What is Testosterone?

Testosterone is a steroid hormone from the Androgen group that is found in both men and women.  In men, testosterone is produced in the testicles, and it plays a crucial role in energy levels, mood, sexual desire and libido, as well as muscle and bone mass.

What is “Low-T”?

Low testosterone, or “Low T” is what happens when the body starts to see a decline in testosterone production.  This typically starts to happen around the age of 30, and the decline usually progresses at a rate of 1% per year.

Now let’s look at the next place where testosterone exerts an influence.

Body Composition

The second area where you will see testosterone causing a problem is with your body composition.

While there a multitude of factors that impact your metabolic rate, testosterone is one of them, especially in males, so if your testosterone is low, you can expect to see a less than favorable change to your overall body composition.

Those who are suffering from this problem will find that they have a greater tendency to be packing on body fat without gaining lean muscle mass, or worse yet, they may be losing lean muscle mass, meaning their body fat percentage is increasing at the same time.

This is a very bad situation to be in because you’re basically going directly against where you want to be going.  You want to be building lean muscle mass and burning body fat, but instead, you’re doing the opposite.

You’re burning lean muscle mass and building body fat.

This will only intensify as you follow that higher calorie diet in effort to build lean muscle.  It’s a very bad situation to be in, yet one that men face each and every day.  If you notice your stomach is getting bigger than your chest and arms, you may very well have a problem on your hands.

Bedroom Activities

The next area where you are going to see the impacts of low testosterone levels is with your bedroom activities.  First, and what may be most noticeable to you, is that your desire will be very low. Your libido levels will have seem to have dropped off a cliff and you’ll find you’re hardly in the mood any more –even if your wife for girlfriend appears in some sexy lingerie.

And even if you do manage to get yourself worked up and in the mood a bit, you’ll find that it takes you much longer to get an erection and you may not sustain it nearly as well as you did in the past, therefore your sexual performance is going to take a severe decline.

Lower Testosterone = Lower Sperm Count

On the less noticeable scale, you will also be producing less sperm than you normally would, so if you are trying to get pregnant with your significant other, you may find that this becomes a real struggle.

Far too many people often blame the female for the reproduction problems a couple is facing when in reality, it is the man who is having the issues.

Recovery after an orgasm is also going to be slower when your testosterone levels are low.

While earlier you may have very easily been able to go in for round two without a struggle, now you may only be a once-per-day sort of man.

That is indicative of declining testosterone levels – and also, a zinc deficiency, which we’ll get to shortly.  So if you suspect you have low testosterone levels because of your lack of muscle building in the gym, look closely at bedroom activities to see if there has been a chance there.  If there has, that is often the telltale sign that it isn’t an issue with your diet or workout causing the problems, it is an issue with your testosterone levels.

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Day To Day Lifestyle

Moving along, the next area where you may find you notice some impacts of low testosterone is with your day to day lifestyle.  You may find that you just don’t quite feel like your usual self any longer.

While earlier you may have been more of a go-getter and someone who was aggressive in daily life (maybe not so much physically aggressive, but you went after what you wanted), now that may not be the case.  You may be laid back and more interested in just taking it easy rather than attacking your goals head on.

You may also find that you’re getting more emotional than normal as well. Ass odd as it may be to hear, many men who are suffering from very low testosterone levels will find that they take on more female-like characteristics, since after all, they are lacking the hormone that makes them a man.  Women are notoriously much more emotional than men are and you likely don’t need me to tell you that, so that is another area where you may see change occurring.

You might find that you’re far more likely to get upset easily and just suffer from greater swings in emotions throughout the day.  Your energy levels overall may also start declining. You might find that you’re physically exhausted when you get home from a busy day at work, whereas before you were fine to get home and go out and run errands, hit the gym, or just do whatever you pleased.

Now, the couch is more your style.

Some men who are impacted by low testosterone may also find that they start suffering from feelings of depression as well. Your mood may be impacted and you may find you feel far less like yourself and far more down in the dumps on a regular basis – even if there is no reason for you to be feeling like this.  Your concentration may also be influenced, so if you typically find it easy to concentrate at work but now you’re struggling to just to stay focused for a few short minutes, this too could be a sign of low testosterone.

Another place where testosterone is going to influence you is with your sleep habits.  Those who are suffering from low testosterone will find they aren’t sleeping as deeply, as long, or as regularly as they used to, thus wake up feeling un-refreshed and tired all the time.

This is a double-whammy against the problem because testosterone is released during the sleep hours to a great extent (along with growth hormone), so if you’re not sleeping enough, this may only make the problem that much worse.  So as you can see, there are many areas in your day to day life that may be influenced by low testosterone as well.

Taking note of these changes can help you assess just how significant of a problem this is becoming for you.

Health Conditions

Next we move onto health conditions that may occur when you are suffering from low testosterone levels.  There are many health conditions that are correlated with low testosterone levels and if they aren’t present now, if your levels continue to stay low, they will be present in the future.

