First ever cycle!! I have crossed over to the dark side!!!

[StumpMT]

Well ladies and gentlemen today I crossed over to the dark side. Yes, today was the very first time that I injected. It went very very smoothly and I didn't feel a thing! Although I was sweating like crazy and got a tiny bit light-headed. Probably because it was the very first time ever doing anything like this to myself. I've done PH's before but as you know this is COMPLETELY different! Next injection in a few days should go better. Anyways, my stats, diet, and cycle are as follows.

Age: 28
Height: 5'11"
Weight: 200lbs
BF: ~12-13%
# of years lifting: 7

Max flat bench: 335
Max parallel squat: 405
Max deadlift: 460

As far as diet goes I eat 6-8 meals per day. I only eat complex carbs such as whole grain pasta, sweet potatoes, oatmeal, Ezekiel bread, etc with every meal except my PWO and last meal. My PWO meal consists of waxy maize and my last meals has no carbs except for what's in 1 cup skim milk (12g). Each meal contains 40-60g protein. The only fats I get during the day are from beef, fish oil, olive oil and peanut butter. So any given day I take in about 3500 calories, 300-330g protein and carbs, and ~50g clean fats. I've kept a diary for a couple weeks with everything that I eat now so I know in my head how much of each macromolecule I'm intaking.

Now onto the fun stuff.....my cycle!!!

Week 1-15: 500mg Test-E (250mg Mon and Thurs)
Week 1-16: 250iu Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG) shot E4D
Week 1-17: 12.5mg Aromasin EOD
Week 18 start post cycle therapy (pct): Nolva 20/20/10/10/10 Clomid 50/50/50/50

I've done a LOT of research on Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG), post cycle therapy (pct), and Aromasin. A lot of people recommend Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG) at the end of the cycle to 'kick-start' the testes while it seems the same amount suggest to run it during the cycle. After going through all this information I decided it would be best for me to run Human Chorionic Gonadotropin (HCG) and post cycle therapy (pct) as DET-OAK has suggested from his post cycle therapy (pct) thread. As far as Aromasin goes I prefer to get as little bloat as possible. If throughout the cycle I feel I need to change the Aromatase inhibitor (AI) dose I will.

Well, that's it. Let me know what you guys think!! I attached a picture taken today. Wish me luck. I'm SO pumped!!!!

 

[aremiller]

doing the same soon will be checking this out see how you do, don't forget EAT EAT EAT!

 

[StumpMT]

Well today was shoulder training. I felt really great today. Did some heavy barbell presses, upright rows, side laterals, then finished off with some clean and presses. After that my shoulders were blown! lol. I just started making my own pre-workout formula that gives me tons of energy! I'm really excited to start seeing gains from the cycle which probably won't be for a couple weeks. I'll keep you guys posted. Oh and my pre-workout formula is as follows:

AAKG: 5g
Beta Alanine: 5g
BCAAs: 5g
Creatine: 5g
Caffeine: 200mg
1,3 Dimethylamylamine (DMAA): 40mg

As far as my training split...it goes like this...

Day 1: Chest/Tri
Day 2: Back/Bi
Day 3: Shoulders
Day 4: Legs/Calves
Day 5: Off
Then start back at day 1. I feel I am getting enough rest and I know to listen to my body. I do abs 2 of those 4 days and cardio 1-3 times per week running about 3-4 miles each session or sprint intervals.

Any constructive criticism is welcome....

 

[OmegaReign]

Looks like you got everything layed out nicely. Can't wait to see the gains you make. Ill be running almost the identical cycle for the first time in a couple months.

 

[StumpMT]

Thanks Omega I'm really looking forward to what kind of gains I'm going to make as well!

Today was leg day. I did 2x5 with 315 deep squats after progressive warm-up sets of 135, 225, and 275. You know I thought I had researched everything about injecting....except.....the pain that users experience after their first couple injections lol. Holy shit I was not expecting to be semi-limping around the day after an injection lol. But from what I read it's normal and I'll get used to it. I still had pain and tightness today during leg training and it hurt like a bitch stretching that quad out but I powered through it and stretched it and massaged it in between sets. After squats I did 4 sets of hack squats then seated leg curls, lying leg curls, weighted lunges, then leg press calf raises. I should have gone heavier or did more working sets with squats but I was a little bitch and let the injection pain get to me....not next time though!!! It's been 2 days since my very first injection and it's still a lil sore but not like yesterday. My next shot is on Monday and I think I'm gonna try the glutes this time after a hot shower to relax my muscle. Tomorrow is my off day so I'll let you know how my next injection and workout goes on Monday.

 

[StumpMT]

Ok so my schedule is pretty busy on Monday and Thursday so I decided to inject on Sundays in the AM and Wednesdays in the PM. This will give 3.5 days in between injections. So that means today will be my second injection. After reading I think I'm gonna go ventrogluteal. Chest tomorrow....should be good!

 

[riprockwell]

Cycle looks good man. You will love it and just remember as mentioned above to eat and eat and eat some more. It is actually nice to see someone like yourself do things properly and waiting until the right age, etc. It is also nice to see someone do their research before starting. Best of luck. One thing to keep in mind is to be patient. I didn't really see much size/muscle gains until around week 8 so just keep that in mind. When I first cycled, I kind of expected gains to be really rapid. However, you doing a 15 week cycle will be nice. Slow and steady is how I like the cycles. Best of luck.

 

[madenj]

I am no expert by any means but I think I read somewhere (probably on here) that your routine should try not to work the same muscle groups consecutively for optimal healing. For instance Day1 Chest/Tri then Day2 Back/Bi. Your actually working your Bi's when you do Tri's on Day1 then working your Tri's again on Day2 when you do Bi's and vice verse. Consider This :

Day1 Chest/Bi's
Day2 Legs/Calves
Day3 Shoulders/Tri's
Day4 Back/Abs
Day5 Off

Or something like that, know what I'm tryin to say?

