Cardarine (GW501516)

The take home points you need to know:

• Cardarine is not a hormone
• It is safe to use by both males and females
• It’s not a stimulant so it will not affect sleep
• GW-50156 increases fat oxidation, endurance, and muscle insulin sensitivity, while lowering cortisol levels

What is Cardarine (GW501516)?

Cardarine (GW501516) was originally developed by Ligand Pharmaceuticals and GlaxoSmithKline in an effort to cure the current obesity and diabetes epidemic. It is a PPAR Agonist. Cardarine binds to PPAR receptors, activating PGC-1α enzymes and increasing the expression of genes involved in energy expenditure. Preliminary studies show that rats given Cardarine had significantly increased fatty acid metabolism. In fact, this is where the common nickname ‘exercise in a pill’ comes from. In essence, Cardarine activates the same pathways involved in exercise.

“3-week treatment with GW501516 increased running performance of both trained and untrained mice. Like training, GW501516 promoted mitochondrial fatty acid oxidation and increased fat metabolism in muscle tissue. However, exercise increased energy supply by promoting catabolism of protein, glycolysis and glucogenesis from amino acids, while GW501516 increased fatty acid oxidation through BCAA and ketone body pathways.”

In another study done with monkeys, Cardarine increased HDL (good cholesterol) and decreased LDL (bad cholesterol). Those who supplement with Cardarine will noticed increased endurance, improved blood cholesterol levels and decreased body fat.

Side Effects, Dosages and Half Life

Cardarine is safe to use by both men and women. It is not a hormone so there is no need to worry about HPTA suppression or running a post cycle therapy (PCT) after using. It is not a stimulant and will not affect sleep or raise cortisol levels.

GW-501516 is generally used in 8-16 week cycles at 10-20mg/day. Since it is non-hormonal you could theoretically run it forever but I personally don’t think running anything indefinitely is smart.

GW 501516 has a 24-hour half-life so a once per day dosage is all that is required. Some people like to split up their daily dosage into an AM and PM dosage but that isn’t needed.

Cardarine and Cancer

No article on Cardarine would be complete without addressing cancer. There is a lot of misinformation about GW and cancer because of a clinical trial in which rodents developed cancer. The whole thing is blown out of proportion. The rats in the study were given supraphysiological dosages, 10mg/kg of body weight. To put that into perspective, a 200 pound man (roughly 90 kg) would have used 900mg of GW-501516 per day during the clinical study. You really can’t correlate the results of this study to someone using the standard recommended dosage of 10-20mg/day.

In fact, new clinical trials with human subjects actually showed GW 501516 has an ANTI-cancer effect.

“GW501516-activated PPARβ/δ reduces TNFα-induced Nfkb1 activity and inflammatory signaling via direct induction of anti-inflammatory genes, as well as indirect inhibition of pro-inflammatory genes by BCL6 dissociation in human pancreatic cancer cells.”

There are a couple reasons for this:

1. The rat study everyone talks about used absurd dosages that no one in their sane mind would take.
2. In the above study, all the rats were injected with genes to cause the development of cancer and the rats given the GW-501516 developed the cancer faster. The GW501516 didn’t actually cause the cancer, it just accelerated the rate at which the cancer grew.
3. Rats develop cancer MUCH more easily than humans and that’s why they are so commonly used in cancer studies.

Usages

Cardarine is a very versatile SARM that can be used by itself, stacked with other SARMs, or included into a post cycle therapy (PCT).

Stand Alone Cycle

Cardarine is a great first SARM to use since it is non-hormonal. You can use it by itself without having to run a PCT afterwards. Females will want to run GW-501516 at 10mg/day and males will want to use 20mg/day. For a first cycle, 8 weeks is perfect. After the 8-week cycle, take a 4 week break, repeat.

Stacked with Other SARMs

One of the most common SARMS cycles is the SARMS triple stack. The triple stack is a combination of Cardarine (GW501516), Ostarine (MK2866), and Andarine (S4).

• GW 501516 is fantastic for increasing endurance and fat oxidation.
• Ostarine is great for improving recovery.
• Andarine is great for increasing strength.

You get the best of everything stacking the three together.

In Post Cycle Therapy’s (PCT’s)

The two best SARMS to include in a PCT protocol are Cardarine and Ostarine.

• GW-501516 prevents fat gain during a PCT protocol when hormones are low and cortisol levels are high.
• Ostarine prevents muscle loss during a PCT when the body is catabolic from high cortisol levels and low anabolic hormones.