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- lOvOl, on 10/18/2007, -8/+67Well, with proper diet and a consistent workout routine, newbies can put on a pound of lean muscle per week without roids. Of course, after a while you will hit a plateau and adding more muscle will get harder, but that is the general rule assuming you are not using roids, HGH, and other hormones.
I have been lifting since I was 13 and have never even been remotely tempted to do roids for a whole lot of reasons, but mostly because doing roids can cause you long-term health problems, even if you cycle them properly. Also, recent research suggests that roids as well as wonderful in building muscles, also are wonderful at killing neurons. Nevertheless, I know quite a bit about lifting and roids so here at the plain and simple facts.
(1) Different people have different natural body types. Women who have big boobs, will almost always have big hips and a big butt. If a woman has big boobs and a skinny waist with skinny hips (i.e. the Barbie Doll look), the odds are that they are probably fake boobs. Estrogen gives women big boobs (which is a sign of fertility), but it also gives them big hips and some cushion for the pushin. Unless you get liposuction and/or fake boobs, you will pretty much never have the so-called perfect body. If a woman you see on the beach (especially if she is over 30) has a perfect body on the beach, there are high odds that she has been to the plastic surgeon. Likewise, men have different body types as well. In general, if you are naturally skinny and can eat a buffalo and still not get fat, you are probably a hard gainer and therefore putting on muscle will be very difficult for you unless you go the anabolic route. You can put on some muscle and you may get the best looking 6 pack on the beach, but don't expect to get bulging biceps, broad shoulders, and a big chest for a very long time if ever without the aid of roids. If you are like me, you put on muscle easy, but you also put on fat easily as well. This means, I can get naturally muscular, but getting a 6 pack and getting "ripped" is just not something that is going to happen to me in my lifetime unless I pretty much spend my entire time at the gym sweating off fat (while burning off muscle at the same time), and take some diuretics as well to eliminate the excess water (many bodybuilders have died pre-competition from dehydration this way). Since I am almost 32, and men pretty much peak in their testosterone output at 29, I can also expect diminishing returns as I get older in terms of strength and muscle and overall lean body mass relative to fat. If I wanted to truly get ripped, I would most certainly have to do roids because when you diet (to get lean) your body pumps out less anabolic hormones because it is pretty stupid for your body to waste energy building muscle when it is starving from an evolutionary standpoint. However, what roids do is they let you get around this problem by causing you to build muscle when your body naturally thinks it would probably be wise to instead conserve calories. This way, you can build muscle while using every spare calorie possible (i.e. stored fat) as a fuel source. Other than a few freaks of nature, just about anyone with huge muscles and very low bodyfat is probably doing roids these days.
(2) Like I mentioned above, putting on a pound of lean body mass per week are considered very good gains. This means in 6 months, if everything goes perfectly you probably could put on 25 pounds of lean body mass. Christian Bale of course was completely starved and in that state you gain lean body tissue very fast until you reach your normal body weight, but even then to go from 100 pounds to 220 pounds is a stretch without pharmacological assistance. After a bodybuilding competition when contestants are dehydrated and have been dieting down for months, it pretty common for a lot of them to go pig out afterwards and quickly put on 20 pounds in a few days. Most of that weight of course being water, and the rest being fat because your body doesn't like to be at 6% bodyfat because it is unhealthy.
(3) At very low bodyfat, your liver is not able to find any fat available for use in creating cholesterol which your body needs as a precursor to building many hormones including testosterone and estrogen. This is why women at very low bodyfat will stop menstruating because their body is simply unable to produce hormones on their own. Of course, you can get cholesterol from dietary sources, but the kind the liver likes primarily for hormone building is the LDL variety. Also, cholesterol is very useful for the body handling fat-soluble vitamins which are of course key to muscle growth. So in a nutshell, having extremely low bodyfat without the aid of steroids, makes it very hard for someone to naturally put on muscle fast. The best way to gain muscle is to lift a lot, sleep a lot, and eat a ton and not worry about gaining fat too much, because you can always diet down later where your goal is essentially to do what you can to minimize the cannibalism of your muscle tissue through gluconeogenesis while maximizing lipolysis as you slim down. While being too fat can slow down muscle growth because visceral organ fat pumps out a lot of estrogen, having extremely low bodyfat will make it hard to gain muscle as well. Of course steroids get you around this problem as well because your body doesn't need to synthesize testosterone if you are injecting it or some other anabolic steroid on a regular basis. - oreonblade, on 10/22/2007, -1/+52I dunno about Christian Bale & Ed Norton. Their bodies look fit, but not like a bodybuilder. I'd believe that they got there through diet/exercise. Weren't the same pictures (of the mentioned actors) used in an article describing the actors with the most dramatic character changes?
