Hit Your Weight Training Plateau?
Here's 5 Keys To Building Lean Muscle
By Bob Myhal, author of the Ultimate Muscle Mass Training Program
Are you trying to pack on muscle but just not seeing
the results you want? If you've hit your weight training plateau, you're
probably not following these 5 tried and
true rules of adding muscle mass.
Judging from what I’m seeing in the gym these days, many people trying to add
significant amounts of lean muscle mass tend to make things more difficult than
they really are.
Now I’m not saying that adding muscle mass is easy. It takes an intelligent
focus and a determined level of commitment. But if approached properly, the body
will respond.
Here are my 5 Keys to Building Lean Muscle:
RULE # 1: SHORT, INTENSE TRAINING SESSIONS
If you’re goal is to add muscle mass, you should be in the gym for no
longer than an hour, tops.
I’m a firm believer that quick, intense muscle-blasting sessions are best,
especially for natural bodybuilders and/or hardgainers.
The "get in the gym, hit your muscles hard, then get home and grow"
philosophy of Mentzer, Yates, and others has proven time and time again to be a
highly successful strategy for mass training.
As an example, I train my complete chest in about 20
minutes. I see some people in the gym who take 30-40 minutes to bench press!
Unless you’re looking to set the power lifting world on fire, this is
counterproductive.
And forget about doing 15 sets for biceps and expecting to grow. Train them
all-out in 5 or 6 sets and you’ll get much better results.
RULE # 2: EMPHASIZE THE NEGATIVE
Research has shown beyond any doubt that the eccentric or negative portion of
a movement is at least as important to muscle growth as the positive or
concentric phase.
By periodically placing greater emphasis on the eccentric, you’ll push your
muscles harder than ever before . . . and as a result, you’ll stimulate new
growth.
For each bodypart, I like to focus on negatives once every couple of weeks.
The easiest way to do this is resist the weight during the negative, lowering
slowly.
For instance, you can focus on the eccentric portion of the Standing Barbell
Curl by raising the weight at a normal tempo (for me this is usually a 2 count)
and then lowering the weight very slowly (a count of 4 or 5).
Because this is a high intensity technique, don't use it for every workout .
. . doing so will likely lead to overtraining. For best results, use the
technique periodically during a couple heavy sets of each bodypart.
Because muscles are generally stronger during the eccentric phase of the
movement (muscles can resist more weight than they can lift), you can also use a
spotter to allow you to use more weight during the negatives. Just have your
partner help you out on the positive portion of the movement, and really blast
your muscles with those heavy negatives.
RULE # 3: VARIETY IS WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT
Variation is the most important principle you can implement if you want to
allow your body to continue to pack on serious muscle mass.
I cannot emphasize this enough.
Our bodies are incredible machines; they’re capable of adapting very quickly
to the physical stresses we place on them during training. In fact, it’s one of
the things they do best.
It’s because of this ability to adapt that you must constantly use variation
in your program—or even changing your program altogether—in order to prevent
this adaptation from stifling your progress. It’s precisely due to a failure to
change your training that results in plateaus and frustration.
Ideally, you should be following a training program that has variation built
into it on all levels. The Ultimate Muscle Mass Bodybuilding Program is a good example. I've had a lot of great feedback
about this program. Check out what people are saying about my guaranteed
bodybuilding program.
In any event, a training program that does not use variation is doomed to
offer only short-term, sporadic gains.
RULE # 4: FUEL YOUR BODY FOR GROWTH
If you want big muscles, then you have to feed your body lots of high-quality
nutrients. Your best bet is to give your body a continual influx of healthy food.
I suggest eating at least 4 and as many as 8 meals per day. Of course, these
meals should be balanced with the right proportion of protein,
complex carbohydrates, and good fats.
Say you want to consume about 5000 calories over the course of 6 meals (a
good target for 200 lbs. male looking to pack on muscle mass with intense
training), then each meal should be around 800 to 850 calories. This is better
than having one meal of 350 calories, one of 1400 calories, and so forth.
Organize your meals around quality sources of protein like egg whites, tuna
and other fish, chicken and turkey breast, lean cuts of beef, etc. Try to take
in around 1 to 1.5 grams of protein per pound of weight. If you weigh 200 lbs.,
than eat at least 200 to 300 grams of protein per day.
Getting enough good fat is also important for muscle growth, and experience
suggests that drastically low fat diets are counterproductive in this area.
For best results, I like to cycle carbohydrate intake. Check out the
Anabolic Nutrition Program for more details.
Now, it’s admittedly difficult to eat 5 or 6, not to mention 7 or even 8,
quality meals per day . . . especially given how busy most of our schedules are.
This is where using a solid meal replacement powder (MRP) and
other supplements becomes absolutely essential.
RULE # 5: SUPPLEMENT SUPPORT
The days of people knocking the benefits of supplements are thankfully over.
Now, even mainstream physicians and nutritionists recognize the importance of
supplementing our diets. And the real-world results bodybuilding and fitness
enthusiasts have achieved through intelligent supplementation speak for
themselves.
Along with training and nutrition, establishing a proper supplement program
is one of the three equal points of the Triangle of Physical Well-Being and
Power.
The list of tried and proven supplements that support muscle growth really
isn’t that long:
