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I saw this video was already posted before, but for those of us who are a bit averse to watching videos, I took the transcript and reformatted it the way I did for a Todd Lee video some time ago. Most of the transcript should be the same as what he said in the video (I can copy and paste that as well, if anyone really cares), only with filler words removed, and titles and page breaks.
I hope this isn't stepping on anyone's toes, I really only did this for myself but figured the community could benefit from it.
I want to emphasize that I am posting a TRANSCRIPT of the video. I am not responsible for any of the contents of this video whatsoever. Obviously, I am not Big Paul.
View: https://youtu.be/JUxzdZouR0I?si=H9Ypd7r2v1pbciJC
Retatrutide. I blame Chase for this one. Chase has gotten himself lean using Retatrutide and some other stuff. He's on a cocktail of stuff now. I talked to him today. I've been doing research and looking into Retatrutide. I spent an entire day reading about it. I already knew a bit about it. I'm familiar with GLP-1s and how they work, but this is a combo multi-receptor agonist that is a new class of drug. It's a combination of GLP-1, GIP, and glucagon receptor agonist. We're going to dig into it. We're going to talk about it. Like I said at the beginning, it is in stage three clinical trials right now. It has not been FDA approved yet. It does seem like it's on the fast track to getting there. I would assume so. Probably in the next year or so, but it does seem very interesting.
It is being developed by Eli Lilly and Company. Phase three clinical trials are where they're confirming the efficacy, effectiveness, monitoring side effects, comparing it with similar interventions, and collecting information about the safety. We have the phase two trial information. We're going to look at some of that today. I'll put links to the article. There's an article on Peptide Sciences that I'm going to be referencing for some of the stuff. Some of the information I gathered through ChatGPT. I read through the Phase 2 clinical trial studies. I looked at that and I'll have links to all that stuff up here today.
Indications, what it's designed to be used for, is obesity. It's being studied primarily for weight management in people with obesity with promising results in early trials with significant weight reductions so far. It's also a type 2 diabetes treatment. Shows potential for glucose control likely with synergistic effects from its multi-agonist action. I think they're just looking for it for weight loss. There are a lot of people with type 2 diabetes, but weight loss is where they're going to make the bulk of their money, but it does seem like it could be beneficial for people with type 2 diabetes. Very beneficial in fact.
The effects of Retatrutide. It stimulates insulin release. GLP-1 and GIP trigger the pancreas to release insulin. It is a glucagon receptor agonist. Increases glucagon activity in the body. Stimulates liver glycogen to release, raising blood sugar. High blood glucose is counteracted with the multiple receptor approach. Also activating GLP-1 and GIP receptors. That's the thing that I was wondering. I knew that it was a glucagon agonist and glucagon triggers the liver to dump liver glycogen and raising blood sugar. It's a defense mechanism. The body has to keep you from going hypo in the middle of the night.
I was wondering how they kept blood sugar from getting too high. It seems like the multiple receptor approach by using the GLP-1 and the GIP with it all seems to counteract some of that. So it's kind of very cool. It also increases lipolysis, fat burning, and energy expenditure, which is also interesting. GLP-1, which we know it slows gastric emptying, slows the movement of food through the stomach into the intestines and leading to a feeling of fullness that helps control appetite.
The slowing of gastric emptying in some GLP-1s. I know in Semaglutide, there is a small risk of gastroparesis. I did not see anything in the studies that showed that that still exists with this particular drug, but I would assume that it does. Maybe it doesn't. That's a concern as a bodybuilder that has to get bigger. Gastric emptying, low gastric emptying is going to be tough when you head into an offseason and you need to eat and shovel down food. Although in speaking with Chase, he's the only person I know that's actually used it, and he says that that seems to go away. And I think it's dose-dependent too, like he's not running the crazy high doses or the higher end doses that they were using in some of the fat loss patients for the study.
