“A Really Long Letter To Every Bodybuilder Who Secretly Believes The Fat Cats Are Ripping Him Off”

WARNING! Don't Even Think About Using Any Nutritional Supplements Until You Read This...

An Open Letter To Every Bodybuilder Who Secretly Believes That Most Nutritional Supplements Are Garbage!

From: Leo Costa, Jr. Tuesday, 11:30 a.m. Visalia, California

Dear Friend,

In just a moment, I hope to make you so angry you'll want to throw a dumbbell right through the wall.

What I have to tell you involves the scandal that's going on in bodybuilding nutritional supplements today. It's a scandal that -- if you're like most guys I know -- is cheating you out of good money and (worse!) robbing you of some serious gains and major results you should be getting from your workouts.

[photo: Leo Costa, Jr.] [photo: Tom Platz -- Bodybuilding Legend]

It's a mess. If you're using any supplements now -- or even thinking about using any -- then you need to hear everything I'm going to share with you. It's that important.

Now, maybe I need to remind you who I am. It may help you understand why I'm sharing the astonishing story I'm about to tell you. That's me in the picture on the left. (I'll tell you something about the other guy in a moment that will blow your mind!)

I'm the president of OTS, the publishers of the Advanced Serious Growth® Training System and the hottest selling book Anabolic Diet by Dr. Mauro DiPasquale. (You've probably seen our ads in Muscle & Fitness and Ironman). I'm also pretty well-know in the bodybuilding world -- just recently I met up with Arnold Schwarzenegger at a special event he hosted in Ohio, and in Palm Springs that same

week I was introduced to former President Ford. Legends like Vince Gironda (who trained Arnold, Lou Ferrigno and Columbo) and Bill Pearl are friends of mine. Some of the guys I've given personal training to include major league baseball players, NFL stars, and even Hollywood actors like Kevin Costner (Dances with Wolves, JFK, Robin Hood).

I think from my picture you can also tell I lift a little iron now and then. I believe bodybuilding is the greatest sport in the world, and I've dedicated my life to it perhaps like no other man for almost twenty years. I even run a gym and a separate research facility here in Visalia.

But the truth is, I got into bodybuilding in a strange way...

I Had To Almost Die First!

This is no joke. Here's what happened. I was a highly-rated college quarterback at Cal Poly University in California with a chance to go pro. Sports writers called me the "Cowboy Quarterback," Because I had the strength and size to level blitzing linebackers -- they weren't used to a QB who could hit back like an inside lineman. (My in-season weight was just over 200 lean pounds). Buy my career ended abruptly. I got blindsided -- hit so hard half my ribcage collapsed, and my heart and lungs were pushed all the way around to my back. I was almost history; the doctors were amazed I even lived, let alone walked out of the hospital a few months later.

I Still Have Scars Like Railroad Tracks Where They Cut Me Open!

They told me to take it easy. But I still had the drive of an athlete, and I turned to bodybuilding. It gave me a whole new life. I haunted places like Gold's Gym in Venice Beach. And I worked hard. And I began to get big. (My "ideal" competition weight is 285 with 6% body fat).

The upshot of all this is that I eventually met my good partner, Dr. Russ Horine, and we decided to get really serious about making gains in the gym. We tried everything -- including several thousand dollars worth of nutritional supplements -- in an all-out effort to pack on as much size, strength and power as humanly possible. That's why I tracked down the Bulgarian Olympic weight-lifting team, who were making everyone else look sick at international competitions. They're the strongest athletes in the world, hands down, and the secrets they shared with me helped us to revolutionize the way bodybuilders train here in America.

Now, as a man who came within inches of death, I can tell you I'm pretty darned particular about what I put into my body. So when I started experimenting with all the supplements out there on the market, I kept close track of what the results were. And guess what? Some of those supplements worked a little bit, some had real unpleasant side-effects (like nausea, gas and blood-sugar crashes), and, for the most part...

Most Of Them Didn't Do Diddly-Squat For Me Except Add Calories To My Diet!

The fact is, I got burned a lot. Wasted my money. And I'll bet you dollars to donuts that you've been burned, too, in the supplement game. Heck, I think every serious bodybuilder has been cheated -- because there's so much crap out there, and no objective scorecard to help you decide what's baloney and what's real.

It's frustrating. Yet, if you're tearing it up in the gym like I am, you need nutritional help. In just an average workout, you're probably pushing your body to it's limit, forcing it to scramble to replace the nutrients and vitamins and other essentials you've burned up. In a breakthrough workout -- where you're really going for maximum gains -- you are literally draining your system empty. A good, healthy diet will help... but for the BIG gains you're after, you need something more.

But how do you choose the right supplement to take?

It's a scandal. In the last issue of Muscle & Fitness I saw, there were sixty-three advertisements for nutritional supplements. Sixty-three! And each ad claimed it's product was the "best" in the world.

Now, I ain't no genius, but I know they can't all be the "best."

What's more, through my personal wallet-emptying experience with enough supplements to fill a warehouse, I know that, in truth...

None Of Them Are Even Close To Being The "Best" Available! Even the Most Poplar and Famous Brands Are Mediocre Or Worse!

Let me let you in on a dirty little secret the "Fat Cats" hoped you'd never hear about: You can't judge the quality of a supplement by price. Or by who's selling it. Or by how fancy the label or advertisement looks.

The fact is, the nutritional supplement market (especially for bodybuilders) has exploded in recent years. It's now a $200 million a year industry -- and everybody with access to a lab wants to get a piece of it. They want your money.

But who can trust -- with hundreds of products out there all screaming for your attention?

How Can You Be Sure What's In All The Goop You're Putting Into Your Body?

