This article would like to emphasize an extremely important point in bodybuilding that newbie bodybuilders, in their anxiousness to build big muscles fast, simply ignore – until they find out the hard way. Hopefully, this article can save you some lost time and agony and actually help you to speed up your muscle building.
It sounds like a lazy man’s statement: “Yes, you can get big muscles by just training less.” But, the truth of the matter is, that you can build bigger muscles faster by working out every other day.
I think many people have heard already that you should rest in between workouts, walk every other day, run every other day, etc. But, the question is, how seriously is this taken? I, for one, did not take this statement seriously thinking more is better. I will lose weight faster, get muscles faster, ram it up and get results faster by doing double the work. I think this is a widely accepted concept the average person relates to and believes – the more you do, the more you get; the more your practice your instrument, the better you get; the harder you study, the better the grades, etc. Thereby, the more time I spend in the gym or working out at home, the stronger and more muscular I will become. But, this concept just isn’t so with muscle building and working out in general.
When it comes to bodybuilding, conventional wisdom goes right out the window. When we work out and are battling against resistance, the body sees this as potentially harmful. Thereby, as a natural adaptive response, the muscles hypertrophy (increase in size) to protect the body against this threat. By consistently increasing the resistance from week to week, the body continues to grow and adapt.
Though this may sound simple, it’s important to realize can only grow bigger and stronger if there is sufficient recovery time. The process of muscle growth simply cannot take place without proper recovery time.
Your goal when training in the gym should be to train with a minimal amount of volume needed to get an adaptive response. Once you’ve pushed your muscles beyond their current capacity and once you have triggered the alarm system within you, your job is done. Further stress to the body beyond this will not only increase your recovery time, it will weaken your immune system and could send your body into catabolic overdrive.
Training more often and with more sets is not necessarily advantageous and most of the time not necessary. Doing high intensity weight training is more stressful to the body than you may think. You could end of structuring your workouts in a way that could actually hinder your progress.
Here is a good guideline to help you achieve maximum results from your workouts:
- Do not train for more than 3 days a week
- Don’t let your workouts last more than an hour
- For large muscle groups (chest, back and thights) perform about 5-8 sets; for smaller muscle groups (biceps, triceps, shoulders, calves, abs) perform 2-4 sets – or follow closely whatever plan is layed out in the program you are using.
If you are consistent with your training and train hard, then going beyond this and training longer and harder will just be counterproductive.
If you are excited about building bigger and stronger muscles and gaining overall body strength and have a real desire to follow a program proven to work and that is safe, I highly recommend Vince Delmonte’s bodybuilding program. It is the No. 1 bodybuilding program on the internet today. After viewing his site, I think you will understand why. You owe it to yourself.
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