Hanging: Ride the Fatigue (Blink's Progress)

Lately my PIs are continue to be really great, my flaccid is hanging better, the veins are becoming more & more pronounced, and overall I honestly couldn’t expect more. I feel like things are moving along well.

I want to take an educated approach with my PE, so a few things have been on my mind. There’s 2x key forces that hangers usually say are critical for makings substantial gains. I’m going to focus on working up to these stress levels to get (hopefully) optimal gains.
1- you need a minimum of 10hours per week of ‘strapped in’ time.
2- most guys claim the majority of their gains come between 10lbs and 17lbs.

This week I’ve been doing 5x sets per day with a max weight so far of 5.5lbs. This should put me in the ‘sweet spot’ of 10hrs+ per week. I’m going to try & keep things at just 5x sets per day for the next 4-6 weeks while I slowly increase my maximum weight.

Once I’m 10lbs+ weight during my 10hours+ of strapped in time per week, I’ll be able to test the anecodotal data myself (the 2x key measures I mentioned above).

It’s going to be a long few months while I try & work up to the ‘zone’ that will hopefully make my PE really effective. I’m pushing myself harder than I did the first time around 1.5 years ago. My time for procrastination is over… Let’s do this!

I did 5x 20minute sets today with a max of 6.5lbs. I felt some very mild soreness, and my unit wanted to turtle (after the 6.5lbs). I wrapped it for a few hours, and my unit is fine now; it stopped turtling. Even though I thought I pushed myself there’s no pain whatsoever.

Whenever I increase my weight, I remove my wrap each set—just to make sure I haven’t done any damage and that things look ok. Eventually I may stop doing this once I trust my feelings more, but for now I’m trying to be extra careful.

I look forward to getting my golf weights (see a few posts earlier). That will help me prevent turtling once I venture into some higher weights. I’ve read a lot of posts lately that talk about how ADS can assist with healing elongated and possibly speed up results and prevent ‘healing shorter’. I haven’t heard of anyone ever losing anything by adding some light ADS to their routine, so I plan on doing it soon.

Back Problem Solution… Finally
As a complete sidenote, I finally found a real solution for my back problems. In the morning, right after I wake up (luckily my wife is always up before me), my wife stands on my back. She’s gentle, & she’s really light, so this only works when I first wake up. If I try this later in the day, usually she can’t pop my back. She doesn’t jump or anything. She literally just puts a foot on each side of my back, and as soon as her full weight is on my back it cracks.

For example, my back cracked about 10-12 times this morning when she stood on it. I’ve combined this with Yoga, workouts & lots of ice. Lately, this is the best my back has felt in 12 years (yes, I’ve been injured that long—it was in the middle of my college athletics career and never healed).

This seems more effective than a chiropractor forcing things into place; since my wife actually uses very little force on my back. It’s all about timing I guess. My back also seems to ‘stay in place’ better this way too. I already love my wife, but wow—my quality of life has gone way up because of her (this is just one of many things).

Supplements I'm Taking
I’ve been working out a lot, so that’s the main motivation for all this crap. I heal faster, and get in shape faster. I’m oldschool, so I’ve learned my own physiology well. I know how to get in shape naturally. I would say whey protein, creatine, omega blend & multi-vitamin are the most ‘core’ things here, but as a whole, everything helps.
Whey Protein
Cell Mass (creatine blend)
Glutamine (only when i’m sore, 1teaspoon every 3 hours, usually I’m healed by the next day)
Multi-vitamin (& some other vitamins)
MSM BLend (for joints, including chondroitin and glucosamine)
Omega Blend (a blend of flax seed, fish oil, etc containing Omega 3,6 & 9)
Olive Leaf (I ran out lately, but the immune system boost has been proven for me.. that’s another story)
Filtered Water (to hopefully offset some of the soda-pop I drink… I use a 3 stage filter attached to my sink)

Working Out
Today I’m through P90X Week3. So while I’ve been growing “Mr. Happy” (my unit), I’ve also been getting in better shape. My wife said the physiological changes from working out are really becoming obvious now. It’s motivating me to keep up with things.

Good health = Priceless
Bigger Unit = Priceless too

Preventing Discoloration
I just learned about the “Firegoat Roll” and I’m going to implement it. It appears this is the easiest way to prevent discoloration… I was just talking to caboose about this & decided to post it on my thread. It seems like a really great method—and the results are fairly instant.

“firegoat roll” discoloration prevention, control, and removal

firegoat - my discoloration follow up

Great news! I measured today, and I’ve regained back some more length.

I’m now at 6.4” BPEL (I measured as low as 6” at one point less than 2 months ago, its horrible but true!)

I think what I’m doing is clearly working, so I’ll stick with it. I’m going to keep doing 5x sets per day, and keep working on increasing my weight past 10lbs. I should surpass my old best measure of 6.75” BPEL in a few months at worst.

