Blink2000's Progress Journal

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Reverse Kegels Pointless?

*************.org/forum/showthread.php?p=1562443#post1562443
I think I'm not going to worry about reverse Kegels. I didn't post it on the main forum because I didn't want a debate or anything...

westla90069 is one of the most knowledgeable people out there on penis anatomy, he's the resident expert at thunders.

I received a PM about this a month or so ago and this is the reply I gave:

Question: "I was wondering, does a muscle contraction actually cause a reverse kegal or is it just the relaxation of the BC muscle? I'm in kinesiology class and although I'll never bring it up in class, I'm wondering if you know of (if any) muscle that is the antagonist (opposing muscle) of the bulbocavernosus.

After reading a bit more, I saw that you posted that a reverse kegel means to just relax the BC muscle. I always thought the act of trying to push your urine out harder was a reverse kegal and would seem like you are contracting some type of muscle since in the body, it's really hard to actually force a muscle to relax in a split second. Thoughts??"

Answer: There was a thread about this not long ago and I was going to write up a little history of the so-called "reverse kegel" here at Thunder's Place. But I never got around to it. One of our members, drgmerlin, was one of the first to discuss it. He used it as a means to avoid ejaculation. Or at least the spasms of ejaculation. He still came, but it flowed out rather than in spurts. He felt that by consciously counteracting the natural muscle contractions he was able to prolong his erection and continue to have sex. I don't remember if it worked all that well, but I do remember he was the one talking about it.

DLD then began to use it as a means to enhance manual stretches. Newbies usually complain about the "tug back" (yes, like Bib's LOT theory) that their penis does when they first try to do manual stretches. That's a normal penile reaction to being pulled on, it tries to pull back against the external force. As you know it's the bulbocavernosus (BC, but also known, and actually better named, as the bulbospongiosus) muscle that's doing the tugging back. DLD saw the reverse kegel, which as you noted is just relaxing the BC, as a means to make the manual stretch more effective.

It was one of them, or perhaps someone else, who said if a kegel is like stopping urine flow, then a reverse kegel is like forcing urine out. That's not actually true, of course. You don't have to force anything, but you do have to concentrate on relaxing the BC. The abdominals are not really involved nor is the urinary bladder or increased intra-abdominal pressure which are the actual muscles used to force urine out.

There is no opposing muscle to the BC. The reverse kegel is trying to not let it contract at times when it normally wants to, such as during ejaculation or when the penis is being pulled on. Doing reverse kegels as an exercise in and of itself is pointless. Unless you're trying to prevent the BC from normally contracting, forcing it to relax won't accomplish anything.

However, I am going to try & work up to towel raises & start doing more normal Kegels. I put a link to towel raises in my first post in this thread (and other links I thought were useful).

[blink2000 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close blink2000]

Routine:
Did 5x sets @ 8lbs again today
(the same as yesterday).
60 kegels
5-10m light jelqs
warm-up/warm down (20m rice sock)

How Much Hanging?
I calculated the hours I've been hanging; I restarted hanging on 15 Jun 2010, I have completed 111 sets, for a total of only 37 hours of hanging so far (only 2 months worth). It's fascinating to look at my log & see the progression in set numbers and weight. It's not an exact science at all either, but I can see a consistent, very slow improvement. I'm taking better notes this time around, and I'm tracking BPFSL; in fact, I'll possibly use that instead of BPEL as my best indicator of progress.

Stamina:
There's such a focus on stamina here & I think we can thank Big Al & Remek for that. I was looking at a link (from Big Al) on Remek's smooth muscle theory. It seems part of his theory is that if we improve our stamina, all our PE efforts will be improved since the penis actually is a muscle (40-50% soft muscle):

The penis is a muscle: *************.org/forum/showthread.php?t=68195

PIs: lately I'm just noticing a huge difference in my flaccid. My BPFSL is only 6.25"(+.45), so I've got some work to do there.

Green Tea + Honey: This seems to have a major impact on me. Maybe because I'm 36. I've been drinking at least 1 cup per day for 3 days only.

Goal: Right now I am mostly worried about reaching 7". (currently 6.4")
Reason: I already reached 6.75" in 2008; I want to surpass that so I can start living in the present.

