Six muscle building and fat loss principles
When investing time and effort into building your dream physique, you need to have confidence in what you're doing. You need to know that what you're doing will elicit the body composition changes you are looking for, not think, but know! You want to have unflinching confidence in the process – without this – you won't put in the effort and time required to produce the outcome you seek.
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You only need to abide by a handful of principles to transform your body, and if you nail these principles religiously, you will see amazing results!
Here are my six muscle building and fat loss principles:
Train hard
This is something that is often forgotten or actively avoided, but it's crucial! Hopefully, you train hard – like Mr T in Rocky 3, but most people don't. In fact, it's almost frowned upon to train hard – if someone grunts in a gym, it's videoed and uploaded onto the gram, but you must train hard. You want to pick weights that take you close to complete muscular failure – on the final set of each exercise, you only want to have a few reps left in the tank, if any. That said, many people don't know what muscular failure is, which means they bail way before it. So, after each set, reflect on it and be honest – could you have lifted more? Would you have banged out a few more reps if someone was stood there screaming at you? If you finish a session and think it was easy, it's not because the session wasn't long enough. It's not because it wasn't full of exercises you despise (burpees). And it's not because it didn't finish with 30 minutes of sweat-inducing HIIT – it's because you didn't work hard enough on every rep and every set – you paced yourself too much. If you can work harder, and do so safely, you should! Training intensity is often the difference between good results and great results! But, remember that good technique is crucial, so don’t throw your technique out the window when pushing for those last few curls.
Train frequently
This is often overlooked, especially in the evidence-based world. You see, training frequency is not that important if the volume is matched – volume being total work (weight x reps x sets). In studies assessing training frequency, the volume is matched – if one group trains twice per week and the other group trains four times per week, they will match the volume to make it fair. This tends to show that frequency is not that important, but in the real world, people who train more frequently hit much greater weekly volumes, and more volume equals more gains!
Hit plenty of volume
You want to lift 3-4 times per week and perform 3-5 hard working sets on each muscle group. This will land you in an effective weekly hypertrophy range of 10-20 sets per muscle group a week. The majority of your sets should be between 6-12 reps – it's plenty of reps which makes for plenty of volume, but it's not too many reps where the load takes a big hit. This is not to say some sets can't be below 6 reps with a bit more focus on strength or above 12 reps to develop more muscular endurance – you’ll see gains with a wide spectrum of rep ranges, but most sets should be between 6-12 reps.
Eat your protein
Talking about muscle building without mentioning protein is like talking about house building without mentioning bricks. I appreciate I talk about protein a lot, but it's imperative! Imagine a brand new builder – he's super excited to build a house, he's prepared to work hard, harder than anyone else, he comes early and is keen to build the best house imaginable. But, unfortunately, he's not been provided with any bricks, so it's safe to assume that not much is going to happen. This is precisely what happens when people under consume protein – they put in the work but see very little progress. You want to eat between 1.6 to 2.4 grams of protein per kg of your body weight each day. This will provide you with enough bricks to build your house – AKA your dream physique!
Progressively overload
Similar principle to training hard, but more methodical. You're not just training hard – you're progressively overloading – gradually increasing the volume, intensity, frequency or time. You want to reflect on weight you've used in previous weeks, and again, be brutally honest with yourself – can you lift more? Progressive overload is a key driving force of hypertrophy and is the main reason tracking your sessions is important! If you're lifting the same weight now as you did last year, then you're either riding the wave of your genetic potential or just not effectively progressively overloading.
Consume the right amount of calories
Finally, principle number six is to consume an amount of calories which is conducive to your goals. If you want to lose fat, then eat fewer calories. If you'd like to maintain your weight, then eat at maintenance calories. If you don't have any body fat to lose and would like to prioritise muscle gain, then you're best being in a slight calorie surplus. Here’s my online calorie calculator which will help you find your calorie needs.
Recap
To recap, train hard, train frequently, hit 10-20 sets per muscle group per week, eat your protein, and progressively increase the weights you lift while eating an appropriate amount of calories. If you nail the fundamental principles, you will achieve amazing results!