So how long have you been lifting? A few days, a few months, never? Chances are you are looking to build mass on those muscles of yours. After being a fitness and weightlifting enthusiast for years, I will give you my top 7 tips to building mass muscle. My own tips I used to pack on girth and mass on my arms, chest and legs. These are general tips you can use to explode your gains in the weight room.
Tip # 1: Eat to build muscle mass. If you are looking to making gains quickly, you need to make sure that your nutrition plan is up to the challenge. Nothing spells disaster more than getting the proper training, but neglecting protein and other food sources to help build and support those muscles. Think of it in terms of a finely tuned race car. If the proper oil and gasoline (protein and carbohydrates) are not given. It will not run at its best and will probably break down (injury). This is often an issue that never gets discussed in many fitness arenas. To make sure that you are maintaining the muscle mass you are building you need to make sure you are getting the proper amount of protein, usually around one gram per pound of body weight.
Tip # 2: Rest. This cannot be emphasized enough. How many of you sleep a few hours a night? I am guessing the majority of you. In order to function at an optimal level and to make the most out of the hard work you are putting into the weight room, you need to make sure that you are allowing your body to rest and recuperate. Your muscles need ample rest to repair and get ready for your next workout. Allowing your body time to rest and recharge will help pack on those mountains of mass muscle.
Tip # 3: Heavy Lifting and lower reps. This one is a basic no brainer. The equation for gaining mass on your muscles and the equation for getting ripped muscles are the complete opposite. Big muscles equal heavy weights and low reps, ripped muscles equal low weights and high reps. In order for muscles to grow there are microscopic tears that occur during the weight training session. Enough so that it does not cause injury, but growth to become possible. By using heavier weights, you are pushing your muscles to the limit and are also allowing the all important goal of building mass muscle to occur.
Tip # 4: Stretching. When lifting heavy weights, it is important to prevent injury. Nothing can push you back further than an injury. Stretching allows your muscles to become more elastic and flexible. It also will aid in preventing injuries that may occur in the weight room. When you push or bend something to a certain limit, it will break. Your muscles are the same way, stretching allows them to be bent and pushed to higher limits, thus causing the occurrence of breaking (injury) to a minimum.
Tip # 5: Keep a training notebook. Constantly monitor what works best for you. And keep it fun. Keeping a notebook of your exercises helps you to prevent boredom and the eventual training plateau from occurring. Mix up your routine to keep your muscles guessing and more importantly - growing. Once your muscles get used to certain exercises week in and week out, they hit a period where the don't really get stronger or bigger (plateau). In order to avoid this, we need to keep our muscles growing and guessing by switching it up. This could be something simple like doing a barbell bench press one week for chest, and following up the next week by doing dumb bell bench presses.
Tip # 6: Technique. The proper lifting technique can bring upon more growth. If our rep counts are too fast, pressing or pushing the weight too quickly, we may not be getting the maximum effort possible out of them. Isolate the muscle and fully work the muscle you are concentrating on. Try not to cheat and watch the mass start to build!
Tip # 7: Learning. Never stop learning. I am constantly trying to learn more techniques to try out in the weight room. Visit weight lifting sites, pick up a weightlifting magazine or do your own research on line. There is a vast amount of weightlifting knowledge out there. We just have to keep looking.
Using these techniques, I put on more mass on my muscles than I thought was possible. I hope that it helps you to do the same!
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