Muscle for Life with Mike Matthews - The Truth About Testosterone Boosters (Are They Worth the Hype?)

Episode Date: May 22, 2023

The allure of testosterone booster supplements is obvious.  They’re a perennially popular topic because the promises are highly enticing, from giving you a surge of energy, to enhancing muscle growth, speeding up fat loss, and even aiding in quicker recovery post-workout. People also claim these supplements improve your sleep, uplift your mood, and even boost your sex drive. The purported benefits are so vast, these products often seem like a bargain, leading many to believe that even if they delivered just half of what's promised, it would still be worth the investment. So, I thought it was high time to record an updated episode on the current state of testosterone boosters.  In this episode, we're going to explore some of the most popular supplements currently available in the market that are reputed to increase testosterone levels.  Tune in because we'll discuss creatine, D-Aspartic Acid, ashwagandha, tongkat ali, zinc, boron, and more. Timestamps: (0:00) - Please leave a review of the show wherever you listen to podcasts and make sure to subscribe! (1:30) - What is a testosterone booster? How does it differ from testosterone replacement therapy (TRT)? (3:29) - What are some specific supplements that boost testosterone? (7:01) - What is D-Aspartic acid? (11:45) - What is ashwagandha? (15:15) - Shop Legion Supplements Here: https://buylegion.com/ and use coupon code MUSCLE to save 20% or get double reward points! (18:21) - What is fenugreek? (23:06) What is tribulus terrestris? (24:20) - What is tongkat ali? (26:25) - Can zinc improve testosterone levels? (28:24) - What is boron? Mentioned on the Show: Shop Legion Supplements Here: https://buylegion.com/ and use coupon code MUSCLE to save 20% or get double reward points!

Hello, I am Mike Matthews and this is Muscle for Life. Thank you for joining me today to learn about testosterone boosters, specifically supplements that supposedly increase testosterone levels. Sometimes it's total testosterone and free testosterone. Sometimes it's more specifically free testosterone. Certain supplements are often promoted to not affect total testosterone much, but free testosterone significantly. And this is a perennially popular topic and product because the promises of these supplements are quite appealing. They purportedly can give you more energy and they can enhance muscle growth and they

can enhance fat loss and they can enhance fat loss and they can help you recover faster from your workouts and help you sleep better and improve your mood and boost your sex drive and on and on. And often the claims that are used to sell these supplements are so strong that even if they only delivered 50% of the claims, it still would be worth the money, to many people at least. And so I thought I would record an updated episode on the state of testosterone boosters as of May 9th, 2023, the day that I am recording this. And in this episode, I am going to talk about some of the most popular supplements on the market today that supposedly can increase testosterone levels like creatine,

diaspartic acid, ashwagandha, tonkat ali, zinc boron, and others. Okay, so chances are you already know what a testosterone booster is, but just to make sure we're on the same page, this is a dietary supplement that contains vitamins, minerals, herbs, phytonutrients, and other such things that purportedly increase your testosterone levels. Testosterone boosters, as I am using that term, differs from testosterone replacement therapy, TRT. That's very different because TRT involves introducing exogenous testosterone, so testosterone that was produced outside of the body in a lab. And that is something that you put in your body with TRT. You inject it or you use a cream. It's usually

injected. And in the case of a testosterone booster, this is a supplement that is supposed to increase your body's natural production of testosterone as opposed to TRT, which is just introducing more testosterone that has already been, quote unquote, produced into your body. And by the way, both of those things differ from using steroids or from using anabolic steroids. When somebody is using steroids or is doing a steroid cycle, that involves testosterone and usually other drugs that raise testosterone levels well beyond what is attainable naturally, well beyond what is even recommended with testosterone replacement therapy, because of course, the idea with TRT is that you are replacing your body's natural production of testosterone. You are not necessarily supposed to be raising your body's production of testosterone well beyond what could ever occur naturally. what is possible naturally and maybe even a little bit beyond that, but not two or three or four

times that like can happen with a steroid cycle. Okay, so now that we have those little distinctions out of the way, let's talk about specific testosterone boosters, specific supplements that are sometimes or often sold as ways to naturally increase your testosterone levels. The first one is creatine, which I'm sure you've heard of. It's a natural compound. It's composed of a few amino acids, L-arginine, glycine, methionine, and it is well known for its performance enhancing effects, its recovery enhancing effects, its muscle hypertrophy and its strength gain enhancing effects, its muscle hypertrophy and its strength gain enhancing effects.