The GLP-1 promotes satiety by acting on the brain. It reduces food cravings by decreasing activity in the left insula of the brain. Inhibits overeating by increasing activity in the right orbital frontal cortex, OFC, of the brain. Modifies reward signaling. GLP-1 neurons project to the VTA and the NAC, which are involved in food reward in the brain. So it seems to change up that. It also has an effect on ghrelin and leptin from what I understand. It also increases insulin production and sensitivity. The GIP works to increase insulin production and insulin sensitivity. From what I understand, the general old GLP-1s do not affect insulin sensitivity. They only increase insulin production.
Now, this is pretty cool too. Improved lipid metabolism. It seems that when I saw studies, it seems like there was an improvement in cholesterol and triglycerides in studies with using this drug. Reduces liver fat. 81% return to normal in 48 weeks. 81% of the people that had fatty liver infiltration returned to normal, and there was an 82% reduction of liver fat in those patients, which is crazy. Reduces A1C and improved insulin sensitivity. From when I looked at the A1C numbers, it wasn't drastic, but there was an improvement in A1C numbers. And it could be to these participants probably weren't diabetic. It probably would be a stronger effect on people that were diabetic. Weight loss. I'll get into some details on the weight loss, but 24% in the 48-week at the 12 milligram dose during the trial.
The pharmacokinetics of Retatrutide are considered to be dose-proportional. Its half-life is approximately 6 days. So you can see the once-a-week dosing is probably adequate. Some side effects, cautions, and considerations when taking Retatrutide that were noted in the study. Gastrointestinal side effects were the most commonly reported side effect. I don't remember the exact percentage, but we can look at it here in a second. Include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and constipation. That sounds like fun. I think nausea was the most common side effect here. There were some reports of vomiting and diarrhea that I know that an issue with GLP-1s. It also seems to be dose-related. And when talking to Chase, he said that his nausea and appetite kind of settled in after about four weeks of being on it.
Decreased appetite, which is something we I guess would be a desirable effect of the drug. Fatigue. Cancer. They noted that a personal or family history of medullary thyroid cancer or multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2, MEN 2, should be cautious when using it. Now, in the studies, there was no malignancy noted in humans, but in the rat studies, there were. So this could be something that's specific to the rats. A problem only in the rats, not to humans, but from what I read, long-term study and observation are warranted right now with where the drug is at. They recommend that if you have a family history of cancer or if you've had a personal history of cancer, then you might want to stay away from it.
Cautions. Care should be taken with the history of pancreatitis, gallbladder disease, or renal impairment. We'll get into that in a second, but there were some issues with some select patients with all three. Increased ALT. It was a pretty small amount of people that had ALT elevations, but there were some pretty significant ALT elevations in some of the patients in heart palpitations. Severe effects, side effects, adverse effects that were noted in the study. 15 serious adverse effect events occurred amongst the 13 participants. There was a transient increase in ALT levels of more than three times normal levels. Those of us that are old oral steroid users, that's nothing. Not trying to rationalize it here, but cost to doing business sometimes.
The ALT levels were unchanged or had decreased a bit at week 48 in these patients. Increased lipase levels were asymptomatic with the exception of one serious adverse event of acute pancreatitis. Those are digestive enzymes. Your pancreas makes digestive enzymes. Heart rate increased in a dose-dependent manner with Retatrutide up to 24 weeks and then declined thereafter. There was some elevation of heart rate in some patients. It seems to go away when you come back off. There were cardiac arrhythmias that were mild in severity with one exception of a severe event of prolonged QT syndrome. A QT wave and participant treated with onanon or Adenron. I don't know what that is. Odenson. I don't know what that is. I slaughtered that one. No cases of clinically significant hypoglycemia, which is also important to note. No medullary thyroid cancer or C cell hyperplasia were reported. Cutaneous hyperesthesia and skin sensitivity adverse events were reported in 7% of the participants.
Here are some of the most notable benefits from the trial besides the weight loss. I mean, that's pretty well established. The phase 1B and phase 2D reported Retatrutide reduced triglycerides, non-HDL cholesterol, and other cardiometabolic parameters compared to the baseline. The improvements were greater compared to both duoglutide and the placebo. 24.2% weight loss reported in the 48-week trial group, which is crazy. That was a 12 milligram dose, which was also the highest dose. The majority of the participants lost at least 10% of their initial weight, with almost 2/3 losing 20% or more, which is insane. Nearly half losing 25% or more, and about a quarter losing 30% or more. Because these were just regular people, and these lazy [__] probably didn't work out or do a diet. Most of them probably weren't following any sort of structured plan or workout routine. I would guess that would be my guess. But I don't know how they control for that.
