T-nation is known for having some good authors and articles, but when it comes time to sell a product, they will do anything to get you to buy. They are a business first, training website second. This is understandable and acceptable, but their marketing tactics and straight up lies are what bothers me.
Most people who go on training forums will know how big of a joke “I Bodybuilder” is, but for some who aren’t aware, here are some of the claims made about this program.
"Six weeks later, like I said, Christian had gained 27 pounds of solid muscle, and ended the shoulder program doing seated overhead presses with 375 pounds for 5 cluster reps! He ended the sixth week weighing 239 pounds. He's now substantially stronger than he ever was as an Olympic lifter. And the kicker is, he still had 75 percent of the program left to do!
"Sebastien gained 20 pounds of muscle in 8 weeks and added 100 pounds to his front squat, while cutting body fat for the bodybuilding contest.
That's sebastien at 195 pounds in 2006. Yup, he definitely gained 20 pounds (plus whatever he gained 2006-2008) from the new pictures of him...
"Kevin gained 24 pounds of muscle in 8 weeks, while losing 14 pounds of fat and adding 50 pounds to his bench press.
"Specifically, from using these methods, we expect the average lifter to gain about 20 pounds of muscle from his first 15-week program — hopefully more — and keep all of it.
"I'm defining our average guy as an in-shape 175-pound lifter who's accustomed to hard training, who's totally committed to working hard, and who wants to build a lot of muscle mass as fast as humanly possible.
Anyone with any training history or any knowledge of lifting will know those claims are ridiculous, but for teenagers just getting into lifting, they might actually believe them. And those are the target market here. Oh, and to get these results you need to buy the “Anaconda Protocol” for 345 dollars. No I’m not kidding. And even worse, this “Protocol” will last you a whooping 16 workouts. This is more expensive than pretty good steroids stack. I can get a month’s worth of dianabol, which is probably the best mass gaining oral steroid, for 80 dollars, and then test for 150ish. But Anaconda is better than steroids, right? Well if the claims that they make are correct, than yes it is.
Here’s a study on the type of gains one might be able to expect on steroids:
“Although many strength athletes frequently report increments of about 10–15kg of bodyweight due to AAS administration, such alterations have not been documented in well designed prospective studies. Most studies show that bodyweight may increase by 2–5kg as a result of short-term (<10 weeks) AAS use. The most pronounced average gain of bodyweight was reported by Casner and coworkers after 6 weeks of stanozolol administration [7 kg in 6 weeks]. However, in a case report, an increase of 12.7kg over a 2-year AAS administration period was registered” (Hartgens and Kuiper ).
Now beginners who are on steroids might be able to get better results than that, but the claims Biotest’s making aren’t on beginners. They are on advanced level bodybuilders who have been lifting, and possibly juicing, for years.
What’s funny is Christian Thibaudeau is even contradicting a previous article he made, but we’ll get more on that later. Right now we’ll look at his claim that he’s at 239 pounds. Arnold only weighed 230 pounds, and while CT is big, and lean, he is nowhere near arnold’s level. We’ll put CT at a generous 220 pounds in the IBB videos. He claims to have gained 27 pounds of muscle. Not lean body mass, but muscle. As CT has said before, for every 10 pounds of muscle, you can store about 4 more pounds of glycogen. Since this whole “protocol” is all about insulin spiking, we can be sure their glycogen stores are filled. So 27 pounds of muscle will allow you to store about 11 pounds of glycogen. Plus the extra water weight you can now hold, we’re looking at 40 more pounds. So before IBB and Anaconda, CT weighed 180 pounds? Are you kidding me?
All "180 pounds" of Christian Thibaudeau
Now back to that old article, I won’t say everything in it, but to summarize it, CT says you can only gain a Maximum of 2 pounds of muscle in a month. Now while Mark Rippetoe recently proved these claims to be false, he also created a fat bastard. So for anyone trying to look decent, this is seems like a good number.
http://www.tmuscle.com/free_online_article/sports_body_training_performance/the_truth_about_bulkingCT now claims that he was wrong, and that he’s learned more in the past year than the previous 10. Yup Christian, whatever you say. Of course you learned so much when you’re trying to sell a new, expensive supplement.
Now Biotest doesn’t just sell anaconda, they have other supplements to sell. Just look around and you can find how ridiculous their claims are for each and every supplement they try to sell, and they always have a promotion for them in all of their articles. I’ll post some ridiculous ones when I get time.
Joe DeFranco is associated with them at times, and he even had Anaconda 6 months before it was released. On his site, someone asked him about good supplements, and he did not say Anaconda, nor any other Biotest Supplements. Yup, it’s building muscle as fast as humanly possible but one of your main guys isn’t even recommending it.
Biotest knows they will always have support from their loyal forum members, right? Well they didn't. Once they announced IBB, everyone on there knew how ridiculous it was. To convince them, what do you think they did? Got the 2 most respected forum members, Professor X and The Mighty Stu, to come down to Colorado and "train with CT". Of course when they came back, they talked about how amazing IBB was, and Professor X, a 265 not very lean man, now claims he can see his abs. Come on. Biotest is also shipping free supplements to other respected members, in exchange for good testimonials. Have some integrity guys. You know how everyone on the forums looks up to you, and you sell out. Fuck you.
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