Building Lean Muscle

Body Building training has become very popular these days, there are many people like teens, professional body builders, athletes, etc. that practice body building, some as a sport, others as their professional job.

The following 7 Tips are MUSTS if you want to save time, money, and maximize your success in a shortest amount of time.

1. Define your personal fitness goals

Set realistic and measurable goals and attack them with the right mindset. Always aim high but be realistic. If you create goals that are unattainable you are setting yourself up for failure. You can become bored, disappointed and disillusioned to the point where you may
give up. Don’t sell yourself short. Set your long term goals, of course, but also set
short term goals that are achievable.

Without knowing that you could end up spending more money than you need to on equipment that you’ll never fully utilize. Not to mention you may fail in your attempts to achieve your goals. And, don’t forget to reward yourself when you do achieve them.

2. Warm up

Warm up before you lift weights and do it every time you go to the gym. Regardless if you’re doing high reps with light weights or low reps with heavy weights, you must adequately warm your muscles. Start by doing 5 – 10 minutes of light cardio work on a stationary bike or treadmill. Then before each exercise take approximately 40% of the weight you’ll be using and do a couple sets of 10 – 12 reps.

3. Eat healthy

This can’t be stressed enough. The only true bodybuilding aids are good nutrition. Consult a
licensed dietician. Watch your local community calendar for free seminars on diet and nutrition. Learn all you can about what nature freely provides that can help you to develop a healthy diet.

Many novice body builders think that because they are trying to build muscle, they can eat any kind of food that they want. Well, this is not true, because eating a dozen donuts will not build muscle, it will build fat. Thus, an important body building tip is to eat foods that are filled with protein, like eggs and meat. Also, be sure to eat other foods that are rich in vitamins.

4. Mix-up your Workout

Don’t do the same workout twice in a row. Keep shocking your muscles. Don’t allow your body to adapt to any set routine. There are many ways you can change your program and sometimes the smallest changes can be all the difference. Use different exercises, set and rep patterns, do things in a different order. This is good for your motivation as well.

5. Take supplements

Supplement your diet with high quality protein. Get 1 gram of protein per pound of bodyweight per day. Spread out this protein over the 5-6 small meals that you are going to eat.
It’s hard to get all the protein, carbs and amino acids you need for optimum muscle growth from food alone. Some people say they don’t need supplements, but most people will benefit from them.

6. Drink plenty of water

Always have water with you and Drink 8 glasses or more of water per day. Water is nature’s miracle supplement. The benefits of drinking a lot of water are limitless.

Water helps to build muscle by transporting nutrients throughout the body and helping deal with your high protein diet by flushing the kidneys. Drinking water is also good for overall health.

7. Take a rest

Make sure that you get adequate sleep and rest.

Keep your rest intervals between sets at 45-60 seconds. This will give your muscles enough time to recover but still keep them fatigued.

Rest is another important part of muscle building. When you train you’re actually breaking down muscle tissue. The actually repair and building process takes place while you’re resting and asleep. If you don’t get enough rest you’re limiting your muscle growth potential.

Almost all body builders have differing opinions on the subject of what the actual purpose of body building is. Body building is the process of developing muscle through the combination of weight training, increased caloric intake, and rest.

These body building tips are basic but they are also very important. Incorporate all of these body building tips into your routine and you’ll see better results and avoid injury.

Sports supplements are a big business. They promise to build muscle and improve performance, strength, and speed. Some of these products have been used for years and have evidence supporting their use, while others are new and relatively unknown. In this article, I really feel for newbie lifters. It’s such a common thing to see a young person (Sometimes not so young) who is really keen on building muscle mass, but to be absolutely confused about a few things. And so often it is supplements that they are confused about. And this is fair enough. There is so much rubbish out there on supplements that it’s really hard to gauge what is correct and what is hype.

So I’m going to outline my philosophy when it comes to supplements and list a couple of supplements that I use myself and can personally recommend to you too.

Think about the word supplement for a moment. Most people don’t actually realise what a supplement is and then feel robbed when they realise they got what they should’ve expected. You see, a supplement is just that. It supplements your diet and training regime. While supplements for building muscle mass can definitely help, they will only work if the rest of your program is great.

