Brief Interlude

Diet's fairly stable and I'm down to about 160. My goal's 159 on Saturday morning, though I'll cheat all-out (versus just a mild carb refeed, or possibly just a fat refeed) if I fall below 160.

I've picked up some Yohimbine HCl (throwback to last year); apparently it's only really effective fasted, so the plan's to take it first thing in the morning, push the whey shake back an hour, and cut back slightly on the protein (dropping calories in the process). If anyone's actually reading this, the justification's fairly concise:

1) Fat cells have two fat loss-related receptors, B-1 and A-2.
2) B-1 receptors increase fat loss, A-2 receptors reduce fat loss.
3) B-1 receptors are basically stable, A-2 increase as you lose weight.
4) Yohimbine blocks A-2 and thereby facilitates fat loss (study-backed).
5) "Stubborn" fat areas tend to display more A-2 than others.

As far as I know, nobody's identified why it only increases fat loss in fasted subjects - presumably the actual increase comes from norepinephrine having fewer places to leave the bloodstream, and the effect dies down once the body's gotten used to the higher norepi levels. Thing is, the fasted thing shouldn't make a difference there, which suggests that yohimbine can't bind the A-2 receptor when insulin's around. Off of that, I'm waiting an hour for my whey shake starting when the stuff arrives.

Other points recently came up:
1) For the yohimbine issue specifically, since it's active only when there's no insulin around, it probably works even better on full intermittent fasting - take it on waking and then again a few hours later (or 3 hours after the big meal and then a few hours after that). Might want to drop the dose, but the only reason I haven't considered switching to this is that I've already dropped tons of money on protein powder.

2) You only need around 0.8-0.9g protein per pound of bodyweight to preserve lean mass on a calorie deficit. This probably isn't as relevant to me (with my PSMF approach, the higher protein dose probably serves to prevent the rest of the protein from being used for fuel, since I'm not consuming any other source of calories), but it might be worth remembering for the next time I want to lose weight.

I suspect my plan for maintaining will actually ease back to an IF approach with various refeeds, probably running multiple 2-3 doses of yohimbine per day (7.5-10g each). I don't know how long it'll take to get back, I just know it's time to start taking yohimbine again.

I'll also look into horny goat weed, though this one will involve some more personal experimentation. Rat studies using doses equivalent to ~13mg/kg/day (basically 1g for me) showed a very significant testosterone increase; the mechanism isn't known, but could be replicable in humans. There's no human backing for this, but the NOW Foods caps would let me test that for around $50/mo, so if I go in and get some comprehensive blood panels done I can test that out. There's also a much more expensive option with pure Icariin, but I'd rather try the cheaper one first.

EDIT: New note: Starting after my ME Squat (Monday), I'm going to start doing the stomach vacuum at least 3 times per day (for multiple breaths each, obviously).