Clamping: Advanced Empirical Discussion

Yes you are right, LV, what exactly is “no-carry fatigue”?

I assume you are referring to the amount of sets that I can take without carrying fatigue to the next day. You can think of it as the amount of fatigue I can take per day which my body will completely recover from within the day/night, so I start fresh the next day. This is the amount of clamping sets I could take everyday permanently without ever needing any sort of break. No overloading of fatigue or recovery.

This stuff does not translate to hanging by the way, so we should leave Bib out of this. Hanging is a totally different ball game I think. If there is any correlation to the method it is by accident. The stimulation in hanging, as well as the fatigue and reason for resting, is totally different.

I could test it as I am quite a veteran. I used to clamp a lot. I’ve done just about every exercise.

But…I am in the middle of the routine you recommended I stick to. However, I am on week 2 starting today which is a single set of 8+1=9 minutes. ;) Haven’t missed a day yet and I don’t plan on it.

I am adding one minute per week. I’ve been away the whole weekend and man do I have some catchup reading to do with this thread.

After reading your recent posts I find it exciting that I am starting week 2 as that has been when gains came about for others. I have said in my progress thread I will measure biweekly so once again, I don’t want to get too excited but…

Anyways, I was thinking maybe I should even take it to the point of measuring my regular erection girth and my clamped girth daily since I am kind of a guinea pig. I believe we could really analyze what is occurring at that 2 week mark. So I’ll start measuring tomorrow. :) Back to reading…

P.S. Tntjockey and deerhunter gained from clamping and have great knowledge. Sorry I don’t know their exact screen names but definitely dig their threads up. You won’t regret it.

TC,

You are on a different kind of routine. Your routine is supposed to completely avoid any overloading of fatigue actually, the point is to cause as much adaptation as quickly as possible. The goal of your routine is really just to get your penis adapted to TUC = 18. Once you achieve that and then start manipulating set frequency, what we are discussing will be useful for you. But I truly believe that the most effective clamping occurs at the higher TUC level, which is why I recommended you slowly move it up before trying to achieve serious gains.

I expect the gains should occur when you start including more than 1 set per day at TUC = 18, which is when we could also use you as a test subject.

My suspicion is that the gains that these people see are the “quick and dirty” newbie gains that most men will see as a result of simply conditioning the penis and improving erection quality - I believe you have already made this observation. This is elastic deformation and, IMO, much of these gains will be lost after a decon’ break or without some type of regular maintenance. It would also appear that they have a ceiling - a point at which further elastic deformation cannot be achieved - a plateau. To achieve plastic deformation (ie hypertrophy) is much more difficult - you are making more meat not simply stretching existing tissue to accommodate more blood. To do this we need to induce a level of trauma beyond the limits of elastic deformation. Although jelqing is a very quick and effective method for inducing elastic deformation, without significant consistency over a long period of time (years) it has proven not to be the most optimal method for creating hypertrophy - Bennett8 is one example that springs to mind. This is not to say that plastic deformation cannot be achieved by jelqing alone, only that it will take substantially longer and will require a far greater commitment. Jelqing has its place - for many men it is enough to sate their curiosity and achieve modest goals. It is relatively safe, but it has its limits …. IMO.

What interests me more is hypertrophy, making more meat, but this is much easier said than done. Inducing sufficient trauma to promote hypertrophy without sustaining significant injury can be a knife-edge pursuit. It is certainly not something that any newbie should attempt and even experienced PEers should approach it with the greatest respect - as we have seen, the consequences of injury can be devastating and permanent. The “risk vs reward” factor needs to be considered very carefully in the cold light of day. However, as Mr 19th Century has proven, it can be done.

LV,
I’m really interested in this project however, my goals at present are concerned with length rather than girth and, in any event, I do not have the requisite clamping experience to be of value to the study as it stands. However, I’d be interested in using your model to see how it works with stretching. Before you say “it’s not the same thing!” (which it isn’t), bear in mind that it does have some similarities and that it differs significantly from hanging (at least the way I do it! :chuckle: ) While both stretching and hanging are primarily concerned with longitudinal stretch (essentially 2 dimensional), and clamping targets a 3 dimensional stretch, the biomechanics (cell destruction through micro tears and oxygen starvation) are common to all. While it can be convincingly argued that clamping promotes more effective oxygen starvation trauma, it should not be discounted that the constriction of blood carrying vessels during hanging and stretching may achieve a similar result albeit in a different (and perhaps less effective) way.

