Originally Posted by quim92
Do you think that those than don’t gain stretching 1h a day like me would benefit from extender? Going to the gym again: can you gain squatting low weights with 50 reps if you have already squatted with very high weights for a few reps and didn’t gain either?
I hope last night’s post where I give the breakdown of a typical days use of the extender gives you a clear description of my usage. I don’t think I’d of gained much from doing an hour a day with this device; simply not enough force to induce the micro-tears needed.
Squatting: I’ll be brief here, because this is a PE forum, and I am not professing expertise, just reiterating my own experiences and my observations of the many guys I’ve worked out with from the 1980s until now:
Most young men who start lifting in their teens to early 20s make great benefit (in size) for the first 2-5 years from simply using good form on basic exercises, trying to increase the weight on these exercises, eating a high protein diet with ample calories for their metabolism/body-type, getting adequate rest. By basic exercises I mean staples like free weight bench press, squats, bent over and/or T-bar rows, chins, dips etc. This does not mean every workout has to go to a low (or single rep) maximum. For example, me and my workout partners would maybe max on bench press (or do a heavy double or triple) once every 3-4 chest workouts, on the others we’d focus on pyramiding in the approximately 6-12 repetition range. Sometimes we’d shock the body and do even higher reps, especially on thighs. And certain muscle groups, like calves, abs and forearms, on most guys, tend to grow better with higher repetitions.
Don’t try to emulate pro-bodybuilders’ workouts. Often, mags like Muscle and Fitness (mainly BS), give pre-contest routines (and photos) that don’t represent what the guy did to get his baseline mass. Also, most pro-bodybuilders are on steroids, HGH and other drugs (and I am saying this based on personal relations with pros and upper-level amateurs in the 80s and 90s, mainly) and can get away with doing a lot of volume, because their recovery is high. I mean no disrespect by this statement—I’ve taken steroids (never HGH, insulin etc), but have trained about 27 out of 30 years of total time training, without steroids and still look pretty good and am strong for my age (without any use now). My greatest mass gains were made BEFORE I ever took these drugs and directly corresponded to strength gains on basic exercises, especially benching, squat, and rows.
Just like I think happens in PE, there comes a time in training when you have to mix things up. Your strength levels may be just about maxed out or, like what happened to me—you begin to really assume a power-lifting type mindset and make gains in specific lifts, without really gaining that much size. Notably, I was so intent on chasing a 500 lb bench in my late teens that I focused too much on that exercise and when I saw photos of me taken over a year (one when I was maxing at 440, the other at 495) my chest showed no improvement. I started to switch up my workout, doing inclines first, higher rep schemes, super-setting pressing moves with flies etc and my chest grew. But to get to this plateau took me 4-5 years and I gained a lot in the early stages of chasing power.
I am approaching PE like that. On the SizeGenetics extender I constantly am trying to push up the number of bars, just get my flaccid penis a little longer in the device. This worked great for the first 8-9 months, but over the last 4-5 months has slowed down a lot. I am plateauing. And I expected this. Now, just like with training for mass, I’m going to ‘flip the script’ and try shocking that tissue into growth with hanging. I’ll probably keep some days of traction in—to me it’s like the bench press of PE!—but maybe listen to some of the senior members and employ a Vac-Extender to make the use easier.
Other questions:
De-conditioning breaks in PE: I don’t have enough PE experience or knowledge to answer this. But I am hesitant about stopping PE for time scales beyond a couple of days. I am going to try to change programs instead of stopping.
De-conditioning in the gym: I never liked to lift weights more than 5 days a week, even 6 was too much. I take rest days as needed, usually training 2-3 days on, then rest. Often on rest days I do some mild cardio and/or abs or some outdoor activity like hiking. I also take off anytime I am sick and don’t try to ‘train through and injury’ when I have a specific part that is hurt. For example, I have arthritis and today my knees and ankles are just killing me and will probably either skip legs in the gym entirely tomorrow or do a little light stationary bike riding. Now, do I think (younger) guys need to de-condition by taking breaks on the scale of weeks or months? Hell no. This makes about as much sense as when I see younger guys in blogs, without appreciable mass, talking about “cut’ versus ‘bulk’ phase cycles. Unless you are really fat, you should probably focus on mass building for the first years of training (I am assuming that you want to get big). Change the grouping of body parts, change the set/rep scheme/tempo, work on eating right—but laying off for weeks-months after training just a couple years? Come on, that is some real laziness! (If you feel over-trained, incorporate more rest days, but don’t stop lifting altogether.)
Academia: I worked at a university in the USA as a researcher and lecturer until recently.