But many people also believe and some people who sell creatine also claim that it can increase testosterone. And sometimes they will refer to some scientific research. Specifically, there are three studies that are often cited. Two of them found that people who supplemented with creatine significantly increased their testosterone. And one of them found that rugby players who took creatine saw an increase in dihydrotestosterone, DHT, which is a hormone that's converted from testosterone. And that's the study, by the way, that has many other people concerned that creatine can cause baldness because increases in DHT is associated

with aggravated male pattern baldness in men who are genetically predisposed to losing their hair. Now, I have written and spoken about that study elsewhere. I won't go into the details, but basically I put very little stock in its findings. I do not expect that study to be replicated. There are some pretty major flaws with how it was designed and how it was executed. And it was a very anomalous finding. That effect was not seen in a number of other studies. And all of a sudden, this study comes along and makes waves and gets a lot of attention, gets a lot of clicks, gets a lot of people talking, which can be good for researchers, especially if they want to get funding for more research. But if you look at the weight of the scientific evidence for both DHT and testosterone, you see that the two studies

that found that people who supplemented with creatine significantly increased their testosterone levels and the one study that showed that these rugby players appeared to have increased DHT levels, those three studies are the exception rather than the rule. The weight of the evidence, when you look at about 10 other studies specifically on both of these issues, testosterone and DHT, you see that creatine usually has no effects whatsoever on testosterone and DHT levels. That said, there is one way that creatine could increase your testosterone levels in an indirect kind of roundabout way, because again, I mentioned earlier, it's well established that creatine can help you train harder. And research shows that intense exercise can raise testosterone levels more than less intense exercise. So high

intensity exercise, especially with strength training, is generally going to increase testosterone levels higher than moderate intensity exercise. And so if a supplement like creatine can help you train more intensely, then as a result of that, you got to do the training and you got to eat and you got to recover and sleep and so forth. But assuming you were doing those other things, then adding the creatine to your regimen could help you generally have higher testosterone levels because you are using it to train harder. Okay, let's move on to D-aspartic acid, which has been popular for purportedly increasing testosterone levels for a long time now, for at least 10, 11, 12 years.

And I remember taking it probably 12 years ago, hoping that it would increase my testosterone levels. And D-aspartic acid is an amino acid and it interacts with the brain's N-methyl-D-aspartate receptors, NMDA. And these are receptors in the brain for a powerful type of neurotransmitter, a chemical in the brain called glutamate. And many years ago, people got excited about DAA because of the results of some animal and some human cell studies. So not living organisms, but cells that are isolated for the

purpose of research. And according to those studies, the interaction between this amino acid, D-aspartic acid, and these receptors in the brain should trigger a series of events in the body that will cause the testes to produce more testosterone. And it was an exciting theory. But then when people started to do human studies, they learned that the effects were very unpredictable. So there was one study. I remember seeing this study. This was used to promote DAA. And this study was published in the journal Reproductive Biology and Endocrinology. And in it, healthy men who took DAA daily for 12 days increased their testosterone by 42% on average. And then three days after they stopped taking the supplement, their testosterone levels were still elevated. They were still about 22% higher than they had been at the beginning of the experiment. All right, that sounds pretty

exciting. That is pretty significant. If you could take a natural supplement with no side effects and increase your testosterone levels by 40 to 50 percent, that would probably be worth it. I would take that supplement because although that's not enough of an increase to make a huge difference in the gym, to really make a difference in the gym, unfortunately, you have to do a steroid cycle. You have to raise your testosterone levels well beyond what is naturally attainable. I guess you could point to an exception, which would be somebody with clinically low testosterone levels. So let's say 200 nanograms per deciliter of blood, quite low, or maybe even below that. If you were to go from 200 or 150 NGDL to a thousand NGDL, which is about the top of the range of natural testosterone

levels, that is going to make a difference in the gym. That's going to make a difference in everything. I mean, you are increasing your testosterone by six, seven times. But if you are going from, let's say, the middle of normal, you're going from 500, 600 NGDL to, let's say, 50% higher. You're going to 700 to 800 NGDL. You probably are going to notice some positive benefits, maybe a bit more energy, a bit more sex drive, a bit better sleep, but you are not going to notice a major difference in the gym. You're not going to gain a ton of muscle and gain a ton of strength. You will notice a slight improvement probably in your performance, but the quality of life benefits that you would experience by increasing your testosterone 40 to

