Training, Strength & Muscle Building
Andrew Griffiths
Max sets per muscle group per session 

The data shows that up to 6-8 sets per muscle group, the gains continue to rise, but beyond, we get hit with a pretty hard plateau – it's clear that more work doesn't always equal more gains, and can even be detrimental.

Max sets per muscle group per session 
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My top five tips

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MY TOP 5 TIPS 

 

1 - Only YOU can make the change - Lots of people are consistently looking for that perfect nutrition plan, training programme, supplement, meal replacement shake or some magic potion that will give them the power of Hercules AKA steroids. The answer isn’t in the magic potion its within yourself (maybe going a bit deep now), but only you can make the start and make the change, nobody else or nothing else will give you the results you seek, only YOU!

 

2 - Prioritise protein - Protein will aid with recover and muscle development, the more muscle you have the more your body needs to fuel that new founded muscle, therefore you will increase your metabolic rate (if accompanied with resistance training).

 

3 - Lift heavy things - As previously mentioned, the more muscle you have the faster your metabolism will inevitably be, diets where you just keep eating less and less are massively soul destroying and not realistic long term. You can end up with metabolic adaptation and it will also inhibit performance.

 

4 - Prep food - This should be a must for anyone who has a busy schedule. If you’re new to this then maybe just prep 5 meals on a Sunday so you have at least got one meal for each working day of the week (put in the freezer) and just develop this over time.

 

5 - Stop drinking so much alcohol!! - Okay, everyone likes a drink, but if you’re drinking every single weekend with a jolly good hangover day filled with KFC, monster energy and sitting on your ass then this could be the one thing that is holding you back. You can still go out, still enjoy yourself, just maintain an element of self control…..YOU’RE AN ADULT! 

Three mechanisms of hypertrophy

Three mechanisms of hypertrophy

Mechanical tension, metabolic stress and muscle damage.

1️⃣Mechanical tension - You want to generate the largest muscle force possible through a full range of motion.

2️⃣Metabolic stress ("the pump") - To optimise metabolic stress you need to maintain constant tension on the muscles. Focus on the pain building up in that muscle, stay with it and embrace it. This way, as blood gets pumped into the muscles by the arteries, the steady muscular contractions will prevent the veins from letting blood escape, resulting in high levels of metabolic stress and cell swelling.

3️⃣Muscle damage - This is focusing on the negatives. It happens with slow negatives, extended range of motion and high tension in the stretched position of the muscle. Doing a random exercise that you haven't done in a while also does the job.

The best lifts are those that can be manipulated to target each of the three mechanisms. The basic big lifts do the trick - squat, deadlift, hip thrust, bench press, military press, pull-up/pull-down and row. These exercises should feature highly in anyone's programming and tweaked accordingly to hit the three mechanisms.

In summary, you can use these three mechanisms in a single disgusting workout, or cycle through them over the course of a week