6 Pack Abdominals

Posts Tagged ‘build muscle mass’

  

So, how much can you bench? It is one of the most frequently asked questions around the country by gym enthusiasts. In fact the amount you can bench is a great yardstick for over all strength and is probably the best way to gain muscle mass on your upper body and therefore the exercise has reached almost mythical status. So in this article we will provide the outline of three time proven tips for increasing your bench press.

1) Perform Drop Sets. These are great for providing your chest muscle with new and unique stimulus to grow. To do these simply perform your bench-press exercise as you normally would and when you can not do any more simply take off a weight disc and do as many more as you can. Then reduce the weight once more and pump out as many more as you possibly can. Keep stripping the bar in this manner until there is very little weight left or until your muscles are not able to perform any more. This is a highly intense method that will in all likelihood leave you sore for a good few days. Make sure your protein intake is high to help build the muscles back stronger for the next few days.

2) Stop training your chest. Instead train your triceps on their own. You can really focus on increasing the strength of your triceps by working out like this. Once you have done this for 3-4 weeks return to your regular bench-pressing workout and you will are highly likely to top your previous best bench-press. This is due to the fact that your chest will have had a really good rest period to completely recover from all of your previous workouts and also your triceps will now possess greater strength. Because you triceps take a great deal of the work load during benchpressing it is obvious that you will be able to press more if you strengthen your tricep muscles.

3) Ten Sets of Ten. This is one more intense and tough technique, indeed Arnold Schwarzenegger was a big fan of this technique. Basically you benchpress as much weight as you can handle for ten reps and then complete another ten repetitions. Proceed once more until you have finally completed ten sets of ten repetitions each. You should be lowering the weight gradually from one set to the next and you’ll probably be needing 2-3 minute breaks in between each set. The idea of this is to really give your chest muscles some new stimulus to grow. Once more expect to be particularly sore for maybe a week or so following this workout but also expect increase your maximum bench-press on your return to the gym. This is perhaps the fastest way to gain muscle on your chest if done correctly nd is great no no nonsense muscle building.

OK, I hope you found that useful so why not go ahead and give those tips a try in your next pecs workout.

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Depending on where you look there is a lot of great information out there on how to build muscle up. However provided here are a few seldom mentioned tips that can certainly aid you in your quest for muscle mass. Here they are:

Try drinking green tea. This can inhibit the enzyme that inhibits nor-epinephrine which mean that you should experience increased levels of this muscle building metabolic hormone which can also help in fat loss too. what’s more it is also stacked full with anti oxidants that can aid a great deal with post workout recovery and general health.

Consume healthy fats. These are essential for correct functioning of many parts of the human body like the brain, heart, production of energy and the regulation of hormones too. Oily fish, natural peanut butter, avocado and oily dressings are all excellent sources of this.

Consume casein protein. This type of protein takes longer to digest and breakdown so therefore supplies an ongoing release of protein. This is great news if you consume it just before retiring to bed as your body can then use it to build muscle up whilst you sleep.

Ingest between 20 and 30 grams of whey protein as soon as you can on waking. Immediately on waking up drink a protein shake. This will put a stop to the catabolic state of your body that you may have been going through whilst you were sleeping and furthermore give you a great start on achieving your daily protein intake target.

On body parts you find difficult to grow try using dropsets. This is a very intense technique that can stimulate growth in even the most stubborn body part. Firstly, complete your set as you would normally and when you have pushed out your final rep lower the weight by around 20 percent and perform more reps, then decrease the weight once again and do more reps. Keep going with this process as many times as you can but be aware that you will experience extreme burn and be very sore the following day.

Ingest lots of water. It is wise not to understimate the benefits of being well hydrated during the entire day. water is critical for many reactions in the body especially muscle building ones.

Stay educated and keep learning. There a great variety of alternative strategies to develop your physique. try different things see what works for you and what doesn’t and take the best.

So, by applying some of the above weight gain tips you should be able to build up muscle even faster than before. Good luck.

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Spending hours in the gym to build muscle up and not making progress? Excellent news! There is a good chance that you are not making incredible gains for just one simple reason. Just this simple knowledge can help increase your power to build muscle up. For a lot of people this little known truth can easily help them build muscle up fast.

So what exactly is this well kept secret? A new drug or something?

No not at all. It is a hormone know as cortisol, known about for a long time but ignored by many weight lifters.