I'll tell you this: You can't trust the advertising. They're mostly written by scrawny professional copywriters who are trained to make any kind of product sound good... regardless of whether it is or not. You know how the rich marketing companies decide on what to put into a product? They sit around, make lists of all the latest fads that get lots of print in the magazines, and then throw together a mishmash of "maybe's" in a bottle.

Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't.

They don't know! It's all guesswork and advertising and posturing. They spend more time thinking up a "hot" name than they do researching the results.

Well, I Got Sick And Tired Of Being A Human "Guinea Pig" For Fat Cat Businessmen Who Don't Understand -- And Don't Care -- About SERIOUS Bodybuilders!

So, can you guess what my partner Dr. Horine and I did? It's so simple, I'm astonished no one ever thought of doing it before.

We Went To The Man Who Created The Supplement Industry And ASKED HIM Why There Were No Serious Supplements For Bodybuilders!

Boy, did we get an earful!

Let me tell you about this guy. His name is John Williams. He's the "secret weapon" behind some of the most successful professional athletes in the world -- including top-ranked tennis stars, boxers, NFL players and major league baseball All Stars. John actually formulated the very first performance-based nutrition programs in the sports world. His specialty now is custom formulas especially created for the specific demands of any given sport -- such as endurance, strength, power, and speed.

Maybe you've heard of John Williams. He was the publisher of Muscle Digest until 1980 (when it was the largest muscle mag on the market -- bigger than Muscle & Fitness). He's no stranger to the gym, either, which immediately makes him different than nearly all the other guys making nutritional formulations. John was a semi-pro athlete (8 years with the Armed Services League) who was forced to learn about nutrition on his own when his knees gave out -- there wasn't a shred of decent research on sports nutrition at the time.

He is the foremost pioneer in the industry. He's so respected in his field that major universities like Harvard and MIT have asked him to help in their research on such important subjects as fighting AIDS with nutrition. And he's so darned good at creating truly hot, customized nutritional supplements for athletes, that when the Soviets and East German Olympic teams visited the U.S. in 1987, they smuggled a truckload of John's formulations back to their own countries to train with.

You get the idea, don't you? This guy is THE man to go to for answers.

So I caught up with John Williams at a spring training camp in Arizona and asked him the nagging question:

Why Aren't There Any Serious Nutritional Supplements Available For Bodybuilders?

John looked sad when he answered me.

Profit, he said. That was the whole problem.

You see, it simply costs too much to use the really quality ingredients that do everything the fancy ads in the magazines say their products do. With the huge profit markup most manufacturers insist on, they're afraid they couldn't compete with the cheaper products already on the market. So they cut costs on the ingredients, and -- worse -- leave out crucial ingredients that are too costly (regardless of how necessary they are to the effectiveness of the goop), and hope their snazzy ads will sell the stuff.

The professional athletes John Williams works with have no problem coming up with the hundreds of dollars necessary for the personalized, custom-designed formulations they desire. They use supplements that do not skimp on the finest, proven, and most effective ingredients -- even though these super-quality ingredients are so hard to find or manufacture, they almost always cost a lot to include in the formulas.

Top chemists agree with John, by the way. For example, one lab technician told me that most supplements on the market just put in a pinch of dibencozide -- only enough to legally be able to say they have it in their formula! They ignore the fact that ten times that amount is needed to be effective! They almost never use the good stuff if a cheaper alternative is available, either -- again, regardless of how much less effective the cheapo is! So bodybuilders like you are out there guzzling goop filled with cheap sugars, poorly formulated Vitamin C that can't

even be absorbed into your system, synthetic Vitamin E that looks lazy next to the natural stuff, hydrochlorides that flush through your system without much effect (but which are four times cheaper than the stuff that works), and, on the top of this and other insults...

They Don't Even Have Many Of The Proven Nutrients That Serious Bodybuilders Like You NEED!

Why? They're too expensive, that's why. Including them would hurt their precious bottom line of profits!

Are you angry yet? I sure was. I was fuming.

Why, I asked John, couldn't someone make the perfect supplement for bodybuilders... and then just not try to make so darn much profit on it? You know -- cut the profit margin down from 500% to, say, a fraction of that.

Sure, said John. That could be done. But he didn't know of any company willing to do it. Because they didn't have to. Almost no one in bodybuilding -- not the trainers, not the competing stars, not the gym owners, not the magazine publishers, not the average guy in the gym -- no one knows enough about nutrition to understand what really belongs in a good, high-quality supplement!

Everyone figures everyone else understands -- and that's why this scandal in nutritional supplements continues.

So I asked John Williams -- the one man in America who could give me the honest truth...

What Would The "Ultimate Supplement" For Bodybuilders Consist of... And What Kind Of Results Would It Offer?

Regardless of cost?, he asked. Yes, I said -- regardless of how much it would cost of formulate. And he smiled. "I've been waiting a long time for someone to ask me that question," he said. And here is what he told me about his "Ultimate Supplement" for bodybuilders... (listen closely -- what you are about to learn could change your life forever!):

The #1 PROBLEM with most supplements on the market is that they are formulated with inferior, cheaper, and less effective (or downright useless) ingredients. Often the ingredients are thrown in the formula with no regard to how they will react with the other ingredients, and they wind up canceling each other out due to poor processing. so they don't offer enough quality "fuel" for your muscles to burn during your workout and -- even worse -- they don't give you the raw tools necessary to build muscle size AFTER your workout. That's when the crucial RECOVERY and REPAIR work is done -- and when you are "cementing" your gains.

The Ultimate Supplement would be formulated to do three things that no other supplement on the market even comes close to doing:

1) It would set up a literal "storehouse" of quality nutrients especially formulated to provide a massive -- yet controlled -- source of high-octane energy for your system throughout your workout. That's what your muscles want while you are putting them under the enormous stress of lifting large volumes of weight. Refined sugar is not a quality nutrient; the Ultimate Supplement would not have cheap energy sources that caused short "highs" followed by "crashes." Only the most potent and powerful fuel sources would do.

