How to Gain Weight and Build Muscle. So you wanna put on some lean muscle mass. And you want to do it within the context of the Primal Blueprint, but aren’t sure where to start. It’s a common question and it’s about time I addressed it head on. As I’ve made pretty clear, our ultimate goal is to achieve positive gene expression, functional strength, optimum health, and extended longevity. In other words: To make the most out of the particular gene set you inherited. These are my end goals, and I’ve modeled the PB Laws with them in mind. But that doesn’t mean packing on extra muscle can’t happen with additional input. After I retired from a life of chronic cardio and started living Primally, I added 1. ![]() The question is how much and at what expense? I’d be the first to tell you that lean body mass is healthier than adipose tissue. Generally, the more lean mass a person has, the longer and better they live. But to increase mass at the expense of agility, strength, or speed is, in my opinion, counterproductive. What would Grok do – go for enormous biceps or the ability to haul a carcass back to camp? Unless you’re a bodybuilder (nothing wrong with that, mind you; it’s just not my focus), I can’t advise simply packing on size without a proportional increase in actual strength. Those bulging biceps might look good on the beach, but then again, so does the body that comes with keeping up with the younger guys, knocking out twenty pull- ups in a row, and lifting twice your bodyweight. Form is best paired with a healthy serving of function. The two are quite delicious together, and, luckily, following the PB allows us to get both without sacrificing either. Of course, we’re all built a little differently. The Question: With all the video games, television, computers, etc., it's no surprise children are becoming overweight and inactive. It is important to educate. A weight lifting and strength training program for women. Thank you to everyone for your support on my blog coming from Pinterest, I know that is where a ton of you. I wouldn’t normally care to pick on someone like Mark Rippetoe, but he’s one of the most popular proponents of performing a barbell squat, AND, he says stuff like. When combined, high intensity exercise and intermittent fasting can be a winning strategy to bring your fitness to the next level; Recent research demonstrates that. Squat instruction video & exercise guide! Learn how to do squat using correct technique for maximum results! Lydia Dziubanek Lost 80 Pounds: The basic building blocks are the same in everyone, but sexual reproduction (as opposed to asexual reproduction) has the funny habit of producing unique genetics and small variations that affect the way we respond to our environments. It’s why some people are short and some are tall, or why some of us respond better to carbohydrates than others. Even though we all pretty much operate the same way, there IS a range of possible outcomes that is proscribed by your direct ancestors. By that same token, some people just naturally have more muscle mass. They’re usually innately more muscular than the average person, and putting more on through resistance training is often an easy task. Then there are those who can’t seem to gain a pound: the hardgainers. They might be increasing strength, but it doesn’t seem to translate into visible muscle mass. Now, my initial advice for a hardgainer is this – don’t worry too much about it! ![]() ![]() As long as you’re getting stronger, you’re doing it right. Let’s face it, though. You’ve probably heard that enough already. It’s fun being the lanky guy at the gym who can lift more than most, but you’re dead set on bulking up (who doesn’t like a bit more muscle to go along with that strength?), and you want to do it in a Primal context. Besides, continuing to increase strength will eventually require increasing size. To do so, you have to target the very same anabolic hormones that others use to get big, only with even more enthusiasm and drive. Like I said, we all have similar engines, but some require more fuel and more efficient driving (sorry for the corny analogy). Activating these hormones will work for anyone, provided they work hard and eat enough food. The main hormones that contribute to muscle anabolism are testosterone, growth hormone (GH), and insulin- like growth factor- 1 (IGF- 1). A little more about each and how to utilize them: Testosterone. Crazy bodybuilders don’t inject themselves with anabolic steroid hormones that are based on testosterone for nothing. Among other roles, testosterone is an important muscle- building growth factor that favorably affects protein synthesis in addition to working with other hormones (like GH and IGF- 1) to improve their function (more on this later). If you want to increase strength and build muscle, testosterone is absolutely required (don’t worry, though: no injections necessary!). Growth Hormone. It’s right there in the name, isn’t it? ![]() Growth hormone. It helps muscle grow and, perhaps more importantly, it burns body fat. After all, leaning out is a big part of building muscle (or else you’ll just look puffy) and GH will help you do it. Insulin- like Growth Factor 1. IGF- 1 is extremely similar in effect to GH, as it should be – GH stimulates IGF- 1 production in the liver. In fact, it’s suspected that IGF- 1 is actually responsible for most of the “growth- promoting effects of circulating GH.”Anabolic hormones all work together. In fact, to maximize their muscle- building potential, you must have all three present. Testosterone increases IGF- 1, but only in the presence of GH. GH promotes skeletal muscle cell fusion independent of IGF- 1, but the two are most effective in concert. Luckily for you, the types of exercises that stimulate the secretion of one will generally stimulate the secretion of the others. Funny how that works out, huh? Enter The Central Nervous System. In order for your body to start pumping out these delicious anabolic hormones, you must first give it a reason to do so. I might even say you should give your genes a reason to express themselves. The most effective way to do this is by notifying the central nervous system. Now, the CNS can be a stubborn bastard, but he’s all you got when it comes to interpreting stimuli and relaying messages to the rest of the body. He’s not easily perturbed, and he won’t bother if you aren’t serious. If you insist on doing nothing but light aerobics or tiny isolation exercises, your CNS will barely notice. If you want to get your CNS’ attention, pick up the intensity. Run some sprints or do some heavy lifting. When you do an exercise like the squat with a heavy weight, all hands are on deck. Your CNS realizes that some serious exercising is going down and notifies the hypothalamus, which in turn talks to your pituitary gland. This tiny – but vital – member of the endocrine system is the gland that dispatches luteinizing hormones to tell the testicles to secrete testosterone. It’s also the gland that synthesizes and secretes GH. IGF- 1 is mostly produced by the liver, but its production is facilitated by the presence of GH, so we can see that it all comes down to CNS stimulation. Chronic cardio doesn’t affect your CNS in any meaningful way, so that’s why we tend to avoid it; vigorous sprints, hard and heavy lifting, and anaerobic output will get its attention, so do plenty of these to maximize muscle growth. Cortisol: A Hormone to Avoid. Promoting muscle and strength growth also requires avoiding excess amounts of catabolic (muscle wasting) hormones like cortisol. Cortisol is the major stress hormone, and it exists for a very legitimate reason (dealing with “flight or fight” incidents, inadequate sleep, anxiety), but in large amounts cortisol increases serum amino acids by breaking down muscle, inhibiting protein synthesis and reducing amino acid uptake by the muscles – all awful things for muscle growth. Compounding the problem even further, the broken- down muscle is converted into blood glucose, which then raises insulin secretion and increases insulin resistance while promoting fat storage. And we all know how great those muscles look with a nice layer of adipose tissue covering them up! On a serious note, most people following the PB already minimize cortisol by getting plenty of sleep and reducing stress, but if you’re preoccupied with building muscle mass and engaging in extended workout sessions to achieve it, avoiding excess cortisol can get tricky: excessive exercise without enough recovery time actually increases cortisol. It makes sense (think of it like your body’s telling you it needs a day or two off), but the desire for more muscle mass drives many to work out to the point of counter- productivity. Just be careful, and give yourself at least a day of rest after a particularly grueling session. Lift Really Heavy Things. If you haven’t figured it out already, you’re going to be doing some heavy lifting in order to put on lean mass. The foundation of your routine should be the big compound lifts: squats, deadlifts, presses (bench and overhead), pull- ups, rows, dips, snatches, power cleans, clean and jerks. These engage multiple muscles while triggering your hormonal response systems. Bodyweight stuff, while valuable, simply isn’t going to get you the strength and mass increases you’re looking for. Testosterone, while useful, only gets really anabolic when you start lifting. You need to get under some decent weight, enough so that your CNS and endocrine system are blasted, but not so much that you can’t maintain proper form. A popular routine is the 5. Popularized by programs like Strong. Lifts and Starting Strength, doing compound lifts for five sets of five reps allows you to strike a balance between strength building and superficial muscle hypertrophy. Done this way, your hypertrophy won’t be purely sarcoplasmic, which results in fluid- filled muscles that look big but don’t see a corresponding increase in actual strength. Instead, the 5. That’s real muscle that would make Grok proud. If you’re lifting heavy and lifting hard, keep your workouts spaced at least a day apart and don’t lift more than 3x/week. Three exercises per session should be perfect. That may not sound like much, but it’ll be plenty if you do it right. Remember, you’re doing big compound movements that will really shock your system, with an emphasis on intensity and power. You don’t want to overwork yourself, release a bunch of cortisol, and set yourself back a few weeks. Squats and deadlifts are absolutely required. They engage the most muscles and produce the biggest hormonal response. They will be the bedrock of your mass building campaign. Most programs recommend doing squats every session, and I tend to agree. You can handle it. Fat Loss for Women: A 7 Day Full Body Routine Plus HIITBuild Muscle, Burn Fat, Get Ripped. Originally posted: 1/2. Updates: 2/1/1. 0 updated routine, added Excel spreadsheet workout logs)3/8/1. HIIT routines for days 2, 4, and 6. Many of you are asking for a full body workout routine to burn fat, so here you go. I have even customized the program for both men and women. You can skip the details and go straight to the routines if you wish: The Program. We are integrating 3 full body training sessions with 3 HIIT routines and taking the 7th day off. Since the goal is fat loss, we are striving to add some muscle mass, maintain strength, and burn as many calories as possible. This is accomplished by staying in a slightly higher rep range than we would normally use for strictly strength training, while using super- sets for most of our exercises. We add an optional set to the end of each workout in case you are able to finish the workout early. Major compound exercises are rotated to prioritize a different muscle group on each of the 3 training sessions each week. Volume, Frequency, and Overtraining. HIIT sessions on off- days are designed to melt fat and stimulate muscle growth, but the sheer volume of work should not force you into overtraining. If you do feel the symptoms of overtraining, you should take either the 4th or 6th day completely off instead of performing a HIIT workout. Some of the symptoms of overtraining: elevated pulse. This routine can be used for 6- 1. When progress stalls and you can determine that the plateau is not a result of overtraining, it is time to take an active recovery week and start a new routine. Rest. You should rest 6. Warm Up. Initial Warmup – small, light exercises possibly including dynamic stretches to warm up the muscles. Feeler Sets – use feeler sets only if necessary, with 4. Recovery. You should engage in some form of recovery on a daily basis. Here are some of your recovery options: foam roller. Nutrition. You know the drill. Calories = 1. 2 x your goal bodyweight, adjust weekly according to progress. Protein = . 8- 1 gram per pound of bodyweight. Carbs = 1. 00- 1. HIIT days, and even less on rest days. Fat = the remainder of the calories once you’ve subtracted protein and carbs from total calories.
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