40mg per day for 4 weeks is perfect. Yeah I think you'll find anyone thats done a few cycles has dabbled in dbol. Its good, raises strength and gives you some mass with the trade off being water retention and possible gyno. Its most peoples first oral due to being widely available, cheap and very effective. Don't let my talk of tbol and anavar turn you off it. Its perfectly fine for your goals.

 

[picholas]

Well the reason I didn't add stats is because currently due to military obligations my diet and training are fucked up. All kinds of gains were lost whilst fat stayed the same. I was planning to add these stats after I end my recomp followed by a minicut which will end right before I start the cycle.

As long as you aren't using the cycle to get back to a "normal" body type. No need for PED's for that. So so long as your serious and put in the work to get back prior to starting your cycle that should be fine.

How long do you plan to train for naturally and then cut for before the cycle?

Your age is important though regardless of the other stats.

To be honest I don't mind extending the cycle. My initial plan was to have two solid cycles a year in a 4 month interval. I guess some extra weeks won't negatively matter that much.

The general rule of thumb is

Time On = Time Off

Don't think you're worried about bridging or TRT right now

Well my goal is to add quality lean mass so I have a solid base to cut and work from there.

In that case you would stay away from "wet gains" so stay with EQ and don't use Deca.

Well this part is what I'm completely clueless. I know nothing about orals, to be honest I would appreciate if you could give a few pointers on different ones. As I said to another post I want to use at least one oral just to kick start the cycle, since I won't like to wait for like 12 weeks to see the first noticable gains.

So like I said above if you want to "feel" it in the beginning you can kick it off with 4 weeks of Turinabol dosed at 40mg/ED

If you want to "solidify" your gains and end strong you can do Anavar at the back end for 4 weeks dosed at 60mg/ED

There's no wrong/right answer as you can tailor your diet and gear to match what you're aiming for.

If you're going for hypertrophy make sure you're exercising the muscle to exhaustion. 5x workout a week, one muscle a day except Bis/Tris you pair up.

 

[Necessary Evil]

As long as you aren't using the cycle to get back to a "normal" body type. No need for PED's for that. So so long as your serious and put in the work to get back prior to starting your cycle that should be fine.

How long do you plan to train for naturally and then cut for before the cycle?

Your age is important though regardless of the other stats.

As I have it in my mind at the moment the recomp and then the minicut would last a total of 3 months. I'm aiming to start gear on September or early October.

I'm 26.

If you want to "solidify" your gains and end strong you can do Anavar at the back end for 4 weeks dosed at 60mg/ED

Ok, so this interests me. so at the last 4 weeks of my cycle I throw Anavar. Does this entail any change to the beginning of PCT?

Regarding training, I was thinking of going with a more "science based" training approach so training each muscle twice a week. From your experience will there be any positive differences if I use yours? I mean the classic "brosplit". It's just that I really love doing U/L splits, lol.

 

[picholas]

That sounds good in terms of your recuperation time and getting back in shape before going all in.

I wouldn't run 2 different orals the first time, so it's up to you if you want to start with Turinabol or end with Anavar.

That being said, if you went with Anavar it's half-life I think is about 9 hours. So you can still dose it 30mg in the morning and the other 30mg at night to keep a constant level. Because you're running Test E and EQ which are longer esters this oral wouldn't effect when you would start PCT as Anavar would be long out of your system before Test E and EQ would be.

You could stop the EQ 2 weeks prior to the Test E and still run the Anavar.

So it would be

Test E 500mg/wk: 1-18 weeks
EQ 600mg/wk: 1- 16 weeks
Anavar 60mg/ed: 14-18 weeks

And then start PCT 2 weeks after your last pin of Test E

 

[Necessary Evil]

@picholas Ok gotcha. Tbh I slightly prefer tbol over anavar mainly due to how expensive it would be if I were to run it for 18 weeks. Also due to the mg/ml ratio of both Test E and EQ would it be fine if were to run a cycle like

• Test E @500mg/wk: 1-20 weeks
• EQ @600mg/wk: 1- 18 weeks
• Tbol @40mg ED: 4 weeks

So, a total of 20 weeks mainly because I would hate to have leftover unused gear for like 4 months. Like this I use all of it and I get the most out of EQ as you previously said. Is that an overkill in your opinion?

