ANSWERS: 1
  • Many people would like to be more muscular. Some want it to improve their appearance. Some want it to improve their health. Others want it to improve their athletic performance. To achieve these goals, they need to understand how to stimulate muscle growth in the first place.

    Principles

    Most people could probably tell you that you can stimulate muscle growth by lifting weights, but can they tell you why? Muscles won't grow if they don't have to. A rigorous exercise program puts increasing demands on the muscles in the body, creating small tears in the muscle tissue. The muscles respond to the demands by repairing themselves and adapting to the heavier workloads to avoid further tearing. Muscles adapt by growing stronger, which mean the muscle fibers grow.

    Muscle Fibers

    There are two types of fibers: slow twitch and fast twitch. Slow twitch fibers are used more in endurance activities. Marathon runner develop their slow twitch fibers. Fast twitch muscle fibers are stronger than slow twitch muscles fibers, but they tire more quickly. These fibers are what used primarily in power lifting or sprints.

    Training

    If you seek to develop your slow twitch muscles, you should do workouts that use lighter weights and greater repetitions (12 to 15 reps). This is not the type of training that will build large muscles, but it will stimulate muscle growth. Training to develop fast twitch muscles means you should be using heavier weights with lower repetitions (6 to 10 reps). Not only will training fast twitch muscle develop muscles, but the muscles can increase noticeably in size.

    Overload

    To keep the muscles growing, you need to increase the stress on your muscles by using increasingly heavy weights. This can be done within the workout by added weight to each set you perform. Your repetitions will drop as you do this, but as long as you stay within the repetition range, it's fine. You can also overload the muscles over time by gradually increasing the weights you use from workout to workout.

    Diet

    While weight training will convince the muscle fibers that they need to grow, a proper diet will make sure that the nutrients are available to repair the muscle tissue and allow it to grow larger. This can come from a healthy, well-balanced diet, though you will want to increase your protein intake either by eating more protein-rich food (lean meat, skim milk, etc.) or by adding protein shakes to your diet.

    Source:

    Build Muscle and Gain Weight Fast Guide

    Higher Faster Sports.com

    Skip Lacour.com

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