Posts Tagged ‘muscle building’

Find a Tailored Weight Lifting Program Just for You

Wednesday, June 3rd, 2009

The right weight lifting program is crucial in attaining the goal of any muscle builder seeking to build his muscle mass. It entails the design of a program that will bring about the desired result. This means that a muscle lifter should not simply go into the gym and throw weights around. Rather, he should have a specific routine to follow. Specifically, lifting weights involve weight training programs that are based on the proper science and tested techniques. According to some professional weight trainers, there are some rules that should be followed. Here are the five rules in weight training.

Stand with feet wider than shoulders and hold a heavy dumbbell in both hands. Bend knees and, keeping weight in the heels, lower butt until it is parallel to floor. Keep abs in and make sure you can see your toes. Push through the heels to raise back up and repeat. Come onto all fours, hands a bit wider than shoulders, lower body resting on knees. Pull the abs in and, keeping back straight, bend elbows and lower body towards the floor until elbows are at 90 degree angles. Push back up and repeat.

Progressive overload requires having more time in your discomfort zone. This is the most basic rule of all strength-training principles. But this is nit understood well enough by trainers. The body is only able to gain strength and muscle mass if it is being exercised to its limit. In contrast, if one exercises only in his comfort zone, the body learns to adjust so no muscle mass is built. This means that the more time in your discomfort zone equals less time in the gym.

The other type of weight training is dubbed periodization. This type of weight training shifts the focus from intensity to frequency. So the weight lifter goes through three phases of weight training under this type of program. In the initial stage, he needs to go through light training for at least a three-week period. After a few weeks, this is followed by medium training. Obviously, this medium type is an improvement from the initial stage of the workout.

Holding on to a chair for balance, bend right knee to 90 degrees. Keeping body upright, lift bent leg straight up until it’s parallel to the floor. Slowly lower back to start and repeat on each leg. For added resistance, use 1-5 lb ankle weights or a resistance band. Stand with feet hip-width apart and bend at the waist until back is parallel to floor. Pull the elbows up next to torso. Keeping elbows static, straighten arms by contracting triceps. Lower and repeat.

It is not enough to just lift a weight. It is important to explode with it, that is, raise it as fast as you can while still retaining control. This is also known as speed-strength conditioning, and it has great influence on power, endurance, and metabolism. It is important to be warned though, this training style will easily drain you like never before.

Lastly, a weight lifting program involves the fundamentals of a science. As such, it involves proper form and execution. Any weight lifter must approach it with precision and care. Otherwise, the time he spends in the gym comes to naught. It is important that he goes through the program with this in mind if he seeks to be successful in transforming his body into the muscle buff he desires that it becomes.

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Proper Diet To Gain Muscle Mass

Sunday, March 22nd, 2009

When you decide to gain weight, you always want the fastest way. But the reality is you have to put in your time and pay your dues at the dinner table. It doesn’t have to be complex and difficult though. Here are some quick tips that you can do today to get that muscle mass you want.

The key is to eat lots of meals per day. You want a total of actually 6. Your breakfast, lunch, and dinner strong meals should all consist of at least 30-50 grams of protein from primarily a meat source. Just as the 3 above exercises are your backbones, these 3 meat meals are your eating backbones. In addition to protein, you need lots of complex carbohydrates and good fats too.

Remember, we talked about 6 meals. Three being large, and 3 being small. Let’s talk about the small meals. Now in between your 3 strong meals you need to consume 3 minor meals, such as a protein shake or a couple of protein bars, or essentially some snack which is going to contain another minimum of 30-50 grams of protein, but you are allowed to have this in protein shake form or other easy, convenient protein forms. And the carbohydrate amount need not be as heavy. This is the ideal eating plan for how to gain weight and muscle.

Now let’s talk about the big three meals. This means eating rather heavy at breakfast, lunch and dinner. You want to add food that is going to contribute to weight and muscle gain and the simple way to do this is just to add a large serving of protein to each meal. For instance at breakfast if you normally just eat cereal and toast, you’re going to have to start throwing some eggs in the mix. The key thing to remember is that muscle is made out of protein, and you will need lots of it to build muscle.

