How To Gain Muscle Naturally… No Steroids Necessary!
Wondering how to gain muscle? There are many fads, gimmicks and “quick fixes” to be found, but there is really only one healthy way to gain muscle mass. You don’t need to be gifted with great genetics or use potentially dangerous illegal hormones or steroids.
The “how to gain muscle” question has a relatively simple two-step process:
1) increase your caloric intake, and
2) workout. This combination will provide the desired results.
Don’t be embarrassed to look in the mirror! You CAN have the body that you strive to achieve. When you first begin thinking about how to gain muscle, the first instinct may be “But I don’t want to gain fat”. Losing fat and gaining muscle mass are two different objectives, and are tackled in two different ways. At this point you have to realize that dieting and exercising to lose weight is different than dieting and exercising to gain muscle.
In gaining muscle mass, the caloric intake must be increased. You have to take in more calories that your body is used to: take in more proteins and fats-your body has no choice but to gain weight. While nutritional supplements may be utilized, this should NOT be used as a substitute for a healthy diet. The increased calories are then offset by working out with weights in order to achieve the increased muscle mass you desire. This workout will stimulate growth by “overloading” the muscles. The combination of caloric building blocks (which help rebuild and repair muscle tissue) along with the increase workout.
If you are among the millions who constantly try to gain weight and build muscle mass, remember that a firm commitment, the proper diet, and a good weight-training regimen are the best ways to succeed in reaching your goal. A muscle mass building diet includes plenty of protein and enough calories to promote weight gain.
A good place to start is to multiply your current weight by 18. This number will give you a rough idea of how many calories your body needs in a day to bulk up. If you are extremely active, play sports, or have a faster than average metabolism, you may need to increase your caloric intake even more. A muscle building diet requires a lot of effort on your part. It’s not easy to consume enough calories in three meals per day. A good suggestion would be to eat several small meals each day rather than three large ones.
Protein is a critical element in any mass building diet. Ideally, you should eat one and a half grams of protein per pound of body weight. While this seems like a lot of protein, spread over several small meals each day it will be a lot easier to meet this goal. Fish, poultry, eggs, and lean red meat are excellent sources of protein. Lots of fresh vegetables and simple carbohydrates combined with plenty of protein should allow you to meet your calorie quota each day. The best muscle building diet is a combination of consuming adequate calories and the proper types of foods.
Let’s break down and simplify this important aspect of bodybuilding. You basically need to understand three things about nutrition:
• The main purpose for each of the three macronutrients: Protein, carbohydrates, and fat
• The “right” ratio, or the “correct” percentages, of protein, carbohydrates, and fat that your food should be divided into in order to meet your bodybuilding goals
• The number of calories you should consume to meet your specific physique-enhancement goals
Good nutrition seems much easier when it is broken down and you look it at from that perspective, doesn’t it? But what do the three macronutrients do for our bodies? What ratio of our food should be allocated to protein, carbohydrates, and fat? How do I determine how many calories I should eat? I’ll answer those questions—and a whole lot more.
Those questions about nutrition provide a wide range of answers that are not necessarily easy to find. But, with experimentation, patience, and persistence , you’ll eventually figure out what’s best to help you reach your personal goals. Unfortunately, there are no easier ways around this fact. There are no magic numbers, solutions, or formulas that I, nor anyone else, can give you to make the process effortless—no matter what you are told. These answers not only vary from person to person, they also can vary within the very same person during different periods of time.
The “how to gain muscle” question has a relatively simple two-step process:
1) increase your caloric intake, and
2) workout. This combination will provide the desired results.
Don’t be embarrassed to look in the mirror! You CAN have the body that you strive to achieve. When you first begin thinking about how to gain muscle, the first instinct may be “But I don’t want to gain fat”. Losing fat and gaining muscle mass are two different objectives, and are tackled in two different ways. At this point you have to realize that dieting and exercising to lose weight is different than dieting and exercising to gain muscle.
In gaining muscle mass, the caloric intake must be increased. You have to take in more calories that your body is used to: take in more proteins and fats-your body has no choice but to gain weight. While nutritional supplements may be utilized, this should NOT be used as a substitute for a healthy diet. The increased calories are then offset by working out with weights in order to achieve the increased muscle mass you desire. This workout will stimulate growth by “overloading” the muscles. The combination of caloric building blocks (which help rebuild and repair muscle tissue) along with the increase workout.
If you are among the millions who constantly try to gain weight and build muscle mass, remember that a firm commitment, the proper diet, and a good weight-training regimen are the best ways to succeed in reaching your goal. A muscle mass building diet includes plenty of protein and enough calories to promote weight gain.
A good place to start is to multiply your current weight by 18. This number will give you a rough idea of how many calories your body needs in a day to bulk up. If you are extremely active, play sports, or have a faster than average metabolism, you may need to increase your caloric intake even more. A muscle building diet requires a lot of effort on your part. It’s not easy to consume enough calories in three meals per day. A good suggestion would be to eat several small meals each day rather than three large ones.
Protein is a critical element in any mass building diet. Ideally, you should eat one and a half grams of protein per pound of body weight. While this seems like a lot of protein, spread over several small meals each day it will be a lot easier to meet this goal. Fish, poultry, eggs, and lean red meat are excellent sources of protein. Lots of fresh vegetables and simple carbohydrates combined with plenty of protein should allow you to meet your calorie quota each day. The best muscle building diet is a combination of consuming adequate calories and the proper types of foods.
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The Three Most Important Keys To Understanding Effective Bodybuilding Nutrition
• The main purpose for each of the three macronutrients: Protein, carbohydrates, and fat
• The “right” ratio, or the “correct” percentages, of protein, carbohydrates, and fat that your food should be divided into in order to meet your bodybuilding goals
• The number of calories you should consume to meet your specific physique-enhancement goals
Good nutrition seems much easier when it is broken down and you look it at from that perspective, doesn’t it? But what do the three macronutrients do for our bodies? What ratio of our food should be allocated to protein, carbohydrates, and fat? How do I determine how many calories I should eat? I’ll answer those questions—and a whole lot more.
Those questions about nutrition provide a wide range of answers that are not necessarily easy to find. But, with experimentation, patience, and persistence , you’ll eventually figure out what’s best to help you reach your personal goals. Unfortunately, there are no easier ways around this fact. There are no magic numbers, solutions, or formulas that I, nor anyone else, can give you to make the process effortless—no matter what you are told. These answers not only vary from person to person, they also can vary within the very same person during different periods of time.
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How to Get Six Pack Abs
Over the years I have seen a lot of flimsy ideas of how to get a set of six pack abs. The most common scams are special machines that will do it and sometimes some kind of drink. I remember at one point Slim Fast seemed to be showing chubby people suddenly spawning a set of six pack abs.
Anyway I wanted to put this notion to rest that there is some magic to getting a six pack. Sure there is some genetics involved in sculpting perfect abs but the two most important factors are diet and exercise.
What? Did you think there was a shortcut?
The diet part is fairly simple; you need to drop any extra fat. You have probably heard this before but there is no such thing as spot reduction when you are losing weight. You will lose weight proportionately, generally, as you lose weight. What you may find is that you have a large stomach and if that is the case of course you will lose that fat faster than you lose the fat on your legs but that is just because that is where the fat deposits will be easiest for your body to use.
As you probably know from reading other posts of mine I subscribe to the idea that people eat too many carbohydrates generally but I still do not support the Atkins diet generally. I believe that you must increase your protein to 20% of your diet, keep fats at about 20% of the calories of your diet and then have carbs as the other 60% of the calories of your diet. If you still have trouble losing you may be a bit sensitive to carbohydrates and you can up the protein a little.
As for exercise, to get a set of six pack abs you will have to do two things; get in an hour of cardio a day to increase your metabolism and start really dropping the fat and secondly make sure that you do your abdominal exercises at the start of your workouts.
For cardio exercise it does not really matter what kind of cardio exercise you get but it is always best to vary your exercise so that you do not overtrain any one muscle group. I never see people speak of this in regards to cardio training but I have found in the past with my bicycling that when I am riding a lot my legs get sore but the rest of my body recovers fine. So maybe try to alternate some kind of biking, swimming, hiking, running, brisk walking and even using a rowing machine if you have a chance. Do cardio almost every day, five or six days a week is good, seven days a week is pushing it a little too much in my eyes.
Next is the abdominal exercises themselves. There are three places to target for your abdominals, the obliques, which are on your sides, your upper abdominals and your lower abdominals. Doing abdominal exercises is something that some people believe you should do every day but I really believe you are doing well if you just do them every second day or three days a week.