 

[StumpMT]

@riprockwell: thanks man! Being my very first cycle I really wanted to make sure I did plenty of research to make sure I knew each chemical and what it did before I injected it into my body.

@madenj: yeah I see what you're saying. Ill have to try that type of split to see how it goes. Or what if I just moved back/bi day so that it wasn't following my chest/tri day?

 

[OmegaReign]

I am no expert by any means but I think I read somewhere (probably on here) that your routine should try not to work the same muscle groups consecutively for optimal healing. For instance Day1 Chest/Tri then Day2 Back/Bi. Your actually working your Bi's when you do Tri's on Day1 then working your Tri's again on Day2 when you do Bi's and vice verse. :

Your saying you work your bis when you do tris?? and vice versa?? pretty sure that is inaccurate.

I think what you meant is when you work tris on chest day the tris are pre-exahusted from chest and don't really get a full workout. Same with back/bis.

Its fine to do chest/tris and back/bis, on back to back days. They don't interfere with each other. What I like to do, is throw in an arm workout at the end of the week to get my arms a full workout. and on chest and back day will just do a couple of arm workouts since they're preexhausted anyhow.

 

[StumpMT]

@omega: hmmmm that sounds good adding an arm day at the end of the week since I don't really feel my bis or tris get sufficient stimulation at the end of chest or back day. I might throw them in for a second workout on leg day or something.....ill figure it out. Thanks for the tip though.

 

[StumpMT]

Well, injection number 2 yesterday in the ventrogluteal region went very, very well. Just a little sore today and it makes it a lil hard to put socks on lol. I attribute it to VMS (Virgin Muscle Syndrome)

Chest day today was awesome!! Started off with decline bench with progressively heavier sets. Did 10rx135, 5x225, 5rx275, 5rx285, 5rx305, 5rx315, then 4rx315. Last set of 315 I couldn't do another. I've only been on for a week but I just feel a lil stronger. Then did incline dumbbell for 3x8, then flat flyes 3x12, and finally cable flyes 3x12. Then it was on to triceps. Skulls for heavy weight low reps, then 3 sets of overhead dumbbell, then a couple sets of dips to finish them off. Chest and tris were SO pumped after that! Great workout.

Tomorrow is back/bi and I can't wait to do some deads....or maybe I'll do rack pulls. Nah....I'll do deads lol.

 

[OmegaReign]

nice, keep postin the progress. We're the same age so want to see the gains you make with this cycle. Gettin me excited to get started.

 

[StumpMT]

Well today was back/bi day. Let me tell you....I felt incredible!! Here's what I did for a workout

Rack pulls: 135x10r, 225x8r, 315x6r, 405x4r, 495x2r, 500x1r (personal best)
Barbell rows: 135x10r, 185x10r, 225x12r, 245x8r
Pull-ups (bodyweight): 10r, 10r, 8r (with 2 negatives)
By this time my lats were SO pumped
Dumbbell rows: 100x12r, 130x8r, 140x8r
Then I did some extreme lat stretching by grabbing a handle or a rack support beam, rounded my back, look down at the floor and just pulled as hard as I could for 30sec. Man I could really feel it stretching my lats. I did this with each arm.

For biceps all I did was a warm-up set of preachers then sets of 5. Thank I went and did 3 sets of hammer curls for 10 reps each set. Bis were so pumped. A lot of it probably had to do with they were already stimulated with back.

Tomorrow is shoulders with another 250mg injection of Test-E in the evening. I'll keep you posted.

 

[skitzz]

you said injections were painless. What size gauge pinz you using?

 

[StumpMT]

Yeah, I did say that I didn't feel a thing. That after the tiny prick I felt while piercing the skin. After that I couldn't feel a thing which I thought was weird cause I could see it going deeper and deeper into the muscle. For the Test-E I'm using a 23g 1.5" and for the HCG I'm using a 29g .5" slin pin.

 

[Die$eL~Man]

good luck... go eat

 

[StumpMT]

Yeah I've found that some ProComplex and 3/4 cup of oatmeal or so mixed in a shaker makes for a quick high carb, high protein snack between meals. I used to make my own yogurt from skim milk....think maybe I'll do that again and have a cup or so along with 1 or 2 meals. It's so easy to make your own yogurt and it's a lot cheaper than buying from the store and tastes better too! What do you guys think about me adding home-made skim milk yogurt to my diet?

 

[StumpMT]

Ok so I just had a pretty damn good shoulder workout. Started off with some standing military presses. Got up to 165 for 2 sets of 6. I really need to work on my shoulders, side delts especially. Another thing...it always seems that whenever I do standing push presses I almost always pull a muscle in my neck some how. Maybe I should stick to seated military or behind-the-neck. Oh well...after that I some heavy upright rows, followed by dumbbell laterals and rear delt raises. I felt pretty pumped throughout this workout despite the neck thing.

I have another injection tonight after work. Why am I looking forward to injection day? lol Gonna go ventrogluteal on the left side tonight.

Oh, if anyone has a great shoulder routine for me try for some mass that would be great. Lately I've been doing heavy military presses, heavy wide upright rows, and cleans.

 

[randy841]

Well, injection number 2 yesterday in the ventrogluteal region went very, very well. Just a little sore today and it makes it a lil hard to put socks on lol. I attribute it to VMS (Virgin Muscle Syndrome)

You'll be sore the first few times, after that you won't feel a thing. Glute injections are the easiest & safest. For my first cycle, that is what i have stuck to - the glutes.

Best of luck bro!