Bodybuilding Basics Why Cant I Get Bigger

"I'm so frustrated! I cannot get any bigger and I'm not getting stronger!" Sound familiar? Maybe you've said it yourself. You go to the gym religously, spend hour after hour doing bench presses for your chest, rows and pulldowns for your back, barbell curls and tricep extensions for you arms yet nothing is happening. Or at least not what you were hoping for when you started bodybuilding.

Here's a true story: Some years ago I was approached by a gym buddy who asked me what my thoughts were o n his training. His frustration was over the fact that in over 3 years of working out and lifting weights, his physique had changed only minimally and his lifts were not much better than when he had started.

I had been watching him and sometimes working out with him for a couple of years so I was aware of his training style: On chest days he would typically start off with some warm-up reps and then would get started on the flat bench. He would usually pyramid up from a starting weight where he wo uld do 12-15 reps and typically would finish at about 4 reps on his sixth set!

Then, he'd usually go to the incline bench, grab the heaviest weight he could handle for 5 or 6 reps and would do another 4 sets with that. He would then go to an incline chair and do more incline dumbbell flyes. After this, he would further blast his poor chest muscles with pec deck, decline and sometimes cable flyes. By the time he was done with just his chest, he'd spent almost an hour and typically had done anywhe re from 18 to 24 sets!

What this guy didn't need was advice, he needed a REST! He was so overworking his chest muscles that by the time he came back to work them the following session (sometimes only 4 days later), they could not possibly recuperate/recover from the blasting he had just given them. If this guy had been in his 20's he might have had a chance but the fact that he was in his early 40's only made things worse.

This story perfectly illustrates one of the main reas ons why people have such a hard time building muscle: Overtraining.

Muscles grow by being subjected to stress. You lift a weight, stress the muscle and if all goes well, in time that muscle will grow to accomodate the stress being put on it. But the muscle does not grow while you are in the gym. That is when you are actually breaking down the muscle. The growth/repair comes when you give your body enough time to repair the muscle that has been worked thereby allowing it to grow. Overtrain ing occurs when the muscle is put under too much stress and the recovery time is not enough for it to repair itself.

Another example of a specific muscle being overtrained is the biceps/triceps group. Too many times, I'll get to they gym, start my workout and see some guy doing biceps. Set after set after exhausting set. I'm done with my workout and they're still doing curls. It is unnecessary and counterproductive.

So What Is The Exact Number Of Sets I Should Do?

There is no set formula for any one person. What works for you might not work for me. What works for an 18 year old will almost certainly not work for a 50 year old! The truth is that it is trial and error. You will have to find the "sweet spot" in your training that allows you to stress your muscle fibers but also allows you to come back on your next session and blast them again. As a very general rule and depending on age and experience, hitting each muscle group twice a week should be something to shoot for. But if you are not making gains, take a look at both the number of sets you're doing and the frequency that you're working a group. Remember, sometimes less is more!

Simple Steps To Bulging Biceps And Horseshoe Triceps

It's no secret that every serious lifter out there desires an impressive pair of strong, muscular arms. Who wouldn't be happy with tall, peaking biceps sitting on top of rock-hard, horse-shoe-shaped triceps? Who wouldn't love to have a pair of ripped, well-developed guns forcefully bursting through the sleeves of their shirt? While developing muscular arms is usually at the top of many peoples agenda, the reality is that the majority of lifters out there have a very poor understanding of how to properl y train their arms for maximum gains. In order to gain the proper insight into effectively stimulating arm growth, we must first recognize three basic truths:

1) Relatively speaking, the biceps and triceps are small muscle groups.
2) The biceps receive heavy stimulation during all basic pulling movements for the back.
3) The triceps receive heavy stimulation during all basic pressing movements for the chest and shoulders.

What do these 3 points tell us about effective arm training? The most important thing for you to realize is this:

For maximum gains in muscle size and strength, the biceps and triceps require only a very small amount of direct stimulation!

So why is it that every time I enter the gym I see the same misinformed people, week in and week out, slaving away on endless sets of bicep curls and tricep extensions?

It's very important to understand that the biceps and triceps receive a very large amount of stimulation from all of your chest and back training. In fact, a lot of the time when you reach muscular failure on a chest or back movement, it is actually your biceps or triceps that give out first! Couple this with the fact that your biceps and triceps are already small muscle groups to begin with and it becomes quite clear that direct arm training is of minor importance.

Remember, your muscles do not grow in the gym. The work that you accomplish as you train with weights is merely the spark, that sets the wheels of the muscle growth process into moti on. The real magic takes place out of the gym while you are resting and eating, as this is the time when your body will actually be synthesizing new muscle tissue. Because of this, it is vital that you do not overtrain your muscles. You must always make sure to provide them with sufficient recovery time if you want to see impressive results. Overtraining can actually make your muscles smaller and weaker.

If you're looking to achieve serious arm growth, you must stop placing so much emphasis on direct arm movements. Forget about performing endless sets of concentration curls and tricep pressdowns. Strong, muscular arms are mostly a product of heavy chest and back training. If you are able to accept this basic truth and place the majority of your focus on building up the muscle size and strength in your major muscle groups, you will prevent yourself from overtraining your arms and will therefore yield greater overall gains in bicep and tricep size.

This is not to say that no direct arm training is necessary, just not very much. Here is a sample arm routine that you can use as a part of your program:

Barbell Curls : 2 sets of 5-7 reps
Standing Dumbbell Curls : 1 set of 5-7 reps

Close-Grip Bench Press : 2 sets of 5-7 reps
Standing Cable Pushdowns : 1 set of 5-7 reps

Take all sets to complete muscular failure and focus on progressing each week by using slightly more weight or performing an extra rep or 2.

If you can incorporate this way of thinking into your arm trainin g, you will achieve arm size beyond anything you previously thought possible!