I like to call this phenomenon the magic pill phenomenon. People think that by just popping a pill or drinking a special shake that their problems will go away or they will instantly skyrocket their results. A great example is my dad. He takes fish oil every day because he read that it helps prevent heart disease. Now, this is true, fish oil has been shown to decrease the risk of heart disease. However, if my dad was serious about his health, he would improve his diet and exercise more. But by taking a pill each day, he is satisfied that his health is fine and so he goes along with his normal daily routine.

And the sad thing is that lots of people do this with supplements for building muscle mass. Taking creatine and not working out is not going to make you more muscular. What you need to do instead is first educate yourself. Once you have done this step, you will be on your road to success.

By educating yourself properly, you will learn how to construct a proper diet regime and you will also learn how to train. Once you have these two things in place, you can then start to worry about supplements.

I guess now you’ve heard my little rant about when to use supplements, you actually want to know which supplements to use and which to stay away from. I’m going to give you my 3 favourite supplements. The 3 supplements for building muscle mass that I use myself.

First up is whey protein powder. It’s great for convenience sake and for getting some extra protein into you before and after a workout. Second comes creatine, it’s cheap and is pretty handy for getting a couple of extra percent of results for you. And finally, fish oil is a great way to get your daily fats in you. Since they come in capsule, they are easy to take, so you can monitor how much fat you are getting in your body.

Lipoic Acid

Lipoic acid is also known as alpha-lipoic acid. It is found naturally in the body. One of the things lipoic acid does is to turn blood sugar into energy for the body’s needs. This may help to build muscle glycogen, which is the reason why athletes use lipoic acid. More studies are needed in this area.

It is also an antioxidant that neutralizes harmful free radicals. Unlike other antioxidants, it works in both fat and water, giving it a broad spectrum of action.

Some other muscle building supplements include various amino acids, protein bars, growth hormone, and a huge selection of multi vitamins, all with varying ingredients used to help promote muscle growth. Growth hormone is released by the pituitary gland and is responsible for our growth, particularly during our teenage years when we hit puberty. In time, this hormone slows down, but by if we supplement with it, we can see a large increase in growth in both muscles and sometimes in bone growth as well. This is a popular choice for muscle building supplements, since the results are very stunning and often surprise people with repeated use. Protein bars are a safe and delicious way to help promote muscle growth. So that’s it for this article. By now you should understand how to properly use supplements and which ones get my personal stamp of approval.

Building muscle and burning fat are common goals in today’s health and image conscious society.

In order to build muscle and burn fat, you must focus on three core principles. You need the right materials, the right tools, and sufficient time to create the body of your dreams. To obtain the ultimate physique, you should:

Eat Right – Proper nutrition is extremely important, not only to fuel your workouts, but to provide the right building materials for your body to build muscle and burn fat.
Workout – A solid workout program provides the tools for your body to use the building materials from your nutrition plan. We provide workouts designed to build muscle mass or burn fat.

Grains

The grains group, which includes foods like bread, cereal, rice, and pasta, should provide the majority of the energy your child needs each day.

These foods are high in complex carbohydrates, which are the body’s favorite fuel, and give your child the energy to play, pay attention in school, and do many other activities.

Grains also provide other important nutrients such as vitamin B-complex (folate), which helps your child’s body use the protein needed to build muscle.
Vegetables
Vegetables provide many of the vitamins and minerals kids need for good health, and they provide fiber to aid digestion. So it’s important to have a variety of them in your child’s diet.

Be sure to scrub vegetables before cooking them. It’s best to steam or microwave vegetables, or eat them raw. Occasional stir-frying is OK. Boiling vegetables is also acceptable, but some of the vitamins and minerals will be lost to the cooking water.
Here is a list of excellent carbohydrate choices that you will want to include in your building muscle diet.

- Whole wheat breads
- Oatmeal
- Apples
- Whole wheat bagels
- Cream of wheat
- Yams
- English muffin
- Mushrooms
- Beets
- Whole wheat pitas
- Red and green peppers
- Cabbage
- Bran muffin
- Bananas
- Cucumber
- Granola bar

Muscles require high quality nutrients supplied at short intervals to grow.
Quality nutrition is indispensable to gain Muscle. If you have a negative Calorie deficit then you are wasting your time in the gym. Its absolutely crucial that you take eating seriously if you really want to build muscle.
Eat 5-6 meals everyday.