Due to the increased length of it I might consider to up my PCT, especially clomid to 100mg for the first few weeks at least.

 

[picholas]

@picholas Ok gotcha. Tbh I slightly prefer tbol over anavar mainly due to how expensive it would be if I were to run it for 18 weeks. Also due to the mg/ml ratio of both Test E and EQ would it be fine if were to run a cycle like

• Test E @500mg/wk: 1-20 weeks
• EQ @600mg/wk: 1- 18 weeks
• Tbol @40mg ED: 4 weeks

So, a total of 20 weeks mainly because I would hate to have leftover unused gear for like 4 months. Like this I use all of it and I get the most out of EQ as you previously said. Is that an overkill in your opinion?

Due to the increased length of it I might consider to up my PCT, especially clomid to 100mg for the first few weeks at least.

I actually mistyped in my last post Anavar was supposed to say 14-18 weeks, I fixed that.

Don't do an oral for that long LOL

And that's fine, it is a longer cycle so you will be shutdown awhile. Some might suggest using HCG on cycle at 500 iu weekly, or some just use it at the end same dose for the last 4 weeks.

Other than that it looks good, starting with Tbol for the first 4 weeks

This is almost identical to the cycle in terms of compound/dose/length I just started except I am not kickstarting with an oral and I am considering running Mast E my last 4 weeks at 400mg/wk

 

[Iron Frenchie]

Most advise not to run EQ if you pct. It has to be ran longer then 12 weeks and the wait time for pct is over a month. I would go with a low dose test and NPP cycle.

 

[Test_Subject]

Most advise not to run EQ if you pct. It has to be ran longer then 12 weeks and the wait time for pct is over a month. I would go with a low dose test and NPP cycle.

EQ isn't bad for PCT people. Yes, it takes a long time to clear, but that's nothing that can't be dealt with by running test prop for a few extra weeks after you stop the EQ.

You can run EQ for 12 weeks no problem if you frontload it.

 

[picholas]

EQ isn't bad for PCT people. Yes, it takes a long time to clear, but that's nothing that can't be dealt with by running test prop for a few extra weeks after you stop the EQ.

You can run EQ for 12 weeks no problem if you frontload it.

^This

But I would still up it to 14-18 weeks to see the results. Then stop and run just Test E/C for another 2 weeks.

You would be able to start PCT 2 weeks after

Personally I love EQ, great results/gains and fairly easy to keep the gains. I get nice and vascular from it as well as a smooth hardness to my muscles.

 

[Iron Frenchie]

EQ isn't bad for PCT people. Yes, it takes a long time to clear, but that's nothing that can't be dealt with by running test prop for a few extra weeks after you stop the EQ.

You can run EQ for 12 weeks no problem if you frontload it.

Yes you can use test p for ending any cycle. He is still going to be shutdown for 16+4 weeks for a total shutdown of 20 weeks. Now if he just ran a shorter ester you could do it in half the time like 10 weeks total. This will also allow you to do 2 cycles a year rather then just 1. You will also recover better cause It’s more about the length of shutdown rather the amount used.

 

[picholas]

Yes you can use test p for ending any cycle. He is still going to be shutdown for 16+4 weeks for a total shutdown of 20 weeks. Now if he just ran a shorter ester you could do it in half the time like 10 weeks total. This will also allow you to do 2 cycles a year rather then just 1. You will also recover better cause It’s more about the length of shutdown rather the amount used.

I don't think you're following. I wasn't talking about switching to Test P.

Running Test E as well as EQ

Say you ran EQ for 16 weeks, normally you would have to wait about about 28 days before beginning PCT

But if you stop EQ 2 weeks (14 days) before Test E and you continue to run Test E for another 2 weeks (14 days) the EQ is out of the system and you stop Test E 2 weeks after that (14 days) you can begin PCT.

If he stopped EQ and switched to Test P he would still have to drop the EQ 2 weeks prior to stopping Test AND still have to run Test P for another 2 weeks, then 3 days after last pin of Test P he could start PCT

So it really only saves you 11 days. And EQ you run longer, EQ is not meant for short 8-12 week cycles.

So unless you're totally changing the compounds he wants to use, there's little benefit to what you suggest.