For your obliques you can do twists. Simply sit on a bench with you body straight up and down and put some kind of a light bar or broomstick across your shoulders and then do twists twist from one side to the other as far as you can go for two sets of 100 reps. The key is to not use much weight at all as gaining muscle on your obliques will widen your midsection which is not something most people want to do.
To work your upper abdominals you want to do some kind of sit ups or crunches. I am more a fan of crunches as they are easier on your neck and mower back. Lie on your back with your legs up on the seat of a chair so that your legs are at a 90 degree angle to your body and then just lift your shoulders a few inches of the ground and then let them down again. This should put stress on your abs and you should feel it pretty intensely after just a few reps. be sure to do this exercise slowly and for at least three sets of 30 reps.
To work your lower abdominals you need to do something that raises your legs in the air as opposed to lifting your upper body into the air. The exercise that I prefer for this is a kind of reverse crunch that I do not have a name for. I lie flat on my back and hold something behind my head to keep my upper body stable and then I just bring my knees up towards my chest and back down to the ground again. If you get really strong this way you can try just lifting your legs straight out and up but sadly I am not that strong.
If you follow this plan you will se results very quickly and depending on how much fat you have to lose you can see rock hard abs fairly quickly. The other great thing about strengthening your abs besides looking better is the fact that strengthening your core makes you stronger overall and help out with your balance and even your stamina.
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Bodybuilding 101: The Total Body Workout
The trend in bodybuilding over the past many years has been to train one body part at a time, once a week. While this protocol can be very effective, it often can lead to overtraining and it requires a heavy commitment of time. If you find yourself too busy to make it to the gym 5-6 times per week or you feel that your body is overtrained and you need a refreshing change, the total body workout may be just the thing you need.
At first you may wonder how you can ever work your whole body in one workout. After all, most people are so accustomed to performing 4-5 exercises per body part for around 12-20 sets that they cannot imagine properly training a body part with anything less. This mindset must be opened up. In working your whole body in one workout, you will be performing only 1-2 exercises and 4-6 sets per body part. However, the training frequency will be 3 times per week.
The total body workout involves a focus on basic, multi-joint movements. These exercises stimulate the most response from the body in terms of not only the muscle fibres recruited, but also in the release of the necessary hormones to promote muscular growth. Also, working all major muscle groups in one session will have a synergistic effect on your body’s response to the training session. In short, your body should respond well to this type of training, especially if it is a drastic change from what you have been currently doing.
The key is to keep the training sessions relatively short (less than one hour) and intense. Work the large muscle groups first (legs, chest, and back) and then the smaller muscle groups (shoulders and arms). By focusing on basic, compound movements you will provide your body with the maximum recruitment of muscle fibres in the shortest amount of time. For example, when you train chest with bench or incline presses, you are also recruiting heavy work from the shoulders (especially the front deltoids) and triceps. This is efficient training. Combined with sufficient intensity, it will create really good results.
With this program, leg training simply cannot be neglected. The simple old-fashioned barbell squat is the best bodybuilding exercise, period. Regular intense squats performed in good form will stimulate muscular growth over your whole body. As a matter of fact, most individuals would benefit from a routine focused on just squats, deadlifts, bench, bentover rows, and chins. These exercises work because they stimulate muscle growth. These are what the old-time greats focused on. So do them.
Here are the exercises recommended for the Total Body Workout:
Quads: Squats, Leg Press, Hack Squats
Chest: Bench press, Incline press, dips (presses may be performed with dumbbells or barbells)
Back: Deadlifts, Chins, Pulldowns, Bentover Rows, T-Bar Rows
For a sample workout, simply choose 1-2 of these basic movements for each body part and perform no greater than 6 sets. For example, a workout could consist of squats for 5×5, bench press for 3×8, incline press for 3×8, chins for 3×10 and bentover rows for 3×8. You get the idea? It’s pretty straightforward. By the way, a 5×5 or 3×8 protocols works really well for the total body workout.
You can follow these basic movements with the following isolation exercises:
Hamstrings: Lying or seated ham curls
Calves: Seated or standing calf raises
Shoulders: Shoulder Press (dumbbell or barbell), lateral or front raises
Arms: Dumbell or preacher curls, lying triceps extension, triceps pushdowns
Abs: Crunches
For the routine, simply choose 2-3 of these muscle groups and perform 2-3 sets of your favourite isolation exercise. The next workout, do the other 2-3 muscle groups. For example, if you did shoulders and arms one workout (at the end of your legs, chest, back routine) do hams, calves and abs the next workout.