At least the least squares mean percentage change in the Retatrutide groups was 8.7% in the 1 milligram group. So they lost almost 9% of their body weight. 17.1% fat loss in the 4 milligram groups. 22.8% in the combined 8 milligram group. 24.2% in the 12 milligram group, as compared with 2.1% in the placebo group. It's hilarious. The placebo group lost weight too. Just goes to show you the power of placebo.
My personal experience, I have not tried it yet. I would say check out Chase's videos where he talks about his experiences with it. So wrapping this up. Let's go through and think about this critically. Here are my concerns. Here's what I worry about for bodybuilding. Yes, it does seem like it does incredible stuff for a regular person, non-bodybuilder who's not going to the gym. Somebody who's a beast, this could work miracles in theory. It looks like, granted that the long-term safety of it pans out. There are some pretty significant side effects that we need to be aware of, especially as you get deeper into contest prep.
Another concern I would have for bodybuilders using this stuff. I know some GLP-1s have some risk of permanent gastroparesis. Which if you're an obese person that struggles with eating, then you eat too much. Having slower digestion is probably not a bad thing because you're going to have decreased appetite, but if you're a bodybuilder trying to get huge, it's going to be a problem if you get into your offseason and your gastric emptying sucks, and you can't pound down the food that you need to to get big.
Now, with that said, talking to Chase, he hasn't had any issues. He said his appetite's been just fine. That it's actually come back. I think he's running a lower dose, but that would be a concern for me. I struggle with appetite myself. I don't like to eat. I have a hard time putting food down. And if you're a person who has troubles with stuff like that, then that is also another concern.
Another thing I would assume that you're not going to be using insulin with this. There is a risk of hypoglycemia. That was noted in the study that when using insulin, it's probably not a great idea for a bodybuilder to be using insulin with something like this. Now, where I could see it being used, and something that might be an idea is if you get deep into an offseason. Insulin resistance is on the rise. You've accumulated a little too much body fat. You have some beta cell downregulation. Basically rising blood sugars, all the issues that come along with going into the offseason too long. Fatty strip on your liver. A lot of bodybuilders when they come out of offseason when they go get liver ultrasounds done, have some fat accumulation on their liver. If you needed to do a cleanup phase to extend your offseason, possibly is that a good scenario where you could potentially benefit from using it? Maybe extend your offseason, running it for 6, 8 weeks, something like that. I'm just tossing out ideas. I'm not making a suggestion here, but I'm just thinking of it for me personally. I would probably proceed with caution. I have a history of cancer. Might not be the smartest thing to do for me with my history of cancer, even though it hasn't shown to be cancerous in people yet. There hasn't been any evidence of it being cancerous only been in rats with the GLP-1s. I don't know that there's any documented cases of cancer in humans. I would be a little bit concerned about that. But I could see a case where you could potentially use it for cleaning up or maybe in the post-contest phase where people sometimes just go bananas and eat everything that's not nailed down. Maybe that's a use case or maybe at the beginning of prep.
I have also seen some instances in studies where they showed that the GLP-1s cause some muscle loss. Although it doesn't seem to be that bad, it's probably proportional to the weight loss. And most of these that they're doing the study on don't work out. They're not doing anything to help themselves. They're not following any sort of structured diet. They're not using antibiotics. So maybe that's not a concern. I do know that I have had clients that have been prescribed GLP-1s by their doctors that have reported weakness, lethargy, some other issues. They have basically workouts when they're on the stuff. Now, I don't know that Retatrutide has the same result, but it's just something to be concerned about and something to think about.
I hope this isn't stepping on anyone's toes, I really only did this for myself but figured the community could benefit from it.
I want to emphasize that I am posting a TRANSCRIPT of the video. I am not responsible for any of the contents of this video whatsoever. Obviously, I am not Big Paul.