It should also be noted that stretching can be far more finely tuned than hanging (and clamping for that matter). While hanging is dependent on weight/time/repetition, stretching invokes regulated tension. For instance, with stretching it is possible to stretch to a predetermined target length and repeat it every single work-out - this is simply impossible to achieve by hanging. I think you will understand now why your proposed regimen may also benefit those who pursue static stretching - it seems almost tailor-made.

lil1 :lep:

Clamping doesn’t target a 3-dimensional stretch, if you are implying that its purpose is that. We aren’t even sure what clamping does. We know there is a 3-dimensional stretch, there is deoxygenation, and there is force exerted on the tunica from the constriction, but we don’t know which of these stimulates growth. That’s basically a synopsis of our clueless-ness :D .

I don’t think the biomechanics are the same. As I’ve repeatedly said on the thread, I am biologically ignorant. With that said, I do not think there is a reasonable way that we can compare clamping to hanging or stretching, unless you are cutting off blood supply while stretching for some reason. I don’t think the stimulus is creating similar adaptation (regarding construction of blood carrying vessels), otherwise we would see girth growth from stretching/hanging. We only see that (to my knowledge) from hanging, when the hanger is a vise and exerts force upon the tunica. The similarities are few and far between.

Basically, I believe that the only similarity in length work and clamping is the subject matter - the penis. We are dealing with the same collagen, etc. Otherwise, the stimulus are completely different (except by accident, as in the vise of the hanger), and I don’t think they are comparable.

Given that, I should also say that I can’t see stretching as being better than hanging. You cannot truly preprogram a stretching routine as well as you can a hanging routine. One of my points in this thread is that we seem to trust our “feelings” too much. We feel that we had a good workout. We feel that we are growing. Through all our PE work, growth comes in discrete lumps, quite suddenly. How many of these growth spurts did the PE’er really know was coming, or feel was coming? Few, if any. Most of the time their feelings about what was or wasn’t a good workout are simply wrong and misleading.

That’s why I distrust manual work for the experienced PE’er, at least as a base of their routine. They need something to be programmed, and need to use actual results (actual growth, in comparison to feelings) to guide their programs. For this reason, I think stretching is an inferior use of time - it depends too much on your own ability to feel a stretch etc. and at the same time is not capable of being designed and acted out as a program (it can, but true tension etc. are wildly fluctuating).

I do think what I call feelings should be used, but they should be used to avoid injury. If a clamper can’t feel his head, or can’t get an erection, or has an overly sore penis, - this is a good time to go by feelings because it tells you that your program did not accurately estimate fatigue. But using feelings as the basis of a program, as opposed to a safety net, is a misleading way to PE. I used “the pump” in bodybuilding as an example before. This is my major beef with stretching and jelqing for advanced PE’ers.

Now aside from all of that, I welcome you to try the OLF/OLR method for whatever PE you would like to try it on. I do not know enough about the biomechanics of length work to really offer a comment. If it does work for stretching it might be that the collagen and smooth muscles simply react well to the OLF/OLR method. Either way, the discussions that led to the OLF/OLR method were constrained to clamping, and the discussions themselves weren’t originally intended to correlate to stretching.

I disagree. Comparatively, clamping does target 3 dimensional stretch more so than lateral hanging or stretching, but it appears to benefit both. How and why it does it, I agree is a mystery.

The problem is that we actually do see girth growth from both hanging and stretching, but not where you would expect it if de-oxygenation were a significant cause of growth. If this were the case then the attachment point and the glans would both be the most likely candidates for growth but this doesn’t appear to happen. Moreover, girth growth at the base is a common side effect of hanging and stretching. [Side note: I’ve really only ever seriously pursued hanging and stretching and started with a base girth of about 5”. Today I’m close to 6” and after a stretching work-out can measure as much as 7” around the base. Although less, I’ve also grown in girth along the shaft which is one of the reasons I’m holding off on doing any girth work until I’ve achieved my length target - it may hinder length progress and I may not need it given that sporting 7” girth could make great oral sex a thing of the past…..]

