I have recently started purifying rapamycin tablets and the dosing the extracted rapamycin sublingually,
Last night I sat down and looked at my Apple Health results and noticed something strange with my VO2max graph.
For months it has stayed at the same level (low, probably due to the amount of metformin I take).
Has anyone seen this before ?
Can anyone please explain what’s going on ?
It almost looks like rapamycin may be countering metformin suppression of VO2max
Could it be used as surrogate biomarker for mTor inhibition ?
Did you adjust any other parameters in your routine? Change your metformin dosing? Work out more?
I know you described your protocol for making the sublingual rapamycin here: Sublingual Rapamycin
But you are, quite possibly, the first person to do this so we really have no benchmarks as to the effectiveness of this approach or protocol. It would be really interesting to get some blood sirolimus tests done to see how much is getting into your bloodstream. How to get a Rapamycin (sirolimus) Blood Level Test
There are some other people here in our forums who I think have found a company that provides this blood sirolimus test in the UK.
I can’t say I’ve seen any responses like this on V02Max before… unless someone wants to report it now in this thread.
The possibilities of different doses and the way we take them, grapefruit juice, olive oil, etc are endless Too bad we don’t have a way of instantaneous way of measuring all of our parameters like we do with glucose monitoring.
I was even thinking that maybe we could even put the mTOR1C rebound effect to good use by working out when it is highest.
No, nothing has changed (exercise or metformin-wise) apart from my starting rapamycin dosing sublingually.
In the past I have regularly taken rapamycin orally with grapefruit juice and never seen this type of effect before.
I am very tempted to continue dosing to see how high my VO2max will go, then do a washout period to see if VO2max falls and then start dosing again.
John, can you please share your weekly exercise routine? Have you noticed any benefits from a functional standpoint? For example, if you’re a cycler have you noticed that your average pace or power (e.g. wattage) has gone up during this period, or if you’re a runner has your time/per mile gone down, etc.?
I’m sure my exercise regime is quite pathetic compared to some on here.
I used to run on a treadmill for 15-20 minutes at 12km/hour… before I found out out that my CGM was showing glucose spiking.
Nowadays my exercising is even more modest. I just go for fast walks (~6.6km/hour) for 10 min ending with a quick run up a hill at the end. I do this 2-3 times a day, after meals.
….and No, I haven’t noticed any benefits or changes in performance.
Well John, on the bright side, your aphthous ulcers (aka canker sores) indicate that your sublingual method is delivering the rapa payload. As RapAdmin suggests, it would be very useful to take a blood test measurement of how much rapa is present in your blood from your experiments.
Apple Health VO2max tracking isn’t turned on by default and Apple uses the name “Cardio Fitness” to find VO2max. If you are using an Apple watch to capture your data it may fluctuate a little and its not really targeting accurate readings.
If you are using any new device it takes quite a few exercises to calibrate a solid reading. You may simply be getting fitter and stronger with those 3x daily up hill runs?
The gold standard for VO2 max tests are typically performed in a laboratory and involve running on a treadmill. The speed of the treadmill increases gradually until you reach the intensity at which maximum oxygen consumption rate is achieved.
Currently I use a Garmin Forerunner 955 with a Garmin HRM-Pro heart rate monitor. It applies the Cooper Method for calculation. It’s not perfect but it is well respected by thousands of serious athletes.
Yes you right, I know that an apple watch only gives a pseudo measurement of VO2max, but I’ve got months worth of data using the same device and with the same exercise and meds protocol, so everything has been constant for at least 6 months. I just find it very strange that my VO2max takes off, the day after I started dosing rapamycin.
I think the best way to go forward, is to carry on dosing rapamycin (next dose this Friday) to see how much higher my VO2max will go, and to satisfy my curiosity.
I’ll then stop dosing and see if my VO2max falls, if it drops back to its previous level, then I think it must be the rapamycin.
I can then see if I can ‘switch it’ back on again by restarting dosing.
I’ve just purchased a smartwatch that measures Vo2 Max and did a lot of research on these devices. The Apple and Garmin smartwatches that measure Vo2Max are reasonably accurate… I think about +/- 4%, so good enough to get a good trend line.
I’m going to dose rapamycin tomorrow, see how the VO2 max looks over the weekend, then start a ‘washout’ starting Monday of next week.
P.S I’ve had a rethink since I posted the above.
I’m going to dose 2mg purified rapamycin today to see if the VO2max rises from its plateau.
If it does so, then maybe the change in VO2max is a graduated response to the rapamycin.
After the 2mg dose has run its course, rather than go to a nil dose (as a ‘washout’), I’m thinking I may drop down to a 0.5mg dose ?
, but will just have to be resourceful with what I’ve got.