Introduction
All right, folks, Big Paul here today. We are going to dig into Retatrutide. I'm going to give you my drug profile for Retatrutide. We're going to talk about the nuts and bolts of Retatrutide. It is currently in phase three of clinical trials. Is it the miracle drug that everybody is talking about? My friend Chase Irons has been getting everybody worked up about it. Chase has used it with quite a bit of success. I figured it's time to talk about it. We're going to look at it. Is it the Panacea that everybody makes it out to be? Are there some downsides we need to look out for? Should we proceed with caution right now?Retatrutide. I blame Chase for this one. Chase has gotten himself lean using Retatrutide and some other stuff. He's on a cocktail of stuff now. I talked to him today. I've been doing research and looking into Retatrutide. I spent an entire day reading about it. I already knew a bit about it. I'm familiar with GLP-1s and how they work, but this is a combo multi-receptor agonist that is a new class of drug. It's a combination of GLP-1, GIP, and glucagon receptor agonist. We're going to dig into it. We're going to talk about it. Like I said at the beginning, it is in stage three clinical trials right now. It has not been FDA approved yet. It does seem like it's on the fast track to getting there. I would assume so. Probably in the next year or so, but it does seem very interesting.
It is being developed by Eli Lilly and Company. Phase three clinical trials are where they're confirming the efficacy, effectiveness, monitoring side effects, comparing it with similar interventions, and collecting information about the safety. We have the phase two trial information. We're going to look at some of that today. I'll put links to the article. There's an article on Peptide Sciences that I'm going to be referencing for some of the stuff. Some of the information I gathered through ChatGPT. I read through the Phase 2 clinical trial studies. I looked at that and I'll have links to all that stuff up here today.
Properties and Effects
The properties of Retatrutide. We mentioned it's a multi-receptor agonist, GLP-1, GIP, and glucagon receptor agonist. It targets the receptors of the GLP-1, glucagon-like peptide 1. We're familiar with GLP-1s because we have Semaglutide that a lot of people have been using for fat loss. Ozempic is the common name for that. GIP, gastric inhibitory polypeptide, and a glucagon receptor agonist is the combination of the drug.Indications, what it's designed to be used for, is obesity. It's being studied primarily for weight management in people with obesity with promising results in early trials with significant weight reductions so far. It's also a type 2 diabetes treatment. Shows potential for glucose control likely with synergistic effects from its multi-agonist action. I think they're just looking for it for weight loss. There are a lot of people with type 2 diabetes, but weight loss is where they're going to make the bulk of their money, but it does seem like it could be beneficial for people with type 2 diabetes. Very beneficial in fact.
The effects of Retatrutide. It stimulates insulin release. GLP-1 and GIP trigger the pancreas to release insulin. It is a glucagon receptor agonist. Increases glucagon activity in the body. Stimulates liver glycogen to release, raising blood sugar. High blood glucose is counteracted with the multiple receptor approach. Also activating GLP-1 and GIP receptors. That's the thing that I was wondering. I knew that it was a glucagon agonist and glucagon triggers the liver to dump liver glycogen and raising blood sugar. It's a defense mechanism. The body has to keep you from going hypo in the middle of the night.
I was wondering how they kept blood sugar from getting too high. It seems like the multiple receptor approach by using the GLP-1 and the GIP with it all seems to counteract some of that. So it's kind of very cool. It also increases lipolysis, fat burning, and energy expenditure, which is also interesting. GLP-1, which we know it slows gastric emptying, slows the movement of food through the stomach into the intestines and leading to a feeling of fullness that helps control appetite.
The slowing of gastric emptying in some GLP-1s. I know in Semaglutide, there is a small risk of gastroparesis. I did not see anything in the studies that showed that that still exists with this particular drug, but I would assume that it does. Maybe it doesn't. That's a concern as a bodybuilder that has to get bigger. Gastric emptying, low gastric emptying is going to be tough when you head into an offseason and you need to eat and shovel down food. Although in speaking with Chase, he's the only person I know that's actually used it, and he says that that seems to go away. And I think it's dose-dependent too, like he's not running the crazy high doses or the higher end doses that they were using in some of the fat loss patients for the study.