2) It would assist your muscles at the cellular level with an ARMY of hardworking

elements that would continually flush out the toxins (like lactic acid) and aid your system in metabolizing nutrients (such as carbohydrates, fats and proteins).

3) And, finally, it would provide the "building blocks" your muscles crave to increase SIZE and DENSITY -- especially during the RECOVERY phase of your workout.

Okay -- we need to call a little "time out" here, so we can set the record straight on something that almost all bodybuilders are fuzzy on.

Let's Clear Up A COMMON Misconception About Getting Maximum Gains:

Listen to me! Muscle growth does not happen DURING your workout! No. During your workout, you are stressing your muscles and causing them severe irritation (what we used to call "tearing your muscles down") -- so when they recover from your workout, they have a clear, unmistakable message: Get bigger and stronger to handle the stress of the next workout.

The simple, biological fact most bodybuilders fail to understand is this:

Muscle growth occurs AFTER your workout!

If you learn nothing else from my letter today, please remember this one thing, all right? Most bodybuilders totally miss the boat on this fact. Physiologically, when you work out, you are burning up ATP (adenosine triphosphate) and glucose for energy, and you need these available in your system. However, you are not absorbing amino acids at this time. Amino acids are the "building blocks" of muscle tissue. But your muscles can't use them until the time immediately following your workout. We call this time...

The 2-Hour "Window Of Opportunity!"

This is the time when 60% of your recovery takes place. RECOVERY is when your muscles experience true gains! They are building themselves up to accommodate the stress and irritation you have just put them under in your workout. However, if your system is deficient in the crucial nutrients your muscles need to speed up recover, they will waste precious time searching for what they need to repair muscle tissue, which slows down your recovery time...

And A Slower Recovery Time Can Negate Up To One-Half Of Your Gains!

ONE-HALF of your gains! Lost, because your system isn't "primed" with the materials necessary to build muscle! That's why supplements with cheap, inferior and less-effective ingredients CHEAT you of strength and size. Does that make you mad? It should. (Read on -- it gets worse!)

PROBLEM #2 with most supplements is that they flood your system with trashy, low-quality sugars that cause unhealthy jumps and crashes in your blood glucose level. Have you ever felt a sudden surge of energy after drinking some fancy-labeled goop... only to come crashing down into fatigue 20 minutes into your workout? Refined sugar is a cheap way to cause energy "highs," but the energy doesn't last.

And Even worse, these "cheap sugar" crashes are the direct result of your pancreas secreting insulin in a "red alert" effort to flush the sugar out of your bloodstream. Why is this so bad? Because insulin is also needed in your system to "push" amino acids into your muscle cells during the crucial recovery period. Insulin is a major anabolic muscle-building agent. So, if you've "shot your wad"

of insulin during a sugar crash, you won't have enough of it around after your workout... when you desperately need it to assimilate the amino acids your muscles crave to build size!

Again, you are being CHEATED out of gains you deserve!

The Ultimate Supplement would replace cheap, refined sugar with "Cadillac" glucose-polymers designed to release a constant, controlled and uninterrupted high-octane glucose energy source that would not challenge your system to secrete "paranoid" insulin. The result: No mid-workout energy crashes... and plenty of insulin available for your crucial recovery stage.

On the flip side of high-octane energy, the Ultimate Supplement would also slow the ammonia build-up that naturally occurs in your muscles during heavy workouts. Ammonia is what causes muscle fatigue. And while most products have, at best, a largely ineffective "shotgun" approach to keeping ammonia production down, the Ultimate Supplement would cut no corners on whatever ingredients were needed to fight fatigue.

PROBLEM #3 with most supplements : They have, at best, only crude ways (and often they have nothing) to cut down on lactic acid. This can actually alter the pH level in your system by raising your "acidotic state" -- and when this happens, your muscles have a difficult time absorbing amino acids!

This important subject has not been addressed in the muscle magazines! Yet it's not complicated. You see, the waste product left in your system when you burn up ATP for energy is lactic acid. A build-up of lactic acid is what makes you sore after a workout -- but even worse, this build-up can actually block amino acids from being absorbed during your crucial recovery time.

The Ultimate Supplement would have mega-doses of "pH stabilizers" to keep lactic acid production down, and allow it to be washed out of your system quickly. That gives your amino acids a chance to do their stuff. (It also helps lessen the soreness you feel later!)

PROBLEM #4: Most supplements combine amino acids with everything else in the goop. This ignores a basic nutritional fact. Namely...

Your Muscles Need Amino Acids AFTER Your Workout -- Not During Your Workout!

While you're working out, any precious amino acids you've already ingested are just sitting around, mucking up the process your body is going through. (Ever feel nausea or gas pains in the middle of a set? Could be all those confused amino acids running around wondering what they're doing in your stomach when they're not needed!)

The Ultimate Supplement would take a radical (but completely logical and scientifically-sound) step and...

Separate The Amino Acids From The Fuel!

1) It's not "cost-effective." And since few people don't even understand how important it is to separate the amino acids, they figure they can get away with it.

2) They can't hide the inferior quality of their amino acids if they separate them from the rest of the goop.

3) The flavor. They want their products to be tidy and pleasant-tasting. Amino acids taste, well, peculiar. So if they separated them, they couldn't hide the taste. So they use low doses of low-quality amino acids, and drown them in the goop with chocolate and other artificial flavors.

The Ultimate Supplement would taste good, too, but since the amino acids are separated, that would be easy to do with natural fruit flavors. (Again, no cheap sugars.)

And what makes a high-quality amino acid different from a low-grade one? A process called "hydrolysis." That's the way pure protein is broken down into the "building blocks" of amino acids. It starts to get very expensive to hydrolyze amino acids above 15% -- and that makes Fat Cat manufacturers choke. That's why most products out there hydrolyze their amino acids a mere 4% to 8%! It's cheaper!