Keep the good work going.

Thanks my Italian brother

Faster Gains with an ADS?
I’m convinced if I heal in a more elongated state (by using an ADS), I may be able to gain a bit faster. This way, instead of pushing myself harder to do more sets and more weight, perhaps I can ‘maximize’ the gains from the work I’m already doing. This could mean more gains with less injury risk.

Piet Stretcher with Captain's Wench or Captain Piet's Wench Stretcher
I have decided to make my own home-made Penimaster Clone—and save $300 (or whatever it costs). Check out the great devices these guys below have made. I believe the two can be combined to make something like the Penimaster, but more comfortable. It will probably be ugly, but it’s not like I’ll be showing it off to my friends!:

Piet Stretcher
Piet’s stretcher -updated- 2
I am thinking I could combine the Piet Extender (home-made) with the captains wench to make a comfortable high quality ADS. Here’s the Piet extender. It’s actually almost like a home-made Penimaster. I would replace the attachment point with the captains wench, and perhaps the base ring as well. However, I am sort of clueless as to what could replace the base ring.

The Captain's Wench ADS
- The Captn’s Wench: PE Device
Basically, I would use the captains wench instead of Piet’s attachment point. I could probably make this pretty easily with a trip to the hardware store. The "Peg Leg" doesn’t sound bad either, but I am thinking a combination of Piet’s hanger and the captains wench would be more ideal.

I’ll probably make a list of ingredients soon and head down to the hardware store to make this. It wont cost too much, so I don’t think there’s much risk if it doesn’t turn out perfect. All I would lose is the time it takes to make it.

There’s probably some every-day device out there that could make that base-ring more comfortable. I’m drawing a blank on what might work to replace it though. Chances are, somebody already has figured something out and even posted it on this forum. I may need to study more of the home-made devices to figure that one out.

Well, this may be the answer to my own question, about how to make a more comfortable base-ring:
Base construction

Apparently you can make a decent base ring from a PVC endcap. It seems it would require a bit of work & skill to make it turn out well though. Here’s a picture with the end-cap designs.
stretcher_nosticksnorubbertube_with_endcap_constr_ details.jpg

Perhaps this combined with the Piet Stretcher, and Captains Wench could turn out pretty well.

Here’s a pretty clumsy stretcher, but it could work as a makeshift solution:
Bib Stretcher: bibstetcher.jpg

As a sidenote, I’m finding these 2x threads really helpful in making my ADS decisions and plans:
ADS (All Day Stretching) Knowledge base
ADS wearing/wrapping tips

I’m doing doing deep BTC hanging, just 5x sets per day with light jelqs. I’m still working towards 10lbs (what I hope will be a “sweet spot” for gains).

I had to cut the weight today; I think I caused some serious fatigue yesterday, I’m back down to 6lbs.

Sometimes I stop paying attention and let myself hang SD. I notice I don’t get any fatigue at all when I lose focus on my primary angle of attack. I’m trying to get used to never letting the angle change. I just drop weight if I start to feel any pain (then I know I’m getting fatigue too).

I woke up with some strong morning wood. That’s a good sign. When I stopped PEing, I noticed morning wood was becoming more of a ‘rare thing’. It seems when I PE its much more frequent. This is probably a signal that I’m not overdoing it and that things are going well downstairs.

I noticed a fat vein was very visible on top of my unit while I was erect (while I wasn’t PEing; I had just woke up)—that’s something I haven’t seen before. Another good sign.

My golf swing weights arrived in the mail today. It looks like I finally have a decent ADS for anti-turtle effects.

Congratulations on those gains! I might look into getting an ADS too, but not until sometime next year. Those are definitely good PI’s, I’ve been getting some strong morning wood too :)

Thanks Caboose ;) I hope to make good gains soon— I haven’t gained much yet. Just slightly over 1/4” to go though, and then I’ll be back at 6.75”.

I tried the golf weights—they are sort of annoying. if you’re over 5” MSEG, they are hard to get on. you have to be really relaxed and flaccid, or they wont go on easily.

they definitely work though—my flaccid was hanging at least 1” to 1.5” longer while the 3x golf weights were on.

I’m still doing 5x sets 20 minute hanging per day, my max is still 7lbs, although I’ll be able to increase it soon (I am finally able to go 20m @ 7lbs).

I find I can never do max weight on my first set with deep BTC. It seems I have to stretch my skin and lube up with the cocoa butter first, every time. I’m definitely ‘riding the fatigue’. I had to lower the weight each set, until on my final set I had to reduce things a few lbs.

My flaccid is hanging better, things are looking good. As I’m seeing my old gains come back (at what seems like an accelerated rate lately), I am getting more motivated. I probably wont re-measure for a few weeks, but I’m confident I’ll be in for a pleasant surprise (based on all the really positive PIs I’m seeing.