Weight Lifting Routines: Top 10 Priorities

Adding muscle mass to your body is not something you do by accident. There are proven principals that work no matter your age, gender or current level of fitness. But as with all things, some ARE more important than others. There are certain training aspects that you simply can't do for whatever reason, or things you just don't want to do. With that in mind here is my Top 10 list of things , in order of priority that you should incorporate into any weight lifting routine that is geared to muscle mass building. Your chance of being successful decreases with each item you leave out, especially from the top 5.

10. Keep Each Workout Under 1:30

This is basically the law of diminishing returns. With each set performed, your energy level drops to the point where you are not able to truly push your self enough to build muscle. The same theory applies to rep count. Doing 6-8 of the highest weight you can handle builds more muscle than failing on the 50th rep. It has been scientifically proven that any session beyond your bodies limit is counterproductive. That number seems to max out at 90 minutes.

9. Limit Your Cardio

If cardio contributed to lean muscle gain, then more cardio would build more lean muscle right? Ever see a muscular marathoner? Enough said.

8. Keep a Weight Lifting Log

The whole basis of muscle building is grounded on the idea of lifting ever increasing weight amounts. How will you be able to know you are doing this if you don't keep track? A log provides your road map to what you will lift, not for what you have lifted.

7. Get Enough Calories

Gaining muscle requires a calorie surplus. If you are not consuming more calories than you are burning per day for energy, than you will never gain new lean muscle. Period. You may lose some body fat, but new muscle growth will not occur. When bodybuilders go into their cut cycle, they stop adding new muscle. A cut cycle is, by definition, designed to make you smaller. This is what happens when you train without a calorie surplus. But consuming too large a surplus leads to fat gain as well. You must know the right number for you.

6. Pyramid Your Sets

Have you ever heard about having to have variety in your workouts? That after a couple weeks of the same routine, you acclimate to it and therefore should switch up to keep stimulating muscle growth? This is 100% true. With that in mind why would anybody think doing 3-5 sets of any rep count of the same weight is the best way to build muscle? Not saying it won't, but why not do the best? Changing your weight every set keeps your muscles guessing. When they have to guess they have to work harder. Simple fact.

5. Get Enough Protein

Amino acids are the building blocks of muscle building. Protein contains these amino acids. Therefore consuming enough protein is critical to making sure your muscles can grow. Not only must you have a calorie surplus, but this surplus needs to be from protein. Calculate the amount of protein you need for lean muscle gain, and with this number in hand, calculate the amount of total calories needed. Protein first, total calories second.

4. Consistency

Successful muscle building takes place when all things are moving in the right direction. To do this, consistency is key. Taking a step back for every 2 steps forward makes building muscle a long, difficult process. The biggest reason that even knowledgeable lifters fail is a lack of consistency. For example, what if the right time to train a particular muscle group fell on Friday night, or Saturday morning? What would you do? There is an optimum time period to allow a muscle to rest, recover, and grow. The better you are at finding this interval (everybody will be different), and staying committed to it, the faster and larger gains you will experience.

3. Rest

You need to allow each muscle time to recover and repair before you work it again. Not resting your muscles enough will lead to over training, and may even start to reverse your muscle growth. The cycle of muscle building is to break the muscle down by weight lifting, it grows back a little larger to be able to handle the expected new work load, and then you break it down again. The recovery (rest) period is when the muscle literally grows. Sounds like a very important process to allow to happen, yes? Resting the muscle is just as important as working the muscle. Don't forget it.

2. Lift Heavy.

How anyone ever thinks they will grow to lift a certain weight without ever trying to lift that weight is incomprehensible to me. If you want your chest to be able to lift 300 lbs and you are currently maxing at 250, does it matter how many times you lift 250? Sure, you could train to where you can do 50 reps at 250 and then try 300, and you'd probably get it. But wouldn't it be a faster route to as soon as 250 is a 6-8 rep fixture to move up to 260, 275? And then 300? You can not learn how to do anything without trying to do that thing. Big men/women lift more weight than you. You will not be their size without trying to lift their weight amounts at some point. Period.

1. Lift Big.

Bang for your effort. Compound exercises will build the most muscle in the fastest time frame. They should comprise more than 75% of your workout time. Why train one muscle with an isolation move when you can train many with the same effort and time. If you are going to do one thing on this list, this is it.

This site is solely for informational and educational purposes. It is not intended as medical advice.
Consult a physician before beginning any new exercise, nutrition or supplementation program....Disclaimer

Copyright 2007-2008 Steve R. Robbins. All rights reserved.