But the amino acids are lower quality. The Ultimate Supplement would use amino acids hydrolyzed to 70% and 80%... more than ten times the potency! And the only way to deliver them at that mega-dose is to encase them in tablets. Separate tablets. (And not "gel caps," either. The gel is made of a protein base that can mess up the real amino acids you want in the profile. So stay away from gel caps, all right?)

PROBLEM #5: The poorest quality amino acids look just like the most expensive and most effective when they're simply listed on product labels as "amino acids." How can anyone know how high the quality is?

And the answer is, you can't. You have to trust the manufacturers. And since they know that most bodybuilders know next to nothing about amino acid quality, you can guess what they usually do. Yup. Give you the cheapest amino acids they can get. More profit, you see.

Well, the Ultimate Supplement would not cut corners. The only amino acid worth using is the best one on the market. It's ridiculously expensive. There is only one other amino acid that's better -- and it's only used for medical research. Only government-funded labs can even get it...

That's When I Told John Williams To Stop Right There.

I'd heard enough! Screw the expense, I said. Screw all that juggling with cheaper ingredients just to maximize profit. Screw fancy magazine ads, and most of all, screw the guessing game of being forced to choose from a hundred and one mediocre products without having a clue what's really in them...

I ASKED JOHN TO GO AHEAD AND CREATE THE FORMULA FOR THAT "ULTIMATE SUPPLEMENT" FOR ME... REGARDLESS OF COST!

I wanted him to pack the "fuel primer" with the most effective ingredients available. I wanted the highest-octane energy to burn, the best nutrients to flood my system, and every enzyme, complex, mineral, herb and compound my muscles could ever desire to be there... so I could maximize my power and strength during the most vicious and most satisfying workouts I could handle! I wanted every cell and fibre in my body to be stoked by the luxury of having the best of the best!

I wanted him to go ahead and separate the amino acids -- so they could be

hydrolyzed up to 80%, just as potent and effective as science could make them! I didn't want my precious muscles struggling to repair themselves with inferior materials. I wanted thick, indestructible BRICKS available during my recovery periods to rebuild my muscles with astonishing size and density!

The Result Of All This Is A Brand New Mega-Supplement Especially CUSTOMIZED Just For Bodybuilders, Appropriately Called: SERIOUS GROWTH® SUPPLEMENTS!

Now, I'm going to tell you even more about this amazing supplement in just a moment. But first we need to get very, very clear on something:

THIS POWERFUL SUPPLEMENT IS NOT FOR EVERYBODY!

In fact, there are some people I hope never find out about it. I'm dead serious. This stuff is not for amateurs. It's a custom-designed formula created especially for the kind of athlete who is dedicated to the sport of bodybuilding.

So I'm telling you now -- do not even think about trying this supplement unless:

1) You are serious about packing on pounds of new muscle as quickly as possible...

2) You are willing to continue throwing yourself into smart workouts to take advantage of the incredible high-octane fuel this supplement supplies...

3) You are super health-conscious, and want to experience the FASTEST GAINS POSSIBLE FOR A HUMAN BEING, naturally.

Are you still with me? Good. I am darn proud of this new supplement. It's got more integrity and honest value than anything else I've ever tried -- and I've tried hundreds of different products, friend.

Best of all, the results you can see with SERIOUS GROWTH® are truly fast. Sixty days ago I put myself on a heavy workout regimen, using this supplement for every workout. Here's what happened:

• My neck increased from 18 inches to 20 inches!
• My arms increased from a cold measurement of 18-5/8 to 20-1/2, cold!
• My legs increased from 29 inches (cold) to 31 inches!

What's more, my bench press skyrocketed from 450 lbs. to 525 lbs.! And my squat went from 675 to 700 -- despite a knee injury I've been working off!

And, hey -- remember Tom Platz, that monster and legendary bodybuilder in the other picture on the first page of this letter? Here's what happened to him when we put him on a new regimen using SERIOUS GROWTH® supplements...

"As you may know, I dropped out of competition seven years ago. My weight went down from 230 to 175 lbs. and my overall strength was sapped. Whereas my legs used to be 35 inches in top shape, they had shrunk to 25 inches. Same with my arms and chest.

"When I decided to get back into shape, I knew I would have to make a tremendous comeback in order to be the best.

"And I did.

"I whipped my body back into Olympia shape in such a short time, I was shocked at how fast I made such incredible gains.

"Within seven weeks, my arms were back up to 19-7/8" ... my chest measured 48" ... and my legs were their massive selves again: 35".

"While it took a lot of hard work, hard sweat, and fierce determination to be the best I could be (again), I attribute my outstanding comeback to the muscle-building supplements I used from Optimum Training Systems.

"I mean, I've seen guys make fast gains before, but not that fast!

"I amazed myself, and everybody else around me.

"But I knew it was the special "anabolic driving system" in these highly sophisticated supplements for OTS that made the difference."

Pretty impressive, huh? It gets better. Listen to what these other people have to say about SERIOUS GROWTH®:

"As a physician, when I read the labels of the supplement products on the market I just have to laugh. In some cases swallowing the label would do more than the product itself! I consider SERIOUS GROWTH® to be a major breakthrough in sports nutrition." -- Dr. Donald Blake, M.D., Ontario, California.

"In just two months on SERIOUS GROWTH®, my body fat went down from 7.8% to just 5.06%, and by contest time (Mr. California) I'll be at 3%! This supplement makes it so incredibly easy to reach those goals! I'm harder, my strength is up, and I have so much more energy now. I wouldn't use a supplement before because they aren't worth the money, but SERIOUS GROWTH® is worth every penny!" -- Mark Pavlovich, age 24.