- ASSHO, on 10/18/2007, -1/+47Is Carrot Top a man or a woman?
- reddevil3, on 10/18/2007, -1/+46Wait wait wait...a Cracked article with all of them on one page????
- Yang1205, on 10/19/2007, -1/+29You'd think with all the steroids Carrot Top's face would look a little less feminine.
- euro22, on 12/17/2008, -0/+26he's a carrot
- MrM1yagi, on 10/18/2007, -3/+24Bodybuilding is 70% diet, 20% lifting and 10% mental. With the correct diet (calorie, protein, carb and fat intake), you will be surprised the amount of muscle mass a person can accumulate over time. For Dre, it looks like he did the standard cut and added mass. He looks great now, nice traps and delts. Carrot Top has been jacked for a while. He has been body building for a couple of years and his body the result of working out with the proper nutrition. He maintained his already low body fat and just packed solid mass. It's funny how a lot of people do not realize that anyone can look like that if they have the dedication to transform themselves.
- MattnJax, on 10/18/2007, -2/+19I didn't realize Dr. Dre had gotten so huge. Obviously he's not hanging around Snoop anymore cause as we all know, stoners don't workout. Atleast I don't anyway.
And Carrot Top, well he's just a freak. Reminds of that kid from that Cher movie "Mask." - lexf, on 10/18/2007, -14/+30And steroids. You forgot steroids!
Silly Brantano. - completerobot, on 10/23/2007, -4/+19Not really.
- saltywings, on 10/19/2007, -3/+17Madonna and Sylvester Stallone should fight to the death... I'd pay to see it.
- ZenMojo, on 11/09/2007, -2/+16I laughed at the "people in this office work out 4 hours a day" line. My opinion on the article?
Christian Bale: Ice cream, milk shakes, and pizza are an effective muscle-building regimen. The calcium and protein in dairy products cuts fatty weight and pizza is a good source of calories.
Edward Norton: The article was dishonest...there were three YEARS between American History X and Primal Fear, not three MONTHS. Not to mention that Edward Norton filmed Fight Club back-to-back. He had to know ahead of time what he was getting into, so why wouldn't he start working out early to prepare for dual roles? (By the way, have you seen Norton with clothes on in Fight Club? You can't even tell how cut he is.)
Madonna: Menopause = massive amounts of testosterone coursing through her blood stream. Yoga and pilates build a ton of muscle. Don't confuse effective strength-building with the typical vegetarian, low-protein diet of many practitioners.
Carrot Top: Yeah, he's been working out for years and years. Maybe it's steroids, maybe not.
Stallone: That *****'s on roids.
Charlie Sheen: Isn't Hot Shots from 15 years ago? Who even cares? - sfpfc, on 10/18/2007, -1/+14carrot top and danny bonaduce needs to lift their pants up, i don't want to see any slip from those two
- floridiot2, on 10/18/2007, -0/+12Christian Bale looks ***** deathly horrible. He even said he wanted to lose more weight, but the director wouldn't let him.
- lOvOl, on 10/17/2007, -1/+13You are right that I have never bench pressed my own weight, well that is because I have never done bench presses which require a spotter to do safely at heavy weights. I do dumbbell presses and dumbbell flyes at the moment for my chest workout which is more than my current bodyweight for reps of 8-10, and dumbbell presses are a hell of a lot harder to do per pound than the bench press.
And like I said, you don't have to take steroids to know about how they work which only requires a rudimentary understanding of hormone physiology to understand the general principles of what they can and cannot do in terms of helping people get bulky while staying lean at the same time. The same goes with what estrogen does in the shaping of the female form. You can either be skinny and flat, or else you get big boobs and a big butt. That is generally the way it works for women, though occasionally there are rare natural exceptions. If you looked at the numbers in terms of how many women get cosmetic surgery these days, you would probably find it absolutely staggering. - drmobutu, on 10/19/2007, -1/+12Christian Bale. One of these days, some smartass Hollywood screenwriter is going to write an Oscar-winning role, based on the story of a double amputee...
