T3 Off Cycle

[Daisy_Girl]

Hey Guys - I posted this i nthe Women's Board, but haven't gotten any info. Thought someone here might have some thoughts for me.

I know T3 can be catabolic, but is there anything you can do to minimize muscle loss if you take T3 when you are *not* on AS?

I was thinking if you keep protein intake high, reduce cardio amounts and/or increase weight training....maybe?

FOR EXAMPLE -

I eat about 160-190g protein a day (female, 5'4", 135lbs, ~19%BF). Right now, I do cardio 6x/week for 30-45 min each time at moderate-high intensity. I lift 4x/week. I have found over the years that I have to hit each upper body part 2x/wk or I get no growth. Legs *sometimes* I will do 2x a week - not usually though, depends on other activities (and how sore I am). Have made decent muscle gains - esp in upper body - on a cycle of SPA&Denkall Ox. Want to keep most of this and burn some BF to have more definition.

If I took T3 without anything else (no AS), the T3 would "eat away" at both fat and muscle so I would lose weight, but my metabolism would slow down because of the muscle loss. Right so far?

So to minimize the muscle loss (in order to keep muscle gains and keep metabolism high) but still burn BF I would think I could keep my protein intake *at least* where it is now. And drop the cardio down to either less days or less duration. Maybe even increase my weight training? How?

Any thoughts on how to maintain muscle mass when on T3 (or just not lose it all)?? Is it possible? Opinions, thoughts and experiences wanted!

 

[MrPickels]

I have absolutely no experience training women but I really don't see a difference physiologically in men and women in terms of this. If I was doing it for myself, I'd bump up protein and reduce frequency of the cardio. The T3 should more than make up for the reduced cardio. It may take longer to diet down to where you want to be but you should keep more muscle. These are just my opinions, I know I'm not a guru by any means, this is just what I would do for me. Any input from the more experienced?

 

[Beezers]

It would be rather difficult to maintain your current muscle mass while on "weight loss" or supraphysiilogical doses of T3 without any anabolics to counter-act muscle catabolism. T3 is not tissue specific...It will increase the degredation of muscle protein even while on AS. It's just that while on AS you are capable of synthesizing new muscle proteins to compensate for the increased protein turnover rate. You would have to keep your calories high and avoid excessive training, meaning cardio. But then that kind of defeats the purpose of using T3 in the first place. I lost a good deal of muscle while on 2g of AS per week and 4500 cals per day while using T3. The more muscle you ahve the faster you loose it so my situation was quite diffeent than yours, but it indicates just how metabolically active this hormone is. It will increase oxydation in the body, but unfortunately for us that includes the oxydation of amino acids. I would honestly think you would be better off without it while not on any AS.

BTW....How was the Denkal OX?

 

[Daisy_Girl]

Denkall Ox is good - still have 3 more weeks on it. Was doing 12.5mg, just went up to 15mg yesterday, will do 15 for the last 3 weeks.

Denkall gave me the same results as SPA (for cheaper!) - crazy strength, no sides. Definately give it thumbs up!