What actually is cortisol?

Produced in response to stress placed on the body cortisol is a hormone released by the body throughout the day. Cortisol levels decrease gradually throughout the day from their highest point in the morning.

What is its role exactly?

Well it enhances your short term memory, aids in regulation of blood sugar levels and helps detox the liver. However it can raise blood pressure and decrease bone density if your cortisol levels get too high, however this would be unusual. However critically it does diminish muscle because it aids in the body using muscle for energy rather than fat. this is the reason that workouts should be under an hour long. After this time period they will actually be restricting their growth!

Here are a few guidelines to ensure that you are not wasting your time trying to build muscle up:

1) limit your cardio workouts, too much cardio causes the body to release cortisol which as explained is not what we need.

2) Try to not consume too much caffeine as this will increase your cortisol levels.

3) Ensure your sessions are kept below one hour. wear headphones if this helps you to stay focussed.

4) Stress causes the body to release more cortisol too so try to relax, although granted this is easier said than done.

5) Consume small frequent meals as infrequent meals make the body assume it is starving and will thus try and use muscle mass as a form of energy before it makes use of fat reserves by releasing more cortisol.

6) Sleep. This is when your muscle building hormones peak and your cortisol levels are highest so shot for 8 hours sleep.

With those building muscle tips in mind you should be able to give your workouts a great boost and help you to build up muscle more efficiently.

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We hear loads of advice and guidance on what to do to build up muscle but much of it is conflicting. For that reason we are going to clear up a few things right now about what not to do to build up muscles. Here we go, 7 things not to do when trying to build muscle up:

1) Train for more than 45 minutes. training longer than this can actually inhibit muscle gains because at this point a hormone is produced that limits the muscle building process, train for less than 45 minutes and the hormones level is about correct for building muscle.

2) Follow a ’see food’ diet. Often you hear that you should just eat as much as everything as you can. Well of course we need extra calories to add muscle mass but do you really believe that stuffing yourself full of E numbers, fatty red meats, fast food, simple carbs (sugars) and so on is going to be healthy for you long term. Of course not stay with the nutritious muscle building foods and these will then make sure that you develop lean muscle mass and prevent your body suffering long term health problems.

3) Isolation muscle building exercises. That refers to exercises such as tricep presses that place focus on one individual muscle alone. Your time and energy could be put to use a lot better. Stay with compound multi joint exercises such as squats, pull ups,presses and so on. These exercises stimulate muscle growth in more than just one muscle at a time.

4) Do not ignore aerobic exercise. I’m sure you have heard that you should avoid aerobic stuff as it uses up valuable calories that could be used for burning muscle. yes this is true but come on there is a sensible balance here. Sure get big but do you want to be huge and not be able to walk up a few flights of stairs without panting. In order to preserve long term health then do aerobic exercise 2-3 times a week and simply make up for this by eating more.

5) Switch exercises a lot. You may know that variety keeps the muscles growing, that is true but at the same time not allowing your muscle to establish an exercise groovecan also stop you from making the progress you otherwise could do. Stick with an exercise for a couple of months before dropping it.

6) Lift too often. Over training is probably the biggest cause for lack of progress. One to two workouts a week for each muscle group should sufficient fro most people.

7) Give up. Too many bodybuilders quit just because there muscle growth eases up a bit. This is the exact time when you should be rising to the challenge and training with more intensity, paying attention to muscle building nutrition and showing determination.

Go get massive!

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Just as a tree cannot grow with out sufficient water, sunlight and soil no matter what else you give it, to build up muscle your body also has several things that you absolutely must provide it with in order to grow. No amount of fancy exercise equipment, supplement or outfit will allow you to grow muscle if you do not take the following essential steps:

1) Eat big. Some people never really embrace this fact! If you desire more muscle then you have to give your body something to built it out of, like more calories. If you are not taking on extra calories then your body has nothing to build up muscleswith. One method of making a habit of eating a lot is buy a set of large sized plates and dishes. This way every time you get them out you now you have to eat a big portion. Consuming a high number of calories will be easier if you break your meals down into 5-6 meals.

2) Workout intensely. Your muscles will not grow if you do not give them a reason to in the gym. Give your muscle a reason to grow by working out hard for no longer than 45 minutes. Use the classic mass builders that are multi-joint exercises like: bench presses, deadlifts, squats, shoulder presses. These stimulate more muscle growth than many others.