It’s great if you can eat egg whites for breakfast. Try for 3 or more. For lunch, if you normally have a burger, then your going to have to double it and have two burgers. And for dinner, if say you normally have something like pasta, then your going to have to add a hefty amount of meat in the sauce to get that protein in. If you usually have a serving of protein at dinner, say a chicken breast, then double it and have two chicken breasts. And if you can eat them baked or streamed, great. Basically your upping your protein intake with solid, strong weight gaining food. On thing to be stressed again is that you need to make sure you are getting alot of pure protein. Eating fatty and fried foods will not help you.

Again, If your serious about gaining weight, then in between your meals, sometime during the day you’ll want to down a high calorie protein shake. This should consist of protein, juice or milk, a tablespoon or two of peanut butter, a banana, and any other fruit you prefer. You could drink half of it between breakfast and lunch and the other half between lunch and dinner. Or if its not convenient just down the whole thing at once during one of those two periods.

The mathematics require you to eat more calories than you burn. You’ll basically force your body to gain weight on this program if you are consistent with it and stick to it day in and day out for at least 6-8 weeks. Make sure you are not just eating fat and not exercising. If you do that, you have a recipe for getting fat, not gaining muscle.

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Are muscle building supplements worthless?

Sunday, March 22nd, 2009

If you have ever read a book on goal setting, you know that one of the most important concepts is being able to divide your goal into smaller chunks. Writing your goal on paper and pointing out obstacles from the very beginning are also important to help you reach your destination. However, I think the most important aspect of goal setting has to be the emphasis on long-term gains instead of short-term achievements.

Like many people, I usually focused on the short term results of my actions rather than focusing on a long-term investment. Basically, if a project didn’t work out immediately, I would get discouraged or distracted and move on to something else. After all, there’s always something new and exciting to drag you away. Now, how exactly does this tie into strength training or muscle building?

When it comes to trying to build muscle, too many people are spending their precious time trying to find that perfect supplement that will take care of all their needs. Instead of focusing on the most important concepts, they try to find a shortcut so they don’t have to do the work.

Let’s face it, supplements are not the core of a muscle building program, regardless of what the advertisements out there might be telling you. The latest supplement fad from the bodybuilding gurus will not improve your workout or make up for your lack of self discipline.

Unfortunately, it seems that human nature is to look for a shortcut or silver bullet that will give us the results that we want without the hard work. This is absolutely relevant to bodybuilding supplements, because most trainees are looking for an easy way out instead of focusing on the fundamentals. If you try to look for a muscle building supplement to do all the work for you, you really are wasting your time and money. When you think about how simple (although not easy) natural weightlifting methods are, it really is unnecessary to focus on supplements. It all comes back to self discipline and trying to achieve a goal slowly over time.

Many experts trainers who have the muscles to back up their theories are warning us about trying to rely on supplements. Supplements will have only a slight benefit for the advanced bodybuilder, and they might have zero benefit for a beginner.

Most supplements, however, are either useless or are simply not necessary. The essential components of any bodybuilding program will always be progressive resistance training and increasing one’s daily calories. Looking for shortcuts when you have not even mastered the basics will simply lead to disappointment and a lot of wasted money.

I know it doesn’t sound very exciting when you’re told that supplements are not the way to go and that you’ll have to work hard to achieve the results that you want. It’s also not that comforting to imagine all of the workouts you’ll have to complete and how strict you’ll have to be with your diet plan. However, when you realize that there really are no shortcuts, you have to decide whether or not it’s worth it. I think you know that it is worth it, but you just have to start thinking about long-term results.

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Pilates Fitness: Go For The Modernized Trainings

Saturday, March 21st, 2009

You are most probably grown tired of doing your routine exercises because you feel exhausted and tired after doing it. Instead of refreshing you and giving you some relaxation, your traditional exercises may have been stressing you more. If this is also happening to you and you want to have a new set of challenging exercises, the Pilates fitness program is here to answer all that you are looking for.

There is no need for you to endure the hardship of doing those exercises, especially now that Pilates fitness is here to give you a perfect alternative for such dynamic and interactive stretches and movements. The credit for this fitness program should actually be given to its founder, Joseph H. Pilates. He was previously a sickly child back then which was why he did a lot of exercises. He became a skin diver, skier, and a skilled gymnast.

When he developed this program, he was thinking of the victims of the war who were injured and need physical training to be able to make the body function again. After the Pilates exercises were being noticed, he had his first students who happened to be some dancers who strongly believed that this program will help them improve their skills. His next students were some individuals who were physically challenged individuals, elderly people, health enthusiasts to movie actors and actresses.

