What to avoid if you’re looking to build lean muscle
- Eating too little
To build muscle YOU HAVE TO be eating in a calorie surplus, meaning you’re eating more calories than you burn off each day. Eating under this (and most people do) will put you in a deficit… i.e. fat loss mode. - You’re not a powerlifter
We’ve all been there before, treating every session like you have to hit a new personal best on all your lifts. Most of the time people do this just to look good in the gym, but the problem with this is A) you’re not training for strength you’re training for muscle, B) you sacrifice your form just to lift heavier. This leads us on to the next point… - You’re cheating yourself
You’re simply cheating yourself by lifting too heavy so your form is poor. What this means is that your ability to maximally contract (squeeze) your muscles on each rep and also slow the movement down to increase time under tension dramatically drops. This WILL lead to less gains. Yes heavy lifting is great for thick dense muscle, but build up to heavier weights and only increase when form is spot on. You’ll build more muscle lifting lighter with awesome form, than swinging weights about just to look good…most of the time, using momentum. - “It’s worked so far, so it’ll keep working”
Classic bodybuilder approach of being stuck in the same routine for years and years because it’s always worked before. Unless you change something in your routine often (reps, sets, the exercise, the angle, the machine, the intensity) you WILL plateau and WON’T progress anywhere near as much as you would if you kept throwing new things at your muscles. - 3 sets of 10 is gospel
Yes 10 reps are a good rep range for building muscle, however each person responds differently to different rep ranges. Some people have lots of fast twitch fibers, some have more slower twitch fibers, meaning different rep ranges and speed of your rep will differ from person to person. Want the best results from your training? Do all kinds of different rep ranges, not just sets of 10. Lift heavy with form, lift light with form.
