Just do like the Bodybuilders?
One of the things we guys (and many girls) want is muscles. We want to have a big chest, round delts, big biceps, a v-shaped back and a six pack of abs.
It might be natural to think that one should copy what professional body builders are doing, in regards to building massive amounts of muscle, but they play a whole different game. Do not get me wrong, they probably work harder then most people, but the fact of the matter is that most of them are using various types of drugs to speed up recovery, muscle growth, stimulants to reduce/increase appetite and so forth.
If you are like me you are not too keen on pumping your body full of drugs. You want to have a fair amount of muscle mass, to be lean all year around (without having to “diet” all the time) and to have some athletic abilities.
To build muscle there are some key factors that has to be taken care of:
1. You need lift heavy weights
2. You have to eat enough food
3. You must get enough sleep (recovery)
What we will cover here is the first one; You need to lift heavy weights.
Muscle Building Exercises
Good muscle building workouts should involve mostly compound movements such as:
1. Squat (back squat, front squat, bulgarian split squats etc.)
2. Deadlift (regular, sumo, rack lifts, trap bar, one legged etc.)
3. Bench press (regular, narrow grip, dumbbells, one handed etc.)
4. Chinups (narrow grip, pullups, wide grip, baseballbat grip, using a towel etc.)
5. A rowing exercise (barbell rows, supinated grip, t-bar rows, dumbell rows etc.)
6. A shoulder exercise (military press, seated dumbbell press, lateral raises, handstand pushups etc.)
These basic exercises cover the movement pattern of the biggest muscles in your body. Most of them are compound movements, meaning; to preform them you have to move more then one joint. Example: To preform a regular back squat you have to move your hips, your knees and your ankles.
Muscle building workouts can entail the use of heavy weights, but also bodyweight/lighter weights. Of course there will be die hard fans of all the various types of muscle building programs out there, but the fact of the matter is that they all have to cover some fundamental principals.
Fundamental Muscle Building Principals
- The principal of Overload
This means that the weight(resistance) you are using has to be heavier then the weight you are using on a regular basis. The body adapts to this increased stimuli by increasing the circumference of the muscle fibers used, and/or (depending of what kind of stimuli you are providing) by “waking up” dormant motoric units that will activate more muscle fibers next time you work out the same area (provided you got enough rest and nutrition of course).
Maybe that sounded a bit “fancy” but it basically means: You have to increase the weight you are using over time to become a huge mother#$%$#%!
- The principal of Accommodation
If you keep lifting the same weights, your muscles will not grow. The stimulus has to be changed for change to happen. Have you ever been to a commercial gym and seen the same people, lifting the same weights, looking the same as they have for many, many years? That is because of accommodation – they are not challenging their muscles or their central nervous system beyond what it/they are used to = they stay the exact same.
- The principal of Variance
Because of our amazing ability to accommodate, variance is needed. Every muscle building exercise is a separate technique. This means that a lot of the early strength gain we experience in any particular exercise is because of technique mastery. We get better at the technique so we waste less energy = more of the energy follows the lifting path, causing the weight to move faster and with greater ease.
Once we master the techniques, the strength gains will eventually come to a halt (because of many different factors). To further muscle growth we can apply variance in many different ways; higher/lower volume and/or intensity (moving from heavy, low rep squats to higher volume squats using lighter weights can cause a boost in hypertrophy, mainly due to the “deload”-effect, but it was caused by the variance in intensity and work volume.), using different exercises for the same muscle groups, going from a full-body program to a split-program etc.
- The principal of Specificity
You get good at the stuff you do the most. Your body adapts to the training program. If you want to build muscle, it makes no sense at all to focus mostly on jogging.. You have to use muscle building workouts that contain compound exercises like the ones mentioned above.
If you vary your workouts too much (doing a different exercise for the same muscle group every workout), your gains will be less then optimal because of the lack of specificity. You never put in enough reps to master the techniques that will eventually provide you with formidable gains in strength and hypertrophy. In short; If you do not use the principal of specificity you might get OK results, but you will never get GREAT results.
- Individualization
People are different. Some have longer arms, causing them shoulder problems from doing the bench press.. Maybe these people should have been doing dips with shorter range of motion in stead? Some have a long torso. Maybe they will experience back pain from doing regular back squats? Could it be that they should do front squats or bulgarian split squats instead?
The point is that one size does not fit all. Why do you figure there are so many muscle building programs available (besides the obvious economical reasons)? We respond different to different workouts, exercises, intensities etc. To gain as much muscle and strength as possible your program should have some elements of individualization.
Muscle Building Workouts
Enough of the geek-speek you say!? Well hot damn! Let`s get some actual workouts up in here!
One great program that I usually reccomend for beginners/intermediates, is Bill Starr 5×5. This program will give you a great introduction to the basic exercises I mentioned above, and it will pack some serious beef on your frame (provided you do not eat like a little bird..).
I have done this program with great success at least two times (that I can think of..). Here are some videos of me back in 2007, showing you some great Muscle Building Workouts:
Compound lifts are great for packing on muscle! Just remember, these videos are from way back..:)
Bill Starrs 5×5 is a simple program but it is far from easy!
