This is the classic "bodybuilding style" training that produces significant metabolic stress and muscle damage — both signals that upregulate local IGF-1 production within the muscle itself. Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) is one of the most powerful anabolic hormones in your body. IGF-1 mediates most of GH's anabolic and metabolic effects throughout the body and serves as the standard clinical proxy for overall growth hormone axis activity. Reference range, optimal functional medicine levels, and why IGF-1 is the primary mediator of growth hormone activity, a key longevity biomarker with a complex optimal range where both deficiency and excess accelerate aging and disease risk. By this time, AR is expressed on SNB motor neurons (Jordan, 1997) and may directly regulate soma size (Watson et al., 2001). In female rats, the perineal musculature is greatly reduced, and the SNB contains around a third of the motor neurons in males that primarily innervate the external anal sphincter (Breedlove and Arnold, 1981, McKenna and Nadelhaft, 1986, Ueyama et al., 1987). In male rats, the SNB is a pool of around 200 motor neurons that innervate the bulbocavernosus (BC), levator ani, and the external anal sphincter (Breedlove and Arnold, 1980, 1981, Schroder, 1980, McKenna and Nadelhaft, 1986). The evidence for circulating factors has also been replicated as blood from young mice injected into old mice improves motor performance (Sinha et al., 2014). More specifically, nerve conduction velocity decreases in humans around the 5th decade (Wagman and Lesse, 1952), while motor neuron loss starts around the 6th decade (Tomlinson and Irving, 1977), arguing for a possible neural mechanism of weakness in the elderly although it should be noted that the results from Tomlinson and Irving have not been replicated in animals due to their use of non-stereological techniques (Tomlinson and Irving, 1977). Functional decreases in spinal excitability, assessed via the H-reflex, have been reported with advancing age in humans (Kido et al., 2004). Understanding these factors can indirectly help maintain healthy testosterone levels. While it doesn’t directly trigger testosterone release, IGF-1 contributes to an environment conducive to healthy testosterone production. Understanding its functions is key to understanding its potential indirect impact on testosterone. Insulin-like Growth Factor 1 (IGF-1) is a hormone structurally similar to insulin. Thus, several pieces of evidence suggest IGF-1 regulates function of the motoric system elements by enhancing regeneration or increasing cell excitability by upregulating Ca2+ channels. Cell cultures of newborn mouse motor neurons also suggest that astrocytes can mediate IGF-1 effects on cell survival (Ang et al., 1992). However, RE increases IGF-1 mRNA and IGF-1 peptide production in younger adults which result in increases in muscle DNA and protein content (Adams and Haddad, 1996). These results indicated GH has local effects that may be independent of increased levels of the circulating IGF-I (Ohlsson et al., 2009). As previously discussed, GH acts through its receptor; however, many effects linked to RE and muscle growth are believed to act indirectly through an increase in hepatic release of IGF-1. However, the main muscle anabolic effects of GH are believed to be indirect—via inducing the hepatic generation of IGF-1 triggering the IGF-1-Akt-mTOR pathway; in turn resulting in MPS augmentation and as a consequence muscle maintenance and growth (Sandri et al., 2013; Schiaffino et al., 2013). Accordingly, whole-body RE induces GH increases from basal levels of 5 ug.L−1 (Fink et al., 2018b) to 24 ug.L−1 (Kraemer et al., 1990) while localized RE of individual muscle groups (biceps and triceps) leads to increases of only half of this; up to 12 ug.L−1 (Fink et al., 2018a). In contrast, RET in the late part of the follicular phase, when circulating estrogen is enhanced, appears to result in increased fiber type II CSA, nuclei to fiber ratio and muscle mass, compared to RET during luteal phase (Sung et al., 2014; Wikström-Frisén et al., 2017). However, the Women's Health Initiative study found that estrogen therapy in postmenopausal women increased the risk of dementia and mild cognitive impairment. Fortunately, lifestyle changes like aerobic exercise (five days a week) can improve insulin sensitivity to levels similar to those of younger adults. "The commonly observed age-related reduction in insulin sensitivity is likely due to reductions in physical activity rather than aging per se." – Mark W. Pataky, PhD Hormonal changes, including lower testosterone, reduced growth hormone (GH), higher cortisol, and declining dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA), play a key role in metabolic issues. An important observation in the SNB is that normal aging in rodents leads to a decline in testosterone and AR expression on the motor neurons (Matsumoto and Prins, 1998), likely underlying in the shift towards decreased motor neuron soma size within the nucleus from 9 to 22 months of age (Fargo et al., 2007) and the decrease in sexual behavior with age (Larsson, 1958). Separate studies have also indicated age-related functional declines in the human motor system at the levels of the cortex, spinal cord, and motor neurons (Wagman and Lesse, 1952, Kido et al., 2004, McGinley et al., 2010, Kaya et al., 2013, Yao et al., 2014). Although not heavily examined in humans, we review the few studies in the human literature that have examined the role of anabolic hormones on the motoric system. While these studies do not directly indicate that changes in anabolic hormones contribute to reduced human performance in the elderly (e.g., muscle weakness and physical limitations), they do suggest that additional research is warranted along these lines. Short-term fasting (16-24 hours) increases growth hormone secretion dramatically — GH can spike 2-5x during a fast. Eccentric-emphasized training (slow negatives) causes more muscle damage and correspondingly higher local IGF-1 expression during the repair process. Standard ranges are age-adjusted, reflecting the normal decline in GH-IGF-1 axis activity with aging (somatopause). If your diet is inconsistent, your training is unfocused, or you are sleeping five hours a night, no stack will fix that. The MK-677 and enclomiphene stack is best suited for men over 25 who have already dialed in their training, nutrition, and sleep fundamentals. And because neither compound introduces exogenous hormones, the recovery period after cycling off is minimal compared to traditional enhancement protocols. By optimizing both systems simultaneously — without shutting down either one — users report real improvements in body composition, strength, sleep, and overall well-being. Intriguingly, this reduction in testosterone tracks with the gradual decline in muscle mass observed with age, i.e., ~1–3% decline in circulating testosterone and 1–2% loss of muscle mass in men (Vingren et al., 2010; Gharahdaghi et al., 2019), perhaps suggesting declines in endogenous testosterone may be linked to loss of muscle mass. Testosterone is ~98% bound to serum proteins (sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG) and albumin) and only 1–2% of testosterone is unbound or free. Therefore, the links between the testosterone response and exercise adaptation in women remain contentious and require further investigation. The differences in outcomes between these studies may be driven by the experimental design (different biopsy location; i.e., biceps brachii vs. vastus lateralis and different testosterone inducing exercise regimes, which resulted in different peak testosterone; i.e., 27 (West et al., 2010) vs. 38 nmol.L−1 (Spiering et al., 2009) and also the time course of muscle sampling (between 3 and 4 h post-RE). The latter is suggested to occur through increased expression of Pax7 and MyoD transcription factors (Thomas et al., 2010; Sambasivan et al., 2011) which induce satellite cell expansion, differentiation, and self-renewal of muscle function and mass (Kitajima and Ono, 2016; Chidi-Ogbolu and Baar, 2019). In addition, estrogen is also known to activate insulin/IGF-1 (Lee et al., 2004) and PI3K/Akt (Mangan et al., 2014) pathways, potentially enhancing the mechanisms regulating MPS (Hansen et al., 2012) and consequently muscle growth (Smith et al., 2014). While less studied in this sphere, endogenous oestrogens seem to have a metabolic role in regulating skeletal muscle; for instance, being critical for the regrowth of atrophied skeletal muscle (Sitnick et al., 2006)- an action mediated by the estrogen receptors, located within skeletal muscle tissue that function as transcription factors (Hansen and Kjaer, 2014). Oestrogens are steroid hormones, primarily produced in the ovaries from testosterone via an aromatase enzyme, of which women have four times the amount compared with men, until the menopause (Hansen and Kjaer, 2014). However, transient activation of ERK1/2 induced by testosterone was not found to be directly related to the hypertrophic signaling cascade; though activated ERK can phosphorylate co-activators of the intracellular receptor at the nuclear level (Bratton et al., 2012), through potentiation of estrogen receptor activation function 1 (AF-1) by Src/JNK (serine 118-Independent pathway) which promotes cellular growth (Feng et al., 2001; Estrada et al., 2003).