I cannot disagree more. Static stretching is less about feeling and more about rulers - no guessing or intuition needed (except for staving off injury)! I think the concept that you don’t fully appreciate is that there is very little “play” or deviations in a static stretcher. Essentially, if you set it to 8”, that’s exactly what it is - 8”, regardless of whether your penis happens to be in it at the time. It’s not the same as an off-the-shelf PenisMaster™ Extender - different paradigm altogether. Extenders work on a low force/high time ratio, whereas static stretchers exploit high force/low time ratio. Any measurement of tension/weight is not as crucial as length measurement - enough tension is used until the next incremental increase in length is attained. Rinse and repeat. Using this method over the last 6 months I’ve been able to go from 6.25” to 8.25” stretched length resulting in a BPEL of 7.5” (7.75” if I squint and manipulate it a bit :chuckle: ) But it’s going to get tougher, which is where I think your method may assist me getting that final .25-.5” and will see me achieve my long term goal …. and maybe even a bit more!

Sorry if you feel I’ve hijack your thread, but I really am confident that your method may also be of value to other disciplines. And that’s not a bad thing …..

lil1 :lep:

Interesting post. There is no question that clamping creates a “3 dimensional stretch,” I was just pointing out that it does not target that - ie that is not our goal. Otherwise, for example, we may remain hard for the maximum “stretch” during the set.

Static stretching? I thought you meant manual stretching. If you are referring to the ADS device, then I agree that the device can be used to apply pre-planned fatigue levels.

If you are seriously interested in this, please start a new thread so that this clamping thread is not taken off course. I can reply to you there :D .

The stalling of gains is not something that happens to newbies only, but also to intermediate and advanced PEers. You are doing the ad hoc hypotesis that gains of newbies are only elastic gains. You should recognize that is just a supposition, nothing is supporting this idea. I’ve a different guess.

Hypertrophy hasn’t that much to do with length gains, I think; hypertrophy of TA means a thicker, not a longer TA.

I can’t see why jelqing should be an optimal way to create elastic gains. Those kind of gains are better targeted with hanging or ADS/extenders, that’s what studies on CT seems to suggest. And a 1on/1 off or 2 on/ 1 off routine hardly creates elastic gains.

Anyway, the ‘ceiling’ happens in both elastic deformation and in plastic deformation; weigth-lifters base their gains on hypertrophy, and they know plateau very well. Stalling is a stasi of adaptive response, a very general mechanism.

‘Trauma’ is exactly what asks for rests, generally speaking: after a trauma, the body is involved in deep changes, so repeating the traumatic event again and again isnt’ a good idea, I think. Repeating the stimulus is good only when the intensity is low.

If you read this whole thread, the idea is exactly to create an overload - so, a point of accumulation of stimuli that results in a dramatic change of the adaptive reponse.

For a newbie, first jelqs are a traumatic event. It’s pretty hard to deny this. In your own ideas, trauma is linked to plastic deformation, right? For an advanced PEer, jelqs aren’t a trauma; raising the number of jelqs alone, on constant basis, can hardly create a trauma. It’s a known stimulus, to which the body has already adapted.

Now, how does it pertains to this thread? Maybe the LLH thread is a better place?

BTW, I do agree that this method is better suited for lenght than for girth. For example, an overload of girth work will decrease the EQ; so repeating session will become harder if one is not using some drug.

marinera,

If the right overload is used, this will not happen. It is only if the overload is too far beyond the recoverable amount, and done for too long. Say my recoverable about is 3 sets per day. If I do 5 per day for a week, I will endure poor EQ. Poor EQ is a bad thing, from experience, it will deter gains if achieved repetitively. However, overload can be achieved at, for example, 4 sets per day for a week without negative EQ.