[vulcan Retired ModeratorPE Gym EditorPEGym Hero Find all posts View Profile Close vulcan]

Wow 740hrs - it is pretty impressive when put in those terms.

[blink2000 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close blink2000]

bad math. It's correct now. 111 sets is only 2220 minutes, or 37 hours! way less time. It's hard to get lots of time in the hanger. I started with very low numbers of sets during the first month.

I'm only doing 5x sets per day, which is 1.7 hours per day. To get 100+ hours per month, I would have to do 12x sets per day (4hrs).

[blink2000 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close blink2000]

I wish I could hang 740 hours in 2 months. That would be 12 hours a day, it's never been done before to my knowledge.

You would need 3x angles of attack.

[millia Senior Member;PEGym Editor Find all posts View Profile Close millia]

Not to mention a shit load of free time. 12 hours a day would be almost impossible.. Unless you never sleep.

[blink2000 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close blink2000]

12 Hours A Day = 16+ Actual Hours = Impossible
Good point... 12 hours of hanging would take 16 hours a day... and that assumes you never wasted a moment which is not realistic. Even with just 5x sets, occasionally something goes wrong & I have to re-wrap or I'll inspect myself. I think even if you work from home, more than 12x sets per day is nearly impossible (theoretically you could do 12x sets in 6 hours including the 10minute rest periods, but really, it ends up taking a full 8 hours probably).

Shorter Learning Curve With More Sets
I think doing a decent number of sets has helped my hanging skill a lot. Re-wrapping a lot, and changing hanger settings too, and experimenting with different kinds of wraps has probably shortened my learning curve. Just a week ago, I probably re-attached the hanger 20 times or more in one day, due to some problems i was having with hanger twisting. I think doing 8x sets per day in the past helped me too. I potentially learned more quickly than someone doing inconsistent hanging, or only doing 1x set per day, since I would actually re-wrap every single set & re-attach the hanger. I think that improved my skill/knowledge of wrap & hanger settings...

True Fatigue vs. False Positive (Pain)
Lately too, I have been slowly improving my ability to identify true fatigue. Sometimes its hard or impossible to tell between skin pain & actual fatigue pain. I get false positives when my technique is off. Like lately I learned putting a thin layer of cocoa butter on my shaft allows me to do a few more pounds. If I don't do it, I don't reach proper fatigue. Theres a lot of small things like that which add up to make a very big difference.

And although I occasionally get a burning sensation in my pelvic bone (from good lig fatigue), it's rare & hard to come by. I hope increasing my maximum weight will help me start truly targeting my ligs better. For now, it seems the attachment point stress, and my inability to add more weight is what is holding me back. This seems to support my own theory that I need to get into the 10lb+ range before I can start getting some better deformation. Aside from that, when I was doing 8x sets per day, I was totally failing at being consistent. At 5x sets per day I'm able to always do the same amount of sets; this helps me make more sense of my tracking, and my personal logs. I can see my progression (or lack of) much more clearly.

Optimized Hangtime + Weight for Gains
I am hoping this will create a truly optimized balance of enough hang time + enough weight.

Target Weight: 10lbs
Target Hangtime: 10hrs+ per week.

That should translate to maybe 40-45 hours of hang-time per month, and I am hoping to get the "bottom" of my weight range up to 10lbs. Right now when I am fatigued, I drop to 5lbs, so I have a long way to go. When I'm feeling 'fresh' I'm at 7lbs to 8lbs. I am not sure, but I may need to reach at least 15lbs before I spend most of my time at 10lbs+.

[vulcan Retired ModeratorPE Gym EditorPEGym Hero Find all posts View Profile Close vulcan]

I am starting to get my head around this now. Is it beneficial to make very small increases in weight over time, rather than bigger increases?

So achieving a 1 pound increase gradually by increasing in small increments rather than in 1 go.

[blink2000 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close blink2000]

Incremental Changes:
I am moving at 1/2lb increments. It's far from an exact science, but usually it seems I stay at a weight about 4 days or so before I can move up another 1/2lb. That's as long as I hold the number of sets constant. So I am moving up maybe .5lbs every 4 days, but occasionally, I'll get stuck at a weight, or even have to reduce the weight for a week or longer.