More than 3 hours without food leads your body no option but to tear itself and use that energy for fuel. This is called Catabolism. Its the enemy to Muscle Building (Anabolism)

Collagen is a flexible, fibrous, and very strong protein strand that forms the framework which supports all the cells, soft tissue, and organs of your body. It is flexible like nylon, but has twice the tensile strength of steel! Collagen is found in your bones, tendons, ligaments, joints, cartilege,

the walls of arteries and veins, muscles, skin, hair and nails. There is more collagen protein in your body than all other proteins combined, and it forms about 75% of your skin.

Have you been going to the gym regularly for months and haven’t been able to put on any serious poundage? If you answered yes to any of these questions, it’s time to take a step back and make some plans. Building muscle is not rocket science. There are four key factors that will mean the difference between building muscle and staying skinny. You have to ask yourself these four questions.

Is my diet optimized for building muscle?

It’s time to get out of the “3 meals per day” mentality. If you want to gain (or lose) weight you need to feed your body whole foods, six times per day. This means splitting your large meals up and eating about once every three hours. Not only is this good for your metabolism, but your body will use the foods instead of storing them as fat.

Your six meals per day should consist of mainly complex carbohydrates and protein. You should aim for at least thirty grams of protein per meal. High protein foods include lean meat, chicken, fish, egg whites, cheese and milk products. Complex carbohydrates are found in brown rice, brown bread and potatoes. Stay away from foods high in salt and sugar

Should I be using supplements, and when should I be taking them?

If you can afford supplements you should be using them. The basic three you should be considering are protein, carbs and creatine. Whey protein supplements are the fastest known way to deliver quality protein to your muscles. This makes shakes particularly effective after your workouts, when your body is craving protein for muscle re-growth.

There are three key times that supplements should be taken. First thing in the morning, after your workout and before bed. If your diet is up to scratch you shouldn’t need supplements at any other time. Don’t use supplements to replace meals. Supplements are supplements, not meal replacements.

Am I training hard and not smart?

The biggest mistake the new lifters make is thinking that the more they workout the bigger they’ll get. This couldn’t be further from the truth! Two basic rules you must remember when it comes to weight training. First, quality is better than quantity. Second, compound exercises are the kings of building muscle.

Compound exercises require at least two joint movements. Big compound exercises are the squat, bench press, wide grip pull up and seated row. These movements recruit many more muscles fibers to use to move the weight. This means more muscle groups are worked, the exercise is more challenging and the potential for growth is much greater.

Generally you should be doing three compound exercises for one isolation exercise. For example your back/biceps workout might consist of wide grip pull ups, seated row, bent over row and standing bicep curl. You might think this is not enough work for your biceps? Wrong. Your biceps are worked heavily in all over these exercises; the bicep curl just finishes them off.

The length of any training session should not exceed one hour. And you only need to train one muscle group once per week. This means a split routine should only need to be three days per week. In fact, most professional bodybuilders only train four times per week. Remember, it’s quality not quantity.

Do I get enough rest and recovery time?

When you workout you’re not building your muscles, you’re breaking them down. The reason why you looked “pumped up” when you’re in the gym is because your muscle tissue is swollen and damaged. Your muscles actually grow when you are resting. So in simple terms, no rest equals no muscle growth.

So take it easy when you’re not working out. Ease up on the cardio. And make sure you get plenty of sleep. Sleep is the body’s number one time for building muscle. This is also why it’s important to eat before bed, so your body has the fuel to repair muscle in your sleep.

Simple isn’t it?

So you can see that despite what you read in magazines or on the web about building muscle, it’s surprisingly simple. If you get the four aspects I have mentioned in this article right, you will build muscle. If you’ve got any questions, I’m available on the forum on my site. See links in my bio.

Are you eating your prescribed six bodybuilding meals a day and not gaining muscle?

Have you been blowing your hard-earned cash on body building supplements with techie names like “Nitric-this” and “Cell-Max-that”, yet still fall short of getting the size gains you’re after?

You’re not alone. Thousands of muscle building enthusiasts are needlessly struggling – grunting and sweating for painfully little progress – and mislabeling themselves “hard-gainer”.

