One simple diagnostic that you often hear for males to gauge their
testosterone status involves the morning erection. Basically, if you’re
not waking up under a tent first thing in the morning, your level of
testosterone may not be adequate.
Of course, it’s not an entirely accurate measure. Your sleep cycle
can affect it. You see, testosterone spikes during REM sleep and you
spend a greater amount of time in REM stage during the latter part of
sleep, which is an indication that it’s time to wake up… but you may not
always experience this effect upon arising, pun intended!
A better marker of depressed testosterone would be a loss of libido
and erectile dysfunction, which are two classic signs and symptoms of
overtraining (see page 102 of The Elite Trainer). According to
fellow strength and conditioning coach Mike Mahler, a great way to
determine whether your workouts are too long and too demanding is this:
Are you able to perform sexually right after a workout?
If the answer is yes, then continue doing what you
are doing. Your current training is not depleting you hormonally and you
should be able to make good gains.
If the answer is no, scale back your training. Cut
the sets in half, leave a little in reserve, and don’t crawl out of the
gym after every workout. To quote eight-time Mr. Olympia Lee Haney:
“Exercise to stimulate, not to annihilate. The world wasn’t formed in a
day, and neither were we. Set small goals and build upon them.”