3) Consume plenty of water. Just as your body needs excess amounts of quality calories for to support muscle growth your body also needs water for all of the muscle building reactions to occur. Training of course will also increase your fluid intake needs. Take a bottle of water around with you.

And of course just as you cannot expect a plant to grow if you throw harmful substances and so on on it there are several things you absolutely must not do in order to build up muscles

1) Do not over-train. Your strength will actually decrease if you push your muscles too hard too often. Why? Following an intense training session your muscles are actually broken down by micro-tears. Your muscles will then grow back bigger and more powerful than before over the following days. You will always be unable to grow if you do not allow you muscle sufficient time to recover. Rest is a key factor. 

2) Do not stuff your body full of useless calories. Sure you need to get a lot of calories on board to build muscle up but you need quality calories as well. Food products such as these: leafy green vegetables, pasta, fruit, rice, eggs, fish, chicken, potatoes and so on should be normal. For muscle building these are all awesome.

3) Never ever quit. What works for some people may not of course work for you. If progress is not apparent then mix things up and experiment with different exercises, a different diet in fact do anything you can just never give in. Stick to your goal and you will achieve it. remember to relax and enjoy the process of building muscle up, you will not turn into Arnie in a few weeks it will take sometime, keep a training diary to track your progress and for motivation.

So why not go ahead and consider whether or not you truly are adhering to these most basic guidelines. If you are not then if you really want to build muscle up then wouldn’t now be a good time to change?

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There are hundreds of different exercises you can do with free weights and resistance machines or with just your body weight to build muscle mass. You should include mainly multi-joint compound exercises in your workout as they build muscle fastest. The time proven and most effective are: shoulder presses, bench press, pull ups, dead lifts, squats and rows.

Whilst they are very effective your body needs to be constantly challenged in new and different ways if your goal is building lean muscle mass. Here are a few great exercises for different parts of the body that are often overlooked yet work. From time to time try and include these exercises in your workouts. Workout routines can be prevented from getting boring and can stimulate more muscle growth by introducing variety.

For skinny calve muscles have a go at skipping with a jump rope, donkey raises and running on the beach to trigger muscle growth. making use of ajump rope for skipping and also running on a sandy place bear foot will place great pressure on your calves to grow. because the muscles in your calves are normally made use of in activities that are largely endurance based such as walking they often grow more when stimulated using higher rep ranges. Donkey raises are when you place your toes on the edge of a 3-4 inch high block bend over to 90 degrees at the waist and rest your hands on a bard or bench at that height. get a friend or training to jump on to your back then pump your calves to move all of your body weight and theirs up and down. This exercise is more difficult than the usual machine calve exercises as you have to use stabiliser muscles to keep you steady whilst performing them.

When was the last time you hit your chest muscles with dips? The entire chest region and triceps can be hit by doing dips. Some of the older gyms have parallel bars installed in them for this precise exercise. Different grips can be experimented with as they often form a v shape. This means you can really hit different areas of the chest and triceps effectively.

How about using stiff legged deadlifts for your hamstrings. This exercise is really effective for the hamstrings yet used very little. Simply do deadlifts but you legs have to remain straight throughout meaning you bend at the waist and keep a straight back to lift the barbell or dumbbell. Warning these can make you very sore and also on lifting the weight keep it close in to your legs for good control.

Make use of bicep hammer curls for upper arm growth! These are the same as regular dumb bell curls only you keep the palm of your hand facing in towards the body throughout. This places great stress on the inner bicep muscle that gives it thickness and size throughout called the brachialis muscle whilst also still developing the main bicep too.To prevent yourself from using momentum when curl stand with your back firmly against the corner of a wall.

When was the last time you saw anyone do lunges in the gym? Both mass and shape are given to the quads with this exercise. With a dumb bell in either hand take a large stride straight forwards and then bend both knees down to approximately 90 degress, return to the start position and do the same again on the other leg. A great option if you do not want to squat.

For creating muscle definition and for a superb aerobic workout why not try boxing padwork it is very effective for the hitting the entire upper body or do uphill sprints to shred your leg muscles or even get on an exercise bike for uphill intervals immediately following a leg workout. That is a real killer of a mass builder!

with those group of classic exercises in your thoughts change your routine around a bit to build more lean muscle mass.

