If you want a muscular physique with as little amount of body fat as possible then your plan of action will need to be altered and more specific. From your training regimes down to the food you eat, every part is crucial to the success of your muscle-building efforts.
To help you on your way we’ve jotted down 5 tips that will help you on your way to building some solid lean muscle.
Increase Training Frequency
If you’re looking to add some real size and definition to your muscle, consider increasing your training load. 4-5 times a week is an ideal amount and the increase in training time will be helpful when trying to add mass.
Make sure that you’re not training the same muscle group more than two times in a row to help prevent overuse injuries and allow your body time to recover.
Vary Your Workouts
The 8-12 rep rule still rings true when it comes to gaining muscle and although it can be very effective, it’s good to keep in mind that your body needs to be challenged in order to change.
To change things up consider mixing some lower rep (6-8) and higher rep (20-30) ranges, adding variety with strength and strength-endurance workouts can help to stimulate muscle growth and lead to better size, strength and power.
Utilize Compound & Isolated Movements
Focusing on the ‘big lifts’ such as squats, deadlifts, overhead press, chest press, and pull ups should be your main priority, these exercises use numerous muscles while being performed, making them more efficient when it comes to building muscle mass. These exercises tend to be your heaviest lifts and moving more weight is a key component when looking to add strength and size.
Just because your main focus should be on compound movements doesn’t mean you have to neglect everything else, adding these to your workouts helps add volume and improve areas that are overlooked in compound exercises. Another positive with using isolated movements is that you can’t overload them, therefore your body can recover a lot quicker.
Focus On Recovery
Of course everyone knows that the majority of the work is done inside the gym, but the common mistake that people make is not getting adequate rest and so their results are directly affected because resting is the most important factor for repair and growth.
Along with making sure your nutrition is up to scratch, allow yourself to get 8-9 hours of sleep per night for optimal recovery. Other important factors are trying to keep your stress levels too a minimum, the amount that this can hinder your progress is more than you think!
Add Supplements
We should start this off by saying supplements aren’t necessarily for everyone, nevertheless it can certainly be helpful when trying to fill nutritional gaps and improving your results.
Supplements such as fish oil tablets, multi-vits, creatine, and protein shakes have shown to help recovery, strength and performance. If you’ve never given supplements a try before, it could be worth looking into if you want faster results.