The major problem I see coming with this method, if it works, is that using high levels of TUC, we don’t have much flexibility with the set load. It may be that the recoverable sets for a person are 3 per day, but using 4, that person can only last a week without over-overloading. We want to time this at exactly 2 weeks according to the research we have done, so this becomes a problem as is clear.

I was waiting for your retort marinera! I actually replied stating that marinera disagrees, but thought I’d leave that to you :D .

I also agree this should go to your thread marinera, or a new dedicated one for OLF/OLR applications to lengthening. Lets keep this one dedicated to clamping.

Sorry I haven’t gotten back sooner, but I am currently on vacation with limited access to computers.

The water pumping is a whole long discussion in itself and really opinions in every direction. Its the non-compressibility of water that I think gives it an edge, in both the ability to expand the tissue and its seeming ability to exert that force with seemingly less stress to the surface blood vessels. You really have to try it and judge for yourself.

As far as breaks, I have read personal accounts of benefits from both approaches, the constant and the periodic decon. Its appearent to me that some guys seem to do far better with the constant stress, and others seem to do far better with the periodic planned decon. I experimented with what I called a “wave” which consisted of loading and deloading. I never achieved consistent results but there were hints that it had potential.

As far as me, I still haven’t figured out which one I do best with. You may be correct that deloading to allow the tissue to “defatigue” might be all that is needed. I don’t think I have ever deliberately deloaded as a form of recovery in place of decon, so I am curious to see your results.

I can tell you from personal experience and from those whom I have worked with, many of us see a very definite slowing and stopping of progress from the constant load approach as well as the slow increasing of load. This same group also has consistently reported best gains after a decon.

One of the short falls of the IPR system for those who were trying to reproduce Xeno’s results was that you first have to dial in the proper amount of force/time to INITIATE gains, before you could get ANY results from the system.

That really remains the CRUX of any PE system in my mind, finding the “growth zone”. Once you find that, THEN applying a system of ramping up or down and or recovery or decon will have some relevance…but only then! If you haven’t found the amount of PE that INITIATES gains for you, then all the recovery or ramping or decon is really an exercise in futility.

So for guys that have a pretty good idea of what makes them START to grow, then it would be very interesting to apply these different perimeters and see which produces the greatest overall gains.

I think personally I will experiment with a deloading phase and contrast it with a decon phase and see which produces the greatest results.

It may well be that the two approaches might be best determined by what happens during a decon. If you lose all or most of your gains during a decon, then a deloading phase might be best. If you lose very little or none of your gains during a decon, then a total decon might be best.

Intuitively, I think that a total decon would be a better choice, as long as it isn’t setting you back to zero gains. I would think that a total decon will set you back closer to a baseline of stimulus needed to initiate gains than a deload, which in the long run seems to me to allow a longer total growth period…but of course thats all my best guesses at this stage.

Good thread guys.

Interesting post. I can’t see how a complete stop from stimulation could be preferable though, as growth could feasibly be incurred during deloading, and if not, at least an assurance of no loss. The deloading phase’s purpose is to remove all fatigue, so if it does not then it is simply being done incorrectly (we have to figure out how to make sure fatigue is gone).

There is no reason to make this an absolute thing, we simply need to use the right rate and time span at that rate to remove the built up fatigue entirely, and the rate at which we recover (per day, as in how low the sets are) is dependent on how long we want the deloading phase to last, and vice versa.

On another note, I have a new issue at hand. So the major issues we discussed so far have been dealing with fatigue in a preplanned manner, the use of drugs (EVO & Cialis) to aid in clamping work, and the prefer ability of high TUC. I think a major topic that we need to understand is why some clampers gain girth at the base (point of constriction) while some don’t. If this is a valid method, I can’t see why we don’t begin to clamp on other portions of the penis as xeno recommended. Big Girtha tried this, but I never saw a post of his describing his results.

marinera & anyone else: care to chime in?

If you clamp at the base, all the blood is pushed in a smaller volume, so pressure is increasing a lot.

If you clamp higher on the shaft, then part of the blood - blood contained in the portion of the penis under the clamp - is pushed inside the body, so pressure isn’t augmenting that much. Seems pretty obvious to me, but maybe I haven’t understood the question? :shrug: