Muscle Building Basics - 4 Steps to Growth
Sunday, 07.01.2007, 11:50am (GMT)
If you want to build serious muscle you need to learn the basics and
apply them. The bodybuilding and fitness industry has become
overpopulated with websites marketing everything from expensive
supplements to weekend certificate "experts" pushing the latest fitness
hype.
How do you know what to truly believe in the fitness community when such a vast array of conflicting information exists?
Isn't it time you learned the muscle building facts and avoid the
common pitfalls? In this article you will learn just that, the simple
muscle building basics, guaranteed to catapult your muscle gains! Let's
get started...
Are you making progress in the gym?
Has your strength stalled?
Has your muscle gains plateaued?
Are you tired of putting forth 100% effort in your training program, only to be stuck at a complete standstill?
If you are frustrated with your lack of energy, strength, and development you could be overlooking some simple and basic steps.
Mind you, these are steps you may already know, but when you get caught
up in your training and nutrition, it's easy to lose sight of the
basics that produce results.
So, let's take a step back and rebuild your training program so it's effective.
Refrain from Overtraining – Sure, as a fitness person or bodybuilder
you have heard this term time and time again. In fact, you have heard
it so much that you know you are not a candidate of overtraining.
Overtraining is simply lacking necessary rest between workouts. Why is
resting between workouts important? The body rebuilds and grows when
it's allowed to rest. If you fail to receive sufficient rest between
workouts, your muscles cannot rebuild into a stronger and denser unit.
If you have been hitting the iron 5-6 days a week, cutting your
training down to 3-4 days a week may be just the recipe your body needs
to overcome your plateau and start growing.
Keep it Basic - Muscle growth is a result of force against weight. This
simply means that high repetitions with light to moderate weight
results in muscle endurance while employing low repetitions with heavy
weight results in muscle growth.
Hypertrophy occurs when a muscle uses its maximum amount of power to conquer a greater resistance.
To put it simply, maximum overload results in muscle growth.
Add Variety – Your body can adapt to general heavy weight with low
repetitions at times so every eight weeks or so it's good to change
things up, such as poundage, repetitions, tempo, etc.
Great training principles to include breaking a plateau include:
German volume training
Super sets
Giant sets
Tri-sets
Drop sets
Negatives
And so on
Adding a variety of training principles will not only prevent boredom,
but can also pull you through a training rut and even spark new growth.
Know Your Limits – Hypertrophy is a result of anaerobic training
intensity, as previously discussed. However, bad training form using
heavy poundage takes stress off the targeted muscle and brings other
muscles into play, which can result in injury.
Do not jerk or swing your weights or hold your breath. You must stay in control of each and every repetition.
A proper lift is using textbook form. With each repetition you should
concentrate on both the concentric and eccentric motion as well as the
contraction point. In addition, breathing is an important component of
lifting properly.
When you can no longer execute a repetition with proper form, either stop or get the assistance of a spotter.
Conclusion
Now that you are armed with some basic muscle building tips, you are
better equipped to tackle your next training session for better muscle
gains.
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