The GLP-1 promotes satiety by acting on the brain. It reduces food cravings by decreasing activity in the left insula of the brain. Inhibits overeating by increasing activity in the right orbital frontal cortex, OFC, of the brain. Modifies reward signaling. GLP-1 neurons project to the VTA and the NAC, which are involved in food reward in the brain. So it seems to change up that. It also has an effect on ghrelin and leptin from what I understand. It also increases insulin production and sensitivity. The GIP works to increase insulin production and insulin sensitivity. From what I understand, the general old GLP-1s do not affect insulin sensitivity. They only increase insulin production.
Now, this is pretty cool too. Improved lipid metabolism. It seems that when I saw studies, it seems like there was an improvement in cholesterol and triglycerides in studies with using this drug. Reduces liver fat. 81% return to normal in 48 weeks. 81% of the people that had fatty liver infiltration returned to normal, and there was an 82% reduction of liver fat in those patients, which is crazy. Reduces A1C and improved insulin sensitivity. From when I looked at the A1C numbers, it wasn't drastic, but there was an improvement in A1C numbers. And it could be to these participants probably weren't diabetic. It probably would be a stronger effect on people that were diabetic. Weight loss. I'll get into some details on the weight loss, but 24% in the 48-week at the 12 milligram dose during the trial.
Pharmacodynamics and Pharmacokinetics
Absorption administered subcutaneously with a steady-state concentration reached after several doses. If I recall correctly, in the trial, I believe they were doing a single weekly dose. I think Chase said he was doing twice a week. Don't quote me on that. Chase has videos up on it. I'll post links to his videos as well. Distribution. The drug is widely distributed across all tissues, targeting multiple receptors. Metabolism is primarily in the liver. We'll talk about it in a second, but there were some cases of increased liver enzymes in a few of the patients in the trial. Excretion primarily renal. Half-life.The pharmacokinetics of Retatrutide are considered to be dose-proportional. Its half-life is approximately 6 days. So you can see the once-a-week dosing is probably adequate. Some side effects, cautions, and considerations when taking Retatrutide that were noted in the study. Gastrointestinal side effects were the most commonly reported side effect. I don't remember the exact percentage, but we can look at it here in a second. Include nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and constipation. That sounds like fun. I think nausea was the most common side effect here. There were some reports of vomiting and diarrhea that I know that an issue with GLP-1s. It also seems to be dose-related. And when talking to Chase, he said that his nausea and appetite kind of settled in after about four weeks of being on it.
Decreased appetite, which is something we I guess would be a desirable effect of the drug. Fatigue. Cancer. They noted that a personal or family history of medullary thyroid cancer or multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2, MEN 2, should be cautious when using it. Now, in the studies, there was no malignancy noted in humans, but in the rat studies, there were. So this could be something that's specific to the rats. A problem only in the rats, not to humans, but from what I read, long-term study and observation are warranted right now with where the drug is at. They recommend that if you have a family history of cancer or if you've had a personal history of cancer, then you might want to stay away from it.
Cautions. Care should be taken with the history of pancreatitis, gallbladder disease, or renal impairment. We'll get into that in a second, but there were some issues with some select patients with all three. Increased ALT. It was a pretty small amount of people that had ALT elevations, but there were some pretty significant ALT elevations in some of the patients in heart palpitations. Severe effects, side effects, adverse effects that were noted in the study. 15 serious adverse effect events occurred amongst the 13 participants. There was a transient increase in ALT levels of more than three times normal levels. Those of us that are old oral steroid users, that's nothing. Not trying to rationalize it here, but cost to doing business sometimes.
The ALT levels were unchanged or had decreased a bit at week 48 in these patients. Increased lipase levels were asymptomatic with the exception of one serious adverse event of acute pancreatitis. Those are digestive enzymes. Your pancreas makes digestive enzymes. Heart rate increased in a dose-dependent manner with Retatrutide up to 24 weeks and then declined thereafter. There was some elevation of heart rate in some patients. It seems to go away when you come back off. There were cardiac arrhythmias that were mild in severity with one exception of a severe event of prolonged QT syndrome. A QT wave and participant treated with onanon or Adenron. I don't know what that is. Odenson. I don't know what that is. I slaughtered that one. No cases of clinically significant hypoglycemia, which is also important to note. No medullary thyroid cancer or C cell hyperplasia were reported. Cutaneous hyperesthesia and skin sensitivity adverse events were reported in 7% of the participants.
