Today is Day 15 of Free Weeks of Fitness… it’s the last week, we’re almost there!
Announcing our Week 2 Winners! Each winner will receive a $100 Gift Certificate to Hayneedle. Congratulations! Winners chosen using Random.org.
Winner 1: Simone Traverse
Winner 2: Nancy Hall
Winner 3: Tamara Bennington
Make sure you “Like” each day’s featured product on Facebook (not the blog post, but the item itself) to be entered in the giveaway. You don’t want to miss out on your chance to be one of 3 to win this week’s $100 Gift Certificates – but only those who’ve “Liked” all five (5) products this week. Go! Make sure you have liked all the products featured in Free Weeks of Fitness by the end of the week so you are entered to win the $5000 Hayneedle Home Gym Shopping Spree.
To see all of the Free Weeks of Fitness posts in once place, click here.
Now, let’s get into today’s post. Chris from Zen to Fitness is back.
5 Simple Tips to more Muscle
1. Work Out Less
This isn’t quite as it sounds – but it does apply to heavy lifting. Our muscles need time to grow and repair when we’re out of the gym. After reading work from Dr. Doug McGuff in his book, Body by Science, it’s clear our muscles only need a certain amount of stimulation to trigger growth. What’s optimal? I would say lifting heavy weights with intensity once or twice a week is more than enough. Other days, focus on cardio, sports, yoga, bodyweight circuits, running, and other fitness-building activities. You’ll notice not only real muscle-building, but that you’re starting to feel great!2-
2. Know When to Quit
When form and rep speed of your movements slips, it’s time to quit the set and rest up. I like going for 25 reps for a body part keeping weight fairly high and rest under 60 seconds. Go through as many sets as you need to achieve roughly 25 reps with the selected weight. Just remember to stop as soon as your lifting speed slows down or you lose that spring – lift explosively and do the negative slowly.
The same goes for sprinting. When doing sprints, it’s time to stop once you lose your explosiveness and your legs start to feel heavy. For me this is normally after 5-7 sets with about a 1 minute rest.
- Try 8 sets of 3 reps
- A Simple workout of 5×5 Squats and Pull-ups
- Make sure you try to progress with the weights you are pushing
The reason for stopping the set once your rep speed slows has to do with muscle fibers firing; there is simply no need to go further. Going beyond this point will only cause injuries and overstraining of the tendons rather than muscle growth and adaptation.
3. Intensity
This is key for me. Keeping things intense in the gym not only makes things fun but it’s the best way to work out. Make sure you work out with little or no rest this is great as it kills two birds with one stone. You will be working out your muscles and getting a cardiovascular workout at the same time.
The beauty of this is that you will empty out your muscle glycogen stores during the workout, plus you will increase your EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption, or afterburn). This means you’ll burn more calories over the next 24-72 hours, plus improve nutrient partitioning – allowing your muscles to act like sponges soaking up what you eat and putting it to good use. How CrossFit/Intensity Works
CrossFit is great at this. Their workouts usually take less than 15 minutes; they’re fun and intense and provide real benefits in a short amount of time. Check out SimpleFit for no-equipment workouts or the BrandX Scaled CrossFit workouts for some pointers.
4. Adequate Nutrition
In order to grow more muscle, you need to provide with well-balanced nutrition. This doesn’t mean eat as much as you like and try to force feed your way to muscle growth. Just eat when you’re hungry, and stick to whole foods. Another tip I like is to keep eating away from bedtime. This works in two ways – it stops fat gain (from experience, trust me it works) and it improves HGH release through your sleep as you won’t be tied up digesting your food during the first few hours of your sleep.
Keep your protein fairly high and eat lots of good fats (fish oil, avocados, coconut oil, salmon, sardines, eggs, nuts, etc). This will not only keep you full, but these foods are harder for your body to breakdown and therefore provide you with satiety and energy throughout the day.
Snack on things like carrots, strawberries, and other fruits and veggies. For a great healthy dip when snacking, I love a homemade guacamole or salsa using some cut up peppers for crunch.
5. Rest
How do you know if you’re not getting enough sleep? Check out this post I did on sleep a while back; it outlines some of the signs of a tired mind and how to get better sleep.
You don’t need to be getting 9-11 hours of sleep every night to grow or recover, but the more solid 7-9 hours of good sleep you get per night, the better. Do whatever you need to in order to get off to a good night’s rest. If that means reading a book, watching some TV before bed, or even having a small glass of wine after a stressful day then go for it. It’s not only muscle growth that you get out of a good night – you’ll also function far better mentally the next day. If you’ve had a day recently when you were easily irritated or more on edge than normal, chances are a tired mind and lack of sleep played a part.
So get plenty of rest and relaxation. If you can afford it, going for a neck and back massage once a week is a great way to promote relaxation and break away from stress. I also find a bit of old fashioned running or swimming a great way to relax on an off day. Sometimes I will just grab my running shoes and hit the road for 20-30 minutes – with a good playlist of music, I always come back feeling refreshed and relaxed.
Today’s featured item is the Bowflex PR3000 Home Gym. Follow the link, check out the item, and hit the Facebook “Like” button - you’re on your way to be entered to be 1 of 3 weekly winners of a $100 Hayneedle Gift Certificate (be sure to like all items for the week through Sunday to be entered). Stick with us through all Free Weeks of Fitness (21 articles and products), and you’ll be entered to win a $5,000 shopping spree to outfit your some gym. Get all the details here.
You can start with a hamstring stretch. Standing with your hips shoulder-width apart and your knees relaxed, slowly bend and the waist to stretch the back of your upper legs. Remember to keep your legs slightly bent and don’t bounce in the stretch. Hold this for 30 seconds, and then stand up nice and slow. Next you can do a standing quadriceps stretch. You may want to hold onto something for balance. Standing on your left leg, bring your right foot up towards your glutes and grab your toe or ankle to hold your foot up behind you. Keep your knee in line with your body and close to your other knee, and your foot behind your glutes to maintain good form. Hold this for 30 seconds and then switch sides.
Fitness and training methods are always evolving, always changing. The theories about what is best and most effective will always be changing, but what’s important is that people keep pushing the boundaries and developing new techniques and ideas
1. Beets – I love beets for their versatility. Superb in salad or with some goat cheese, or really nice to snack on. They pack a real anti-oxidant boost and are rich in folate. Try to eat them raw or cook lightly to keep the nutrients intact.
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