In the first article in this series I dealt with the way that we can do our individual sets to increase our muscle gains in the gym. Now I would like to deal with the other issues in the gym that will make a difference in gaining muscle.

The big things that we can do to gain muscle are more or less sets, time between sets and compound versus isolated exercises.

Number of sets per exercise

This is a source of confusion for most people as I find that all bodybuilding magazines would have you doing 16-20 sets per muscle group. The thing to understand is that you want to stress the muscle but if you are not a competitive bodybuilder taking steroids or other body motivating substances then you can not recover from these incredibly grueling workouts.

The best number of sets for an exercise to really gain muscle is one warm-up and three heavier sets. With this number you can do three exercises per muscle group without overtraining the muscle and therefore ruining your workout.. If you feel this is not enough than you are not taking advantage enough of the sets you are doing. You should finish each set after your warm-up without being able to do another rep. One way to decrease the number of sets is to do your sets to more exhaustion. You over exert a set you can finish to exhaustion and then wait 10-15 seconds and try to get another rep or two in, if you can�t get a spot to get those extra reps in.
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Gaining muscle can be difficult once you have hit a plateau, this is a state where no matter what you seem to be doing you are not getting any stronger and therefore you are not gaining any muscle. This is something that really sucks and I will try to address this is three different posts. First I will deal with your sets themselves, secondly deal with your workouts and thirdly deal with the stuff going on outside the gym.

So what can you do to gain muscle and break through the plateau? Shock your muscles in entirely new ways! There are a few ways within your sets. One thing to remember when you are doing sets is the intensity of the set itself.

Your muscles are very rarely using more than a few percent of the total number of muscle fibers to do an activity. Think of how your muscles are going to work if you are doing a marathon compared to how your muscles are going to work when you are running a 100 meter sprint, a big difference.

What we want to do when lifting weights is to push our muscle fibers all as hard as possible and use as many as possible. You will likely be more interested in having legs like a sprinter not legs like a marathon runner. A sprinter uses lots of muscle fibers per step, as many as possible while a marathon runner is using very few and the muscle alternates using them so that the person can run for a far longer time. simplistic example, but hey it works! Read the rest of this entry »

Weight workouts can be tough and you may be wondering what you can do so that you can get the most out of your weight workouts. The last thing that you want after working so hard is to not get all of that last bit of muscle from the workout.

When doing weight training it is very important to make sure you are doing the following 10 things to get the most out of your workout.

Before Your Weight Workout

1. Eat a big meal 2-3 hours before your workout.. It is important for you to make sure that your eating is right, this includes a good sized meal before your evening workout. You want your meal to be high in complex carbs (grains, potatoes or rice instead of sugar) so that you will have the glycogen that you need in your muscles in time for your workout.

As soon as your workout ends your body will need to recover and if you are expecting that pre workout drink to heal you then you will be very disappointed. Read the rest of this entry »

The best way to add muscle is to do compound exercises. Compound exercises are the kind of exercise that work more than one muscle group and although compound exercises are harder to do they tend to have a bigger payback in muscle mass gained.

If you are looked to lose weight compound exercises are also good as they tend to concentrate on the massive muscle groups that will help to increase your metabolism.

One thing to really concentrate on when doing compound exercises is to make sure that you are controlling the weight on the up as well as down part of the rep so that you do not cheat and not use those weaker muscles at all. Slow and controlled is the message when doing these exercises

A great example of the difference between an isolated exercise and a compound exercise is Flyes, which are very isolated to your pectoral muscles compared to bench presses which hit your pecs, deltoids, and triceps. So know that you know the difference here is that list. Read the rest of this entry »

To make an improvement in body mechanics or physiology, you must give the body a reason to improve.

The only way this is possible is to put a demand of effort on the muscle groups that causes them to adjust the body to good mechanics and to strengthen the physiology.

It is readily apparent that use of the muscles of the body can be arranged to improve the general posture of the body through strengthening those muscles which hold organs and joints in good position. It is not so readily understood how use of muscles can strengthen the physiology. Read the rest of this entry »

The Standard set of bar bells and dumb bells consists of a long bar about 1 inch in diameter and 4 to 7 feet long; two short bars from 12 to 16 inches long with collars to hold the plates in place on the ends; and an assortment of discs or bar bell plates from 1¼ lbs. each to 50 lbs. each.

A 7 foot bar is used in weight lifting competition and is so made that the sleeves on each end which hold the plates are on bearings to reduce the friction on the bar in turning as much as possible.

For general exercise purposes, a 5 or 6 foot bar is quite adequate and easier to use than the longer 7 foot one. The bar is made of steel and usually has knurled hand grips. The inside set collars are made of cast iron or steel and on a 5 foot exercise bar are set in about 10 inches from the ends of the bar. Read the rest of this entry »

As a computer guy that sits all day I get intrigued everytime I read an article like this. I am always looking at these top 5 kind of lists not for all of the content but mostly for the little nuggets of info you can get from them. The guys at LifeHack.org have a list of some exercises that you should not do if you are at a deskbound job. Here is a list of the exercises

• Leg Extensions
• Military Press
• Situps
• Bench Presses
• Leg Extensions

These are all very good exercises and I think for all people it is good to do each of these exercises…well except maybe situps (do crunches instead). I do think that this is great info so go ahead and read the article and see what you think. Post back here with comments too.

Well I have to preface this post with a warning that what I am about to write about is a high fat high calories snack that anyone trying lose weight will want to always avoid.

Okay, Peanuts and raisins. This is a great snack for people that have trouble gaining weight and people that are tying to bulk up. I know that most people are not too interested in bulking up, instead they will want to lose weight. I remember back a few years working out a lot with weights and having friends that could not gain muscle trying anything to get the calories needed. Read the rest of this entry »

I have been working out off and on since I was 15 years old and one of the problems with the whole bodybuilding industry is that it is based on vanity a lot more then it is based on fitness.

I still remember when I was 20 and smoking and going into a bar and a fellow weightlifter told me that bodybuilders don’t smoke they just drink. Well going out boozing is not a picture of fitness to me anymore but the bodybuilding industry is built on vanity just as it has been for many many years.

I found the following interesting article at Intersportswire.

Thirty-five years ago the term “body building “ was synonymous with fitness. But in 2008 these terms are mutually exclusive. If your personal trainer is a bodybuilder, you should move on. Read the rest of this entry »

Your chest workout is probably one of your favorites. As you get stronger your chest starts to fill out and your upper body begins to get a “V” shape to it which is helpful in making your midsection look tighter and your waist look thinner.

So now that you know why you want to Build huge pecs and you probably already knew this. The next question is how do you Build huge pecs?

OK there are a few things that you need to know. To build up your chest you need to have a very focused workout for your chest.

Here are those keys to build huge pecs

Lift big to get big – This means that you need to train with heavy weights to get stronger. As you get a bigger bench press you will get a bigger chest. Read the rest of this entry »