More Muscle and How to Build It

Today, I am going to give you the truth about building muscle. And along with explaining it, I will tell you exactly how to get started.

Gaining muscle is an almost surefire way to get more attention. Think of all the interest in guys like Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig when they bulk up for a film role.

It doesn't matter if you're a skinny guy who wants to gain 20 or 30 pounds of muscle mass in a hurry, or you just want to pack on 10 or 15 pounds of "Hollywood muscle" so that you turn heads on the beach or around town. This strategy will work for everyone.

So, if you want to build more muscle, and what you're doing at the moment isn't working, pay attention. What I have to say might be just what you need to get better, faster results.

Step #1: Think Big

The first step has nothing to do with what you eat, the type of training you do or the supplements you take. It's about the way that you think. You have to genuinely believe that getting big is possible.

Forget about your body type or being a so-called "hard gainer." Ignore the outrageous claims in the muscle magazines about how much muscle you can build in a few months. Set challenging but realistic goals for yourself and work as hard as you can towards achieving them.

Step #2: Get Real

What constitutes a "challenging but realistic" goal when it comes to building muscle?

You might not like what I'm about to say, but I'm going to say it anyway. The fact is that some people have very favorable "muscle building" genetics and will see impressive results after only a few months of lifting weights. Others will build muscle more slowly. And that's just the way it is.

Yes, I know there are plenty of people running around trying to persuade you that they have "the key", be it a super-secret training program or exotic supplement- to putting on 50 pounds of muscle in [INSERT COMPLETELY UNREALISTIC TIME FRAME HERE].

Truth is, if you're just starting out lifting weights, you're doing extremely well to be gaining about 2 pounds of muscle each month, or 24 pounds over the course of a year.

Even Arnold Schwarzenegger, who combined extremely favorable genetics with an almost super-human work ethic, was very happy to out on 25 pounds in WEIGHT (not just muscle) over the course of a year. Here's what he wrote in his autobiography Arnold: The Education of a Bodybuilder...

So if Arnold says that 25 pounds was as much as he'd ever gained in one year (and not all of this was muscle), you'll be doing well just to match it, let alone beat it.

Step #3: Press, Pull and Squat

There's a good chance you've already heard the parable of the Professor and the Bucket. It goes something like this:

A professor and his student stand in a warehouse. A large tin bucket and several boxes are in front of them.

The professor picks up a box that contains large rocks, each one about four inches in diameter, and pours them into the bucket. The stones reach the top of the bucket, and he asks the student if it is full.

“It is,” the student replies.

The professor takes another box, this one containing stones about one inch in diameter, and pours them over the rocks in the bucket. The smaller stones fill in the spaces between the rocks. Again, he asks the student if the bucket is full.

The student looks and says, “It is.”

The professor then pours in the contents of a third box, this one containing small pebbles. Again, the student looks in and agrees that the bucket is full.

Finally, the professor pours a box of sand on top of the rocks, stones, and pebbles. And once more, for the fourth time, the student has to acknowledge that the bucket is full.

“The lesson,” the professor tells the student, “is to do the most important thing first, and each lesser thing in order of its priority. In this way, you will be able to fill up your life four times, instead of just once. If you do the unimportant things first, you’ll be filling your bucket with sand… and there won’t be room for anything else.”

So what does all of this have to do with building muscle fast?

To build as much muscle as you can in the shortest time possible, you need to concentrate on pressing (overhead press and bench press), pulling (deadlifts, chin-ups and rows) and squatting.

Think of these exercises as the "big rocks" that should go into your training "bucket" first.

Of course, that doesn't mean that you CAN'T include other exercises such as lateral raises, flyes, incline curls and so on.

However, these exercises are the "pebbles" and "sand" and should be used as a SUPPLEMENT TO rather than a REPLACEMENT FOR pulling, pressing and squatting.

Step #4: Stimulate Don't Annihilate

When they look for advice on how to build muscle, a lot of guys turn to the muscle magazines. They'll tell you that the only way to make your muscles grow is to stimulate all your muscle fibers by "bombing them into submission" with lots of exercises, sets and reps.

Truth is, you can't take a high volume (20-30 sets per muscle group) workout used by a heavily drug-assisted champion bodybuilder and assume that you'll get identical results by following the same program. It's not going to happen.

For most guys, a total of 20 "work sets" per workout (excluding warm-up sets) is more than enough to get the job done. That's not 20 sets per muscle group. That's 20 sets IN TOTAL for the entire workout.

"You can get jacked by doing three, four, or five sets per exercise," says Muscle Gaining Secrets author Jason Ferruggia. "Plenty of guys have. But if you possess average genetics and don't take steroids, you'll probably do better with a lot less work."