50% would be worth it, I think, if you could do it safely and healthily with a natural supplement like D-aspartic acid. And there's another study that I know of that was promising as well. In this study, DAA was used with infertile men. They took it for 90 days. They increased their testosterone levels by 30 to 60% on average. Now, if you are not an infertile man, of course, you wouldn't want to assume that it would work as well in you as it did in infertile men. You can't extrapolate the findings with infertile men to healthy men. The problem with DAA, though, as I mentioned earlier, is unreliability. There are two studies that were done with weightlifters. So those are people probably more like you and me. And those studies found that DAA either had no impact on testosterone levels or that it even

caused testosterone levels to decline on average. So, for example, in one study that was conducted by scientists at the University of Western Sydney, researchers found that weightlifters, these are men, of course, who took three grams of DAA daily, which is the normal protocol for two weeks, saw no change in their testosterone levels. And interestingly, the men who took six grams, so there was a six gram per day group for the same period of time, experienced a decrease in testosterone levels on average. And so I am not very enthusiastic about DAA because you can take it and not know what's going to happen. Your testosterone levels might go up a little bit. They might go up a lot.

They might not change at all, or they might go down. Okay, let's move on to the next supplement I want to talk to, which is ashwagandha. This is a plant root that is used in Ayurvedic traditional Indian medicine, and it's been used in traditional Indian medicine for a long time. It is known as an adaptogen, which is a compound that causes a very low, imperceptible level of stress in the body. And that then causes adaptations that help the body better deal with other stresses. Now, ashwagandha is a great supplement. I'm a fan of ashwagandha. I take it every day because it's in my multivitamin Triumph, which you can learn about over at buylegion.com slash Triumph, B-U-Y legion.com slash triumph, if you want to check it out.

And research shows that ashwagandha can increase strength, it can increase sex drive, it can increase cognition, it can decrease anxiety and stress, a number of good, well-established, evidence-based benefits. But then there's testosterone. Now, there is evidence,

several studies have shown that ashwagandha can indeed boost testosterone levels in men who have low testosterone caused by fertility issues related to infertility. And that was published in the Journal of the International Society of Sports Nutrition. And it found that in men who were new to weightlifting, ashwagandha was effective, was more effective than a placebo for increasing muscle and strength and increasing testosterone levels. Now, that is promising evidence that ashwagandha can increase testosterone levels in men. But we do have to remember that this was in men who are new to weightlifting, whose bodies are hyper responsive to weightlifting. We know from other research, for example, that simply lifting weights will greatly increase

testosterone levels, of course, greatly increase muscle and strength levels as well. Now, in this study, adding ashwagandha did appear to further increase testosterone levels and further increase muscle and strength levels. So I don't want to take that away from ashwagandha. But if you are not a new weightlifter, if you are an experienced weightlifter, if your body is not hyper responsive to training anymore, ashwagandha might not have the same effects or the size of those effects might not be the same in your body as was seen in this study. And so while I don't think that it is misleading to say that ashwagandha can increase testosterone levels in men, especially in men who have suppressed testosterone levels because of fertility issues,

I don't think that it is accurate to call ashwagandha a testosterone booster and to tell any and all men that taking ashwagandha will significantly increase their testosterone levels and their muscle mass and their strength. I think that given the current state of the evidence, it is accurate to say that if you are a healthy male and you are an experienced weightlifter, ashwagandha will probably improve your performance and it may improve your testosterone levels to some degree. It's hard to say how much and if it's going to matter, if it'll even be enough for you to notice. But again, I am a fan of ashwagandha, but more for its other benefits that I mentioned earlier, because those are better established. There is more high quality research supporting

those other claims than the testosterone claim. Did you know that you don't need supplements to build muscle, lose fat, and get healthy? That you don't need any pills, powders, and potions whatsoever if you know what to do in the kitchen and in the gym. You can get into fantastic shape without supplements and stay that way for the rest of your life. But if you have the budget and if you have the inclination, the right supplements can help. And that's why over 300,000 discerning fitness folk have chosen my sports nutrition company, Legion. Well, that's not the only reason why they chose us. They also chose us for our 100% natural and science-based formulations, our fanatical customer service, and our no-hassle 100% money-back guarantee. Now, what do those things mean exactly? Well, by all natural,

