posted Fri, 09/18/2026 - 04:29
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43 year old male about 17%bf. Been working out for 4 years now and dialed in diet. Currently 200mg test c a week. What should my first cycle be? Would like to recomposition if possible
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Outside of the good advice already added, my first cycle was just an increased dose of test over my TRT dose. You need to know how your body reacts to more test. How much you aromatize, how you feel, etc. Get blood tests don't guess.
A good plan would be to drop some body fat before starting a legit cycle.
On 200mg a week, you should be able to drop considerable BF % as long as your diet and training is dialed in.
If youre not able to see great results on just that 200mg, raising the dose isnt gonna help.
Youre almost there... spend another month or two trying to drop some more fat. Learning more about what youre about to take on, if you decide to cycle.
Form gppd habits now, before you throw gear into the mix. Learn to walk before ya run.
Youre in a good position if youre 43 and have never cycled before. Idk what the rest of your health is like but... if you do this the right way you could set yourself up to be living a very healthy/active life in your older years.
Before talking about a “first cycle,” I’d clarify what you mean by currently being on 200 mg/week of testosterone cypionate.
If that’s physician-prescribed TRT and 200 mg/week is genuinely required to keep your testosterone in a physiologic range, that’s one thing. But if you’re taking 200 mg/week recreationally, or it’s putting your total/free testosterone consistently above the normal physiologic range, I’d argue you’ve already started your first cycle, just a relatively conservative testosterone only one.
I wouldn’t automatically add another compound simply because you want to recomp. At 43 and ~17% body fat, there’s a pretty good argument for first seeing what you can accomplish with the testosterone you’re already taking while tightening nutrition and training. Recomp is driven heavily by energy balance, protein intake, training stimulus and recovery; adding another anabolic doesn’t fix those variables.
I’d also want to know your actual numbers before changing anything: total T, free T, SHBG, estradiol, CBC/hematocrit, blood pressure and lipids. “200 mg” tells us the dose, but it doesn’t tell us your exposure or how you’re responding to it.
If your numbers are already supraphysiologic, asking “what should my first cycle be?” is probably the wrong question. A better question is: What am I getting from 200 mg/week, what are my health markers doing, and is there actually a reason to increase anabolic exposure?
Good advice here.