I posted a little while back about DMSO as a transdermal delivery mechanism for Pine Pollen & Deer Antler.

As far as Pine Pollen is concerned yes – go for it. The DHEA, Testosterone, amino acids and other molecules will be transported into your blood.

IGF-1 however has a molecular weight over 1200 ng/mol & DMSO will only transport stuff under 400 ng/mol

Thats OK as most nutrients are under 400 ng/mol

For those larger molecules such as IGF & vitamin B12 for example we must go a step further.

We must concoct our own liposomal delivery substance. Essentially this means blending DMSO, Lecithin and your chosen nutrients and exposing it to ultrasound vibration.

Easy desktop stuff and here is more information Home Made Liposomal Delivery

That article is about doing it for Vitamin C but it will work for IGF-1, B12 and anything that works transdermally too.

If the stench of DMSO is too much you can make the liposomal delivery system with alcohol.

Just remember if the molecular weight is under 400 ng/mol then DMSO is as good as pinging it.

Things are going as well as they can with two torn tendons in my left shoulder.

The Accident

To cut a long story short I lifted an odd shaped object overhead with improper form. Its as simple as that. The odd shaped object was my 80lb weight vest which I then proceeded to use for an hour. When putting it on I struggled & contorted the wrong way. Tore two tendons.

Symptoms

Its been two months since the initial injury. For the past two months I have seldom raised my left arm above shoulder height. To do so would result in intense pain. Putting my hand behind my back has been the same.

There has been pain all night if I exercise or lift weight too hard but its a dull ache not severe.

Stretching it is pure agony.

The Physio

I waited three weeks before seeing the physio because I hoped it would heal up and go away. It did not.

First visit he did some tests and told me I have bursitis and a possible small tear.

I was sent for an ultrasound and they made me take an x-ray also. I have two small tears in the subscapularis and infraspinatis and bursitis in my left shoulder.

The physio is guiding me through a progressive recovery starting with isometrics only initially. Now I do band exercises and stretches.

If it doesnt hurt I am allowed to do it.

What Exercise can You Do?

Well its actually nowhere near as bad as it sounds training wise. I can not lift overhead or do benchpress. Anything behind the back is out. Apart from that I can train exactly like normal even with the same weights.

Have I lost condition?

Over all no none at all with the exception of my left shoulder. My left arm is fine I can still do heavy bicep curls. tricep kickbacks etc. But I can lift zero above my shoulder. Until this week I could not stretch my arm above my shoulder without pain so did not try.

Today I have regained the ability to raise my arms but not straight up by a wide margin so it may take a month of daily careful exercise to regain a fully stright vertical arm. Before doing this I will check with the physio that it is safe to do.

Any new exercise I add I check with the physio first. So yes I have lost considerable range of motion in my left shoulder & no doubt strength but I wont be testing that for 1-2 months.

I can do side delt raise with bands & trap shrugs with 140 lbs (2 x 70 lb kettlebells). I can do front raise and cable flyes.

So the injury is very specific in that it prevents over head & behind back only.

When will I be better again?

I expect the bursitis and pain to be fully gone in two months. That will be four months after the injury. I expect to be pressing over head & doing pressups and bench again about four months from now with light to moderate weight.

I expect to be lifting heavy overhead & weight vest training six to seven months from now.

Full recovery from tendon injury is widely regarded as 9 months same as getting pregnant.

What medication have I taken?

Zero. None at all I think in the last two months I have taken two ibuprofens which I felt seriously guilty for taking. I have used Turmeric & black pepper instead. I have also used a raw ginger poultice a couple of times. Thats it.

Its highly unlikely that I will take a cortisone shot into the bursa.

I do intend to experiment with DMSO and deer antler velvet. I will put this directly onto the wound and maybe sublingually. I also intend to use Pine Pollen & Black Ant extract with DMSO. This is to combat andropause and should have a dramatic effect on the tendon healing. I will not apply DMSO directly to the tendon for an extended time. Perhaps daily for a week then once per week for a month.

If I could use ostarine, other SARMS and peptides I would but they are illegal in New Zealand and hence expensive and difficult to import.

I will at some point be moving overseas and will become a regular user of SARMS & peptides.

My Advice

First of all if you are a serious athlete that trains with weights & will do so for life you probably have a 50% chance of a tendon tear. Its something we all dread. Took me 32 years before it happened. I started lifting at 16.

So just do what you can for your joints, good supplements, warm ups and downs, special exericises. Physio equipment like PEMF can help too.

Also have rest days and periodize your training.

