Before we get started though I want to clarify a few points.
- The ridiculous claims made by most fitness and
bodybuilding magazines are only there to get you to buy that issue – nothing
more!
- If you are serious about strength training you need to
be reading books and NOT cheesy fitness magazines
Ok… here we go.
In order to add muscle tissue you must force the body to
add it. Your body won’t just add a pound of muscle just because you followed a
3-set workout that you read about in Muscle + Fitness. You need to give the body
a reason to make improvements – in this case add muscle tissue.
You have to provide what I call a “stimulus”. This can be
done in many ways and I’ll address a few in just a moment. Basically, you need
to force the body to add muscle by subjecting it to levels of stress it is not
used to. Some methods are more obvious than others but all can work. Here are a
few examples of how this can be done effectively.
First, the basic and common methods:
- Increase weight or resistance
- Perform more repetitions
- Perform more sets
- Move the resistance slower
- Rest less between sets and exercises
Now for the more advanced methods:
- Pre-exhaust (perform an isolation exercise first and
immediately continue with no rest on a compound movement. ex. chest flye and
then chest press)
- Static holds (hold the resistance in the hardest
position of the range of motion. ex. the top position during a leg extension)
- Partial reps in weak range (perform a portion of the
rep where you are weakest. ex. the top half of a rep of leg extensions)
- Strip-set (after a warm-up set, perform 3 sets back to
back with no rest while starting with the heaviest weight possible and each
time strip off some weight to allow you to continue)
- 1 ½ reps (perform one full rep and then on the second
rep only perform half the normal range of motion and then return to starting
position to begin the next rep. ex. one full rep of lat pulldowns, pull second
rep all the way down, resist weight back up but only half way and then pull
back down)
These are just a few examples of methods of increasing
intensity to ensure progress. The key point to remember is that whatever you do
it must be progressive in order for it to elicit a physical change. This is even
more critical for those looking to add muscle size.
Although this article is geared towards individuals who
are interested in gaining muscle size, the principles can also be used for
individuals who want to build strength, increase metabolism, or tighten and tone
muscles.
Here are some general recommendations for different goals…
If your goal is to tighten and tone muscles:
- Focus on increasing reps, decreasing rest, and changing
exercises frequently
- Train each muscle group twice per week
- Perform fewer sets of many different exercises (1-2
sets per exercise)
If your goal is to increase strength and power:
- Focus on increasing weight
- Train each muscle group once every 7-10 days
- Perform multiple sets of each exercise (2-5 sets per
exercise)
If your goal is to increase muscle size:
- Focus on shocking muscles by changing variables
frequently (exercises, set and rep schemes, rest time, etc)
- Train each muscle group on a variable schedule
(experiment by training a muscle group 3 times a week and then once every ten
days)
- Perform multiple sets for a while and the perform
single sets for a week or two
Some final reminders:
The recommendations above are general and of course would
need to be adapted and adjusted for your personal goals and experience. For
those of you who are advanced and may be thinking there’s no way you can build
strength by training once every 10 days I challenge you to try it for at least 4
weeks, or those of you who think that you need to stick to the same basic
movements like bench to build size I challenge you to try shocking the muscles
by changing the exercises you perform each week for 4 weeks, and those of you
with little experience I hope that you’ll throw away the fitness magazines and
learn what really works.
There are some great books on these subjects and for those
of you who are serious about strength training I personally recommend you check
out the books “APEX” and “No Turning Back” by Brian Johnston. You can find them
online at www.iart.com
If you have any questions about the techniques described
in this article please feel free to contact me. You can email me at jesse@achieve-fitness.com
I wish you the best!
| About The Author
Jesse Cannone
is a certified personal trainer, nutritionist, and best-selling fitness
author. Sign up to receive his free email course, Muscle Building Tips which
is full of powerful tips and techniques for maximizing strength and size.
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