Building muscle, like accomplishing anything, requires some rational thinking and a well-executed strategy. It doesn’t just happen because you made it to the gym and finished your workout. It won’t occur simply because you’re using a product that was purportedly created by a “genius” wearing a lab coat. Successful natural muscle growth takes place as a result of adherence to laws of nature – just like success with any endeavor in life.

To back my point, let’s look at what many muscle building aficionados counter-productively do in gyms around the world. This is a simplistic example, but some variation of this scenario is the cause for much unneeded frustration for too many natural bodybuilders.

Let’s say Bill and Joe are training partners. They arrive at the gym to perform their much-anticipated biceps workout. Bill likes to start out with standing barbell curls and he’s glad he has Joe there to spot him. Bill just knows that if he can get Joe to assist him with the heavy sets, some “forced reps” will really get his arms growing. He’s decided to use the ever-popular ‘pyramid technique’ to work his way up to those heavy sets.

Bill ends up doing six sets. His sets are as follows: 50 pounds/8 reps, 55 pounds/8 reps, 60 pounds/6 reps, 70 pounds/6 reps, 55 pounds/7 reps, 50 pounds/6 reps.

Bill feels proud of himself. It was a grueling biceps workout. His first three sets were moderately challenging. However, the 70 pounds he piled on the bar for his fourth set of 6 reps represented a respectable stretch for him.

Although he didn’t ask for any help from Joe, he definitely had to dig deep within himself to find that extra pride-inducing push that allowed him to achieve the set of six reps. This fatigued his biceps enough to make the final three sets sufficiently challenging, even though they were performed with descending amounts of weight.

Five days later, Bill and Joe are back again for another biceps workout. Why? Because their schedule says it’s time to work those muscles again. Of course, muscles only grow from recovery between workouts – not directly from the tissue-ravaging training sessions themselves. But Bill and Joe have apparently worked out some kind of deal with their biceps in which the muscles have agreed to recover and grow in a four to five day span (sarcasm).

Bill wants to get bigger, so he’s decided to boost his heaviest set up to 75 pounds. He figures this will really “shock” his biceps into growth. His sets on this workout look like this: 50 pounds/8 reps, 55 pounds/8 reps, 65 pounds/6 reps, 75 pounds/6 reps, 55 pounds/6 reps, 50 pounds/5 reps.

Wow… Bill got a little assistance from Joe and managed to use five pounds more weight on his two heaviest sets. That extra intensity caused him to fall short a couple reps on his final, lighter sets. But that’s okay, right? Bill is increasing the poundage and getting stronger and bigger, isn’t he?

Hell no! … Bill is deceiving himself. If you add up the total volume he moved in the approximate twenty minute time period during the first workout, it was 2,305 pounds. Five days later, he moved 2,260 pounds in the same time frame. His volume of lifted weight went down. Now he’s counting on moving forward after having possibly over-trained in this most recent workout. Yet he’s not even aware of what he’s doing.

If you follow the Muscle Building and Weight training tips given here. you will

* Build Muscle and Gain weight much faster
* Get the Dream Muscular Physique you deserve.
* Lift weights which will shock your Gym Buddies
* Feel amazing confidence and Self-esteem
* And much more.

Copyright © 2006 Richard Knight

If you’re anything like I was a short while ago, “a skinny guy trying to build muscle mass”, then I have some important tips that could help you start seeing results instantly.

There are 3 key ingredients that you MUST HAVE in order to build muscle mass and quickly at that. And here they are:

Muscle Mass Ingredient #1 – More Protein

If you want to build muscle mass quickly then this is a “must”. Just remember, the only thing that can build muscle in your body is Protein. So if you’re not consuming enough protein it’s IMPOSSIBLE to build lean muscle mass and stack on the pounds.

In order to maintain your weight, you should be consuming 1 gram of protein for each pound of body weight. So if you’re a 150 lb. guy then in order to maintain your muscle mass at that weight you need to consume 150 grams of protein each day. And if you want to build muscle mass, you’re going to have to consume “more” protein, to not only maintain the muscles you have now but to build more.