You might be thinking how this program had helped a lot of people. This is because the Pilates fitness training is all about movements of the body. The movements are usually slow movements but intense in performance. The program focuses more on improving and strengthening the inner core muscles, including the back and the abdomen, so that the outer body will look and become slimmer yet fully developed.

As such, one is guided through a slow development from executing small-scale movements to large-scale actions as confidence increases. Pilates motion that runs from the core towards the extremities allows greater control of joints in the body. Likewise, injuries are far from happening in this sense.

The Pilates training is beneficial to almost every individual, especially to those who are on the age of maturity. This kind of training will help them improve their body condition through the movements. After doing this training, their body will definitely have a posture, coordination, flexibility, and strength that is noticeably improved and better than the previous condition. This is also good for those who had been through surgery.

But there is one thing that needs to be cleared about this training. It should be emphasized that doing this training does not only requires physical performance. Your mind should also coordinate with your body as it moves and therefore needs focus and concentration as you do the training. You will surely get positive results when you do the Pilates exercises together with the correct breathing techniques on a mat exercise or you can also use the Pilate training equipments.

Among the equipments provided by the Pilates fitness are the reformer, the pedipull, the cadillac, the barrel and the chair. These are designed in line with the program to help participants to do the training with full focus and concentration. Using these equipments, the Pilates fitness program will give your body a good and fully developed muscular appearance. The inner core will be strengthened and the outer will be stretched out.

With all these details, as far as one can tell, the Pilates fitness exercise is a one set of modern methods that you can use to have a body that is stronger, flexible, and fit than it was before.

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How a little planning can avoid a lot of muscle pain

Saturday, March 21st, 2009

Starting out on any project can be a lot of fun. There’s usually excitement, and this is enough to get people going for a while. Unfortunately, this period is more like a honeymoon and doesn’t really last long. Building muscle, for example, takes consistency over long-term.

If you’re serious about building a huge amount of muscle, you’ll need the right information to get started. This information can help you make progress more effectively and more quickly while avoiding injury. If you don’t take time to learn some fundamentals in the beginning, you may end up paying for it down the road.

The first thing you should do is address any preexisting injuries before taking on an intense muscle building program. Getting a checkup with your family doctor is a good start, but you may need to consider some other therapies such as myofascial release to clear up any trigger points or scar tissue. Even some forms of massage therapy can be quite helpful, and many are surprised by the relief that these therapies can provide.

You may not be familiar with these kinds of therapies, but more and more people are taking advantage of them. The key is to tackle these injuries before they get out of hand, and you certainly should be careful before beginning any kind of weight training while nursing an injury.

After beginning a muscle building program, many unfortunately don’t follow a good recovery program. You have to remember that the actual growth of your muscles does not occur in the gym, so you need to give your muscles enough rest in between workouts. Following this warning can help you progress more quickly as well as avoid injury. So many make the mistake of increasing their workouts when they don’t see immediate results.

Their logic is simple: more is better. While this may be a simple concept, it is inherently flawed because it ignores the basic principles of muscle-growth. The goal of a strength training workout in the gym to is to challenge the muscle beyond its previous limits and create small tears in the muscle. The body will adapt to this new stress by rebuilding the muscle in a larger size (hypertrophy). However, the growth of the muscle itself will occur during the recovery phase, not during the actual workout in the gym. Allowing the body to heal before the next workout is critical to long-term success, and many experts only recommend as few as 3 hours of training per week!

Getting plenty of rest is actually one of the most important parts of muscle building. Do not underestimate the importance of a good night’s sleep. Growth hormone is released during deep sleep, which is why you need to get plenty of sleep if you’re serious about building a good amount of muscle. Also remember that your entire body is under stress during a workout, not just your muscles. You need to give your entire body a chance to recover before returning to the gym.

The last bit of advice I would like to give you before you begin your new weightlifting program has to do with listening to others. When you start going to the gym or hanging out in a bodybuilding forum, you’ll probably be exposed to many different opinions that contradict each other. It’s tough to sort it all out, but you need to look for people who have proven their philosophies and achieved success. Look for a trainer who has proven how to build muscle naturally without steroids and even with no supplements (or a minimum of supplements).

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6 Tips to Build Muscle Faster

Thursday, March 19th, 2009

The majority of people are impatient, especially when they are trying to achieve their muscle building goals. Here are some good bodybuilding tips for those who are looking for the secrets of building muscle faster. Follow these tips; you will see results in weeks.