"This stuff is incredible -- it's about 5 times more hydrolyzed than any other product! This is the best supplement on the market, hands down." -- Jon Olson, Age 30 (Winner of Middleweight Mr. Fresno 1990), Personal trainer.

"Wow! So far I've been on it one week and have seen great results. I've gotten more separation and greater mass than ever before. Leo, I'd just like to thank you for changing my life." -- Sean O'Laughlin, Chicago IL

"I AM TOTALLY AMAZED! I have tried other products out there, they don't hold a candle to you... I've put on eight pounds in the last couple of weeks - due to your supplements. Without your help, I would still be slaving away hoping to get big!" -- Mike Hendricks, Dallas TX

Are these people any different than you? I don't think so. They're just hard-working bodybuilders and professionals, men who are so blown away by the results they've seen with this supplement that they're willing to sign their names to a testimonial. It takes a heck of a product to inspire that kind of cooperation.

But let me tell you a little more about this amazing supplement. If you're not a "label reader" already, you should start being one right now. Here is a

list of the most active ingredients in SERIOUS GROWTH® -- go ahead and compare them with whatever glop you're using now (and pay attention to the super-potent doses we've used, too!)

[boxed sidebar, three columns of small type:]

Serious Growth's® Most Active Ingredients

Manganese (1mg). A real bodybuilder nutrient. Eliminates fatigue, and aids in muscle reflexes. The form we use is more expensive than the sulfate form used by other products.

Molybdeaum (35mcg). Metabolizes carbohydrates and fat.

Iron (9mg). Works with Vitamins E and C to eliminate those free radicals, and so prevents fatigue, aids muscle growth, and makes you more resistant to disease.

Selenium (50mcg). Another free-radical scavenger. We combined the typical selenium with a hot little amino acid to improve its performance -- it's a Corvette compared to the Pinto sodium selenite used by other products.

Germanium Sesquioxide (1mg). A relatively new, expensive, and seldom-used (because it's expensive) nutrient that helps recovery and chews up free radicals.

Ferulic Acid (sometimes call FRAC) (25mg). This is a plant sterol similar to gamma oryzanol and octacosanol -- slimmed down in the lab to give you only the most potent features. You've probably seen this product sold separately at very steep prices.

Boron (1.5mg). A trace mineral that helps your system stabilize insulin. Remember, insulin is your body's most effective anabolic hormone -- boron can help you use it for maximum growth potential.

Vanadium (100mcg). Another mineral that assists in insulin stabilization. A cheaper form of this is often used in other products -- you can tell because the cheapie can cause you intestinal irritation.

Dibencozide (5000mcg). A co-enzyme of B/12 that offers you enormous increases in strength and overall muscularity. A problem with dibencozide in other products is that it may not be pure. A kilo of the stuff costs around $30,000 -- more than most guys make in a year! -- and some sleazoids will treat it like a drug and "cut" it with filler. Our lab tests every batch that comes in. The lab techs shake their head, but we insist they put 5000mcg. of pure dibenocozide in every bottle of SERIOUS GROWTH®. (Even at diluted strength, other products have only trace amounts of dibencozide! Yet it's ridiculous to think you could get decent results with such minute portions!)

Co Q-10 (5mg). Not found in most formulas. Expensive, but a free radical killer that can pump more energy into you at a cellular level.

Poly-Lactate (25mg). This is your body's preferred fuel source -- and when it's available in your system, you don't produce as much lactic acid. This means your recovery process is speeded up, and you avoid sore muscles. (Also missing will be that shaky feeling you may have had during and after your workout.)

PAK (Pyridoxine alpha-ketoglutarate) (50mg). This is a special synthesized compound that helps reduce lactic acid by about 27%, which my chemist tells me is phenomenal. It also increases you oxygen intake by up to 67% -- an aid to any workout and recovery phase. Here's something interesting: There are 2 kinds of PAK -- one is British, one American. Each are a little different, so we blend them together to get the best aspects of both. Yet the British version is 6 times more expensive than the U.S. brand. You won't find it in any other American product.

Glucose Polymers. Unlike refined sugar (from candy bars and soda pop and inferior supplements), the glucose polymers we use are the most scientifically-sound form you could use. It does not cause the rocky insulin "crash and burn" response that refined sugar does -- instead, you get a smooth, controlled release of high-octane energy throughout your workout.

Fructose (Crystalline). Combines with glucose polymers by qualified chemists, this stuff delivers a more potent energy "load" to your system. But only when it's used in careful combination with glucose polymers.

Inosine (100mg). Perhaps the most crucial nutrient restoring energy to your cells. When you get depleted of ATP during a workout, you also drain your "phosphate reservoir," causing fatigue. Inosine is essential to restoring your cells to proper chemical balance.

Creatine Phosphate (500mcg). Another fatigue-fighter; replenishes your stores of creatine phosphate that are lost in exercise. You don't ever want to be running on empty.

Burzo Vustanovivyvane (Bulgarian Herbal Complex). These are herbs the Bulgarians found that dramatically accelerate recovery: Achillea Millefolium, Cetraria Islandica, and Onopordon Acanthium. Why Bulgarian herbs? Because, if you'll remember, the Bulgarian weight lifters are the strongest men in the world -- so we insisted on going with the same ingredients they recommend!

OTS Electrolyte/Mineral Complex. This is a complex of Krebs cycle activators and mineral complexers containing: citrates, phosphates, pyruvates, poly-lactates, succinate, aspartates, and malates. The Krebs cycle is part of the ebb and flow of your energy levels. The minerals we use are specifically formulated to blend together and work like a team.

OTS Branch Chain Amino Complex. This is a complex of delicately-balanced free form amino acids in a small amount strictly for slowing down your ammonia build-up during heavy workouts. This small amount of amino acids is not the major protein payload of this supplement -- in fact, if you ingest more than a small amount of protein right before your workout, you'll actually slow down your absorption of everything, the protein and your essential nutrients.