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A typical dilemma for any active sportsmen who lifts weights and wants to gain muscle mass is that they know there goal to build muscle up conflicts with the fact that they do a lot of cardio-vascular work. How can someone like this build muscle fastest whilst still doing cardio, indeed is it even possible?

Quite often it is suggested that in order to build muscles fastest you have to keep cardio training down to as limited an amount as possible. This is said because cardio workouts do two main things that work against muscle building, they are: 1) use up a lot of calories 2) increase the speed of your metabolism. Both of these two things contribute to the same problem, namely, not getting enough calories on board. How many calories ought I to be eating is therefore the next natural question?

Well, to maintain weight each day you must eat enough calories to cover the energy expenditures of your body as if it were at rest (this is known as the basal metabolic rate), then consume enough extra calories to cover the exercise that you will do. Every day you will have to take on board another 500 calories if you want to build muscle mass.

Is there a way to figure out this total?

Yes, there definitely is and one way of finding this total is by following the Katch-McArdle formula (BMR based on lean body weight). Here it is:

Men: BMR = 66 + (13.7 X wt in kg) + (5 X ht in cm) – (6.8 X age in years)

Women: BMR = 655 + (9.6 X wt in kg) + (1.8 X ht in cm) – (4.7 X age in years)

Once you have gotten this figure you should then multiply it by one of the following to allow for your daily activity levels:

Sedentary = BMR X 1.2 (little or no exercise, desk job)
Lightly active = BMR X 1.375 (1-3 days/wk sports/light exercise )
Mod. active equals BMR X 1.55 (moderate exercise/sports 3-5 days/wk)
Very active equals BMR X 1.725 (hard exercise/sports 6-7 days/wk)
Extr. active = BMR X 1.{9 (hard daily exercise/sports & physical job or 2X day training, i}.e marathon, contest etc

So, should you be doing cardio and weights frequently then you should multiply this by at least 1.725. Your daily energy needs will be safely covered by this amount. This total then needs to changed according to your specific goals. Assuming your goal is muscle building a further 500 calories each day need to be added to this amount.

So, if the number you reach is for example 3000 calories then that would equate to 6 meals a day of 500 calories. To follow this strategy one snack or meal would be based around 11 gram coming from fat, 62 grams coming from carbohydrate and 37 grams coming from protein. This is figured out as so due to the fact that one gram of protein or carbohydrate is worth 4 gram whereas one gram of fat equals 9 calories.

Correct muscle building nutrition and working out your calorie needs like this is what is going to ensure you build muscles fastest, not any miracle new exercise!

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In your quest to build muscles as fast as humanly possible here are a few quick tips to help you on your way. No messing around here seven top build muscles tips:

1) Eat frequently and often. For people new to weight training and bodybuilding you may have some problems actually eating enough calories to grow. Consume about 6 meals each day and eat very large portions every day to overcome this problem.

2) Get plenty of rest. Your muscles need times to rest in order to grow. They don’t grow in the gym. So just as you should workout to build muscle mass you should also rest a lot to get big.

3) Don’t train for longer than 45 minutes a time. A hormone that is detrimental to muscle building is released at around this time marker. Finishing your workout after 30 to 45 minutes means that your body’s hormones are at an optimum level to support muscle growth.

4) Keep a training diary. tracking your progress provides information on what workouts work well for you. You can make use of them again at a later date. They also mean that you can have meaningful goals for every single training session which enhances your motivation and proves that you are improving.

5) Use supplements to improve your overall diet. If you have cash spare use the following supplements to improve your development: essential fatty acids, whey protein, multivitamins and possibly creatine. You can make excellent progress even if you can’t afford supplements so do not lose heart.

6) Train with determination, focus and intensity. Maintain intensity in your workouts by using techniques like: negatives, super sets, giant sets and drop sets.

7) Do not give up…ever! This journey will take some time and you need to be in it for the long haul. Of course you want to build huge muscles mass as soon as you can but don’t forget the journey is half of the fun. So with those brutally effective building muscle tips in mind go out and get huge.

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Stressing your muscles in different ways is one of the keys to continuous and uninterrupted growth to build muscles mass. By completing the same weight training routine again and again your muscles become very familiar with that particular type of stress and little by little the routines ability to trigger muscle growth will lessen. Fortunately there are a few easy things we can do to shake things up a bit build muscles mass and get your muscles growing again.