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on my customer experience team is a certified personal trainer, and they are there to not only answer product-related questions and help people with their orders, but also to answer any and all questions they might have about diet and about training. You know, the questions that are actually more important than the questions about supplementation. And our money back guarantee is really simple. If you don't absolutely love our stuff, you let us know and you get a prompt and courteous refund. No forms, no return is even necessary. So if you want to add some all-natural science-based supplements to your regimen that can help you build muscle, lose fat, get healthy, you want to try Legion today, just head over to buylegion.com, B-U-Y,

legion.com. And if you use the coupon code muscle at checkout, you will save 20% on your first order. And if it is not your first order with us, you will get double reward points on that order. So you will get 6% cash back. And remember, if you don't absolutely love our stuff, just let us know and we will give you your money back. No questions asked or we will send you something else if you'd rather try something else. So you really have nothing to lose. Go to buylegion.com now, use the coupon code MUSCLE at checkout to save 20% or get double reward points if it is not your first order and try my supplements risk-free. Okay, now let's talk about fenugreek, which is an herb that is also used in Ayurvedic medicine,

traditional Indian medicine, and it's often used to improve health, to stimulate appetite, and to boost sex drive, to boost virility. And people believe that fenugreek can also boost testosterone levels in men because it prevents an enzyme called alpha-5 reductase from converting testosterone into estrogen. And so if it could do that, then it would simultaneously increase testosterone and decrease estrogen levels. Now, ironically, reducing estrogen levels wouldn't even necessarily be a good thing because estrogen has anabolic properties that help with muscle hypertrophy and that help with recovery and help with performance. But many people, many muscle bros, they think testosterone good, estrogen bad.

So if this raises testosterone and lowers estrogen, that is a double good. Now, there is some truth to this claim that is often used to sell fenugreek, but you need context because several studies supplements that contain fenugreek. And while it's not appropriate to just dismiss research out of hand because of the source of funding, because there might be a conflict of interest, in the case of supplement research funded by supplement companies, you really should assume that they are guilty until proven innocent. There have just been too many examples over the years of corrupted supplement research paid for by supplement companies. Remember the HMB study that purportedly showed that HMB is better than steroids for gaining muscle, for losing fat? Remember that study? Well, that was just one of many examples that I could share with you. And one of the big problems with some of these fake

studies that have been conducted over the years is even the data was fake. So if you are scientifically literate, maybe you are a researcher yourself and you dig into the paper, you dig into all the data that's provided and you're looking for methodological flaws. You're looking for evidence of shenanigans. You're looking for evidence of maybe statistical sleight of hand. You won't find anything in some of these papers because they were made up out of whole cloth. And so anyway, coming back to this fenugreek research funded by supplement companies that sell fenugreek, one of the other problems with this

research is independent studies. There are independent studies that show otherwise. And that, for example, is one of the reasons we eventually learned the truth about HMB. Those fantastical findings that I mentioned were not replicated in studies conducted by independent, that I mentioned were not replicated in studies conducted by independent, unbiased third-party researchers from universities around the world. And eventually we learned that HMB does have some useful properties, particularly for reducing muscle breakdown rates, improving post-workout recovery, but it is not an effective muscle building supplement in the way that creatine is, and certainly not in the way that creatine is, and certainly not in the way that anabolic steroids are. And so anyway, with fenugreek, there is a study that was conducted

by scientists at the University of Mary Harden Baylor. And in this case, researchers had men with no testosterone abnormalities, so just healthy men, exercise and take 500 milligrams of fenugreek or a placebo every day for 12 weeks. And the results showed that exercising increased all the men's testosterone levels, but taking fenugreek provided no additional benefit. That said, they did find that fenugreek did seem to curb, to mitigate the increase in estrogen that was caused by exercise. So the men who were exercising without fenugreek had higher estrogen levels. Now, as I mentioned earlier, though, higher estrogen levels, the natural increases in estrogen that occur with exercise are not a bad thing. We actually want that. If you are taking

anabolic steroids and your estrogen levels are way too high, yeah, that's a problem. But if you are not taking steroids and you are training hard, you want your estrogen levels to increase proportionately with your testosterone levels. It will happen naturally. You would not want to take a supplement like fenugreek to interrupt that. So my position on fenugreek currently is that it seems to help older men who have low testosterone levels. Otherwise, it's ineffective in healthy men. Next up is tribulus terrestris, another herb used in Ayurvedic medicine, and it's often used to promote sexual wellness in men. And this is probably the number one best-selling testosterone booster of all time. It's been selling well for at least a decade,

