3 Golden Rules for Maximal Muscle Growth

Since the time we spend in the gym is so limited, it’s very precious and we’re all basically looking for a way to make every minute worth the effort put into it. One logical assumption would be that the greater the number of sets and reps you perform is, the better your results will be. But is this really true?

A closer look at the issues most bodybuilders face would easily convince us in the opposite. Simply put, an endless series of any movement lacking proper form and focus won’t get you anywhere in the same way that a lack of volume or intensity will yield weak results even in terms of the most powerful exercises. The real solution lies in the way you arrange your routine and the amount of attention you pay to form and proper execution. Let’s explain this further with the help of a few golden rules you should always abide by for the purpose of creating an optimally effective routine structure.

1. The specific order in which you perform your exercises directly affects the order of muscles you fatigue, which greatly influences your gains from the whole ordeal. And if you want your overall size and power to grow, you’ll need to emphasize the big muscle groups. A good rule of thumb is to hit the smaller muscles only after you’ve finished with the heavy lifting and drained all energy from the big ones, so never place isolation movements which tire out the small muscles before compound exercises.

2. Always place weightlifting before cardio. If not, long cardio sessions will use up most of your strength and fatigue your muscles before you even touch a bar. Keep in mind that this rule also applies for the day before having a heavy lifting session. On the other hand, if you do cardio the next day after a lifting session, the fresh muscle gains can improve your performance.

3. Finally, try to put free weights before exercise machines. Free weights allow you to train functional movements with full range of natural motion, protect the health of your joints and increase muscle coordination, but most importantly, they work almost all muscles in your body. On the other hand, machines are great for isolating smaller muscle groups and we’ve already discussed their place in an efficient muscle-building routine. In general, free weight exercises are more difficult and place a lot more stress on the body, which is essentially the key to a ripped physique.

Got it? Good, because it’s really as simple as that. Now go and make every one of your iron-pumping sessions count!

The Myth of Low Carb Diet and Muscle Loss

One of the greatest myths in dieting is that low-carb nutrition can lead to reduced muscle mass. Although many of us have suspected so, now there is a scientific proof that low-carb diets don’t have negative effect on the anabolic response of your muscles to weight training.

The Chemistry Behind Energy

For a long time carbs have been considered a primary source of fuel for our muscles. This misconception about the necessity of carbs in our diet has been taken for granted and emphasised by many nutrition experts, often at the expense of people’s health. Let’s just take for example the Food Guide Pyramid proposed by the federal government.

It recommends six to eleven carbohydrate meals daily, levelling the field for type-2 diabetes. Following this same logic, the school lunches offered to our children are packed with carbohydrate rich foods, which is one of the main causes for obesity among children.

The truth is that your body is capable of creating all the glucose it needs from the fats and protein in your diet. You don’t need to ingest cabs to provide you with fuel. And yet, this fact has been somehow ignored by many of the so-called dieticians. Still we rely on sugary energy boosters, that are supposedly keeping us up to task.

This misconception about the necessity of carbs may have been caused by the fact that our bodies do need glucose (which is the simplest form of sugar) to create energy. However, we don’t really need to consume it in our diets.

Glucose is the basis for starting the glycolysis process, which results with the creation of the adenosine truphospate, or the ATP molecule. The ATP molecule is what provides the energy to our body. Our cells cannot function without steady supply of ATP.  This applies particularly to muscular contraction.

The consumption of ATP is increased during an intensive workout and when our muscles are pumped. Having in mind that the production of energy begins with glucose, it becomes clear why so many people mistakenly believe that carbohydrates should be the main dietary source of energy. It turns out that fats can trigger the energy production process in much more efficient way.

However, this is only true for people who are not used to consuming carbs. But when we choose to ignore this alternative mechanism and bypass it with steady intake of sugar, it tends to atrophy.  The truth is that our body can get used to the direct sugar infusions, thus forgetting about the other alternative. If you still need more arguments about this, jut take a look around you.

One of the most compelling evidence about the devastating effects of dietary carbs is the modern epidemic of obesity and type-2 diabetes. While the simple truth is that they can be easily avoided, without putting in danger our energy creating processes.

