If you are a newbie to the gym, building muscle may seem easy. However, it’s not going to be a linear growth curve throughout your training career.
To achieve best results, you will need to learn how to train both smarter and harder - not just one or the other. You will need to understand the need to fuel your body with the right nutrients, at the right time, with structured nutrition and scientific supplementing. But don’t fret, this isn’t as scary as it sounds!
There is a difference between strength training and hypertrophy training (training with the intent to increase muscle size); although doing one will generally help achieve the other. In both cases, training should occur 3 – 4 times per week and should last for no more than 1 hour. Exercises should also consist of a combination of compound (multi-joint movements eg: squats) and isolation (single-joint movements eg: leg extensions).
4 key tips to build muscle
1. Train using overloading training principles
A good strategy to build muscle is to implement different strategies of progressive overload like the ones below. But remember you should always start lighter and get used to the movements. Train with a partner where possible for motivation and safety, and consult a personal trainer or professional if you have any questions.
- Drop sets: where you start with a heavy weight and complete reps until failure. Then drop the weight down and do more reps until failure etc.
- Super sets: where you do one movement heavy until failure and then do a different exercise working the same muscle group lighter with higher reps.
- Start-stops: where you complete reps to failure. Stop for 5 – 10 seconds and then go again and repeat.
- Pyramids: where your first set is heavy, but the next working set is heavier and the last working set is the heaviest. Some people like to do this in reverse. This is called reverse pyramid. Forced reps: where you push to failure and have a spotter help you get some forced reps.
- Negatives: where you do full the range of motion until failure and then get a spotter to help lift the concentric (upward) part of the lift and you lower it on your own slowly then repeat 2-3 more times.
- Partials: where you do full reps until failure and then attempt partial reps until failure.
- Tempo: where you vary the tempo up, pause and down. Eg: 3 seconds up, 3 second squeeze and 6 seconds down. This tempo can be changed to put more or less tension and overload on the working muscles.
2. Journal
Athletes who keep a training journal are 300% more likely to reach their goals. Writing down how you feel before you start, energy, motivation etc can be helpful. Write down what you ate (if at all) before training and what supplements you took (if any).
Write down your reps, sets, weight for each exercise and review your previous workout before you start so you can reassess your lifting goals. #YOUVSYOU
3. Use food as fuel
Protein
To build muscle you must fuel the machine. Getting adequate protein, but not too much that it slows MPS (Muscle Protein Synthesis), is critical to ensure you get amino acid at the right time to take advantage of anabolic muscle building growth phases.
You should aim for 1.8 – 2.2g of protein per kg of lean body weight per day. You should try to get most of your protein from food throughout the day and only use supplements if there isn’t enough protein coming in from your food.
Carbohydrates
You may need to consider increasing your carbohydrate intake as carbs fuel muscle energy and stimulate insulin, which is a highly anabolic muscle-building hormone. Supplementing with carbs around training for muscle growth is not uncommon.
A supplement like Switch Nutrition Essentials Carbs, which is a combination of two fast-acting carbs for rapid recovery and insulin release, may help.
Fats
Getting adequate fats is important for the production of cholesterol, which is the backbone of anabolic hormones like testosterone. You should focus on a combination of saturated, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats.
Getting sufficient sunlight to activate vitamin D from cholesterol is also critical. Vitamin D has been shown to boost testosterone by 42% in men with low testosterone.
4. Supplement with key supplements
Protein
As discussed above, trying to get most of your protein from food is ideal. However, getting to the levels needed to support muscle hypertrophy (growth) can be difficult through your diet alone. Using a protein supplement such as Protein Switch™ may be required to help you to reach your daily goals. This is the most effective way to ensure you get a return on your training investment.
Amino acids
Amino acids are the simplest but most potent form of protein. It’s what you end up with once you digest protein down. Once absorbed amino acids are what make up the building blocks of all human tissue including muscle. Amino Switch™ consists of all 9 Essential Amino Acids (EAA’s) in the perfect muscle tissue ratio. 1 serve of Amino Switch™ is equivalent to 30g of WPI and absorbed 5x faster. It is also 200% better than BCAA’s alone. You can use Amino Switch™ during or after training instead of BCAA’s or WPI.
Creatine
Still one of the most clinically-proven muscle-building ingredients on the planet, creatine monohydrate has been clinically proven to boost strength, speed, performance and muscle size. We recommend you use 5 – 10g daily.
Switch Nutrition Essentials Creatine is the highest quality HPLC tested 200 mesh micronised creatine available.
Testosterone boosters
There are several well-researched ingredients that have been clinically-shown to boost testosterone. You will find a combination of these vitamins, minerals and herbs in Alpha Switch™ at proven effective levels that will support energy, strength, blood flow and muscle growth along with libido.
Beta Alanine
Another great ingredient for increasing training load and performance is Beta Alanine. However, Beta Alanine needs to be consumed at 3.2 – 6.4g daily for no less than 21 days straight to see any real benefit in strength and training volume. Results for muscle gain are achieved after 6 – 8 weeks of supplementation so don’t rely on your pre-workout to supply what you need. Use a 100% Pure Beta Alanine like the HPLC tested version from Switch Nutrition.
Pre-workout
Pre-workouts will ideally have you training harder and lifting heavier with greater pumps! What you should look for is one that has natural, clean stimulants that your body can use effectively, and not build a tolerance to. Always look for an open label so you can see exactly what you are getting. We would recommend one that contains natural caffeine plus EnXtra®. EnXtra® is a patented compound found in Alpina Galanga. This compound can boost focus and alertness while amplifying caffeine by 30 – 50%. Also look for a pre-workout that contains VASO6®. This is an eNOS activator that helps convert citrulline and arginine into nitric oxide. This is the limiting factor and outperforms citrulline or arginine alone. Power Switch™ contains all these ingredients and much more. It’s also one of the more affordable and better tasting pre-workouts.
Carbs
Although not essential to supplement, carbs can help restore energy rapidly which may reduce muscle breakdown. They also boost insulin which is a powerfully anabolic (muscle building) hormone that can help shuttle amino acids into your cells to build muscle faster. We would recommend using a fast acting carbohydrate powder during or after your training with Amino Switch™. Carbs by Switch Nutrition is a combination of two rapidly absorbed carb sources and has zero fillers, flavours or colours.
To summarise...
- Focus on the low hanging fruit… get into a calorie surplus. To add muscle tissue, you need to feed the body the nutrients to achieve this.
- Make sure you are looking closely at your macronutrients and micronutrients.
- Increase your training volume, but get adequate rest between sessions.
- Rest is how you grow. This means a lot of the growth you experience is immediately after training and during quality sleep. If you aren’t getting deep, REM sleep then consider Adrenal Switch™ before bed to lower cortisol and boost testosterone & growth hormone while getting a deep restorative sleep.
- Stay hydrated. Muscle cells grow more if there is adequate hydration. A 2% dehydration results in a 20% drop in performance and growth.
- Change!! Continue to periodically change your training time, structure and volume. This will get your body adapting to the new stimulus in a positive way.
- Enjoy the journey. If you don’t enjoy the training, the food and the supplements you will have difficulty sustaining and maintaining the results.
Disclaimer: The above article is merely a guide and is in no way a recommendation or a treatment protocol for any health conditions or diseases. You should always consult with a qualified health care provider before changing your supplement, training, or nutritional strategy. Formulated Supplementary Sports Foods must not be used by pregnant or breastfeeding women, anyone consuming prescription medication or children under the age of 15 unless advised by a qualified health care provider.
