Buckfever's progress report/bananaman story.

4/27/2018 Update

So after the 100% tension for 61 minutes on the 18th, I was able to get back to 100% tension for 5 of the last 8 days but never able to get to that duration again for a session. Indeed there was a trend towards shorter session durations.

So I reviewed the log and decided to drop back to 80% of max tension and today was able to get a 62 minute session in. Pretty clear I moved up too fast. Again we come back to this “sweet spot” concept where the tension needs to be modulated to allow for adequate duration.

All that said there is research being done at Mayo on a novel traction device with which preliminary results are showing promise with much less time than what has been previously found with traction devices. I don’t want to jump the gun but it might be that the attachment is the limitation with the traction devices and that is why adequate duration becomes the critical factor.

That said I’ve been curious why it is that many times hanger’s don’t see gains with very high tension. So it seems that while anecdotal, one should be trying to get incremental gains with the least amount of tension.

And if that is in fact the case, this becomes a matter of endurance.

It’s very fascinating to read the logs and discussions here. Because success here has emotional requirements. Endurance, resilience, determination, temperance….. are demanded of the practitioner. It’s kind of a funny paradox that such an endeavor, demands that we examine our virtues.

And yet it is so.

Temperance is one of my watchword. And I learned it elsewhere. PE is simply an exercise in its use.

4/30/2018 Update

90% max tension 61.5 minutes

Keeping at it, discipline.

5/5/2018 Update

I think I’m going on maintenance for a while.

Not a question of privacy but simply that my schedule is overwhelming for the next 6 weeks or so. I was getting up an hour early to get it in and all that was doing was getting me exhausted. I can’t put PTT ahead of sleep, it’s not a perspective I can embrace. I’ll do what I can when I can and come back to it full throttle down the road.

Exactly! I make these decisions every day. PE is second to my family, work and physical fitness. When the heat is on, PE takes a back seat.

Smart man.

5/9/2018 Update

Finding a balance.

Slept in for 4 days and felt decidedly better, so much so that I had energy yesterday after work to get to the gym and grab an extra workout. This morning I woke up before the alarm clock and started up the maintenance program.

Although I guess I view it as a more of a much slower progression program. My goal will be to only get one 60 minute extender session a day, 6 days a week. I’m going to keep the focus on maintaining the duration of 60 minutes and only very, very slowly increasing the tension. My goal of adding another 1/4” to the extender remains, however that is on the back burner now, I’ll get to that down the road when my schedule permits.

Taking a longer term approach to the matter and right now I want to consolidate the stretch gains to this point. More concisely I do not want to give back the progress made. This is a much more tenable approach given my current circumstances.

Today: 10% max tension, 60 minutes.

so i dont understand …what you say is that use the extender for 1-2 hours with max tension or with little tension ?

Okay so this is actually a complex question. My plan is to use the maximum tension with which I can consistently get an hour duration in the extender.

I have enough experience with this to know that it is a complex question but not enough to give veteran advice on it. What I will say is that one of the biggest limitations with regards to progress on the extender is the condition of the glans. So you can use a higher tension and get hour long sessions in but then the glans gets beat up and it’s not sustainable. So then you can not apply consistent traction day to day of sufficient duration.

So the tension has to be somewhat less than the very max tension. I wish I could give you something more specific, but I’m still figuring it out.

I think there are also other factors unrelated to the glans issue, so like I said it’s a complex issue.

I know that there are differing views but I side with those veterans that speak about a slow measured approach.

Best I could say is maintain the session duration, increase the tension slowly. It’s a marathon not a sprint.

5/10/2018 Update

30% max tension @ 60 minutes.

5/13/2018 Update

40% max tension @ 60 minutes.

Hey what’s up Buck, just coming into this and curious what brand extender you’re using? I’ve been hanging for a year+ w/bib + pumping the past ~3 months w/bathmate/vacutech. What you said about temperance resonates with me as I’ve found that by consistently hanging 5+ sets per day *most days of the week, I’ve slowly and steadily made gains and they are still going strong. To me it’s just like getting sober from alcohol which I was told is “slowbriety”. It happens slowly over the course of time and requires a deep commitment and patience.

I also never went super heavy and instead I’ve incrementally added weight for a few heavy sessions but then probably 60%+ of my hangs are lower weight between very low and medium low depending if I’m working etc.

Anyways I haven’t dabbled in extenders yet but was thinking about it so just looking for info as I’m a noob in that realm, thanks!

> And it strikes me, being at this for a year now, that a non PE practitioner, really can not fathom what kind of substantial accomplishment a legitimate 1/8” gain in length is.

Oh this is so true, I’ve been hanging religiously in my apartment for months and specifically since March I have been telling myself “If I get my BPFSL to a certain length (my absolute metric), then I can no longer deny that it works — it’s the real deal”. Despite plenty of photos from the beginning and along the way, an irrational part of my mind still can’t believe it’s possible to grow larger at all. I recently got to and just started to pass that length on the ruler this past week and I was totally elated yet no one except anyone reading this will ever know lol.

“what brand extender you’re using?”

The extender that I use is identical to the X4 labs Peyrionies Pro edition standard treatment, but I bought it on Ebay for less. It has the hybrid cradle, I use the noose and secure the straps by running velcro through the comfort strap slots.

5/14/2018 Update

50% max tension @ 60minutes.

5/15/2018 Update

60% max tension @ 60 minutes

So brought the tension up slowly while keeping the session duration at 1 hour. Based on the amount of visual stretch of the noose, this seems like a good level of tension to consolidate for a while.