1) Progressive Overload. Well really you should be doing this as a matter of course. You can either keep increasing the amount you are lifting as often as you can or you can keep the same weight and try and do more reps. A combination of the two is fine also

2) Giant sets. This technique is employed by following up one regular set with another set of a different exercise that targets the same muscle group. For example, squats followed immediately by leg extensions. You ought then rest for a minute or two and the repeat.

3) A superset is where you do one normal set and then straight afterwards you do another set for that muscles opposing partner muscles. This often produces a really great pump in those muscles. Such as, rows after bench presses, tricep pushdowns followed by bicep curls.

4) Forced repetitions. On a regular set, instead of failing on the last rep you basically get a friend to asisst you in completing the final rep and then to help you in doing a further 2 or 3 reps. The help should be very little and only just enough to allow you to complete the reps.

5) Negatives. This is when you do a normal regular set to failure and then with the help of a partner complete another rep but then you have to lower the weight under complete control and slowly yourself.

6) Drop sets. Do a regular set until failure, lower the amount on the bar and do a few more repetitions, decrease the amount of weight lifted once more and continue doing more reps and keep doing this. This is a very intense technique that creates a real burn and can help build muscle mass a great deal.

This is just a start on the different varieties of exercise that can be done to build muscles mass but be warned these can leave you feeling quite sore for the next few days so always ensure that you allow sufficient rest between exercises.

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When  a personal trainer first asks a new gym attendee what their goals are, they most often hear replies such as: “Build muscle lose fat”,  “build muscle then lose“, “burn fat build muscle”, ”build muscle and burn fat”. So, it would seem to be that nearly all people would prefer to get bigger muscle s and also simultaneously reduce their percentage body fat. In the next few paragraphs I discuss if it is really possible to do this or is it something that only professional bodybuilders and marketing companies believe is possible?

Is it really possible to increase muscle mass and lose fat simultaneously?

The short reply is ‘yes’ but not I might add without a lot of difficulty, working out calorie intakes and discipline but it is possible! In order to build muscle you have to consume extra calories than you burn off during each day leaving you with plenty left to actually build muscle with but not so many as to cause them to be stored as fat. Without excess calories you will not build muscle, with too many excess calories you may build muscle but also add some extra body fat as you do so. The thing you have to do is to take on board enough calories so that you are able to increase you muscle mass but not so many that you build fat tissue. There are

If you wish to avoid adding fat at the same time as building muscle then you really have to work out your exact calorie requirements and then stick to them. to work out your calorie requirements then use the following simple equation that provides an approximate answer:

Find out your body weight and you percentage body fat e.g. 10% bod fat at 200 pounds in weight.

Workout your lean body mass e.g. 200 pounds – 10% equals 190.

Take your lean body mass and multiply it by 19 e.g. 190 multiplied by 19 equals = 3610

This is then the amount of calories you approximately need to eat to gain muscle mass provided you are doing effective workouts too. However this is just a rough figure but if you consumed 500-1000 more you would maximise your muscle growth but probably pile on some body fat too. this number of course is only an approximate figure and it would be difficult to track the number of calories you consume in a day anyway.

I think you are probably not too thrilled at the prospect of following the above method therefore you may be asking what the alternatives are. Well the two step option is the most highly recommended and it is what most bodybuilders do. First you build muscle then you lose weight. This is often called doing a bulking phase and the a cutting phase. This is much simpler to do as in the first phase you basically eat as much quality food as you like. All you have to do is make sure you are eating more than the figure above. This bulking phase which should last 3-6 months will see you put on a few kilos in body fat but mainly you will gain muscle mass. This is when you start to consume much fewer calories and also ramp up the cardio-vascular training sessions so that you work off more calories per day than you intake.

Maintaining your muscle mass and burning off excess calories will thus be the main focus of the newxt few months. So a year on the results will in deed have built muscle and burnt fat but you will have done so in two very distinct phases. The long term affect is excatly the same only you use to distinct phases and it is a lot easier to do.

so if you are aiming to burn fat and build muscle then I strongly suggest that you attempt to do so in two separate phases. Expert author Tom Venuto has the entire process and more broken down into simple steps for you, read the ‘Burn The Fat Feed The Muscle E-book’ Review here for more information on how to build muscle then lose fat.

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