Bulgarian Bees Milk (Royal Jelly). Not bee pollen or bee-propylis. This is the super-potent natural sterol substance fed by drones to the queen bee that allows her to grow so fast. The Bulgarians consider it a staple for bodybuilders. Most Royal Jelly products have been allowed to degrade -- it loses all its potency within 24 hours of harvesting. The Royal Jelly we've used was quick frozen within minutes of harvesting and stabilized, thus preserving its potency. It's expensive, but it's the only way to take advantage of this amazing substance.

Chromium with GTF (Polynicotinate) (200mcg). Without biologically-active chromium in your system, insulin is useless

Serious Growth's® Most Active Ingredients (Continued)

and ineffective at building muscle! (Wow!) That makes this ingredient very important. But perhaps even more crucial is the fact that we've gone out of our way to use the only form of chromium that has the greatest bio-availability to your body. Part of the supplement scandal, you should know, is about the chromium picolinate that's gotten so much coverage in the magazines (and that has been dumped into dozens of products with no thought of effectiveness) -- despite the fact that the picolinate form has difficulty being absorbed into your system, and actually has a tendency to neutralize other key nutrients in your body! This is not good! You want maximized muscle growth, not inhabited muscle growth! It's crazy, but other products just continue to throw their formulas together with no regard for the effects on you, the guy has ingest the goop! My advice is to stay away from any product containing chromium picolinate, okay?

Calcium Complex (500mg). Calcium makes your bones strong, metabolizes the iron in your system, and makes you sleep better. We had to be careful to choose the best (and most active) form of calcium, though -- if we used the inferior stuff (like other products do), it could have interfered with the absorption of other minerals.

Sodium (235mg). Here's how the chemist explains sodium: As part of a complex of Krebs cycle activators and mineral complexers, sodium expedites proper nerve and muscle functions. All I know is you shouldn't confuse this with table salt (sodium chloride). The form we use is a workhorse: It pulls out 10-12% more oxygen from each cell, thus increasing your oxygen capacity. It reduces lactic acid, and buffers the acid in your blood. In addition, this form has been shown to drop your resting heart rate, allowing you to recover 30% faster than normal! On top of that, it also helps rid your system of those dangerous free radicals, thus reducing your muscle soreness.

Magnesium (400mg). For An improved cardiovascular system. We use the most active form available.

Potassium. This is an electrolyte necessary for proper fat digestion.

Zinc (Picolinate) (7.5mg). Decreases cholesterol deposits, and helps with your mental alertness (so you won't drop plates on your foot). Don't be fooled by the less-active forms used by other companies, like zinc gluterate or zinc oxide.

Copper Gluconate (.25mg). Helps your heart contract, and keeps your energy levels high through faster iron absorption. This is more expensive than the commonly-used copper sulfate, but worth the cost because it's more usable in your system.

Vitamin A (2500IU). We use beta carotene for this essential nutrient because it's one of the best anti-oxidants available. (Other products use the less-effective Vitamin A palmitate or Vitamin A acetate.) This antioxidant is important because it acts as a "free-radical scavenger." Free radicals are toxins you produce during workouts that speed up the aging process (!), attack your immune system, and wipe out your endurance. With a high-quality Vitamin A source present; however, these toxins are destroyed and hustled out of your system with minimum fuss. That way you can work out longer and harder, and recover much faster.

Vitamin C (75mg). We use a hot new form of buffered Vitamin C called "Ester C" because it has 400% greater absorption than regular Vitamin C -- so more of it gets into your muscle tissue. It also doesn't create uncomfortable acid in your stomach. (Regular Vitamin C has a tendency to flush out of your system too quickly -- you'll see this when your urine turns bright orange!)

Vitamin D/3 (200IU). Most products cheat and use the cheaper Vitamin D/2, which is a less active form of this essential nutrient. Check your labels.

Vitamin E (50IU). Other products use the synthetic D-L form of Vitamin E to cut costs -- cut they also cut effectiveness!

Vitamin B/1 (Thiamine mononitrate) (750mcg). Lots of good things happen when this nutrient is present: more growth, improved mental attitude, and a smooth-running nervous system and heart. The other guys slack with the highly-reactive hydrochloride form of B/1, which is like a loose canon causing all sort of trouble in your system... including negating the benefits of other nutrients! What good is a cheaper supplement if it's actually hurting you?!

Vitamin B/2 (Riboflavin 5' phosphate) (850mcg). A deficiency in this nutrient could cause a serious crisis in your system -- because you wouldn't be able to metabolize basic carbohydrates, fats and all-important proteins. (It also helps keep your skin and hair healthy!) Using an inferior potency of B/2 is like shooting yourself in the foot -- worse, not even having it could checkmate your gains!

Niacinamide and Niacin (10 mg). For improving blood circulation and reducing cholesterol.

Vitamin B/6 (Pyridoxal 5' phosphate) (24 mg). This form is about five times more expensive than the hydrochloride form other products use, but it's worth the extra cost. Your body can utilize it entirely -- not half-assed -- for the proper assimilation of protein and fat.

Vitamin B/12 (3mcg). For increasing energy and utilizing fats, carbohydrates and protein.

Pantothenic Acid (5mg). Great stuff -- helps to prevent fatigue while you work out.

Biotin (300mcg). For easing muscle pains.

Folic Acid (400mcg). Acts as analgesic for pain.

Choline (Phosphatidyl) (200mcg). This is a fat emulsifier that controls cholesterol buildup, and also eliminates toxins through your liver. There is a nice soothing effect to having this in your system, too. This is the good stuff, with a 100% absorption rate. With other forms such as choline bititrate you only get to use about 30% of its potency.

Inositol (200mcg). A close buddy of choline -- works to burn body fat and lower cholesterol levels, and also nourishes brain cells.

