Fast Tracking Muscle Building by Training Smarter
Fast Tracking Muscle Building by Training Smarter
Everything you NEED to know about muscle building
I can pretty much summarise the main factors of muscle building in 3 simple rules...
Rule 1 - Track calories & macros
First thing is always nutrition, you need to be in a calorie surplus in order to develop some serious muscle tissue. If you don’t eat enough it will be extremely difficult to gain muscle, you might get some good results initially, AKA newbie gains, but eventually you’ll need to address your calories.
Food is the most anabolic substance you can utilise. Think about its, the bigger you get the more calories you need, your body will not justify expending all that valuable energy building and maintaining muscles tissue unless there is already a sufficient amount to work with.
Let’s take that one step further and break food down into the three macronutrients, or macros, these are carbs, fats and proteins. You’ll need a respectable amount of all three for the following reasons…
Carbohydrates for energy and to replenish glycogen
Healthy amount of fat to support cell growth and produce important hormones, most important one in this topic is testosterone.
Obviously plenty of protein to help build and recover muscle tissue.
Rule 2 - Incorporate all three mechanisms of hypertrophy
The three mechanisms are - mechanical tension, metabolic stress and muscle damage.
1. Mechanical tension - Focus on lifting heavy weights! Mechanical tension is providing a maximum amount of tension through a full range of motion, basically providing a lot of resistance in relation to your one rep max, you don’t develop big muscles by lifting small weights. This mechanism is the quickest way to optimise strength gains and is the most important mechanism.
2. Metabolic stress ("the pump") - You know when you’re training and your muscles start pumping up and your feel insanely pumped, well that pump will actually help you build more muscle. 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 AKA pump.
3. Muscle damage - When you lift weights you create a certain amount of damage to the muscle, when the muscle is damaged it will repair, to help prevent this damage from happening over and over again it will compensate by increase muscle tissue and strength. The best way to influence this damage is by focusing on slow negatives, extended range of motion and high tension in the stretched position of the muscle. This obviously reinforces the importance of strict form.
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 rows. These exercises should feature highly in everyone's programming and tweaked accordingly to hit the three mechanisms.
You can use these three mechanisms in a single disgusting workout, or cycle through them over the course of a week
Rule 3 - Track Progressive overload
The main thing you need to look at when it comes to building muscle and strength is progressive overload, basically progressively lifting more.
The simplest way to think of progressive overload is the story of the guy on the film “Holes” carrying a pig up the mountain, each day he carries this pig up a mountain, each day the pig got bigger, which meant each day he got stronger.
Progressive overload requires a gradual increase in volume, intensity, frequency or time in order to achieve the targeted goal of the user.
- Volume - how many reps and sets you do
- Intensity - in the context is how much weight you’re lifting
- Frequency - How often you train
- Time - How long you train
Obviously you don’t want to constantly increase how often you train and how long you train for, so a more realistic thing to focus on is the amount of weight you’re lifting. This doesn’t necessarily mean doing your one reps max or three reps and focusing on increasing that. You can work in a more optimal body building range between 6 to 15 reps and increase the weight you’re doing on those exercises. For example, if you do 3 sets of 10 reps back squat using 100kg, try and do the same amount of reps with 105kg next time you do it, alternatively you can increase the volume and do the same amount of weight but increase the reps to 12, instead if 10, or potentially do an extra set, this is progressive overload, there is more than one way to skin a cat and there is more than one way to progressively overload muscles. You should change up the rep ranges as you go, but try and work in a rep range between 6 to 15 reps. This can change for specific sports such as powerlifting and strong man competitors, but for muscle building this will be a glorious rep range to work with.
When exercising, your body will adapt to a point, but if you want to make further development then you need to exert greater demand on the body by TRAINING HARD and TRAINING SMART. If you don't progressively overload the muscles by forcing them to do more than they're accustomed to, they have no reason to make further adaptations. Simply put, your body will not develop unless it needs to!
Fat Loss Tip - Never Shop Hungry
Fat Loss Tip - Never Shop Hungry
That escalated quickly!
Yes, I folded to the dreaded festive treats!
This was not one of those well-planned treats that fitted into my macro and calorie goals, this was simply me eating junk because I was hungry.
This all came down to me shopping on an empty stomach, I don’t usually allow myself to get hungry, I like food too much, but today I allowed myself to get extremely hungry and then went shopping……….big fail!
When you’re hungry your blood sugar levels are lower, to increase your blood sugar levels you’ll want to eat, and nothing gets your sugar levels up faster than sugar! Your body knows this, this is why it craves junk food when you’re hungry.
Best way to avoid this is to eat regularly (small meals for fat loss), this will stop you from feeling hungry and never, never, NEVER shop when you’re hungry.
[Fat Loss] Do I need to track calories?
Do I need to track calories?
How to get in great shape when you’re a parent
How to get in great shape when you’re a parent
This post is inspired by my new son Arthur Rhys Griffiths,👶🏻 he is 3 months old and my second child (first is my beautiful daughter Ruby you can see hanging off my arm). If you’re a parent you’ll know the challenges that come from trying to get in or stay in great shape when YOU are not the priority, you can even feel guilty when you do something for yourself. This is a big problem long term, what kind of role model are we to our children when we can’t look after ourselves.
I use the oxygen mask analogy with this scenario, if you’re on a plane and it starts having some major problems (touch wood this never happens to you), the oxygen masks will deploy. When this happens you’re advised to sort out your own oxygen mask before your children’s, this is because you can’t help others unless you help yourself!
Personally, I’ve been struggling with this the last 3 months, the reason I struggle is that the majority of my time is spent working from home as the majority of my business is online. I regularly get tagged in to look after Arthur which prevents me from working, I’m cool with this, of course, however, when you’re self-employed you’re always working and can feel guilty when you’re not. This result is my own time being sacrificed (gym time), I’ve been making it work to an extent, but sometimes only hitting the gym twice a week, this for me has just not been enough. Then when I have squeezed in the time I’ve not eaten correctly (or enough), due to time. I’m sure a lot of you can relate to this.
So what can we do? Do we sacrifice our time with the children? Do we train less?
My best piece of advice is putting a plan together, a simple plan that you stick with. 📝
Here are the problems I have and the new solutions.
Problem one - Taking time away from family to train.
The solution, to train when they are sleeping, that’s right! Starting tomorrow I’m going to get up at 5 am to go to the gym, everyone is likely still sleeping, my family and my clients. This prevents me from being stuck working or being busy with family.
Problem two - Having time to eat clean.
The solution, prepping food! I’m now going to get back on the prep wagon, I’ve stopped prepping food as I had time in the day to cook etc, this is no longer the case with my business growing fast and my family commitments.
Problem three - Missing out on family time due to work and gym commitments, I’ve structured and planned out my days and done this with my other half (better half), we have put a plan in place so that we both have regular gym time, eating clean time and taking care of the newborn time. Today, for example, I’m taking both children out and my other half is going to have some time to chill out, breath and hit the gym.
Inevitably this comes down to having help, support and a structured plan in place!
Now it’s your turn, have a think about the problems you have and possible solutions you might have to these problems.
Think who can help you (look after children for an hour).
Then put a realistic plan together and that you can stick with, the times can change, but the core of the plan wants to stay consistent.💥
10 Immutable Fat Loss Tips
10 Immutable Fat Loss Tips
The Internet is full of conflicting information, so here I'm providing you with 10 Immutable Fat Loss Tips, tips that have stood the test of time and are backed up by plenty of research. I believe that most fitness professionals, no matter what their background would all agree with these tips. Don't waste your time with the latest trends and meal replacements shake, just master the basics and start with these immutable tips.