maybe even close to two decades now. And all of the excitement began some time ago when animal research showed that this herb contained a compound that can increase something called luteinizing hormone, which can then prompt the testes to crank up natural testosterone production. And as is common in the supplement space, supplement companies were quick to use the animal research to sell tribulus terrestris as a testosterone booster in humans. But then researchers got around to doing the human studies and found that it didn't work that way in humans. And that's why a systematic review, which is kind of a study of a lot of studies on a topic,

in this case, tribulus terrestris and testosterone. And this one was published in the Journal of Dietary Supplements. And it concluded that tribulus terrestris is ineffective at increasing testosterone. So unless you are a male rat, you don't have any reason to take tribulus terrestris. All right, let's now talk about Tongkat Ali, which seems to be having a bit of a resurgence these days. This is also referred to by some other names, uricoma, longifolia. Sometimes it's called longjack. Sometimes it's called Malaysian ginseng. And it's an herbal medicine native to Southeast Asia. And it's been traditionally used as an aphrodisiac. And many people have believed it improves sex drive because it improves testosterone levels. And research shows that that's partially true.

So if you look at animal research, particularly research on rodent cells, sexually sluggish rats, as they are called, so rats with little sex drive, as well as men with low testosterone levels, seem to benefit from Tonkat Ali. In sexually sluggish rats and in men with low testosterone, it may increase their testosterone levels to a meaningful degree. But there's only one study that has investigated how Tonkat Ali affects testosterone levels in healthy men. And it found that it may marginally increase testosterone levels in healthy men, but not enough to matter, not enough to improve body composition, not enough to improve energy levels, not enough to improve sexual function. And then there are several other studies that suggest that Tonkat Ali is quite effective in healthy men. suggest that Tonkat Ali is quite effective in healthy men. But again, unfortunately, these studies were funded by supplement companies that make Tonkat Ali. So we have a few of these studies that suggest, oh, it works quite well in healthy men. And then a couple of studies that were funded by supplement companies that showed that it does not work well. It does not increase

testosterone levels, which shows, again, that not all supplement company funded research is bogus. A lot of it is, but not all of it is. And so on balance, then it looks like Tonkat Ali might be able to help men who have low testosterone levels, but probably doesn't do much of anything for healthy men, men with healthy, normal testosterone levels. Next up is zinc, which is a mineral that we need in small amounts, a trace mineral as it's called, and we get it from meat, we get it from fish, seafood, cereals. Now, zinc is an important mineral for a number of reasons, and one of those reasons relates to testosterone production, because research shows that if we don't eat enough zinc, it can suppress

our testosterone production. Therefore, many supplement companies have claimed taking zinc boosts testosterone. Of course, it's not that simple. Studies show that, yes, taking zinc can boost testosterone in men who are zinc deficient. That has been shown in research. But what if you have normal testosterone levels? And what if you have normal testosterone levels? And what if you get enough zinc to meet your body's needs? Well, if we look at research on ZMA supplements, zinc magnesium supplements, and how they affect healthy men who are not deficient in zinc and who do not have low testosterone levels, we find that these supplements have no effect on testosterone and that zinc

itself appears to have no effect on testosterone if you get enough zinc and if you have healthy testosterone levels. And so zinc is not a testosterone booster, but if you're not getting enough zinc, it might boost your testosterone levels. Now, there is one interesting footnote regarding zinc supplementation and testosterone that's worth mentioning, and that is research that shows that supplementing with zinc may prevent testosterone levels from slumping after exhausting exercise, after very vigorous exercise. Usually this is with competitive athletes or high-level athletes who do a lot of intense training. There are studies that have shown that when athletes and unfit men follow intense exercise programs, the ones who

take zinc maintain healthy testosterone levels, while those who take a placebo experience a drop in testosterone. So not as exciting as boost your testosterone levels, but something. OK, last up, we have boron, which is a metal like chemical element that is found in fruit and tubers and legumes and alcoholic drinks like wine, cider and beer. And there isn't much research on how boron can affect testosterone levels and testosterone production. And the evidence that we do have is inconsistent. But of course, supplement companies don't let minor details like those get in the way of making money. And so like Tonkat Ali, boron is more popular now for, quote unquote, boosting testosterone

than any point in the last 10 or so years that I've been in the fitness racket. There are more and more supplements popping up, it seems, every month with boron that claim to boost testosterone levels. So let's quickly talk about some of this research and why I don't sell a supplement with boron and claim that it boosts testosterone levels. So in one case, you have a small study that was conducted by scientists at Tehran University of Medical Sciences. In this case, researchers gave eight healthy men 10 milligrams of boron daily for a week, and then blood test results were taken six hours after the first dose and then after seven days. And what they saw is six hours after the first dose, the men's testosterone levels were trending upward. And then after seven days, their testosterone levels were significantly higher, about 28% higher on average than they had been at the beginning of the trial.