So if you want to build muscle mass quickly and safely a general rule of thumb is to consume 1 – 2 grams of protein for each pound of body weight. So if you’re a 150lb. guy you’d want to consume at least 150 grams of protein upward to 300 grams of protein a day.

Muscle Mass Ingredient #2 – More Carbs

Despite what Dr. Atkins said, for all us skinny guys “Carbs are GOOD”. We need carbs as a source of energy. But you don’t want to consume just any ‘ol carbs. You want to consume a lot of complex carbs rather than simple carbs.

In other words, you still want to stay away from the sweets and simple sugars that are found in a lot of our junk food, and you want to consume more complex carbs like those found in whole wheat bread, brown rice, sweet potatoes, whole grain cereals, yams, spinach etc.

Why complex carbs? Because unlike simple carbs (sugars) it’s virtually impossible to turn complex carbs into fat – which means more energy to burn (work out with) and less fat to deal with in the end.

If you want to build muscle mass fast, ideally you’d want to consume 2 – 3 grams of carbs for each pound of bodyweight a day.

Muscle Mass Ingredient #3 – Heavy Weight Training

You cannot build muscle mass without “Heavy weight training”. Let’s just put it this way “the more stress (heavy weight) you put on your muscles, the more it will grow”. And it’s simply because when you put extreme stress on your muscle by lifting heavy weights, your body responds (builds more muscle) so that next time it won’t be as hard or strenuous on your body to lift the same weight.

Ideally, if you want to build muscle mass – lean muscle mass to be more specific, you’d want to lift weights that allow you to do 6-8 reps and no more.

Of course there’s a whole lot more to building muscle mass, but if you follow these 3 key ingredients you’ll be on the road to building lean muscle mass quickly and a whole lot easier than you ever thought possible. Good luck and grow “Massive”.

Free weights versus machines. This is one of the debates that have been going around amongst body builders on whether which is more effective and efficient when it comes to building muscle.

Only those experienced body builders who has been lifting weights for years know a little better.

The experience body builders will agree to one thing. Free weights are definitely better to muscle building in comparatively to machines.

Here’s why: Free weights will cause your body and muscles to build and work against resistance in a 3 dimensional environment. This means that when you work on a particular muscle group, you are working the muscles all around that area.

When it comes to machines, they normally only allow your body to build and work against resistance in either 1 or at the best 2 dimensional environment.

Not only not, working on free weights increases your strength which overall are used in your daily activities as everything you do and movement in your body requires strength from all 3 dimensions.

There are small skinny guys which load the bench press machine with 4 plates on the side but can’t even perform 2 plates on a free weight bench press. I almost guarantee that if you see someone performing a 4 plate per side on a free weight bench press, they are usually a large person.

However, they are advantages to using machines. Since machines focuses the work on muscles in a 1 or 2 dimensional environment, they can be used to be more focus on building up more muscle to a specific area. They are used by experienced body builders who know what they are doing to shape their muscles.

But overall, I strongly suggest that free weights to be used as the majority and priority exercises which are more important for beginners and intermediates whose aim is to build strength first.

You can build your muscles in two different ways. First you can rely on the heavy and fatty foods. It will help accumulate extra fat on your body and your muscles would look heavy due to the deposition of the fat. But this is not the right way to increase your muscle. It develops obesity and creates a number of health problems. On the other hand you can build muscle through bodybuilding. It connotes a well-shaped body muscles with the loss of extra fat. Bodybuilding gives a good and sculpted look to your body without actually increasing your weight.

Building muscles through natural ways is always good. You can do it with a proper planning. Here are some tips discussed for gaining body muscles through bodybuilding.

First, do strength training and get stronger. Strength training will help you gain huge muscles. If you don’t know how to start just begin with strong lift program. Do it at least half an hour daily.

Second, go for weight training. It will make you stronger and making your muscles more prominent. It works your muscles. Muscles undergo wear and tear and then recuperate. In addition to it weight training teach you how to balance weight. It increases your muscle endurance. It is quite safe if you work in a natural motion. It is versatile in nature as there are plenty of equipments you can use for weight lifting. You can better go to a gym for weight training.

Third, Target your biceps, triceps abdomen and legs also while doing weight training. Don’t forget to train your legs. Then only your entire body will take a good shape.

