Cycle Duration - OTC Steroids vs. Prescription

[MF210]

Why is it that conventional steroid cycles are 12-16 weeks, but OTC/PH cycles are usually 6-8 weeks?

I'm using a non-liver toxic stack of transdermal 4AD/19Nor (with a little of both orally pre-workout).

I've always wondered why OTC cycles are so much shorter. Any reason why I shouldn't do this cycle for 12 weeks?

 

[LilPsychotic]

Get bloodwork at six weeks and see. It depends on what steroids you are refering to here. If you mean oral vs injectable, orals are much more toxic than injectables, and thus run for shorter durations.

 

[BigMattTx]

Most of the designer orals are methylated and bring bad sides by week 4-5. In your case, with non-methylated transdermal PHs, I dont see why you couldnt run it at least 8 weeks and maybe longer. The biggest worry is diminishing returns to where the extra sides/toll on your body isnt worth the gains.

 

[badfish51581]

Toxicity, Esters, and Culture....

Toxicity - Orals (OTC or otherwise) typically aren't run for long periods of time because of the toxicity.

Esters - Injectables are typically attached to an ester that determines how long it lasts in your body. There are both short and long acting esters, but to reap the benefits of the long acting esters, you need to run them for 10-16 weeks at a time.

Culture - There seems to be two distinct cultures on these boards and people who roam between the two. OTC only users and underground users. Since pros tend to fall into the underground and many of them are "on" year round, the underground groups tend to be okay with permanent HRT, blasting and cruising, etc. Whereas a lot of OTC users tend to be scared of suppressing naturals levels for too long, because they have no intention of ever going on HRT so they tend to be more conservative.

You're good to go running that for 12 weeks as long as you're also cool with being suppressed harder than if you only ran it for 4 weeks. Which also means it's going to be a little more work to recover than if you ran it for a shorter period of time. Plenty of people do it, so I would be too concerned if you don't hear much about it on this board.

 

[MF210]

I'm using the two original PH's trandermally. 4-Androsenediol, and 19Norandrostenediol.

I may take a small "pinky dip" orally pre-workout, but that is it. Neither are methyl, and both are transdermal. But yet you never really hear about people running 12 week plus cycles like this.

In my mind this should be equivalent to a test/deca cycle which people run for 12 weeks, so why couldn't I?

 

[cjszip]

I'm using the two original PH's trandermally. 4-Androsenediol, and 19Norandrostenediol.

I may take a small "pinky dip" orally pre-workout, but that is it. Neither are methyl, and both are transdermal. But yet you never really hear about people running 12 week plus cycles like this.

In my mind this should be equivalent to a test/deca cycle which people run for 12 weeks, so why couldn't I?

You absolutely could, but it WOULD be a good idea to keep something on-hand such as HCG.

Here's what I think- you're using transdermal prohormones, you're NOT using injectable, active steroids. The difference is that a conversion process occurs, which after a peroid of 8 weeks, I imagine would begin deminishing. Compare this to the user who's using injectable steroids, and there's absolutely no down-regulation or conversion changes. The active steroid (since there's no conversion) is the same on day 90 as it was on day 1- the amount you're injecting. In your case, the conversion levels are bound to change during the same length cycle.

Since you're tossing around the idea of using this for 12 weeks, I assume you've got a small treasure stashed away. Why not just do two, 6-week cycles? If what I'm saying has any merit to it what so ever (that conversion will down-regulate to help maintain homeiostasis) then would you gain MORE using the transdermal for 12 weeks straight, at the cost of a difficult PCT and a greater percentage of muscle loss, or for two, 6-week cycles with a simple PCT and most, if not all gains retained? Personally, I hate PCT. It's a shitty time for everyone. And although I only cycle 2-3 times a year (at the most, and all relitively mild) I still wouldn't want to be shut down for long peroids of time if I had intentions of doing another cycle in the near future.

 

[EasyEJL]

I'm using the two original PH's trandermally. 4-Androsenediol, and 19Norandrostenediol.

I may take a small "pinky dip" orally pre-workout, but that is it. Neither are methyl, and both are transdermal. But yet you never really hear about people running 12 week plus cycles like this.

In my mind this should be equivalent to a test/deca cycle which people run for 12 weeks, so why couldn't I?

I agree with the HCG comment, the real issue is suppression levels with 4ad.

The main reason you never hear of 12 week cycles like this is that for the lack of availability plus the illegality plus the cost and pain in the butt factor of transdermals, you may as well inject.

 

[Space]

The main reason you don't hear any stories of people running 12 week cycles is because people who use designers are generally inexperienced with steroids and are afraid of suppression. You will hear a lot of people talking about hcg without having used it before because of their concerns.

Personally I think a 12 week transdermal cycle is just fine, so long as you have a proper PCT lined up. But, most people would just forgo the transdermals and just pin.

 

[MF210]

You absolutely could, but it WOULD be a good idea to keep something on-hand such as HCG.

Here's what I think- you're using transdermal prohormones, you're NOT using injectable, active steroids. The difference is that a conversion process occurs, which after a peroid of 8 weeks, I imagine would begin deminishing. Compare this to the user who's using injectable steroids, and there's absolutely no down-regulation or conversion changes. The active steroid (since there's no conversion) is the same on day 90 as it was on day 1- the amount you're injecting. In your case, the conversion levels are bound to change during the same length cycle.

Since you're tossing around the idea of using this for 12 weeks, I assume you've got a small treasure stashed away. Why not just do two, 6-week cycles? If what I'm saying has any merit to it what so ever (that conversion will down-regulate to help maintain homeiostasis) then would you gain MORE using the transdermal for 12 weeks straight, at the cost of a difficult PCT and a greater percentage of muscle loss, or for two, 6-week cycles with a simple PCT and most, if not all gains retained? Personally, I hate PCT. It's a shitty time for everyone. And although I only cycle 2-3 times a year (at the most, and all relitively mild) I still wouldn't want to be shut down for long peroids of time if I had intentions of doing another cycle in the near future.

I don't have HCG, and that is a good point that the body may stop converting the prohormone as it gets used to the compound. I may just stick with a 7 week cycle, with 3-4 weeks of nolva, then some trib for a week or two, then two weeks clean, then boot up again (-:

 

[cjszip]

I don't have HCG, and that is a good point that the body may stop converting the prohormone as it gets used to the compound. I may just stick with a 7 week cycle, with 3-4 weeks of nolva, then some trib for a week or two, then two weeks clean, then boot up again (-:

Glad to hear you're considering this approach. I think you'll gain more size with two, 7 week cycles, than with a single 14-week cycle. Besides the conversion levels being reduced, you need to also consider receptor down-regulation as well. Even though 4-androstenediol by be anabolic on it's own, it may not do much with down-regulated receptors.

Besides, easier PC recovery is nice too.