Betaine (200mcg). The chemist tells me there are two different forms of betaine, and most products use the cheaper form, which closely resembles hydrochloric acid. We use a crystal form that is superior.

Now Let's Look At The Amino Acid Complex In This Astonishing Supplement!

Match our label against any other product in existence. You simply will not find a more powerful, or more potent amino acid complex. It's formulated to rush into your system during your recovery time, and provide unbelievable STACKS of the

crucial "building blocks" your muscles need to increase in size, strength and density. Here's the profile:

[boxed sidebar:]

Amino Acid Profile:

• L-Lysine ... 135mg
• Glycine ... 20mg
• L-Histidine ... 28mg
• L-Cysteine ... 9mg
• Larginine ... 75mg
• L-Valine ... 90mg
• L-Aspartic ... 70mg
• L-Methionine ... 29mg
• L-Threonine ... 37mg
• L-Isoleucine ... 78mg
• L-Serine ... 48mg
• L-Leucine ... 200mg
• L-Glutamic ... 208mg
• L-Tyrosine ... 50mg
• L-Proline ... 103mg
• L-Phenylalanine ... 47mg
• L-Alanine ... 125mg
• L-Tryptophan ... 12mg

This profile is (according to the chemist) a branched-chain enhanced pancreatic digest of casein and di- and tri-peptides with free-form amino acids and L-Carnitine and L-Ornithine in a base of Vitamin C (Ester C), Mexican Cactus Powder, and Vitamin B/6. Got that?

What's really important, of course, is the results this profile offers you. The main benefit amino acids give you is protein synthesis -- making the protein in your body work effectively to stimulate muscle growth. But for this to happen, your system must be in a state of "positive nitrogen balance"; therefore, the amino acids are necessary to provide the nitrogen.

Let me explain: Recent studies show that maximum muscle gains are made when your body (because you're a bodybuilder) is in a state of "highly positive nitrogen balance." So that's how we formulated our amino acid profile -- to give you exactly that highly positive nitrogen balance. Alanine, therefore, is in super-abundant supply (125mg -- more than most other products by a long shot). Leucine is also there in a big payload -- because it's perhaps the "key" amino acid for really spectacular muscle growth. L-Carnitine acts like the "shuttle" for the rest of the branched chain. L-Ornithine is death on ammonia in your cells. And the Mexican cactus powder works wonders on helping you retain nitrogen, by slowing down the breakdown of the amino acids until they've done their job.

Well, there you have it.

I've Just Given You The Top-Secret Formula For The Most Expensive Bodybuilding Supplement In Existence!

But I'm not worried. No one is going to be ripping us off soon, because -- in every possible instance -- we took the most expensive and most time-consuming path to creating this SERIOUS GROWTH® supplement. Who's going to want to spend the time -- and the money -- tracking down exotic nutrient blends that cost 4 and 5 times as much as the cheap stuff they're used to using... fighting Customs bringing in the more expensive overseas versions of powerful ingredients... putting in 10 times the amount of stuff like dibencozide, when only a pinch lets them legally mention it on their labels... traveling to Bulgaria for quick-frozen Royal Jelly... or processing and re-processing the formulation until it's absolutely certain all ingredients are working at peak efficiency?

I'll tell you who -- no one but us.

And I'll tell you something else we did. We found one of the most sophisticated and modern and well-equipped laboratories in the country to do our formulating. (No, I'm not going to tell you where it is -- this is a secret we intend to keep away from our competitors forever!)

What's so important about his lab? Well, for one thing, it creates much of the

custom formulas for Olympic and professional athletes, so it knows it's way around a quality formula. For another thing, it has a special drug-manufacturing license that keeps them under the restrictive scrutiny of the FDA and state licensing boards -- this lab runs a squeaky-clean operation. This makes a big difference -- because most plants that make supplements only have a food-processing license... which means they are not required to have trained, licensed chemists on staff!

The chemists that create SERIOUS GROWTH® supplements, on the other hand, are fully-licensed and trained in pharmaceuticals, which allows them to actually create much of the unique ingredients used in the supplement! This eliminates the reliance most labs have on outside sources -- sources that are too-often tempted to dilute the potency, or mishandle the ingredients.

It Does You No Good At All To Drink Goop Full Of Oxidized Ingredients That Have Died Somewhere Between The Manufacturer And Your Stomach!

The fact is, a lot of the goop on the market today is crammed with ingredients that may have been what the label says they are at one time, but have been altered during formulation or storage... and lost all of their potency!

At the lab we use, every batch of ingredients that comes in is checked... and then double-checked to verify its potency and identity. Every once in a while a barrel of Vitamin C or something equally crucial will arrive from the manufacturer that isn't what it says it is -- and our lab sends it right back. Those food-processing plants that make the other supplements? They wouldn't know if it was real Vitamin C or baking soda. It would just go into the goop.

And here's an interesting little tidbit: The head chemist at our lab was so impressed with the formulation we presented to him...

He Sent The Supplement To His Son To Use!

He said it was the first "real" supplement he'd ever seen that was worth anything -- most other products he'd worked on were poorly designed, and hardly worth the bother. (His son, by the way, trains Navy search-and-rescue teams, pushing them out of helicopters into freezing Arctic water -- where, even with a survival suit, you have less than 15 minutes to live. That's quite a testament to the trust he puts in our supplement.)

Now for the next question I'm sure is on your mind...

How Much Does The SERIOUS GROWTH® Supplement Cost?

Well, I'll tell you -- it doesn't cost anywhere near as much as it should, considering the immense amount of trouble and expense we went to create it. If we had kept this supplement just as a custom job for rich professional athletes (which we considered doing), we could have charged them almost anything we wanted. The product gets results, and pros will pay anything for results.