Trial Results and Side Effects
This is an excerpt from peptides.org. If you guys want to go there, there's a link to it in the video description below (link here). The largest in the two most notable trials included 338 non-diabetic subjects. 6% to 16% which dropped out of the study due to side effects depending on the Retatrutide dose. In comparison, there were no dropouts due to adverse effects in the placebo group. The most common reasons for discontinuing treatment were gastrointestinal adverse events. Here's the list of the most common adverse events experienced by the 62 people who reached the highest 12 milligram weekly dose of the peptide. Nausea in 45% of the dropouts. Vomiting in 19%. Constipation in 16% of the dropouts. Diarrhea 15%. Cardiac arrhythmia and 11%. Fatigue 10%. Early satiety. So being full too full. 10%. Increased lipase levels 8%. Injection site reaction 8%. Hepatic disorder 3%. Pancreatitis 2%. Here's what the researchers should know about the risk of more serious side effects. 15 serious events occurred in 13% of subjects with similar frequency in both Retatrutide and placebo groups at 4%. Transient increases in ALT levels to more than three times the upper limit were observed in 1%, which we already talked about.Here are some of the most notable benefits from the trial besides the weight loss. I mean, that's pretty well established. The phase 1B and phase 2D reported Retatrutide reduced triglycerides, non-HDL cholesterol, and other cardiometabolic parameters compared to the baseline. The improvements were greater compared to both duoglutide and the placebo. 24.2% weight loss reported in the 48-week trial group, which is crazy. That was a 12 milligram dose, which was also the highest dose. The majority of the participants lost at least 10% of their initial weight, with almost 2/3 losing 20% or more, which is insane. Nearly half losing 25% or more, and about a quarter losing 30% or more. Because these were just regular people, and these lazy [__] probably didn't work out or do a diet. Most of them probably weren't following any sort of structured plan or workout routine. I would guess that would be my guess. But I don't know how they control for that.
Dosing Results
1 milligram with an initial dose of 2 milligrams. There was a 4 milligram with an initial dose of 4 milligrams. An 8 milligram group with an initial dose of 2 milligrams. An 8 milligram group with an additional initial dose of 4 milligrams. 12 milligram group with an initial dose of 2 milligrams. I've seen this stuff listed on the black market in these peptide places, and it's incredibly expensive. I can imagine how much it would cost to do a 12 milligram dose a week, especially when the prescription comes out. But right now, it's probably a $600 or $700 a month expense to run that much at 48 weeks.At least the least squares mean percentage change in the Retatrutide groups was 8.7% in the 1 milligram group. So they lost almost 9% of their body weight. 17.1% fat loss in the 4 milligram groups. 22.8% in the combined 8 milligram group. 24.2% in the 12 milligram group, as compared with 2.1% in the placebo group. It's hilarious. The placebo group lost weight too. Just goes to show you the power of placebo.
My personal experience, I have not tried it yet. I would say check out Chase's videos where he talks about his experiences with it. So wrapping this up. Let's go through and think about this critically. Here are my concerns. Here's what I worry about for bodybuilding. Yes, it does seem like it does incredible stuff for a regular person, non-bodybuilder who's not going to the gym. Somebody who's a beast, this could work miracles in theory. It looks like, granted that the long-term safety of it pans out. There are some pretty significant side effects that we need to be aware of, especially as you get deeper into contest prep.