- mc4_a, on 10/17/2007, -5/+15Uh, you can all of the dedication in the world, but once you get past the first 5-10 pounds of newbie gain, you're limited to about .5 pounds of muscle a week if you're lucky. If you eat a lot of extra calories above what it takes to gain that lean mass, you're looking at additional fat.
A dedicated natural bodybuilder will be lucky to put on 10 pounds on lean mass a year. Some of the gains listed are due to 'roids. No question on Norton and Bale. The time spans don't work. You can do all the training in the world, but you can't put on mass that quickly naturally. Bale probably did two or three decent cycles to put on that much. - psbpv3o, on 10/17/2007, -2/+12Dugg for christian bale. Because I too have a man-crush on him.
- gossipninja, on 10/17/2007, -1/+10they arent athletes in the traditional sense in that what they do is not a sport, they are entertainers, but they do have to be in an athletic physical condition. Note I hate wrestling, but im sure they do work out and are fit. However we should note, this is about those NOT on steroids..
- shazzb0t, on 10/17/2007, -0/+9***** mental has to be at least 10%. it takes commitment to go into the gym and tear your body apart each day for even 30 minutes, not to mention 2 hours. I work in a gym and know what it takes. Given these people's resources, getting results like these are not hard. Personal trainers teaching you how to lift and move effectively, nutritionists telling you how to manage your diet effectively, and being able to purchase the right foods are all aspects of training that can be helped along by cash. Genetics are do not doom a person to be the same forever. I'd say MrM1yagi had it right the first time.
The fact is no one knows for sure. - Lane, on 10/19/2007, -3/+10This is truly shocking, why if muscle can be artificially enhanced then what is next?.....womens breasts! could they also be the same way?! Lies all lies!
/sarcasm - fucayama, on 10/23/2007, -1/+8Yeah I'd forgot about Dre
- tavenger5, on 10/17/2007, -0/+6You mean that stripper the other night had nothing but lies??? Big luscious lies!!? NOOO!!!!
- gquaglia, on 10/17/2007, -1/+7Madonna's hands look like they should belong to the Emperor in Star Wars aka Darth Sidious. Creepy!
- JrGhoull, on 10/17/2007, -4/+101 or 2 of em didnt seem so bad that they might not have been steriods (it dont think edward norton did) but the majority of em clearly did
side thought: i dont think that the guy who wrote this really knows anything about working out. sure, a lot of people, do in fact do steroids...but those people tend to stick out from the rest. truth be told, a decent diet and a steady amount of vigorous exercise can really bulk you up within a short amount of time. - carl25, on 10/17/2007, -1/+6yea when i saw dre i was like what the *****
- MrM1yagi, on 10/17/2007, -0/+5Genetics do not play as large of a role as you claim jugger. If someone is dedicated 100% to change their body, they will. The body follows the mind so to speak. I suggest checking this thread at bodybuilding.com. There are very inspirational stories and pictures for men over 35 deciding to change the look of their body and succeeding.
http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=243 ... - solidsnake1298, on 10/17/2007, -0/+5I will have to agree with Brantano. In my first year of high school I was 6'0" and weight 115lbs. The second half of 9th grade I took weight training and increased my weight to 190lbs in 6 months working out 5 days a week for a hour at school and an extra 6 days a week for a hour at home. Now I will agree with Lexf and mc4_a that I not all of my weight gain was lean muscle, but it was definitely a majority (80-90% of the weight gained).
Most people don't realize how much weight in muscle they are gaining. As they workout, they lose weight in fat and gain weight in muscle. When I started I was already lean. - mc4_a, on 10/17/2007, -1/+6It's the speed of the gains that the question here.
Here's an article on bulking that is considered one of the best on the subject of bulking and it pretty much supports that you can only push your body far to put on weight:
http://www.t-nation.com/portal_includes/articles/2 ...
And yes, I lift every day. - ANorton, on 10/22/2007, -2/+7Who is Carrot Top, this list says celebrities?