The total body workout should be performed 3 times per week on alternate days. A Monday-Wednesday-Friday routine works well and it leaves the weekends free for you weekend warriors. The important thing is to remember never to do the same exercise twice in a row. So if you did squats, barbell bench and chins and barbell rows on Monday, change it to leg press, dumbbell incline press, pulldowns and deadlifts on Wednesday. This is an easy routine to follow.
If you are looking to get maximum results with limited time, this routine rocks! If you are looking for a change or something new to stimulate new growth and strength, the total body workout could be just the ticket. Give it a try – you may just love it! Now get to the gym and train with intensity!
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Bodybuilding: Helpful Tips
With any sport, hobby, or special interest, there are always some little tips and tricks that can make a big (or little) difference. The same is true for the sport of bodybuilding. There are some little things that you can do that can really help you out. The following are a few things that I do that have really helped me over the years. You might find that these tips are what you need as well.
1. Have a post-workout shake as soon as possible after your workout.
This is critical to assisting your body repair and recover from your workout. It will also help you tremendously in the area of muscle gains. Bring your shake to the gym with you and drink it while the sweat is still on your body. Use whey protein (isolate is best) as it absorbs very quickly. Also use some fruit (bananas are excellent) or fruit juice. Add creatine to voluminize your cells and glutamine to assist in tissue repair.
What I have done for years is keep a small container of whey protein powder in my gym backpack and just mix up a shake with water using my water bottle. I add creatine and glutamine and eat a banana with it or an apple. Sometime I’ll even have a couple of cookies. The important thing is to get some sugary carbs into you with your protein. This will replace the depleted glycogen stores from your workout.
Do this on a regular basis and you will notice an improvement. Actually, it’s really a no-brainer. What could be easier?
2. Have a coffee before you train.
If you don’t like coffee, take some caffeine in another form. This will give you a little boost and help you get through your workout. This is especially effective if you train early in the morning or right after a long day at work.
By the way, caffeine is a fat burner but it is also a diuretic so make sure you drink lots of water. This leads me to the next tip:
3. Drinks lots of water.
Always have water with you and keep hydrated. Pretty simple. Enough said.
4. Listen to your body.
If you are feeling tired, sore, have aching joints, or you are having trouble sleeping at night, you could be overtraining. So take a day off. Also, make sure you take two days off in a row often so give your body a chance to rest and repair. I would say to make sure you take two days off in a row every 2-3 weeks at least.
If an exercise doesn’t “feel” right, don’t do it. Do something else. Use exercises that feel good to you, ones that enable you to feel the muscle group you are working. Nothing is worse than having to perform a movement that you hate doing. This could lead to injury and just plain boredom.
5. Use straps for pulling exercise like chins, pulldowns and rows.
This will allow you to keep pulling with your lats and prevent you from having to terminate a set prematurely because your forearms fatigue.
6. Keep trying to get stronger and lift more weight.
This is especially significant for the basic, heavy movements that you perform on a regular basis, right? I’m talking about squats, deadlifts, chins, bench presses, incline presses, dips, rows, etc. Set goals and maintain steady progress forwards. The body has incredible adaptive capabilities and to keep getting results, you will have to keep challenging it. The next tip follows from this point.
7. Change your routines often.
I try never to do the same workout twice in a row. Keep shocking your muscles. Don’t allow your body to adapt to any set routine. Use different exercises, set and rep patterns, do things in a different order. This is good for your motivation as well. Variety is the spice of life. So change things up.
8. Have fun.
Enjoy your workouts. Relish the pumped up feeling of your muscles. Get addicted to the good vibrations you experience after a good workout. The sense of accomplishment and the positive feedback you get from your friends and loved ones when they see the changes in your physique and your mindset.
9. Get a training partner.
A good partner will motivate you, provide support and so on and so on. It’s also a two-way street so your partner will benefit from your help as well. It’s a win/win situation and it could be the best thing for your training.
There are 9 tips. As I was writing this, I could think of a few more, but I don’t want to be guilty of information overload. I hope that you take some of this advice to heart, give it a try and see if it works for you. Sometimes, it’s the little things that make all the difference.