My Goals vs Weight
My true goal is just fatigue, so even though I do want to increase my weight, I wont rush into things.

I am avoiding rest days to keep my maximum weight low. I'm trying to get the full growth benefit possible from these lower weights, and I have... .4" so far. That's perfectly reasonable for me; (it's .2" per month of consistent work--definitely fast newbie gains/ as if I'm a newbie again).

But, as I mentioned before, I'll try to stay in the 10-20lb range as long as possible, since so many guys say this is the sweet spot for gains (in terms of weight).

[vulcan Retired ModeratorPE Gym EditorPEGym Hero Find all posts View Profile Close vulcan]

Like a gradual war of attrition.

Even before I read about the 10-20lb sweet spot, my instinct told me to stick around that weight (once I got there) & increase duration. At the time there were a few guys on the forum who were almost competing to see how much weight they could hang.

In my mind the trick is to apply stress almost by stealth over time. Otherwise with too much load, it could end up like Plyometric training, getting strong but thick ligs.

[blink2000 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close blink2000]

"Is it beneficial to make very small increases in weight over time, rather than bigger increases?"

Yes. Absolutely.

First: What is fatigue?
When you approach the pain barrier and feel the need to drop the weight. This is fatigue.

Second: What is our Goal?
We are targeting a larger, not a stronger penis. The idea is to keep attacking the same angle and continually weakening the target tissues to micro-tear, stretch, deform, creep and and eventually heal elongated. We are pulling out crimps in our tissues, stretching our tunica and ligaments, and keeping the repair bonds between these collagenous tissues as weak as we can without creating a macro-tear. This is truly an art. Also, doing it at lower weights is always safer. Higher weight = more risk, and more potential for a devastating error.

20lbs to 25lbs+ = Very Slow Growth (Not Good)
Luckily, it takes a lot of time to reach these higher weights, so you'll be a veteran, and fine tuned to your own physiology so you'll be prepared once you reach the higher weights. Unfortunately, really high weight is not where the growth is. Most guys grow the most under 20lbs. Growth slows down dramatically past that zone. I have no idea why, but it may be related to slow adaptation to attachment point stresses, which perhaps start failing to out-pace the toughening of our ligaments and tunica. (This is only a guess based on what I currently know and my view on that might change)

Use Minimum Weight Required for Fatigue
You want to use the minimum weight required to reach fatigue, then once you really feel fatigued you drop the weight as needed. Usually after I really 'ride the fatigue' well one day, I'm forced to drop the weight I'm using the next day. Bib often went a few weeks in a row at reduced weight because he was hanging daily and not allowing himself to ever fully heal. That's controlled damage.

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Hopefully they can restore the forum. It seems I'm missing about 80-90 posts now.

[blink2000 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close blink2000]

I did lots of editing, rewrote some articles & even posted a new article... that would be a shame if it's gone.

[blink2000 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close blink2000]

Ok, some information was lost recently on our forum including some discussion that went on in this thread. I'll try & summarize things:

15-Aug-10 Day off. PI's up, spontaneous erection, morning wood (but semi-soft wood), green tea seemed to raise libido
16-Aug-10 5x sets, 8lbs max
17-Aug-10 5x sets, 8lbs max
18-Aug-10 5x sets, 8.5lbs max
19-Aug-10 5x sets, 7.5lbs max

Fresh Roasted & Brewed Cocoa Beans
I tried fresh roasted & brewed cocoa brew (I don't know how else to explain it). I guess it's similar to coffee but just from cocoa beans. It smells awesome; just like chocolate. I noticed it gives some very powerful, sustained energy, way better than any energy drink I have tried. I drank low carb monster drinks as much as 2-3 a day for a month solid, and I can say for sure, the cocoa works better for an energy boost. Caffeine does give a jittery mental boost too, but fresh brewed cocoa gives a kind of sustained energy I have trouble describing.

I'll write more later, I'm still afraid the forum will crash again & I'll lose my information & posts...

[blink2000 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close blink2000]

Side note: I have been doing split sets for a few days now (that means some morning & some night sets, this way I can keep re-breaking the weakest links in my tissues and keep thing deformed in an elongated state while they heal... Hopefully I can maintain this long term. I know it will give more gains.