"As long as you're lifting challenging weights, getting enough sleep, and eating sufficient calories (around 500 per day above your maintenance intake), you're going to gain muscle. There's no rule that says you have to bomb each body part to make it grow."

How many reps should you do in each set?

I get e-mails from guys who are doing endless sets of 12-15 reps and then wonder why they're not growing. Although there is a time and a place for both higher (12-20) AND lower reps (1-5), most of your sets should be done in the 5-8 repetition range.

By the way, "stimulate don't annihilate" is a quote I stole from 8-time Mr. Olympia Lee Haney. It's good advice.

Step #5: To Get Big, You Will Need To Get Strong

To force your body to grow, you will need to utilize a principle known as progressive tension overload. Let's say that you start out lifting 100 pounds for 3 sets of 6 repetitions. Every month, you add 5 pounds to the bar. In 12 months time, you'll be lifting 150 pounds. And your muscles will have become bigger and stronger to accommodate the extra weight.

Here's an example of the type of thing I mean - you can use this method of progression with any exercise, although I prefer to use it with the compound lifts (bench press, squat, overhead press, and deadlift). The weights are just there for illustration.

Phase 1
WEEK 1: 3 sets of 8 reps with 90kg
Total training volume = 3 x 8 x 90 = 2160kg

WEEK 2: 4 sets of 6 reps with 100kg
Total training volume = 4 x 6 x 100 = 2400kg

WEEK 3: 5 sets of 5 reps with 110kg
Total training volume = 5 x 5 x 110 = 2750kg

WEEK 4: 2 sets of 5 reps with 110kg (DELOAD)
Total training volume = 2 x 5 x 110 = 1100kg

As you can see, both the resistance and volume are increased on a weekly basis in weeks 1-3. Then, you deload in week 4 by reducing the volume (I'll explain more about the importance of deloads in just a moment).

After the deload, go back to 3 sets of 8 repetitions. But this time, use a slightly heavier weight than before. A good rule of thumb is to add 5% or 5 pounds (2.5 kilograms), whichever is the smallest.

Phase 2
WEEK 5: 3 sets of 8 reps with 92.5kg
Total training volume = 3 x 8 x 92.5 = 2220kg

WEEK 6: 4 sets of 6 reps with 102.5kg
Total training volume = 4 x 6 x 102.5 = 2460kg

WEEK 7: 5 sets of 5 reps with 112.5kg
Total training volume = 5 x 5 x 112.5 = 2812.5kg

WEEK 8: 2 sets of 5 reps with 112.5kg (DELOAD)
Total training volume = 2 x 5 x 112.5 = 1125kg

As you can see, the total amount of work your muscles are doing is increasing over time, which is the real key to gaining strength and size.

If you're not getting stronger, you're probably not getting much bigger either.

Step #6: Pump and Burn

A lot of people will tell you that "getting a pump" has nothing to do with muscle growth. And it's true that the temporary increase in muscle size that you get after working out lasts for just an hour or so.

However, the TYPE of training that leads to that "pumped" feeling DOES have a role to play in building muscle.

As I mentioned earlier, probably the most important trigger for muscle growth is progressive tension overload — lifting more weight over time.

But there's a second stimulus, which you might see referred to as accumulating byproducts of fatigue, metabolite accumulation, metabolic fatigue (or some other variation on the theme) depending on who you listen to.

Metabolic fatigue is all about "going for the burn" and training in a way that makes your muscles feel like they're pumped up and on fire. And there are a number of different ways to stimulate metabolic fatigue.

You can use multiple sets of a given exercise with moderate-to-high repetitions (8-15) and short (30-60 seconds) rest periods between sets. You could incorporate a "burn out" set at the end of a series of heavy sets. Tourniquet training (which involves tourniquets applied to the part of the body you train) has also been shown to reduce the flow of blood to and from the working muscles, which serves to increase metabolic fatigue.

That's why it's a good idea to include both low reps and heavy weights as well as higher reps and lighter weights in your training program.

Step #7: Eat, Eat, and Eat Some More

You've heard it before, but it's so important that I'm going to say it again.

What you do in the gym is only half the story when it comes to getting big. Without enough food, all your muscle-building efforts in the gym will go to waste.

However, that doesn't give you a license to go and eat anything and everything in sight.

Your body is limited by its own physiology when it comes to building muscle.

What this means is that there's an upper limit on the amount of nutrients you can take in and turn into muscle.

If you're currently eating below this upper limit, then you'll build muscle faster by increasing your nutrient take.

But once you've "maxed out" your rate of muscle gain (which is heavily influenced by the level of anabolic hormones in your body), simply adding more calories won't automatically lead to a faster rate of growth.