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7 Reasons Why Your Muscles Stop Growing – How To Get Muscle To Grow Again
Have ever wondered why your muscles stopped growing after a few months of training even though you are training very hard? Here are 7 reasons why your muscles stopped growing and how to get your muscle to grow again.
• You are training too hard – Every time when you train your muscles intensely, you are actually breaking down your muscles. So your muscles need to recover from the damages you inflicted on them. So train each muscle group only once or at most twice a week.
• You are training too long – Keep your workout intense but do not workout more than an hour each time. After 45 minutes of intensive training, your cortisol level will increase. This hormone is known to destroy muscle cells.
• You are sleeping too little – You need to sleep more for good muscle growth. Your muscles grow when you sleep. So sleep more than 8 hours a day and watch those muscles growing fast.
• You are abusing alcohol – Alcohol is known to break down muscle mass plus many other body destruction ability.
• You do not change your workout routine – You must change your workout routine every 6-8 weeks. Your muscles adapt to your routine and stops growing.
• You do not progressively overload your muscles – You must try to increase your reps or weight every time you next train a particular muscle group. Otherwise, there is no reason for your muscles to grow.
• You do not eat sufficient protein – If you want to build bigger muscles, you must eat more protein. Protein is the building block for your muscles. It is recommended that you need 1 gram of protein per pound of your body weight equivalent. If not enough protein is consumed with your normal diet, do supplement with protein shakes.
There you are, the 7 reasons why your muscles stopped growing even though you are training hard. There are many more methods on how to grow your muscles bigger but these 7 reasons and how to overcome them will be sufficient for an average bodybuilding beginner.
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Body Building Basics – Building a Better Body you can be Proud of!
There are as many varied opinions on what “plan” one should follow to build muscle, as there are people who have those opinions. On one thing they do agree, however. You must have a regimen.
· You can begin by defining your objective.
· Why are you interested in body building?
· What do you hope to accomplish?
· What is your ultimate goal?
It’s all about commitment and belief. There is an abundance of information about how to begin and conduct your journey, but without a burning desire to achieve, you are doomed to inevitable failure.
The following tips are not intended to be a “one size fits all.” Take from it what you will. In that light, consider the following list:
1. Before beginning any serious weight lifting or body building regimen, consult your physician.
2. Set your goals. Define what you expect to achieve with your new bodybuilding campaign within a realistic time frame. If you create goals that are unattainable you are setting yourself up for failure. You can become bored, disappointed and disillusioned to the point where you may give up. This is a very sad outcome to what might have been the best decision of your life. Don’t sell yourself short. Set your long-term goals, of course, but also set short-term goals that are achievable. And, don’t forget to reward yourself when you do achieve them.
3. Consider the costs.If you don’t already have a budget, create one. Then, determine what amount of discretionary funds you have available for your bodybuilding program. This will determine whether you can afford to have a home gym or if your needs would better be served by joining a club. Joining a club is still a good short-term introduction before spending hundreds or thousands of dollars on equipment that might not be appropriate for your needs.
4. Don’t forget some of the low cost alternatives to purchasing your bodybuilding equipment. If used equipment is still functional why spend the extra dollars just for a little glitz! Good, brand name used equipment is every bit as functional as something right off a showroom floor.
5. Consider combining a home gym along with a membership in a public facility. Purchase less expensive free weight equipment for use at home and join a gym to have access to the more expensive equipment. You can design your entire workout routines around a combination such as this.
6. Eat healthy! This can’t be stressed enough. The only true bodybuilding aids are good nutrition. Consult a licensed dietician. Watch your local community calendar for free seminars on diet and nutrition. Learn all you can about what nature freely provides that can help you to develop a healthy diet.
7. If you choose to use dietary supplements, make certain that you know what you are putting in your body. Follow the packaging guidelines we outlined above. Ask your physician for his/her recommendations based on the regimen you have selected. No friend, coach or acquaintance can take the place of your physician. In fact, you may even investigate finding a physician who specializes in sports wellness.
8. Be kind to yourself. Yes, it’s important to push to achieve your goals, but it’s very easy to tip the scales in the other direction and create a nightmare for yourself. Obsessive, compulsive behaviors are not conducive to a healthy bodybuilding lifestyle.
