Oral Trenbolone?

Q: I was shopping for roids in Cancun last month and came across a really odd steroid. The pharmacists let me take an empty box of the stuff, which I have enclosed. It's called "Acetrenbo" and is an oral tablet of trenbolone. This has me very confused. I though trenbolone was an injectable steroid. How can they make a tablet of it? Is this even real? 

            A: Thank you for sending in the empty sample. The product you have included is indeed real, although probably not the most effective one you can get. I think you made a good decision leaving the store with the box only. That's not to say that Acetrenbo doesn't work at all. The question on oral bioavailability is not quite as cut and dry as a "yes or no." Indeed, the liver efficiently breaks down most natural steroids- too efficiently for them to really work in a pill form. This is the reason we do not have any testosterone, nandrolone or boldenone tablets on the market. (I know about Andriol, but it uses a very specific technology to make an effective formulation).

            But trenbolone is a little different than these natural steroids. Trenbolone is a potent synthetic agent and is stronger than even testosterone because, among other things, it's much harder for the body to break down. It's not so resistant to metabolism that it should qualify as an oral in the same family as Winstrol, Anavar or Primobolan, but it will work if you take enough of it.

Notice that the tablets for Acetrenbo come in 50- milligram strength. Figure if you take just two per day, you're ingesting 100 milligrams of trenbolone. Were oral bioavailability high, one tablet would be more than enough. Shoot, half a tablet would probably work well on most people. But it isn't, so you need to take 100 milligrams or more to receive any measurable benefit. You're sort of using the shotgun effect, blasting yourself with high doses of oral trenbolone just so a small amount actually gets into the bloodstream. Were trenbolone as cheap as dirt, it wouldn't be so bad. But last I checked, even Acetrenbo was selling for well over $100 per bottle and it contains only 20 tablets each! This practice is definitely not going to be a cost effective one, but I can't say it would be entirely useless.

 Enanthate Dose at Issue

Q: I have enclosed an empty box of Enantato 350. It's a Mexican steroid that is listed to contain 350mg/ml of testosterone enanthate. This is the most testosterone I have seen yet. Can this be legit, or did I get scammed? 

A: This is a legit product, so you don't have to worry about being ripped off. This item is made by Pet's Pharma, one of the more recent companies to enter the steroid arena in Mexico. Pet's uses a printed/holographic sticker as a security feature to deter counterfeiting and I did notice it was present on your box. I have not seen any attempted copies of this sticker, so you should be safe.

In regard to the 350 milligrams per milliliter (mg/ml) dosage, this is possible. Normally, you would only be able to dissolve about 275-300 milligrams of testosterone enanthate into one milliliter of oil. Reaching 350mg/ml takes a little deviation from the normal type of steroid formulation. To achieve this high concentration, the company has likely increased the amount of benzyl alcohol in the solution. There is no listing as to the amount on the ingredients list, but this is by far the most common method. Steroids are better dissolved in alcohol, so this can measurably increase the overall holding capacity of the solution.

But there is a drawback in this. The more alcohol you add to the product (or more steroid, for that matter), the more painful the injections become. The more comfortable shots tend to come from products containing less steroid per milliliter and normal levels of alcohol (usually under 10 percent of total weight). Once you start to get outside the 10 percent range, the shots can become very painful. A drug like Test 400, which contains 400 milligrams per milliliter of testosterone esters per milliliter, can be so painful for the average user that it must first be diluted with weaker steroids before injection. I can't say for sure that is going to be the case for you and your product, though, but you might want to keep it in mind if your injections end up giving you a painful knot in your ass.  

The Dianabol Bridge

Q: My buddy mentioned the concept of "Dbol bridging" to me. It involves taking only 10 milligrams per day while you're between cycles to preserve muscle while letting the testicles get back to normal. What do you think of this idea? I was thinking of trying it so I keep more of my gains next time. Does it have merit? 

A: I'm not the type of person to summarily dismiss an idea without fully investigating it, but I do not feel there is a whole lot of solid logic behind the Dianabol bridge concept. To begin with, the suggested dose of 10 milligrams is really not all that small. In fact, it should provide a significantly stronger effect than your normal endogenous levels of testosterone. A dose of only five milligrams will probably be more than sufficient to supplement your daily androgen levels. That's why the bridge works for the people trying it. They are essentially continuing to take a strong exogenous steroid in a dose high enough to have an effect on muscle mass. But your body will surely notice the 10 milligrams too, and will not return its natural testosterone production until the dose is removed.

In all honestly, there are no studies easily found looking at this exact dose and how it affects natural testosterone levels. I'm sure one or two are out there somewhere, to be found for the looking. But everything I have seen on other steroids, even with relatively low doses of Anavar and Primobolan, shows that suppression of endogenous testosterone production occurs at low doses, much lower than what 10 milligrams of Dianabol is going to provide. So, Dbol bridging works, but it works in a sense that you are not really coming off of steroids. You are just trading a big cycle for a smaller one. Or, more basically, you are just staying on all the time. 

Avodart: New Help for Hair Loss?

Q: I want to do a cycle, but I'm concerned about hair loss. I am already starting to thin a little on the hairline. I was wondering if Avodart would be able to protect me from this side effect? 

A:  Avodart is a relatively new non-selective reductase inhibitor that received FDA approval for the treatment of benign prostate hypertrophy (BPH) in 2002. Dutasteride, the active agent in Avodart, is very similar in structure and action to finasteride (Propecia®), an older and more widely prescribed reductase inhibitor. Both these drugs work by preventing testosterone from becoming its more potent "dihydro" counterpart, DHT.

Avodart, however, has a significantly broader range of activity compared to finasteride. While finasteride largely limits itself to suppressing the type-II 5-alpha reductase enzyme (an enzyme responsible for DHT conversion), which is present in high levels in the scalp and prostate, Dutasteride is not specific for either type-II or type-I reductase. Therefore, it inhibits systemic (whole body) levels of DHT much more effectively. When it comes to hair loss, both medications have a moderate level of effectiveness when taken under the right circumstances, namely normal hormonal chemistry. Once you add in the element of unusually high steroid levels due to drug use, however, the drugs become much less efficacious.

Also, you failed to mention what your plans were in regard to drug selection. You need to keep a couple of things in mind. For one, reductase inhibitors only make certain steroids less active in your scalp. They do not "deactivate" them, which means you can easily take enough steroid to overcompensate for the use of Avodart. Also, reductase inhibitors really only affect a small handful of anabolic steroids. This includes testosterone, methyltestosterone and Halotestin. Most of the synthetic agents, including Anavar, Primobolan, Winstrol, Anadrol and trenbolone, are unaffected by Avodart or finasteride due to the fact that they do not interact with the reductase enzyme. Nandrolone-based drugs also tend to become stronger in the face of a reductase inhibitor, as 5-alpha reduction causes them to get weaker, not stronger, like testosterone-based drugs. Avodart will increase the chance for hair loss with these drugs.

Bottom line, if balding were a concern, I'd be looking to nandrolone first, myself, before experimenting with testosterone and reductase inhibitors. Should I find nandrolones to be comfortable in this regard, maybe then I would venture out into the testosterone and Avodart combination. Then again, you can just say, "Screw it!" and shave your head. You'll be done with all your worries. If you already have active hair loss (a genetic predisposition for it) and insist on taking a lot of gear, you'll probably wind up there soon enough, anyway.

Anabolics 2005: Anabolic Steroid Reference Manual may be ordered by calling 888-828-8008, or visiting http://www.anabolicsbook.com/.