THE REDUNDANCY OF CARBS

Although dietary carbs have been considered as the main source of energy for the human body, this is largely untrue.  End even through many people seem to be aware of this, sugars still remain the mainstay of our diet. We consume them in form of energy drinks, convinced that without them will lack the fuel to build our muscles. However, the importance of dietary carbs has been elevated to a pedestal by the society, not by some scientific and medical proofs. In reality, they are not as essential as we may thing.

The truth is that our bodies are capable of deriving all the glucose we need from dietary fats and protein. While carbs are not essential, protein is. Without a steady intake of some aminos found in protein, your body will not be able to build up muscle mass. And although some fats are definitely bad, the unsaturated fats are not only good for your body, but absolutely essential and should be included in your diet. Only the carbohydrates are redundant.

This dietary fact, that many of us have suspected all along, has finally been proven by the scientific research, that showed that low-carbs diet don’t have negative effect on muscle build up. One of the studies comes from the School of Medical Sciences, RMIT University, in Melbourne, Australia. The researchers have focused their study on determining the effect that muscle glycogen has on muscle growth after workout.

They divided the subjects in two groups, one that consumed normal quantity of sugars, while the other was taking low-carbs diet. However, both groups showed identical performances with high-intensity training.

This is also true for endurance athletes. Even more, it proved that they could improve their performance by reducing the dietary carbs and relying more on amino acids and healthy fats.

The study used biopsy of muscles to show that the molecular muscular signalling is the same both in people eat high-carbs diet, and people eating foods low on carbs during high-intensity endurance training. So much for the essential carbs.

REDUCE THE CARBS INTAKE BUT DON’T ELIMINATE THEM

Of course, this does not imply that you should eliminate carbs from your diet completely. It just means that you need to find healthier alternative. For example, instead of relying on carbohydrate foods, you can stick to foods rich in fibres, like vegetables and fruit. Fibre is one of the most important ingredients for healthy body.

Fiber can be divided into two basic types. Soluble and insoluble fiber.  Soluble fiber can be found in oatmeal, for example, and it has ability to dissolve in water, becoming viscous. This fiber is very efficient in lowering the levels of blood cholesterol, and regulating the consumption of sugars. Because of this, it’s absolutely essential to include soluble fiber in your diet, despite the fact that you’ll also be consuming some sugar with it. Insoluble fiber is even more important when you want to build lean muscle mass and maintain your low body fat.

In addition to containing high concentration of minerals, trace minerals and vitamins, insoluble fiber is also very efficient in fighting cancer and beneficial for our digestive tract. And having in mind that diets low on carbs and high on protein can cause constipation, adding insoluble fibre to your diet will improve your bowel movement.

In addition, both soluble and insoluble fiber are low on calories. As a result, you can eat it in large quantities, and it won’t affect your line. Lettuce, greens, spinach, cucumber, green beans, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, kale, onions, asparagus are just some of the vegetables that are high in fiber and should be found on your table.

The last myth regarding the importance of high carbs diet for muscle building is connected with insulin. The proponents of this theory point out that insulin is an anabolic hormone. Although this is true, it’s also true that elevated insulin levels can be extremely dangerous. First and foremost, they can cause insulin resistance.

Moreover, increased insulin levels trigger the lipogenesis in response to high blood sugar levels. Lipogenesis is the process of transforming nutrients into body fat.

Once again, the facts go against the proponents of this theory. The truth is that our bodies can harvest all the benefits of insulin without including carbs in our diet.

The insulin production can be well kept at bay with certain aminos like the BCAAs (isoleucine, leucine, valine), or arginine and alanine. Not only that, but these amino acids trigger far better insulin response than sugars. The insulin rise triggered by these amino acids is much subtler and causes less stress to our physiology then the insulin spike seen when excess carbohydrates are introduced in our system.

Namely, the sudden rise in insulin is a physiological reflex that our bodies use as a protection and means of purification against unnatural sugar levels that they interpret as poison. When we do it too often, your system can crash leaving you stranded with insulin resistance in which this hormone has little effect both on decreasing and on stimulating muscle growth.

With high quality protein diet you eliminate the risk of missing on the anabolic benefits of insulin. Even more, you’ll balance your insulin production. While your body will still be able to provide you with sufficient insulin production, you won’t notice any spikes triggered by high blood sugar.

How Much Should I Eat Per Day To Gain Muscle Mass?

If you want to gain muscle mass, you should consume at least 15 calories for each pound of body weight. In other words, if you have 200 pounds, you should aim for daily intake of 300 calories in order to gain muscle mass.

