DHT and gains

This is what Anabolic Extreme has to say about the anabolism of DHT. The author here claims that inhibiting DHT will diminish most of your gains:

Quote:

Question: I'm losing my hair and have asked the question on several discussion boards as to whether finasteride will inhibit my gains. I want to use finasteride to prevent a chrome dome but don't want to hurt my gains either. What are hearing on the street about this?

Answer: Finasteride is a fantastic drug for saving your hair. I fully recommend it for this purpose!

I must warn you though that I'm hearing that it destroys nearly all of the potency of testosterone. I know a couple of guys taking nearly a gram of this potent steroid and making greatly diminished gains while using finasteride.

I first though that this was due to bogus testosterone but several reports like this came into me which made me think something was up. The first thing I did was check the research on the anabolic/androgenic potencies of testosterone and DHT.

I found something extraordinary!

All of the literature showed DHT to be 2-3 times MORE anabolic than testosterone but with the SAME androgenic potency. Believe it or not, DHT is a better, safer and more effective steroid than testosterone!

How is this possible? What about all the bad stuff on DHT? It seems that most of testosterone's actions are enacted by its conversion into DHT—both good and bad! Why does testosterone cause muscle growth? DHT! Why does testosterone promote hair loss? DHT! Unfortunately, testosterone converts to DHT in "androgenic" tissues (prostate, hair, skin) at higher rates than in other parts of the body. This makes testosterone have a very low anabolic/androgenic ratio. On the other hand, DHT added directly to the body cts uniformly in nearly all tissues and thus has a better ratio. There is not preferential action or conversion in "androgenic" tissues. When injected, testosterone is less potent than DHT because not all of it is converted into DHT. Per injected milligram, you will get much higher concentrations of DHT in your blood with injectible DHT rather than injectible testosterone. And remember, DHT is the active metabolite of testosterone!

Back to your question, finasteride will GREATLY diminish any gains from testosterone. Not all but most (because finasteride prevents only about 70% of the conversion into DHT). I know one person who used a complete inhibitor of DHT production and with 800mg of testosterone per week saw basically nothing. With testosterone, you can either have your hair or have your muscle but you can't have it both ways

I know this is just one "opinion," but what literature do you think he is referring to?

Does anyone have any experience with DHT and test-only cycles?

RB

All I can say is that I have heard this type of argument before, and my personal gains have been fine while using avodart which kills much more DHT than proscar/finasteride.

Since last april I put on 20lbs naturally, kept logs of every single workout, and all lifts went up dramatically. Maybe it does effect some people more than others.

I startred proscar in aug 1998 and avodart dec 2002.

I agree with scottp999 I have also made good gains all while taking avodart. In fact I feel I am stronger (30% boost in test levels with men that use avodart) since starting avodart. Test is what makes “man a man” and I believe DHT plays a much smaller role then test when it comes to muscle development and size.