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Build Big Strong Shoulder Muscles For V Shape Upper Body – Build Big Deltoids
Most people think that in order to get that V shaped upper body like comic book super heroes, they only have to develop big broad back muscles and lats. Well, by having broad back muscles and well developed lats is only part of the equation to get a V shape upper body. For complete V shape upper body development, you will also need to build a powerful chest, big strong shoulder muscles or commonly called deltoids or delts for short and a slim waist.
We shall discuss how to build big shoulder muscles in this article. You see, you may have a wonderful six pack abs or well defined chest muscles, but when you are in your street clothes, no one can see them. But if you have that massive V shape with bulging shoulder muscles, your body frame will tell the world that under those clothes is a well defined body of a gym warrior.
As with building any muscles in your body, intensity is the key to building big deltoids. Your shoulder muscles are made up primarily of the anterior deltoid (front delt), medial deltoid (middle delt) and posterior deltoid (back delt). All 3 parts of your shoulder muscles must be targeted to build well defined and big strong deltoids that threaten to burst through your shirt. The problem here is that most people do not know that they must work on all 3 shoulder muscles and do most shoulder workouts by just concentrating on the anterior delts with exercises such as military press. Furthermore, working only on anterior delts could lead to over training your shoulder muscles because many other exercises like the bench press, dips and push ups also recruit shoulder muscles for its movements.
Your should be careful when working on your shoulder muscle exercises as your shoulders joints are very susceptible to injuries and therefore proper form in executing the exercises is crucial. Don’t let bad exercise form cause you injuries that may be permanent and put you out of the gym forever. One common injury prone exercise is the narrow grip upright row. Although this is a great trapezius and shoulder muscle exercise, it should be avoided because this exercise invokes unnatural and awkward shoulder joint movement.
So what exercises are good for building big strong deltoids? Well, besides the military presses, try Arnold Press, Lateral Raise, Bent Over Lateral Raises, Shoulder Width Upright Row and Shoulder Cable exercises. Ask your personal trainer or read up on how to perform these exercises in excellent form for great shoulder muscle development.
Remember that you must also develop other aspects such as a big broad chest, wide back muscles and flared lats as well as a slim waistline to get that much coveted V shaped upper body.
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9 Massive Muscle Building Exercises You Can Use to Boost Your Muscle Gains
Proper exercise selection plays a big role in the kind of progress you can make with your muscle building goals. If you want to develop ripped, bulding, rock-hard muscles, you need to use the right weight training
exercises. If not, you won’t get the real muscle buildings gains that you want.
Quads
Squat
Did you really think I was going to say
something else? Wimpy leg extensions, maybe?
Yeah, go for the burn and tear up your knees
while you’re add it. But you won’t build huge
quads from leg extensions. I know squats are
brutally hard work. And that’s why they are
so freaking effective. If you want to bulid
slabs of muscle all over your body, you need
to squat.
Hamstrings
The Stiff Legged Deadlift (knees slightly bent)
Sorry, no leg curls here. Once again, it’s the
hard exercise using a lot of weight that is most
effective for building massive hamstrings that aren’t
overshadowed by overdeveloped quad muscles.
Calves
Standing Calf Raises
Basic is better. You can use a heck of a lot of
weight on this exercise. Go for it. An alternative
is to do them on a leg press machine.
Chest
Dips
Surprised that it’s not the bench press? Sure, the
bench press is the most popular chest exercise. That
doesn’t make it the best. First off, it’s not a hard
exercise. You lie flat on your back. Yeah, that’s
real tough. Try an all out set of dips versus the
bench press and you tell me which has you working harder.
I guarantee you, it’ll be the dips.
The flat bench press can wreak havoc on your shoulders
and rotator cuff. It puts them in a very awkward position.
The dips works your chest, triceps and shoulders more
thoroughly and effectively than the flat bench press
does. Many people have called it the upper body squat.
If you want to build massive muscles through the chest
and shoulder area, make dips a focal point of your
weight training program.
Midback
Deadifts
Yes, another exercise that far too few trainees perform.
Yet, it should be the cornerstone of your back training
program. The deadlift works your back like no other
exercise can. Yes, like the squat and stiff-legged
deadlift, it’s brutally hard. BUt it works. Learn
to like hard work.
Lats
Chins
Chins, not lat pulldowns. If you can’t do enough chins
now, work hard on lat pulldowns until you can. Once
you are strong enough, go to chins for your lat development.
