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So you are wanting to bulk up some muscle....read and learn.
Firstly don't go into training blind...understand what you are doing in the gym.
There are three aspects to bulking your muscles up, (well four actually but I'm not gonna write advice on steroids and what to use and what not to).
These are
Training
Diet
Rest/Sleep
go on then...Testosterone optimisation (however I'm only going to talk about how to naturally increase your anabolic hormones).
Lets start with how they tie in together and why you need all three perfected to get the most out of your training.
Firstly your muscles don't grow in the gym, you can not build muscle whilst eating little amounts of food and you won't grow well if you aren't sleeping properly.
Reason being
Your muscles do not I repeat your muscles DO NOT grow whilst you are in the gym.
Every time you train you cause small tears in your muscles, these are called micro traumas (sp)
You walk out the gym after a hard session with your body in a state of decay, your muscles have tiny tiny traumas that need repairing.
You need correct sleep and nutrition for your body to repair these effectively. When it recovers (if allowed to properly) your body will repair these traumas and over compensate and over repair them (bingo muscle growth).
...living in the gym 24/7 won't make you grow...you need to allow your body to rest and recover properly and you also need to feed it right to help it do so.
Think of it like some cavemen building a bridge over a little river.
They have a little bridge to start with,..... then an earthquake comes along and shakes it about and makes some holes in the bridge.
The cave men can then repair these holes (after the earthquake) and this time they will be clever and make the bits with holes in a bit bigger and stronger in case there is another earthquake.....
Then another earthquake comes along and the process repeats.
Soon the bridge is much bigger as all of it has been replaced with bigger stronger bits.
Now a slightly bigger earthquake comes along and puts holes in some of these new stronger bits of bridge....the cave men have to then decide to make it even bigger to compensate for these new even bigger earthquakes.
....the process repeats and so long as the earthquakes get bigger then the bridge keeps on growing.
So in that analogy...
The Bridge is your muscles
The Earthquakes are the workouts.
The time between earthquakes is your rest and sleep.
The wood to make the bridge and the food to feed the cavemen is your nutrition intake.
The Number of cavemen and how fast they can work are your anabolic hormones (testosterone + HGH).
So as you can see all the above are important factors. If the cavemen don't have enough time to repair the bridge then it will never get bigger and if they don't have enough wood then they can't repair the bridge and if the bridge doesn't get knocked down then they never have a reason to make it bigger and stronger.
So now you know what you are doing in the gym lets have a look at some of the aspects.
Training....
There really is far too much to write on this subject in this thread but to get you started...
Firstly you need to be lifting smart. Use big compound movements like ..
Squats
Chins
Deadlifts
Bench presses
Military presses
Sit ups (full range)
These will cause the most amount of muscle growth.
You can refine your shape etc with smaller exercise to complement the above such as bicep curls tricep french presses and calf raises etc
But.....for main mass building then the big compound movements are a must when trying to build up.
As for rep ranges stick under 12 reps ideally.
Different people respond differently to different training etc but between 8 and 12 reps for each set is a starting point.
Lift smart...don't cheat as you can get injured very easily, especially with exercises like squats and deadlifts.
LIFT HEAVY THOUGH....if you can do the tenth rep very easily then up the weight...each work out aim to progress and keep improving/lifting heavier
(it's a bigger earthquake that way).
Diet/Nutrition
To grow you need to eat more calories than you burn....scientific fact, it is physically impossible to gain weight if you are burning what you put in.
You are best to commit to a bulking cycle and accept that you may get a little fatter whilst you are training to grow your muscles as you need to EAT!!!
Make sure the food you eat is clean though. (cut the crap out of your diet it's only going to clog up your arteries and aid you in getting fat) whilst you are making sure you are in a
.......CALORIFIC SURPLUS
Get plenty of protein (this is the building block of muscles) I'm talking Fish, Egg whites, chicken breasts, lean red meat, cottage cheese, whey protein etc etc.
2.2g of protein per KG of your body weight per day is a good rule of thumb
So an 80kg bloke that wants to bulk up needs 80 x 2.2 approx 176 grams of protein every day really for bulking.
That's a fair bit, think 2 tins of tuna a chicken breast 2 protein shakes and a tub of cottage cheese.
Sounds a lot....it is but hey it will help no end.
Get plenty of carbs but try and keep them brown.
So you are eating plenty of clean foods and getting lots of protein......now we'll talk nutritional timing.
Your body has essentially two states, Anabolic and Catabolic.
Anabolic means growing, Catabolic means shrinking (eating itself).
You want to avoid being catabolic at all costs when bulking, this means not going for over 3 hours without food.
Splitting your food intake over 6 meals per day is recommended and keep protein in each meal.
Get some slow release protein before bed to aid in preventing/minimising catabolic effects whilst you sleep. (tub of low fat cottage cheese is ideal).
Some body builders get up in the night to have protein to stop them ever going catabolic.....bit OTT in my opinion but if you wanna be the best of the best of the best...
Also pre and post workout meals are important....simple carbs before training help fuel a decent work out. (I know I said cut out simple carbs but pre workout it's not a sin)
Quick absorbed Protein and some carbs immediately after you train is one of the best things you can do as you have a window of opportunity straight after you have finished your workout ...... for about an hour your body can utilise nutrients and get the repair process going quicker if you give it the post workout nutrition it needs.
A whey protein shake miked with Orange juice and a banana is ideal post workout.
Rest periods-
Rest ideally 48 hours between workouts, or if you are splitting your muscle groups up then give the groups you have trained 48 hours before you work them again.
Beware though some exercises over lap groups such as chest and shoulders or back and biceps so remember this when picking how to split you workouts and working out your rest periods.
This way they will get adequate rest in order to repair, You do most of your muscle growing/repairing in your sleep so get a good nights kip each and every night 8 hours if you can.
Testosterone optimisation-
Steroids are bad for you end of....I won't offer advice on them and all I will say is steer clear, it's a slippery slope that I have seen many a fellow meat head follow and are damaging their bodies and endangering their health and life expectancy massively.
You can however help keep your natural levels of testosterone as high as you possibly can by making sure you get adequate good fats in your diet (think olive oil, flora etc etc) and by making sure you get plenty of vitamins and minerals in your diet...take a vitamin supplement if you need to.
And before bed get some Zinc....I kid you not, if you can afford it then take a ZMA supplement but if not just Zinc will do the job....it really does boost your manliness
PPPffffff....that seems a bit long winded but really it is very very brief. I would be here for hours if I could get everything down on paper that I want to.
When I can be arsed I'll write a basic beginners bulking up workout and tag it on the end.
Paul
Logged
Damn it, I find it really hard to do this well its an utter struggle to get them all (hence effective probobly)
