Let’s face it, most people lift weights to build muscle….am I right? I’ve certainly talked about all of the other benefits of weight and resistance training in other posts and articles I’ve published on various websites, but I can’t say that I’ve dedicated a post to the one thing that most people equate with weight training, and that’s muscle building. So today is the day y’all! I can certainly say that the number one reason that I continue to lift weights is to increase strength and therefore increase muscle size. At the same time, adding lean muscle to your body composition does wonders in terms of speeding up metabolism, so it’s a double-whammy in terms of helping you achieve a lean, toned appearance.
There’s a guy out there that I’ve followed for years and I really, really dig his approach to weight training and strength building. Mike O’Hearn (www.mikeohearn.com )is an all natural bodybuilder and 4x Natural Mr. Universe, American Gladiator, model and actor…not to mention a power lifter. Yeah, a bodybuilding power lifter! So his approach to weight training is this in a nutshell, you lift heavy using compound strength building movements such as the squat, dead lift, military press and bench press for low repetitions and stress increasing strength. By doing so, your muscles can’t help but grow. In other words you can’t increase strength without increasing muscle mass. The 2nd phase of his workouts after the initial power movements then targets more isolative bodybuilding exercises for higher repetitions such as cable crossovers, leg extensions, dumbbell flyes, calf raises, etc. The 2nd phase of each of his workouts target the muscle “pump.” You gym rats know what that is. Basically it’s just filling the muscles full of glycogen and getting that swollen pump sensation that higher rep work causes. Those heavy exercises cause muscular trauma meaning that by going as heavy as possible for lower reps, you'll cause more micro tears to occur in the muscle fibers. When the body repairs these micro tears, the muscle fibers actually regenerate and grow slightly as a result. If you've never heard of this guy, I urge you to check him out. Dude's the real deal in my opinion and although I've never met him, everyone says he is one of the nicest and most approachable guys out there in the business. I am totally on-board with this approach and I’ve been using it in my own training since I first read a workout and nutrition plan that he designed back in my early undergraduate days. I take a somewhat modified approach to his idea, but nonetheless the nuts and bolts of our philosophies are the same.
I first and foremost design my own personal training plans around triathlon and endurance racing (although I prefer the lower end of the endurance realm such as Sprint Triathlons and 5k runs). Therefore I keep in mind the importance of safety while I am hitting the weights and these days I am less inclined to use free weights and your somewhat more “risky” movements such as the free squat, as I don't want to risk injuring myself and effecting my ability to race. An example of my current style of training is I use the hack squat “machine” and Smith Rack squat as modifications for the traditional raw squat and go heavy on leg presses for lower reps to increase strength and size. I then add in my higher rep movements afterwards such as the leg extension, hamstring curls and seated calf-raises. On my initial heavy exercises, I never push beyond 6 to 8 reps on the first 3 sets and keep the weight as heavy as possible and on my 4th and final set, I aim for 2 to 4 reps with the heaviest weight I can move while maintaining form. Same approach for chest, back, shoulders and arms. I can tell you that my experience with my training approach has always gotten me the results I want. Case in point: this winter during my off-season break from triathlon, I made the decision to add muscle and then cut back weight a bit as my races approached to have a stronger bike and run. I was able to pretty easily add around 10 to 12 pounds of muscle between the months of October and February. I increased quality calories in addition, which I will save for another post to fill you in on, but the training key. I still currently weight train even now as my sports specific workload has increased, because I’ve simply cut back on the number of days I weight train per week. I double-up on body parts in my workouts meaning I do chest and back one day and arms and shoulders on another day. I don’t do leg work right now because of the amount of cycling and running that I am doing. Even though my cardio work is through the roof, I have been able to preserve a nice amount of the muscle I gained during the winter months. This translates into speed and power, particularly at the shorter distance races. So think of it in this way using a diamond as an example. You first use forceful, basic steps to find, excavate and then roughly cut the diamond into shape (that's the powerful strength and size building exercises). You then carefully buff and polish the cut diamond in order to bring out the detail, shine and beauty of the stone (which is the isolative, high repetition exercises).
I’ll talk more about nutrition for muscle gain in another blog post, but this should hopefully cover some of the basics for weight training to specifically target muscle growth J It’s worked for me over the years and I’ve seen it work for others I’ve helped along the way. E-mail me or comment any questions you have on any area I might have skimped on, but remember that it’s consistency that’ll get you the results you want! You have to make getting in your workouts each week a habit, otherwise you can have the most well-designed program in the world, yet you’ll see no results!
Here’s a couple shots of before and after my off season muscle building work:
Not the best example shot, but kinda gives the indication of how slim I got during the race season last year.
Stay Focused and Happy Training Y’all!
Nice information thanks for sharing
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