For instance, low testosterone levels in a male can increase your risk of heart disease as well as cancer, so those are two big ones that you definitely need to be concerned over.  Low testosterone can also increase your risk of developing diabetes, especially if you are noticing that you are gaining more body fat than usual as well.  Low testosterone will also lead to reduced bone density as well, so this could increase your risk of developing osteoporosis or stress fractures down the road as well.

One area that many men are very concerned with when it comes to low testosterone is the development of gynecomastia, which is the development of breast tissue in men.  While you’d have to experience very low levels of testosterone for a much longer period of time, and usually couple this with a high calorie diet so body fat is gained to see female-breast-like tissue forming, men who are experiencing this problem do notice a slight increase in the size of their nipple area and may notice more breast-like tissue forming.

Men who are suffering from low testosterone may also find that their hair, especially facial hair, isn’t growing as fast and isn’t as course or thick as normal as well, both of which would indicate that testosterone levels are lower than they typically are.

So as you can see, there are plenty of healthy effects beyond just your ability to build lean muscle mass that you need to take into account.  Low testosterone levels are going to impact you in a major way so it’s an absolute must that you are giving this problem the attention that it deserves.

So to wrap up and assess whether you have low testosterone or not, click here to take a brief quiz to see if you may be suffering from low-t.

How Do I Know For SURE I Have Low Testosterone?

The only true way to find out if you have below average testosterone levels for your age would be to go to your doctor and get a blood test taken.

The test involves extracting a blood sample and sending it to a lab to get analyzed.

The report will include both your Total (Serum) testosterone levels, as well as your Direct (Free) testosterone levels.

Some resources tell you that the only number that counts is the Free testosterone levels, but that’s B.S.

The Total testosterone levels are just as important as the free testosterone levels when diagnosing low testosterone.

One alternative to getting a blood test is through the use of Testosterone Home Test Kits.

These at home test kits basically involve either a saliva swab test, or a blood spot collection done by using a finger prick.

You collect the sample, and then mail it in to them.

Within a week or so, you should have your results.

I’m unsure how accurate these at-home tests are, but I plan on trying a few out in the near future and will report my results here.

Read more about Testosterone Home Test Kits here.

Our Top Testosterone Boosting Choice – Testofuel

One particular product that you may want to look into especially is Testofuel, which combines a number of ingredients together to create a more powerful, natural way of elevating testosterone levels.  This product contains oyster extract, which is rich in the zinc content naturally, but then in addition to that, also combines a number of herbs that have been shown to elevate natural testosterone release such as Ginseng and Fenugreek.

Then in addition to that, it also provides you with a good dose of vitamin D, magnesium, vitamin B6, as well as D-aspartic acid, all of which will help you see improved muscle building and testosterone release.  It’s hard to find such a powerful combination in testosterone boosting products, which is why this one tends to come out above the rest.

Click Here To Read My Official Review of Testofuel

We have also tested DOZENS of other testosterone boosting supplements, including notable ones like Spartagen XT, Elite Test 360, and Test X180 Ignite.  Many were complete duds, but there are a decent amount out there that can actually work to help boost your bodies own natural production of testosterone.

There’s also a wide variety of testosterone boosting supplements found in stores like GNC, however, it should be noted that they don’t actually refer to them as “Testosterone boosters”.

Rather, you’ll find them classifed as “Hardcore supplements”.

Click here to see our top 3 choices and how they stack up to Testofuel.

Exercise

Finally, the last thing that you can do to help boost your testosterone levels is form a proper exercise program.  As we mentioned earlier, lack of exercise is one of the biggest reasons why low testosterone may result, but in addition to that, too much of the wrong exercise may also contribute to the problem.

For best results, you want to be performing exercises that strengthen the testosterone release system and since testosterone itself is highly correlated with muscular power and strength, this means turning toward exercise varieties that help to enhance these elements of your fitness program.

There are two main forms of exercise that you should be taking into account to help elevate natural testosterone release. These include strength training as well as sprint/interval cardio training.  Let’s look at each one individually.

Sprint Training

If you are going to be performing any sort of cardio training, sprint training is the variation to be doing.  Sprint training is going to cause a very similar hormonal and metabolic response in the body as intense weight lifting is as they are both short duration, maximum capacity forms of exercise that will rely on the CP-ATP system to be utilized (anaerobic metabolism).

To illustrate the powerful impacts of sprinting, all you really need to do is look at a sprinter’s body versus a marathon runner’s body.  Who is the more muscular of the two?

The answer is very, VERY clear. Sprints are typically extremely muscular, extremely lean, and more than likely, have the precise body type that you are going for.  In contrast, if we take a look at the marathoner’s body, we see someone who often possess very little muscle mass, is quite gaunt looking, and definitely doesn’t look so strong.

They may look fit as they too can be very lean (at more advanced levels), but they don’t have the full, muscular look, but rather than thin, wiry look to them.  This is the power that testosterone can have along with the variation of exercise you’re doing.

