I'm trying doing some stacks to make more gains in the gym by taking Anabolic Warfare Shred, Ripped, and Jacked. Is there "knock off" brands of this stuff or any powders I can buy from Bulk Supplements to get the same effects and save some money. They recommend a 3 month cycle and it will get expensive quick.

this guy can help

Have you looked at the ingredient list and looked at buying those ingredients individually? The only supplement I take these days is protein. I don't really even feel creatine does anything for me (have tried it about 5-6 times over the past 15+ years - just never noticed any benefit, or loss of strenght after I stopped).

What exactly is your goal? Chances are just eating more, having creatine, and sleeping more, will give you more gains than any of these stacks.

Yep. There isn't a secret sauce in my experience.

Protein, creatine, sleep, no alcohol, and no calorie deficit is the diet/supplement recipe for strength gains. Not for losing weight, but for gaining muscle and strength while on an appropriate lifting program.

You could also take steroids, but that would obviously be ridiculous.

On looking at these products, Shred just looks like it tries to reduce your water retention (who cares, and don't need a supplement to do it anyway)… others seem light on science and high on bro-science…

Tex_Ag_2017 said:

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I'm trying doing some stacks to make more gains in the gym by taking Anabolic Warfare Shred, Ripped, and Jacked. Is there "knock off" brands of this stuff or any powders I can buy from Bulk Supplements to get the same effects and save some money. They recommend a 3 month cycle and it will get expensive quick.

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Seriously, and this is said to save you $$$ and time. Skip all of that nonsense, get a good, intelligently designed hypertrophy program, eat right (preferably a calorie surplus to gain muscle) and place a massive level of importance in getting enough sleep each night, train hard with a focus towards approaching failure including reaching actual failure at appropriate times (lots of debate here but I use an Reps in Reserve strategy over a course of a mesocycle reaching RIR 0 my last week, but these are all very difficult sets regardless) and you will grow. Creatine is probably the only legal supplement that might give you some gains, but even that is hit or miss for some. And obviously, protein, which I really don't put in the "supplement" category which you are talking about here. While I prefer protein sources like chicken, beef, fish etc, whey and casein proteins are fine for you as long as your stomach can handle it.

Point is, save your money on supplements. Most of them are useless. Honestly, if you're having issues growing muscle, look first to your carb intake. Too many people are under the false impression that they need to cut their carbs to look lean but by doing so you can gain muscle. This is simply not true for most people. Sure, cutting calories will make you leaner. But, again, if you want to gain muscle, you need calories and of that, a very large portion has to be carbs. Once you figure out a good calorie surplus for you, you will see muscle and strength gains, and honestly you don't need to get very fat at all. I mean, you might think you're getting fat, but most around you won't even notice. Just don't be so concerned with staying lean. Lean out once you've gained the amount of muscle mass you want and do that slowly and change your programing accordingly, if at all. Food and sleep = best legal "supplements" for gaining muscle.