Concerns for Bodybuilders
There is a risk of acute kidney damage with it in dehydration. That was noted in the study. When are we severely dehydrated? At the end of contest prep when we cut water using diuretics and doing other things at that time that are kind of silly, and you're putting your kidneys under stress, and you put something in play like this that could further damage kidneys. I speculate that a lot of the kidney damage that bodybuilders suffer comes at the end of contest prep, and I would be concerned about that with this drug at the end of contest prep. If it were to be used during contest prep, I would probably pull it the last couple of weeks.Another concern I would have for bodybuilders using this stuff. I know some GLP-1s have some risk of permanent gastroparesis. Which if you're an obese person that struggles with eating, then you eat too much. Having slower digestion is probably not a bad thing because you're going to have decreased appetite, but if you're a bodybuilder trying to get huge, it's going to be a problem if you get into your offseason and your gastric emptying sucks, and you can't pound down the food that you need to to get big.
Now, with that said, talking to Chase, he hasn't had any issues. He said his appetite's been just fine. That it's actually come back. I think he's running a lower dose, but that would be a concern for me. I struggle with appetite myself. I don't like to eat. I have a hard time putting food down. And if you're a person who has troubles with stuff like that, then that is also another concern.
Another thing I would assume that you're not going to be using insulin with this. There is a risk of hypoglycemia. That was noted in the study that when using insulin, it's probably not a great idea for a bodybuilder to be using insulin with something like this. Now, where I could see it being used, and something that might be an idea is if you get deep into an offseason. Insulin resistance is on the rise. You've accumulated a little too much body fat. You have some beta cell downregulation. Basically rising blood sugars, all the issues that come along with going into the offseason too long. Fatty strip on your liver. A lot of bodybuilders when they come out of offseason when they go get liver ultrasounds done, have some fat accumulation on their liver. If you needed to do a cleanup phase to extend your offseason, possibly is that a good scenario where you could potentially benefit from using it? Maybe extend your offseason, running it for 6, 8 weeks, something like that. I'm just tossing out ideas. I'm not making a suggestion here, but I'm just thinking of it for me personally. I would probably proceed with caution. I have a history of cancer. Might not be the smartest thing to do for me with my history of cancer, even though it hasn't shown to be cancerous in people yet. There hasn't been any evidence of it being cancerous only been in rats with the GLP-1s. I don't know that there's any documented cases of cancer in humans. I would be a little bit concerned about that. But I could see a case where you could potentially use it for cleaning up or maybe in the post-contest phase where people sometimes just go bananas and eat everything that's not nailed down. Maybe that's a use case or maybe at the beginning of prep.
I have also seen some instances in studies where they showed that the GLP-1s cause some muscle loss. Although it doesn't seem to be that bad, it's probably proportional to the weight loss. And most of these that they're doing the study on don't work out. They're not doing anything to help themselves. They're not following any sort of structured diet. They're not using antibiotics. So maybe that's not a concern. I do know that I have had clients that have been prescribed GLP-1s by their doctors that have reported weakness, lethargy, some other issues. They have basically workouts when they're on the stuff. Now, I don't know that Retatrutide has the same result, but it's just something to be concerned about and something to think about.
Conclusion
So I think there are pluses and minuses. For the regular person who doesn't like to work out, doesn't like to follow a diet, it might be a Panacea. It might be the Miracle weight loss drug that we have all been waiting for. That is a possibility. That is a very strong possibility. It does seem to have some very cool effects. Now, time will tell. It's still in stage three clinical trials. Phase three, whatever you want to call it. A lot of this stuff, though, over long-term use, sometimes things come out of the woodwork after something's been in the wild for 5 to 10 years. They find out, oh, there were cases of cancer related to it. Now, that's not saying there will be, but it's something that you do need to consider. Especially guys that like to experiment and go forth ahead and move forward on stuff that's not yet approved. I would proceed with caution, me personally. And I may experiment with it at some point. I may not. I generally don't have a problem with getting lean, and that's not an issue for me.Cliff Notes (not in video)
TL;DR: Retatrutide is a multi-receptor agonist (GLP-1, GIP, and glucagon) in phase 3 clinical trials for obesity and type 2 diabetes treatment. Key findings from trials include:- 24.2% weight loss in 48 weeks at 12mg dose
- 81% return to normal liver fat in 48 weeks
- Improved lipid metabolism and insulin sensitivity
- Common side effects: nausea (45%), vomiting (19%), constipation (16%)