So to set up your cardio program to help you best build muscle mass and boost your testosterone levels, sprint training is what you want to do.  This means you’ll begin with a five minute warm-up and then go on to alternate between 15-60 second ‘sprint’ intervals and then active rest periods that are about 2-3 times as long.

Use the following structure for your interval and rest ratio lengths, depending on how long those intervals are.

15 second sprint – 45-60 second active rest
20 second sprint – 60 second active rest
30 second sprint – 60-90 second active rest
45 second sprint – 45-90 second active rest
60 second sprint – 30-60 second active rest

You’ll notice that as the sprint time increases, the active rest period gets shorter in proportion to that sprint time and as in the case of 60 second intervals, can actually be shorter in duration, which his opposite the protocol of the shorter sprint intervals.

This is simply because of the fact that as you approach 60 second intervals, you won’t be pushing yourself to quite the same capacity as you will be when you’re doing 15 second sprint intervals, therefore you won’t need quite as much rest time for recovery purposes.

You should repeat this sprint/active rest protocol for a total of 6-10 times per session before taking 5 minutes to cool down afterwards.  Keep in mind that since these workouts are so intense, you don’t want to be doing them every day either. Two to three times per week is plenty sufficient, especially if you’re also doing resistance training.

One thing to keep in mind is that while the exercise variations we’re talking about right now will do a very good job at boosting your testosterone levels, if you do too much exercise of any variety and start to overtrain, that will sap your testosterone release faster than anything else.

And by nature, the more intense an exercise is, the more likely it is to release testosterone, but by the same regard, the more likely it is to lead to overtraining as well.  So it’s a fine line that you’re walking and you must make sure that you are monitoring your recovery at all times to ensure that overtraining doesn’t begin to set in.

If you start to notice a decline in your performance on any of your workouts at all as you move through the program, this is an immediate sign that you should be backing off slightly as you are doing too much.

So now that you know the interval sprint side of the story, let’s look at strength training.

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Strength Training

Of all the exercise varieties that you could be doing to boost your testosterone level, strength training may just be the most beneficial overall.  Nothing improves testosterone quite like a properly designed strength training workout, so this is where you want to put your effort.

Furthermore, this is also the type of exercise that is best going to build lean muscle mass as well, so clearly it’s the one to focus on.  Now, when designing a strength training program to boost testosterone levels, there are a few requirements that you’ll want to ensure that you do have in place.

Let’s look at what they are.

Full Body Approach

The very first thing that you want to be doing is utilizing a full body approach. The full body approach is very beneficial for boosting both testosterone as well as strength because you will be working every single muscle group in one workout session.

The more muscles you can work in any given workout, the greater the testosterone release will be.  Use these over body part splits that so many men seem to love. They are not the course to higher testosterone levels.

Compound Heavy Lifting

Next, you also want to make sure that you’re using primarily compound exercises as you develop this workout routine. Here again, compound movements allow you to work more muscle fibers at once, which means you’ll get a greater metabolic and hormonal response from the exercise.

Plus, with more muscle fibers behind you working hard, you’ll be able to lift more weight as well, which further increases testosterone release.  The top compound moves to include are:

• Bench press
• Bent over rows
• Shoulder press
• Pull-ups
• Push-ups
• Squats
• Lunges
• Deadlifts
• Step-ups
• Leg press

Do these more often than your isolation exercises such as curls, lateral raises, and so on.

In all actuality, you don’t even really need to be getting those exercises in the program if you want to see results – you can simply do the compound ones and you’ll be just as well off in most cases.

Shorter Rest Periods

One thing that you will want to note is that using slightly shorter rest periods can also increase the overall level of testosterone release that you experience.

This is a double-edged sword however. You don’t want to take the rest periods so short that you can’t lift heavy enough weight to get that testosterone release or that you risk injury due to poor form, but at the same rate, you don’t want to rest so long you lose the hormonal and metabolic response from the exercise.  Aiming for around 90-120 seconds will work best for most people and allow you to be in the sweet spot you need for optimal results.

Proper Rep Range

Reps are going to factor in as well. Ideally you’ll want to lift in the 5-8 rep range for most exercises.  This will allow you to sustain a heavy weight, but still be using enough total time under tension with each set that will produce the testosterone release that you’re looking for.

While going lower can be okay in some cases, avoid going much higher than 8 reps or you will have to lighten the weight too much to produce the desired results.

Downtime For Recovery

Finally, last but not least, make sure that you have enough time for recovery. This cannot be stated enough. If you aren’t recovering between workout sessions, you will sap your testosterone level almost immediately, so you need to be recovered before hitting the gym.

Most men will do fine with one day between sessions, but some may need two. Monitor your body and adjust accordingly.  So there you have the in’s and out’s on how to exercise to boost your testosterone levels.

Now that we’ve covered the most significant things that you can do to elevate your hormonal release, let’s finish up by talking about 7 must-have foods to get into your diet as well that will speed up the process.