However, when doing the math, you should also take into consideration the calories you are burning with the exercises. So, if you are burning 500 calories through exercises every day, you should also add 500 calories to your daily intake. In other words, a 200 pound man should consume about 3500 calories daily in order to gain muscle mass.

Yet, however simple this calculation may seem, it’s not as straightforward as it sounds. Namely, you cannot just gorge up 3500 calories from any food source. You should choose foods that agree with your body type and your objectives. And if you really want to gain muscle mass effectively, you should know how much proteins, carbs and fats you consume in your diet.

Gaining Muscle Mass

In order to gain muscle mass, your daily intake of protein, carbs and fats should be the following.

Your daily consumption of proteins should range between 1 and 1.5 grams per 1 pound of body weight. An individual weighing 200 pounds, should consume somewhere between 180 to 270 grams of protein. The daily consumption of carbs should be 2 grams per 1 pound of bodyweight. A 200 pounds man should consume 400 grams of carbs daily.

The daily consumption of fats should not exceed 0.4 grams per 1 pound of bodyweight. An individual weighing 200 pounds, should consume about 80 grams of fats every day.

If you want to have a clearer picture of what you should eat in order to gain muscle mass, take a look at this table.

After learning the amount of calories you need to consume on daily basis in order to gain muscle mass, all that you need now is to find a workout protocol that will prompt the muscle growth effectively. Just remember that including the exercises in your daily routine will increase the number of calories you are burning. Consequently, if you want to gain muscle instead of losing weight, don’t forget to compensate this number with your daily calorie intake.

Use This Simple Tip to Boost Muscle Recovery and Growth

Muscle hypertrophy is the ultimate goal of every bodybuilder out there. It’s a commonly accepted truth that the rood to hypertrophy, most often than not, leads through the gym and it takes hours upon hours of heavy iron lifting.  Although this method has been proven to yield fantastic results, it’s certainly not the only road to hypertrophy. What we are writing about is not something new and unheard. This is not some miracle muscle building program, nor it’s some instantaneous pill that pumps you up over the night. In fact, it’s a method as old as fitness itself – if not older, and it’s called stretching.

Yes, it’s a simple and seemingly effortless technique used by people in yoga classes, and often scorned and neglected by bodybuilders. Yet, you might be surprised that stretching can greatly help your muscle growth.  Of course, there can be no substitute for hard training and proper dieting, and they should always remain at the top of your list.

However, stretching comes in really handy for relaxing our muscles during the recovery period, and make muscle growth much easier. Naturally, in order to reap the full benefits and avoid injuries, you must first learn how to stretch properly, and when to do it.

The Basics of Muscle Stretching

First and foremost, you should never start stretching before you properly warm up your body. Stretching your muscles when they are cold, increases the chances of getting a serious injury resulting from muscle tears and ripped tendons.  Warm up your muscles with some cardio and get some blood flowing into them before you start stretching.

Of course, that only covers the first step.  Stretching during weight training is not as simple as that, and if done improperly it can inflict damage to the targeted muscle group. Hence, avoid stretching the active muscles. If soreness and pain set in your targeted muscles, it would be much better to apply light massage between sets and not to stretch them.

Stretching During the Workout

The negative effect of stretching the muscle group targeted with the workout goes beyond the obvious risk of injury. It can also weaken your muscle making it unable to perform the lifts. So, it’s inadvisable to stretch the targeted muscle, then how does stretching help your muscle growth? What you want to do is to stretch the antagonist muscle instead.

This will increase the recovery of targeted muscle during the workout. For example, you’d want to stretch your lats when working the chest muscles, or the hamstrings when you’re working the quads. Stretching the antagonist muscles between the sets will not only relieve some of the tension of the targeted muscle, but it will also increase their strength for the next lift.

Timing your Stretch

We’ve already established that you stretching the muscles when cold can result in injury. And that stretching the muscles during the lift can reduce their strength. All that remains is that the best way to utilize stretching to trigger muscle hypertrophy and help the recovery period is after training. This way you eliminate all the risk and you make sure that you rip all the benefits.

You can even use some light weights to increase the effects of stretching. Hold, for example, the bottom position of a dumbbell flight with light weight to provide thorough stretch of your chest muscles.