In addition if you are 40-50 start considering Hormone replacement and chemical performance enhancement at some point.

Its been two months since I tore my rotator cuff. Each day I get a tiny bit better but boy when I do stretches on this sucker it hurts in a way that simply isnt normal.

Never mind. Today I started using kungfu Dit Da Jow. I did not use it sooner but probably should have. By using Jow, and drinking or eating turmeric I have less pain than if I was using ibuprofen. Ginger too is great. I am also taking cissus quadrangularis. I will try DMSO for the first time in a couple of weeks.

So I pong like jow, have orange shoulders, cant bench press or lift over head.

Apart from that everything is perfectly normal.

Very good news concerning Pine Pollen & Deer Antler

I made a post some time ago extolling the use of these natural extracts. Well it seemed to fall short as while they do indeed contain an awesome profile of anabolic and health enhancing substances, oral absorbtion falls far short of making them useful. Even making tinctures using alcohol seemed to fall short. The alcohol may well extract many of the compounds but they still only pass minimally into the blood stream.

Well fortuitously I tore my rotator cuff. I developed bursitis and in the process of researching joint pain & inflammation cures I came accross good old DMSO.

DMSO is a chemical we have all heard of but many may have forgotten as I did.

DMSO is an organic solvent, largely non-toxic with many pleasant health side effects. Relevant to Pine Pollen and Antler is the fact that it transports chemicals through the skin and into the blood stream. In the case of testosterone the valid research indicates it is close to 100% absorbtion.

So if one uses DMSO instead of alcohol then you have a tincture that is better than medical hormone replacement – problem solved.

Be aware this will definitely lead to testicular shutdown so its up to you to determine a suitable administration protocol.

Also DMSO is a double edged sword. While it is non toxic it will transport any toxin directly into your blood. So if you are sloppy about how you use it death & organ damage are a definite possibility, or cancer down the track.

You must take meticulous care to use only pure compounds that do not contain any contaminants, all storage vessels and application utensils must be preferably glass.

No messing about with this stuff as the physiological effect is exacly the same as injection. FDA has all but banned it and consider why – every cannabis, meth & heroin addict would be poisoning themselves to death if it caught on.

I have never had any shoulder injury or weakness in 32 years of lifting. 3 and a half weeks back I did an 80lb weight vest session. As I put the vest on I kind of dropped it onto my shoulders in an awkward position. I noticed some minor shoulder pain but continued.

The shoulder pain is minor but has persisted for all this time nearly a month now. I knew all along it was rotator cuff when it did not go away after a couple of days. Thus I have been doing the standard things. Rest initially, I did not ICE but should have on the first & second day. Total cessation of overhead & bench press. Many exercises have zero pain such as heavy side holds with KB’s. Isometric press in a doorway. Most isometrics dont hurt. Kettlebell swings dont hurt.

What does hurt is anything overhead or behind my back. I am lucky its a level one tear only. I went to physio on Monday and he tested it out, said I have bursitis and a possible tear but my pain levels and range of motion are good.

I went for xrays and ultrasound today which revealed a small subscapularis tendon tear, bursitis and inflamation.

So I am in for a couple of months of physio – possibly a bit more to get it back to heavy overhead lifting. Certainly two months to normal use.

Lots of isometrics and rotator cuff stuff. Its surprising with this injury – which incedentally I have always feared, it hurts much less than I thought. But I only have a small tear. The ultrasound technician said most of the pain will be from the bursitis and inflamation not the tear.

Honestly it does not hurt much but I am not dumb. This is a potential disaster if the tear gets worse or comes back so I have altered my exercise accordingly.

Not the end of the world, life goes on & training goes on.

Want a simple uncomplicated workout that pushes you to the physiological & psychological brink?

Here I am with my elevation mask & 80lb weight vest.

Just put them on & walk for 40-60 minutes.

Lets face it those good at mid & long distance running are skinny little runts.

If you want to be military, particularly Army you have to be able to run and run fast for long distances. Sadly you can not do this if you are big.

You may be a far better athelete but if your BMI is high you will be a bad runner even if you are not obese but muscular. You simply can not have the best of both or all worlds. Trust me the military has been at it for thousands of years. If they had figured a way to have super muscular troops that can run 10km fast they would not be testing BMI.

There is simply no trade off or workaround. If you want to do well in the military you need to get your BMI down and increase your strength to weight ratio. So for me at 5ft 11in this would mean going down to 80-90kg and getting as strong as possible.

Clearly this is not an athletic ideal but it is a military ideal. Remember the military is an outfit that is training you potentially to die not to win a muscle man contest.

