Are you Not Gaining Muscle like you Should Be? Here’s Why

 If you are hitting the gym all the time, and if you are eating well and focusing entirely on weight training, then you may wonder why you are not gaining muscle like you should be. If you want to make sure that you do not fall victim to some of the many mistakes that people make when trying to get fit, then the only thing that you need to do is read this guide.

You’re Not Lifting Heavy

Whenever you are looking for muscular growth at a cellular level, the preferred way for you to do this would be for you to do heavier weights at less reps. Hypertrophy happens when your skeletal muscle enlarges. If you can achieve hypertrophy, then this will put you in the state of building muscle, but you won’t achieve that by lifting small weights. If you can do 15 or so reps with the weight that you are lifting, then you are probably not going to get in the state of hypertrophy. Instead of doing this, you need to try and do a pyramid workout. You need to start out with a weight that you are able to lift for 8 reps, but make sure that you don’t do more than 10. When you have done this, you then need to increase the weight and do six reps. Keep on doing this until you can get to the stage where you are really struggling to complete the rep. If you can do this, you will then begin your hypertrophy journey.

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You Aren’t Trying Enough

Trying until you cannot try anymore isn’t a bad thing at all when it comes to resistance training. In fact, it is how you get stronger. That being said, the amount of reps that you do is crucial. When it comes to hypertrophy training, you will have to experience failure at some point, between 2 and 8 reps.  If you just want to maintain muscle and not really build, then you’ll want to manage 12-15 reps before failure as this will help you to tone up without gaining too much.

Your Recovery Isn’t Enough

Performing a lot of sets in a quick space of time will not help you to gain muscle. There’s a good reason why some of the bulkiest people in the gym hang out on a bench for a little while. You need to allow time for your body to recover so that you can keep on pushing. Muscles are able to recover 85% of their muscle capacity in as little as 15 seconds. This is ideal if you want to build endurance, but it’s not ideal if you want to build mass. A good rule of thumb would be for you to wait around 2 minutes between your sets. If you can do this, then your muscles will recover, and you can then make the most out of your next rep.

You Aren’t Lifting Enough

You are absolutely right to assume that you need to have rest days between all of your resistance sessions, but you can lift 4 times a week by simply focusing your efforts on various muscle groups. You should be working one muscle group twice a week. If you do more than this, then you may find that you are working out far too intensely, and that you are not able to get the results that you are looking for. It’s recommended that you hit a chest, shoulder and triceps workout on Monday and then again on Thursday. You can then do your leg workout routine on Tuesday and Friday. Every muscle group will then get a total of two recovery days, and this will help you to build your muscle with ease.

You could Do with some More Protein

At the end of the day, protein has to constitute as being 20% on average of your calorie intake. You should increase this a bit if you want to build muscle mass.   If you are going to supplement, then you need to try and combine casein and whey protein. Animal proteins tend to be complete when compared to plant proteins. Whey is the type of protein you should be having right after your workout, as it will help you to recover. Casein is much more effective when you are looking at long-range recovery as it will help you to rest overnight.

Your Body Requires Rest

An aggressive resistance routine that goes over 4 days a week or more will require you to sleep more. The average person should be getting a minimum of 7 hours sleep per night. On top of this, you have to make sure that you are getting REM sleep too. If you are not sleeping enough, then your body won’t be able to repair itself as easily, and you may find that your muscles struggle to grow in size as well.

You’re Very Inconsistent

If you are not putting in 100%, then you should never expect to get 100% back. This includes your rest, nutrition and your consistent workout. Grabbing a beer or a pizza will sabotage your workout if you combine it with missing out on your Wednesday workout. There’s nothing wrong with missing out on a workout or even grabbing a pizza, but try and make sure that you do not do them on the same day. If you do, then you will throw away everything that you have worked for, and this is the last thing that you want.

You’re Not Supplementing

When you train for muscle gains, you have to know that nutrition plays a huge factor. This includes your post-workout supplement too. If you have had a hard workout, then this means that your muscles will be depleted of things like creatine, protein and even glycogen. Making a workout shake can replace things like this, giving you a huge difference overall. You can also take peptides too. There’s a lot of peptide research out there if you want to find out more.

You’re Not Training for Muscle

Every week, you should be trying to make some kind of progression. If you want to build muscle, then you have to make sure that you are constantly adding to your weights. Ideally, you will be making some kind of progression every week. If you aren’t, then you could be severely limiting your results.

You’re Not Training Hard

If you are not training with some degree of intensity, then you won’t get bigger, and you won’t get stronger either. At the end of the day, compound training is a key element, and you have to make sure that you focus on movements such as squats, deadlifts, overhead presses and even weighted chins too. The more hard and heavy you can go, the better.

You’re Not Changing Things Up

From time to time, you have to make sure that you change things up. You have to make sure that you lift heavier, then lighter, and then work on a different exercise entirely. You may think that going lighter is not a good idea, but in moderation, it can be because it gives your muscles different resistances, and it also encourages them to grow and develop in more ways than one. If you look at all of this, then you will soon find that you can make the most out of any workout that you do, and this will really work in your favour. If you need some help with your workout, then hiring a personal trainer is certainly the way to go.