First, when you are building muscles by working out, you should be careful not to do too much. Logically, it seems as if working harder, doing more reps, lifting more weights will make you see results far faster, but this is incorrect.

Since there are so many ways for building muscle faster. Don’t overtrain your body. It is seriously wrong way to do it. Damaged muscle recover takes time. If you damage or strain muscles, it may take up to monthly to cover for next working out exercise. While lying on your back, you can’t build your muscles.

Your weight lifting workout exercise should set at 70% to 80% of your maximum muscle strength. The damaged muscle will repair itself. And the more muscle damaged, the more muscle will be added when it repairs. And 70 to 80% is the good muscle damage point for this purpose. Quickly building muscle means you should take on quick workouts that last no more than one hour each, or the lactic acid buildup will create negative effects.

Aerobics No More

Aerobics don’t help in muscle mass building. But they are good for cardio. They can actually interfere with your attempts to build muscle.

Eat More Fish and Meat

Eat plenty of fish and red meats that are lean. Salmon is good. Salmon have loads of Oemga-3. The proteins in red lean meats will help your muscle growth faster.

The Benefit of Rest

Have a full day rest after a day of weight lifting. Which mean no continuous workout for 2 days. You also can train certain part of muscle in day 1 and train totally different part of muscle in day 2. The main purpose is letting muscle rest and repair itself. Sleeping is also important for your health as well as muscle repair itself. As we mention before, our body will add more muscles after the muscle repairs itself.

Proper hydration is also needed for building muscles. Proper hydration means enough water in your cell for carrying nutrition and riding of body waste, regulating body temperature and protecting your joints. These are tips that you should try out for having healthy body and good working out.

Good Protein Source

In order to build muscles faster, you should add lean chicken, tuna, turkey, lean red meats and eggs in your meal plan. Intake lean protein is important for building muscle. Some protein sources like red meat and salmon have fats. They can boost your testosterone levels and help your muscle growth and increase muscle strength.

Visit Your Doctor

For the proper rest of muscles, you need to talk to your doctor regularly. Your doctor will give you many tips on staying as healthy as possible.

More Sleep the Better

Sleep 8 to 10 hours daily is important for building muscles faster. For this amount of sleep, your muscle can relax and build muscle mass faster. Much of the growth of your muscles happens while you are asleep, so sleep then whenever you get the chance.

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Natural Supplements For Bodybuilding

Tuesday, March 17th, 2009

Want to know which one is the best bodybuilding supplement? Nowadays, you find search many types of supplements from the Internet or magazine. But choosing the right one for working out is not easy. What we say “right” or “best”, we are talking about the muscle building supplements that bring you the best results.

The most useful muscle building supplement for your working out is protein. And many bodybuilder experts agree with this point. Protein helps bring all the necessary muscle building enzymes to where they need to be. You need protein to have a higher energy stage for more exercise while building muscle.

While execute your muscle building program, whey protein is one of the supplement you should not skip. Intaking correct dosages and correct amounts of whey protein can bring your the best results.

Another choice of essential muscle building supplement is creatine. Creatine can help you fight tiredness and let you have better working outs. Creatine is a natural nutrient already exists in body. If you want to have better workout results, you should increase creatine level in your body and take creatine supplement is a good choice.

Your muscles are suffering a certain amount of pressure when you are doing weight training exercises in your muscle building program. Your body has to produce a chemical called nitric oxide to fight with this pressure or stress. Supplying nitric oxide to your body is very important especially when you are carrying out stressful working out exercises. Effecting sexual health is the side effect of nitric oxide. Since many users claim that they don’t have such side effects, you can choose to use it on your own risk.

Achieving the best outcome of working out, you can also check out another bodybuilding supplement - glutamine. Glutamine helps to transfer the bodybuilding nutrients to muscle and make it growth faster and bigger.

It is up to you to choose what kind of muscle building supplement to use. Set up a realistic goal and pick one supplement that can accomplish your desired goals. Muscle building supplements work differently and lead to different results. Picking the right one can help you achieve more effective working outs.

There are many brands and companies produce supplements. Select one with verified results. The exaggeration usually occurs in many supplement companies. So before buying supplement, remember to check the affiance of the supplement. Before buying any supplement, it is vital to check the users’ reviews. Selecting a right supplement become vital for enhancing your weight training exercise as well as accomplishing the results you want.

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