So what can you do if you are young and have instinctive yearnings to be a combat soldier but also want to be a muscle man?

Well what I would do is focus on the military objective because once you are 35-40 you will be past the expiry date anyway. Go hard, have your military career. Then when the time comes retire & change your training & physique.

Now another option is to cut to the chase. Stuff the military, pack on the muscle & become a muscle man – hell you can pay for your own gun & skydiving – right?

Its up to you – just be aware you can not do both at once.

Muscle Man can not run!!!

He can however sprint & can carry heavy loads for long distances. Could muscle man be a better soldier? Maybe but not within the institutionalized military.

Maybe he can be a better operator but not at official special forces. He can certainly be a better police officer, bodyguard, arena combat athlete or street fighter.

Also if you are too big for medium & long distance running accept that as your reality. Dont fight the flow – go with it. Take up sprinting & high intensity training.

Now take a look at these sprinters:

Those are magnificent lean physiques right?

Who the hell would not want to look & feel like that? Well stop trying to do mid & long distance. Do the hit training. Be a sprinter, bodybuilder, power athlete. You can still have a magnificent cardio-vascular system. Whats more this style of training is better for your heart & longevity than skinny man endurance training which actually causes heart muscle damage.

Muscle man is fitter than skinny man even though for certain jobs skinny man is better – including ironically being a modern combat soldier or special forces comando.

If you want to be a comando do not become a bodybuilder or a sprinter. Simple fact easy to understand. BMI may not accurately reflect your athleticism or health but it does reflect your ability to run mid & long distance.

One final point to raise is just why upper body mass seems to be beneficial for sprinters. It is extra weight to carry after all. The answer’s involve biomechanics, peripheral heart action & nerve force irradiation. So be assured that yes a bigger & stronger upper body definitely amplifies sprinting capacity – which is great.

Finally here are some links on sprint training, BMI and VO2max:

Sprint Training

Ideal Running Weight

I got a rebounder some months ago. I always used to enjoy briefly using a rebounder at the gym & I am too heavy for running much at 100+ KG’s.

So a rebounder seemed like a good idea. Many books & sites claim rebounding is as intense calorie wise as running or skipping. Well I can tell you that that is not the case unless you make it so.

I find rebounding much less strenuous than either running or skipping but having said that if you go all out it can indeed get your pulse pumping.

Main benefits: Conditioning of archiles tendons & calves, feet & shins, safe for knees & hips.

The above benefits will greatly improve your injury resistance while running & if you are big like me you just cant run too frequently without injury.

Lymphatic drainage: Yes all forms of exercise will drain your lymph but rebounding certainly seems to be particularly effective.

Cardio: The more you put into it the more you will get out of it.

The big test for kettlebell snatch is the SSST – for males that’s 200 24kg snatches in 10 minutes. RKC also has a test that is 100 in 5 minutes. Women can do the tests with 16kg.

Now those numbers represent a “pass” but some people do it with much more weight.

Snatch is tough on cardio & on the hands. Hence if you want to do well with snatch training then you will benefit from doing a lot of intense running and other similar cardio. If running is too hard on your knees you can row, cycle and jump rope.

Snatching alone won’t get you to top numbers in the snatch due to the hand damage.

So you want to take a two pronged approach as like most kettlebell work this is “strength-endurance”

For strength I recommend the Alpha Snatch program which is designed to take you up to the next level kettlebell in six weeks.
If you can snatch 50 reps in 5 minutes with a 20kg then after this program you will be able to do the same with a 24kg.

You then rest from it and do some other stuff for six weeks and you may repeat aiming for the next level up.

OK Alpha Snatch will take care of your strength approach to the snatch.

For the endurance side of things apart from a cross training approach I also recommend Kenneth Jay’s famous “Viking Warrior” program. Its a great kettlebell snatch endurance & cardiovascular program.

Now Kenneth was clearly full with great enthusiasm for the snatch when he developed this program but has since released “Cardio Code” which explains that snatch while being very good is not the absolute best exercise for cardio.

So this is the general approach to take:

1: Use “Alpha Snatch” to increase your snatch specific strength. Its is only a short workout so you can still do all othe your other regular strength & fitness training with minor adjustments.

2: Use a “Viking Warrior” style regimen to increase cardio & snatch endurance when not doing “Alpha Snatch” – this is done with less weight.

3: Use “Cardio Code” to increase your cardiovascular fitness above and beyond what snatch training alone can do for you.

The end result after 6-12 months will be super performance in the snatch for both strength & endurance.