- benska, on 10/17/2007, -0/+5Who cares if they're taking steroids?? If they aren't a professional athlete, its really their problem.. its their bodies. I'm sure half the people who commented above smoke pot and they'd ***** a brick if someone started to criticize them. I think steroids is one of the worst ways to pollute your body, but its their life, and these celeb's aren't really gaining too much professionally from doing it. You gotta give 50 cent a break, he needs some confidence do to his total lack of talent.
- das7282, on 10/19/2007, -3/+8You said it... Actors! Exactly what they are!
- Vodka2389, on 10/17/2007, -1/+5Links lack images.
- inactive, on 10/19/2007, -2/+6And not very good ones at that!
- thrallie, on 10/17/2007, -2/+5typical response of someone on steroids, accuse a person you've never seen of being a fatass to make yourself feel better about using steroids.
- lOvOl, on 10/17/2007, -1/+4Sad I saw John Cena on Larry King and some other wrestlers talking about roids in the sport and you could tell he was lying through his teeth. It is sad because you can tell when a wrestler stops using roids because they become flabby almost overnight and then people stop liking him.
As long as the so-called "fans" have unrealistic expectations of what elite pro-wrestlers are supposed to look like, then steroids are always going to be part of that business. - MrM1yagi, on 10/17/2007, -0/+3My apologies for the link. It removed the last two numbers in the hyperlink. I suggest everyone should check it out.
http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showthread.php?t=243 ... is the correct thread. - wushu18t, on 10/23/2007, -1/+4derp dee derp doo dum dee derp
- mastercheif, on 10/23/2007, -2/+5Thread has been won. Go Home.
- psbpv3o, on 10/17/2007, -1/+4It's even more amazing that he went from American Psycho to the machinist. It would suck to have a perfect body and then starve yourself to that point. Bale is one dedicated dude.
- knuckles, on 10/22/2007, -1/+3Article is poorly researched. Yes, people take steroids, but you don't get huge ripping abs just from TAKING steroids. You still need to work out, and that's where this article falls flat on its ass. The author implies that NONE of these people have ever worked out or know how to use the equipment which shows a complete lack of understanding about steroids. If just taking steroids and sitting on my ass all day long gave me rock hard abs then I'd be a junkie right now.
- lOvOl, on 10/17/2007, -0/+2http://www.bodpod.com/
Call around your local area for a place that has a few. The prices are pretty reasonable for getting an accurate BMI. This is the best method next to getting your BMI done accurately next to hydrostatic weighting (or so I have read).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_fat_percentage
Note, the BodBod is not mentioned on there. If you don't want to use either of those methods, then skin calipers are probably your next best shot. - starf, on 10/17/2007, -0/+2Check again.
They're illegal for everyone. - tavenger5, on 10/17/2007, -1/+3did I miss something?
- cliffzdude, on 10/17/2007, -0/+2It's hard for teens and those in their low 20's to put on such mass, but one (small) advantage of some years under your belt is putting on muscle mass. Most of those shown were very believable. Many probably have been big, or were big but you couldn't tell. Dre has been big in the past, and a bit fat. Pull off the fat, add to that some muscle memory, and a lot of good workouts and eating right yield a good physique. Carrot top has been getting bigger and bigger for years, he's from my area and is seen out and about now and again. No big deal. Too bad his comedy sucks. Madonna is just a workout freak, overly ripped and ugly doesn't equal 'roids. If you've been bigger in the past, you can get back there lightening fast. I've personally put on way more than .5 lbs of mass a week, while losing fat. Its a matter of time and commitment, two things as a new Dad I have none to spare. Goodbye six pack, hello keg.
- atbnet, on 10/17/2007, -0/+2You seem to know your stuff so I'll ask you. What's a good way to calculate BMI since they don't seem to take in any account of muscle mass.
- bigpeeler, on 10/17/2007, -0/+2 lOvOl
- giveer, on 10/23/2007, -0/+2Because he can knock you out with his mind.
- Gamer2k4, on 10/17/2007, -0/+2It's called research. I've never been to Egypt, but I know what the pyramids look like.
- knuckles, on 10/17/2007, -0/+2He was a very funny prop-comedian. Has a permanent gig in Vegas now, like Celine Dion. Hopefully we can contain them there. Thank you brave peoples of Vegas!
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