Let's say that your upper limit is 3500 calories per day. But you're only eating 2500 calories per day. In this case, taking in an extra 1000 calories will lead to a faster rate of muscle growth.

But just because those extra 1000 calories have helped you gain muscle faster doesn't mean that twice as many calories is going to result in muscle being built twice as fast.

It will just lead to you getting fat.

So if your main objective is to gain muscle mass, you have to eat more nutrients than you use each day, but you shouldn't eat so much that you end up gaining more fat than muscle.

There are many different methods to help you work out how many calories you need to gain weight. They range from simple formulas, such as multiplying your bodyweight by a fixed number, to more complicated equations that take into account your height, weight, age, resting metabolic rate and so forth.

Personally, I’m a big fan of keeping things as simple as possible. The approach I recommend (and the one I use myself) is to multiply your bodyweight by a fixed number that varies depending on your current level of lean bodyweight.

1. Firstly, calculate your lean bodyweight. For example, if you weigh 200 pounds at 15% body fat, you have 30 pounds of fat and a lean bodyweight of 170 pounds.

2. Multiply your lean bodyweight by 20. Using a lean bodyweight of 170 pounds, that gives you 3,400 calories per day.

This level of calorie intake should allow you to gain 1-2 pounds per month, most of it in the form of muscle. This represents good progress for anyone with a year or more of serious training under their belts (i.e. an intermediate). For advanced trainers, gaining 1 pound per month is a good rate of growth if you want to maintain a low level of fat.

You're going to find it very difficult to eat this much food if you're "eating clean" all the time. So it's fine to include a little "junk" in your diet — ice cream, pizza, that kind of thing.

Any formula, whether it's simple or complex, gives you a starting point. Then, you monitor your progress and decide whether you need to change your diet based on the results you're getting.

Assess your progress on a weekly basis. If you’re not gaining weight, increase your daily calorie intake by 250 calories for one week. Keep making small increases until you see a change on the scale. Likewise, if you notice that you're adding too much blubber, cut back on calorie intake by the same amount.

Whatever you do, don’t resort to one of those crazy 10,000 calories a day diets. You can’t force your body to gain muscle faster than your genetics will allow simply by stuffing yourself with food. It won’t work.

To build muscle fast, you also need an adequate supply of protein. But you DON'T need the crazy amounts I've seen some people recommend, such as 2-3 grams of protein per pound of bodyweight.

The vast majority of scientific research that I've looked at shows that the optimal protein intake for building muscle in natural trainees (i.e. guys who aren't on the juice) is around 1 gram of protein per pound of bodyweight (roughly 2.2 grams per kilogram).

Step #8: Recover and Grow

A lot of guys are wasting their time with split routines that involve training different muscle groups 5-6 days per week. And while some people can get great results with this type of program, they're in the minority.

If you've built a decent "base" of muscle and want to improve certain muscle groups, then some kind of split routine might be the way to go. But for most guys, lifting weights 3-4 days per week is all you need.

While there are many ways to put together an effective muscle-building training routine, most people will respond best to a whole-body workout done 2-3 times per week or an upper-lower body routine performed four days each week.

Step #9: Blast and Cruise

Although it's important to push yourself when you're in the gym, your body isn't a machine and you'll need to give it a rest now and again. Without it, your muscle-building progress will grind to a halt.

The simple way to do this is to take a week off for every 3-6 weeks of hard training. An "off" week (called a deload) doesn't mean doing no exercise at all. Rather, reduce the number of sets by 50% while maintaining the weight and number of repetitions used in the previous week.

Personally, I like to have a 3-week "blast" followed by a 1-week "cruise" in week 4.

Step #10: Keep It Simple

Once you have a decent training and nutrition program set up, the key to long-term success is to stick with it. Just keep adding weight to the bar at every opportunity and continue to feed your body with the nutrition it needs to grow.

Ignore wobble boards, swiss balls, Bosu balls, Vibration plates or any of the other "toys" found in gyms these days. Forget about the latest muscle-building bandwagon that everyone else is jumping on, no matter now tempting it might look. Don't worry about complicated training routines, exotic muscle-building supplements or fancy diets.

It's a lot more important to work hard on the basic exercises than to spend your time (and money) on the latest fad that the magazines are getting excited about.

When you concentrate on lifting heavy, training hard and eating right, the size will come.

About the Author

Christian Finn holds a master's degree in exercise science, is a certified personal trainer and has been featured on BBC TV and radio, as well as in Men's Health, Men's Fitness, Muscle & Fitness, Fit Pro, Zest and other popular fitness magazines.

If you want better, faster results from the time you spend in the gym, click here now for instant access to his step-by-step muscle-building and fat-burning workout routines.

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