Fourth, eat properly. A good diet is necessary for muscle growth and recuperation. It will help build your muscles. Split your meals. Eat six times daily but avoid fatty and junk foods. Strength training burns your calories. So you need extra protein and carbohydrate to compensate the loss of energy. This way you can gain weight without gaining fat.

Fifth, eating healthy is also must in muscle making program. Your diet should incorporate all kinds of vegetables and fruits, whole grains, saturated fat containing fish and olive oil and fiber food.

If a person wants to build muscle fast and rapidly then this article is the best option for him to gather information about how build muscles in a fast and rapid manner. Different people have different reasons for building muscles. For example, some people want to build muscles for staying healthy and fit to perform well in sports while others build them for looking in front of the opposite sex. If a person wants to build muscle fast then he should first get a motivation for this because without motivation no task is possible for a person. The best way to get a motivation is to write the reason behind building muscles on a paper and stick it somewhere so that the person would be able to read it everyday. When he continuously reads the motive of muscle building everyday, then he would realize that he need to get off from his couch and go to the gym and exercise regularly.

For building muscle fast, the person need to know the reason or rather the “science” involved in building these muscles. This is not the science which is involved in rocket propulsion but the working of the biological processes of how the muscles expand themselves in our body and get heavier and bulkier in less time required. Not every person has 17 inch biceps and proper abdominals on his stomach. So, a person need to work hard and go through intense workouts daily in order to build muscle fast and in a very effective manner. Some people decide to go for supplements but most of them have their own side effects and adversely affect the body in the long run. So, intense workout is the best way for building muscles fast.

When a person goes through an intense workout, the molecules of the muscles breakdown inside his body and are split into lighter particles. This process is called micro trauma and it is invisible to us as it occurs inside our body. When the workout is over, these lighter particles again join themselves and form bigger particles during the recovery time. When these bigger particles are re formed, they become stronger and heavier then before and hence muscles are built in the person’s body. Foods like chicken, eggs, fish and beef which are rich in protein are suggested along with these workouts as a lot of energy is drained. These foods provide the body with intense amount of energy so that the body gets ready for the next workout.

Nowadays people are getting crazy about bodybuilding. Hey! You wannabe a muscle man don’t you? Well, it’s not a big deal. Gaining muscle fast is quite possible. But it requires some strategy. The strategy has three main elements. First is weight training through weight or hydraulic resistance equipment. Secondly, high level nutrition intake supplemented by extra proteins is equally important. Third, taking rest for recuperation between workouts will serve the real purpose.

Weight training is critically needed for a sculpted body with prominent muscles. Here weight training should not be confused with strength training. Weight training builds muscle fast whereas strength training helps strengthen muscles and increases muscle flexibility. Weight training is not started abruptly. It should be preceded by some stretching and warm up exercises. Cycling, running and jogging are some good warm up exercises. Sit ups and push ups exercises constitute important elements in bodybuilding program.

It is always better to set a goal for the build muscle fast program. Build a three months program. In the first month the number of sit ups and push ups should be kept up to 15. It should be done in three sets followed by weight training. Weight training should be started with mild weight. It slowly improves the stamina and endurance of the body. Moreover, it should always be targeted to the major muscle groups such as biceps, triceps, and thigh and abdomen muscles.

In the second month the number of sit ups and push ups may be increased up to 50 in a week. The quantity of weight in the weight lifting should be increased as per stamina. The number of repetitions in the weigh lifting should be increased. In the third month the pace of sit ups and sit ups should be maintained with minor additions in the exercises. The quantity of weight should be increased to give maximum stretch to the muscles. But the build muscles fast program is still incomplete. What is missing here is the nutrition.

Adequate nutrition is must for the muscle building program. A body builder needs more carbohydrate and proteins than an average person. During weight training and other exercises muscles undergo micro tears which later recuperate. Therefore body demands extra energy and nutrition. Extra energy is provided by carbohydrate and protein works as bodybuilding substance. Therefore an ideal diet for muscle gaining program should incorporate protein and carbohydrate enriched food such as rice, oats, nuts, mutton, soy, fruits and green vegetables. In addition to it, plenty of water intakes are also must. It helps in digestion and keeps body metabolism in good condition. This is all about how to build muscle fast. Just keep it up and see the difference within six months. Good luck!!