Shoulders
Dumbbell Upright Rows
Why not some form of overhead press? Because overhead
presses focus more on the front delt. To hit the bulk
of the muscle, you need to hit the side head, which
involved moving your upper arm out to the side. So
you’d think lateral raises. However, this is a light
exercise. You can’t really overload the delts with
side lateral raises. So what’s left? Dumbbell Upright
Rows done the right way. You gotta do these with
dumbbells, not a barbell. This allows you the freedom
of movement to do them in the most productive manner.
As you pull the dumbbells up, your upper arms should
move slightly out to your sides as you lean slightly
forward. Your upper arms move into the same finishing
position as if it were a lateral raise but your forearms
finish as if you were doing a row. You can use more
weight this way and it really overloads the delts and
traps.
Triceps
Dips
Yep, the same exercise as for chest. To emphasize the
triceps more, make sure your body is straigh up and
down as you lower and raise yourself each rep. If
you want a separate exercise, go with the close
grip bench press. I prefer doing this on a decline
as opposed to a flat bench. There is less emphasis
on the shoulders.
Biceps
Standing Dumbbell Curls
The dumbbell curl is much more effective than the
barbell curl or ez curl bar curl for a couple of
reasons. First, the ability to supinate your hand
adds to the effectiveness. The barbell curl also
has a tendency to place more emphasis on the
forearms than the biceps as you curl the weight up.
The ez curl bar is not effective for the biceps as
it puts your hands in a position that de-emphasizes
bicep contraction. Go with the dumbbells and supinate
your hand as you curl so that your pinky is above
your thumb at the top of the rep.
No matter what kind of weight training routine you
use, make sure to include most of these mass builders
as often as possible. This way, you’ll be sure to
get the most muscle building bang for your buck from
every routine you use.
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Muscle Building Mindset
Do you want to build muscle as quickly as possible? If so, are you training with the proper muscle mindset? For optimal success, prior to entering the gym, you must be willing to train like a warrior.
The muscle building mindset doesn’t start once you begin training, but prior to setting foot in the gym. A muscle building mindset is mandatory for optimal muscle growth. Muscle isn’t added magically, you must force your muscles to grow. Therefore, growth first starts with being in the proper muscle building mindset.
There are three phases to this muscle building mindset. Phase one, the preparatory phase, starts when you are on your way to the gym. This is the time you remind yourself of your clear cut plan of action, prepare for what exactly your program calls for, and what specifically you are going to accomplish. This phase serves to ignite your mind towards the next phase, the training phase.
Prior to setting foot in the gym, you should have a clear mental picture of what goals you want to accomplish. Picture yourself with lean, rippled, pumped-up muscles. Imagine pounds of muscle being packed onto your body. Next you want to picture yourself executing the exercises to complete muscle failure in order to stimulate growth. Picture it! Picture yourself as a warrior conquering the weights.
Now is the time to walk into the gym with your exact workout plan in mind, and knowing how intensely you are going to execute it. As you walk into the gym, you should be worked up and ready to conquer the weights. Your heart rate should be on the rise, your body starting to perspire with anticipation, all ready to attack!
During the second phase, the training phase, you must focus on the task at hand. Your objective is to activate every single muscle fiber within the particular muscle you are targeting. Focus on your muscle fibers firing 96, 97, 98% capacity as you strive for momentary muscle failure. It is also important to focus on the number or reps, and weight needed to beat the previous workout. You must strive for an all-out effort with each work set, and the focused mentality to beat those previous numbers.
Once your hopefully short and extremely intense bodybuilding workout has concluded, you will enter the closing phase of the muscle mindset. In the closing phase, get out of the gym, and concentrate on your muscle fibers recovering with strength for the next workout. Highlight the positives of the workout, and strategically plan over the next week what specifically you want to improve upon. If your strength and size hasn’t improved after a couple of workouts, your body requires more days off for recovery. Let your body fully recover prior to your next battle in the gym.
With this muscle building mindset, you are bound to succeed! Once again, you must force yourself to grow. It takes a very special mindset to provide enough stimulation to your muscle fibers in order to adapt and grow bigger, and stronger.
So the next time you train, remember this important mental aspect of bodybuilding. You should now walk into the gym with a warrior-like, muscle building mindset to force growth. Anything short of that will slow down the muscle building process.