You can't find SERIOUS GROWTH® for any amount in any nutrition store. Nor can you find anything even remotely similar, anywhere. This is a one-of-a-kind formulation.

But one thing I am not, is greedy. We aren't running some mega-dumb corporation here. My office is in a back room of my gym in the small farming community of Visalia, California (population: 70,000). Any ads we've run for the Serious Growth® or the Advanced Big Beyond Belief™ System have been plain old Black-and-White ads -- no fancy graphics, few color pictures, just the basic information on what we have and how you can get it. Heck, even our logo and labels are hand-made -- done on a small computer in my friend Bob's office.

I didn't create this supplement just to take your money! I created it because...

The Sport NEEDED It!

Bodybuilders are big guys, and we need big supplements, brimming with more ingredients and nutrients and fuel sources than any other athlete on the planet would ever require in ten years.

It just happens that the best and most effective ingredients are expensive to put into a supplement in the doses and potencies necessary. In fact, just making this supplement costs me more than the total cost you'd pay for other supplements out there!

I'm telling you this because, even though this is without question the most expensive supplement ever formulated for bodybuilders (or any other athlete, for that matter), our profit is nevertheless very small. We don't need a lot, because we're not running a big show here in the wilds of Visalia. Other companies bump the price of their products -- shamelessly -- up to 500%! And I don't feel that's fair. The profit on our supplement is a fraction of that, and I don't care what the "experts" say.

So, do you want it? Good. If I didn't believe, deep in my heart, that you would want to try this SERIOUS GROWTH® supplement, I wouldn't have bothered writing to you.

One More Thing -- It's Important!

We've actually created two levels of the Ultimate Supplement for you. First there is SERIOUS GROWTH®. This is the most effective amino acid delivery system available. We couldn't make it any better if we wanted to. It is THE BEST. The best always carries a hefty price tag along with it, the SERIOUS GROWTH® Supplement is probably the most expensive bodybuilding supplement on the planet.

Once we created SERIOUS GROWTH® we put John Williams to the task of creating a more affordable version that still packed a super-powerful punch. Hence, by removing just a few exotic and expensive ingredients and leaving virtually everything else the same, (the same rate of hydrolysis, the same active and bio-available nutrients), we developed CRITICAL MASS™. I've used them both, and in my opinion, SERIOUS GROWTH® packs about 15 to 18% more punch than the latter. I predict the newly arrived CRITICAL MASS™ Supplement will be our most popular product -- largely because of the lower price (almost half) -- while SERIOUS GROWTH® is used by the professionals and those who are aspiring to be professionals. To clue you in, what many of our test clients are doing is this, they use CRITICAL MASS™ most of the time, then they use SERIOUS GROWTH® during those periods of extreme rigorous training (like heavy leg and back workouts) when they need that extra help with recovery.

The price per unit of SERIOUS GROWTH® is $94.80 plus $5 shipping and handling\ (total: $99.80). The price per unit of CRITICAL MASS™ is $47.80 plus $5 shipping and handling\ (total: $52.80). You can use your credit card and call 1-800-582-2083 today. (Ask for department SG-03). That's a toll-free call, and your order will be rush-shipped to you by outgoing first-class mail. Or, if you prefer, you can simply fill out the ORDER FORM below, then cut it out and mail it with your check or money order (payable to OTS) to:

Optimum Training Systems 2945 South Mooney Blvd., Dept. SG-03 Visalia, CA 93277

You'll get the same rush-shipment just as soon as we receive your order.

Please don't put this off. You can see by what other guys are saying that this is truly and honestly the real thing. If you're as serious about bodybuilding as I am, then you're gonna want to try SERIOUS GROWTH® just as soon as possible -- you'll feel the results almost immediately... after your first few workouts! In fact, if you're working out as hard as I think you are, the results you see will astonish you and put the "fear" into your friends. This stuff is that powerful. So call today.

I honestly hope to hear from you today.

Sincerely,

[signature: Leo Costa Jr.]

Leo Costa, Jr.

P.S. One more thing -- it's important. Because this supplement is so customized (there isn't another formulation like it in the world) and so expensive to make, we do not keep a large supply of it on hand -- it's just too darned expensive for us to do that. Instead, we have a close relationship with the lab to make sure we're well-stocked to handle expected orders. But even so, sometimes we get so swamped with unexpected orders (some guys order 10 units at a time!) that we fall behind a little bit. So I urge you to order NOW (1-800-582-2083) and avoid any wait you might have if we're forced to run a new batch to fill orders. Thanks.

[scissors icon] Clip out this coupon and send it in today!

PRIORITY ORDER FORM!

For the Fastest Service Use Your Credit Card And Call Toll-FREE 1-800-582-2083 (Ask for Department SG-03)

• ☑ YES! I'm ready to use the most advanced and effective nutritional supplement, that's especially customized for my needs as a serious bodybuilder! Please rush me the following order:

• ☐ Send _____ unit(s) of Serious Growth®, at $94.80, plus $5.00 shipping & handling\* (Total: $99.80) per unit -- Total amount enclosed: $_____
• ☐ Send _____ unit(s) of Critical Mass™, at $47.80, plus $5.00 shipping & handling\* (Total: $52.80) per unit. -- Total amount enclosed: $_____

\*$5.00 S&H for FIRST UNIT ONLY. Add just $3.00 S&H for each additional unit.

• ☐ Enclosed is my check or money order (payable to O.T.S.).
• ☐ I prefer to pay by credit card. Please charge my:
• ☐ Visa ☐ MasterCard ☐ AmExpress ☐ Discover

Card #: ____________ Expires: ______

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Please Ship my order to:

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Optimum Training Systems • 2945 S. Mooney Blvd., Dept. SG-03 • Visalia, CA 93277

California & Virginia residents add appropriate sales tax. Foreign orders must pay additional shipping and handling. Call 1-209-732-5378 for details.