Okay, that's interesting. But again, small study, short study. What else do we have? Well, there is another study that was conducted by the same lead researcher. It was conducted before the paper I just quickly reviewed with you. And that one showed that men taking boron daily for four weeks increased their testosterone by about 11% on average. And that's less exciting than 28%, because if you could increase your testosterone by 10, 11% by taking boron every day, unfortunately, that's too little to make a difference in anything. You will not notice any difference and there is nothing beneficial that's even going to be going on

beneath your level of awareness. There are many supplements you can take that are doing good things in your body and you just don't notice it. But increasing your testosterone by 11%, unfortunately, isn't worth swallowing even a few pills a day. Then there's another study that was published in the International Journal of Sport Nutrition. And in this case, scientists gave bodybuilders two and a half milligrams of boron or a placebo every day for seven weeks. And the results showed that both groups increased their testosterone levels, but the ones that were taking the boron did not see a significant increase compared to the ones who were taking the placebo. So not much research,

and the better research that is more applicable probably to you and me, even though we are not bodybuilders, we probably are doing some strength training. We are more similar to bodybuilders, quote unquote, which remember that term is used loosely often in academic circles, academic papers. We are certainly more close to bodybuilders than untrained men. And so given the conflicting results and given the paucity of research, I think it's truly to say whether boron can significantly increase testosterone levels or not. And so that's it for the supplements I wanted to talk about in this episode. Now, if you are willing to possibly throw some money away every month and swallow some pills every day in hopes of increasing your testosterone levels, maybe you want to run a

little N1 experiment. Maybe you want to get some blood work done just to see before and after. If you were to choose any of the supplements that I have mentioned in today's episode, I would recommend going with ashwagandha, tonkat ali, and boron if you just want to see what happens, especially if you want to do some blood work so you really can see what happens. Now, if you're wondering why my sports nutrition company, Legion, doesn't sell a product like that, an ashwagandha, tonkat ali, boron product, maybe with one or two other speculative ingredients thrown in, it's because the level of evidence for these supplements does not meet my standards. It doesn't meet Legion's standards for what I feel is even worth producing. And I insist on promoting my supplements honestly. And so what

would that pitch look like for that supplement? It would sound a lot like what I explained in this episode. There's a little bit of research on a couple of these things. If you have low testosterone, there's a good chance it helps you. If you don't have low testosterone, it's hard to say. There's a good chance it won't help you. And if it does help you, it's probably not going to be very significant, but there is an outside chance that it will help you a lot. And you are really going to notice a difference, probably not with building muscle or losing fat or working out, you know, workout performance, but more so with energy level and sex drive and mood. And so if that's enough for you to give me 40, $50, whatever it would cost, sure, I'll take your money, but no promises. Eh, not a great sales pitch. Not why I started selling supplements in

the first place. I want to be able to make a strong evidence-based argument for every ingredient in every product and for every product on the whole. I want to be able to make such a strong evidence-based argument that a professional scientist in this field would appreciate the product, would agree with how I have represented the ingredients and the research, and would agree that the formulation on the whole is strong enough to warrant its existence, to at least warrant consideration. And so anyway, I would love to make a testosterone booster because it's a huge market. There's a lot of demand there, but I won't do it until I can make one that meets those standards. Well, I hope you liked this episode.

I hope you found it helpful. And if you did, subscribe to the show because it makes sure that you don't miss new episodes. And it also helps me because it increases the rankings of the show a little bit, which of course then makes it a little bit more easily found by other people who may like it just as much as you.

And if you didn't like something about this episode or about the show in general, or if you have ideas or suggestions or just feedback to share, shoot me an email, mike at muscleforlife.com, muscleforlife.com, and let me know what I could do better or just what your thoughts are about maybe what you'd like to see me do in the future. or just what your thoughts are about maybe what you'd like to see me do in the future. I read everything myself. I'm always looking for new ideas and constructive feedback. So thanks again for listening to this episode, and I hope to hear from you soon.