How to Build Muscle Fast: Proven Tips for Rapid Gains
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Are you feeling frustrated with your lack of progress in building muscle? Maybe you have a strong desire to add size to your frame, but find yourself struggling with patience?
As a personal trainer who has worked with countless people with similar goals, I understand your struggles.
Building muscle is not an overnight process, but with the right approach, you can see significant progress in a shorter amount of time.
In this article, I’ll share some proven tips and strategies to help you build muscle faster and more efficiently, without compromising your health or safety.
Let’s get started and get you on the fast track to achieving your muscle-building goals.
Table of Contents
Building Muscle: The Basics
The most basic way to increase your muscle mass is to first look at your diet. If you are weight training, you have to make sure that you are taking in enough protein for your body to rebuild the tissue broken down from weight training.
This is not a secret, but some muscle builders fail to recognize this concept, which hinders them from creating new muscles.
When you get a protein surplus, follow up with resistance workouts to synthesize these proteins into new muscle tissues. Although few researches have been conducted to narrow down the optimistic ways of gaining muscles, moderate to heavy resistance training combined with high protein intake remains the only scientifically-proven method of building muscles.
How Much Protein Do I Need Per Day To Build Muscle?
If you’re undergoing training, the recommended daily protein intake is 1.6 grams per kilogram of your body weight.
Assuming you weigh 70 kilograms, your daily protein intake should be 112 grams.
You can also check your total calorie intake to ensure you have enough macros to burn during workouts. To do this, you must calculate your total daily energy expenditure, which significantly depends on your age, sex, weight, and activity level.
Once you get your total calorie requirement daily, add 300-500 calories to establish your calorie goal for muscle gains.
Each macro (protein, carbs and fats) is very important, so don’t just focus on protein.
Design Training Programs
Since we’ve established your daily protein intake, we will now look into the details of your training programs. Ensure to follow all that’s mentioned below to attain the maximum result.
Choosing the Proper Workouts
If you want to work out all body parts simultaneously, you must design a full-body routine. Ensure to include core and leg exercises and push and pull routines.
Here are sample workouts you can try, mix and match them into your workouts:
Core: Planks, flutter kicks, Russian twists, reverse crunches, hanging knee raises, barbell rollout, L-sit, and bear crawl are all great moves for your core.
Leg: Barbell back and front squats, leg press, leg curl, hack and split squats, deadlift, and lunges.
Push: Barbell bench press, dips, Hi-to-Lo crossover, dumbbell shoulder press, lateral raises, lying tricep extension, and abduction row
Pull: Inverted rows, pull-ups, deadlifts, dumbbell rows, dumbbell pullovers, bicep curls, and chin-ups.
If you’re unfamiliar with any of the workouts, then just head over to YouTube.com and follow a demonstration. There will be plenty.
How Many Days A Week Should You Train?
After these suggested exercises for each area of the body. You need to start thinking about how best to structure your gym routine.
If you’re a beginner, we recommend starting with at least three days a week.
Here’s a sample:
Monday: planks and flutter kicks for core; front squats and curl for the leg; barbell bench press for push; and inverted rows and pull-ups for pull.
Wednesday: reverse crunches and barbell rollout for core; hack squats and lunges for the leg; lateral raises and abduction row for push; and bicep curls and chin-ups for pull.
Friday: hanging knee raises and bear crawl for core; split squat and deadlift for the leg; hi-to-lo crossover and tricep extension for push; and pull-ups and inverted row for pull.
Remember to always include compound and isolation routines in your training because these have the best long-term results.
* Compound routines include barbell back squats and barbell bench presses that effectively develop large muscle groups.
* Isolation routines like bicep curls and leg curls target particular muscles.
Make Sure You Get Enough Rest
Putting rest days in your schedule helps your body have enough recovery time to grow. Don’t push too hard, and aim for a full-week routine because this will only lead your body to ruin.
Rest days are just as important as workout days. Have a day when you don’t even think about lifting weights and just recover and eat some good food.
How Many Reps Should I do?
Repetitions refer to the number of times you complete one routine exercise at a given set.
For instance, your trainer gave you three sets of pull-ups, each with 20 repetitions. So, you’ll need to perform a total of 60 pull-ups with a short rest between 20 times.
Here are the recommended maximum repetitions for every type of goal:
1 to 5 reps: a low-rep routine with heavy loads can develop muscle strength.
6-12 reps: a medium rep routine is recommended for muscle growth.
12-20 reps: a high-rep routine for building muscular endurance
Remember that the recommendations above are only for 1 set, which means you must start over again after your rest period until you complete the required number of sets.
Other research suggest that some bodybuilders respond to higher repetition ranges during muscle building.
How Long Should I Rest Between Sets?
The rest time between sets can play a critical role in the effectiveness of your workout. The amount of rest you need between sets can vary greatly depending on your goals, fitness level, and the specific type of exercises you’re performing.
In general, the rest time between sets should be long enough to allow your body to recover, but not so long that your muscles cool down completely.
A good rule of thumb is to rest for 30 to 90 seconds between sets. This rest period should allow you to recover enough to perform the next set with proper form and intensity, without getting too fatigued.
For strength training, with heavier loads you may need longer rest periods of 2 to 3 minutes between sets, especially when lifting heavy weights.
On the other hand, for cardiovascular training, such as circuit training or high-intensity interval training (HIIT), the rest time recommended is much shorter, normally around 15 to 30 seconds of rest between sets. This allows your heart rate to stay elevated and keeps you in a state of metabolic stress.
How to Use Eccentric and Concentric Phases to Build More Muscle Faster
Muscle contraction is essential in muscle building because it activates muscle fibers and generates force to allow your body to move.
In weightlifting and bodybuilding, they involve two main phases of muscle contraction – eccentric and concentric.
* During the eccentric phase, your muscle lengthens and strengthens while consuming less energy.
* In the concentric phase, your body muscle contracts a consuming force greater than what’s added.
To trigger muscle build-up, you must spend more time in the eccentric phase.
For instance, during a squat, your body going down performs eccentric forces, and going up means concentric muscle force.
To integrate this technique into your routine, you can either slow down your time during the eccentric phase or incorporate variations in your exercise where you focus on lengthening your muscles.
Conclusion – How To Build Muscle Fast
Muscle building takes months of proper training and healthy dieting before you can see evident results in your body shape.
Building muscle is a serious matter that requires time and discipline to accomplish with the best results.
Consider everything we’ve discussed about protein intake and training programs to help you build new muscle tissues faster than other workout methods.
Author
- Danny Loeb is a qualified Personal Trainer, Fitness Model and Writer. He enjoys blogging about health and fitness, messing around with Photoshop, and sharing his experiences with everyone.
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