So, do you want to build muscle? You go to the gym day after day but, despite everything, you can’t get head-spinning muscles or brute force? Who wouldn’t want a pair of “boulder shoulders,” a “treasure chest,” and an impressive 220-pound bench (or more)?
Many of you are wondering: “Why can’t I gain muscle yet?”. Well, you almost always don’t understand the purpose of skeletal muscle and the reason for its growth.
Most of the time, “new gym-goers” forget to check out “nutrition before entering the weight room. Typically, they don’t eat enough protein for muscle growth and recovery after lifting. This is absolutely not to ignore other dietary requirements, but l” protein intake is essential to achieving the desired gains.
Speaking of workouts! Some “gym-goers” don’t have a proper workout routine. After decades of observing the gym environment, “newbies” often switch between machines, not knowing exactly what they’re doing. The worst thing is when they just talk to friends or scroll through their cell phones endlessly!
Another problem is rest and recovery. Not just lifters, but people in general don’t give themselves the opportunity to sleep those crucial hours for muscle and hormone recovery.
Last, but not least, “constancy”. Many gym-goers are inconsistent with their workout routine. For example, they can train for a few months, followed by a few weeks or even months off. During this break, muscle gains stop or even reverse, leading to noticeable muscle loss.
If one is guilty of not having committed, all is not lost, because changes can be made today.
Within the main body of the article, we’ve covered all of these aspects in much more detail, giving you an idea of how to achieve your muscle and fitness goals.
Understanding Skeletal Muscle
Without getting into too technical jargon, there are about 640 muscles in the human body. All “inside a muscle, there are smaller microfilaments that make up hundreds of thousands of muscle fibers. Muscle fibers contract to promote movement of one” joint.
An example would be microfilaments of actin and myosin within “of the approximately 100,000 muscle fibers of the biceps. To perform a biceps bend, l” actin slides over myosin to shorten muscle fibers (elbow bend). To stretch the muscle, the microfilaments return to their original position.
If muscle fibers are overloaded by lifting weights, muscles should become visibly larger and stronger over time as an adaptation to stress. This phenomenon is also known as resistance training-induced muscle protein synthesis.
These adaptations can prepare a lifter to withstand greater forces (lifting heavier weights) by reducing the chances of muscle tears or breaks. More information on this in the next section.
Factors that affect muscle growth and how to solve them
Muscle growth can be hampered by poor protein intake, suboptimal workouts, lack of sleep, and poor consistency.
Importance of protein intake
Protein intake is as important as kicking your ass in the gym (not literally) when it comes to muscle growth.
Dietary protein consists of all nine essential amino acids contained in food sources such as whey, milk, eggs, chicken, and beef. High daily protein intake promotes muscle protein synthesis, a scientific term for muscle growth and recovery.
New lifters often don’t get effective amounts of protein. As a result, they miss the opportunity to gain muscle and recover properly from workouts.
Total dietary protein intake
According to experts, lifters can aim for 1g of protein for every pound of body weight, which should be enough to “nourish” muscles for growth. For the average 160-pound man, that’s 160g of protein per day.
Maximizing muscle protein synthesis
According to the literature, by eating a high-quality meal, muscle protein synthesis (muscle building) overcomes muscle protein degradation (muscle loss).
This way, people remain in “muscle building/recovery mode” for a full 3 hours, before abandoning the activity. At this point, we can eat another meal or snack to stimulate muscle recovery again. More or less 30-40g of high-quality protein per meal or snack should suffice.
This absolutely does not mean that focusing on meal timing is more important than “total protein intake. However, to take the longer step of the leg, a lifter could distribute l” total protein intake in 3-5 meals and/or snacks.
It could be 3 meals of 40g protein (e.g. chicken breast, fish fillet, beef bites, etc.) and 2 snacks of 20g protein (e.g. smoothies and protein bars, etc.). This diet plan can reach the goal of 160g of protein we talked about.
Some supplements, such as BCAAs, can be taken with meals to increase the overall amino acid profile, in case you choose lower-quality protein sources like soy.
BCAAs can also be taken a couple of hours after meals to slightly lengthen the anabolic response. Why not take a look at the high quality BCAAs at Biaxol supplements?
The role of resistance training in muscle development
“Beginner” lifters are guilty of not overloading the muscle enough to promote significant strength and hypertrophy (muscle growth).
Ideally, these lifters could use an instructor to help them determine their maximum 1RM lift. For example, the maximum bench lift might be 133 pounds (100% intensity) for the average novice man.
Una volta che i sollevatori si sono fatti un “idea della loro forza attuale, possono modificare i pesi per entrare nei range di sollevamento per l” ipertrofia.
Decenni e decenni di ricerche hanno dimostrato che questi intervalli di sollevamento per lo sviluppo muscolare si aggirano intorno al 65-85% di intensità. Per impostazione predefinita, gli intervalli di ripetizioni dovrebbero essere limitati a 6-12 per serie. Nella pratica, questo potrebbe essere un esercizio di panca da 100 libbre (intensità del 75%) per 10 ripetizioni e tre serie.
D’altra parte, i sollevatori possono scegliere di periodizzare l’allenamento e di passare attraverso alcune fasi di allenamento della forza. Come suggerisce il nome, l’allenamento della forza enfatizza il sollevamento della forza.
In turn, the maximum force of a lift can increase. After 10 weeks of correct lifting (including all lifting phases), a 10-20% increase in force is realistic. By maintaining a modest level, the maximum force of a lift could increase from 133 pounds to 146 pounds (10% increase in force).
At this point, the lifter example can return to the muscle building stages and lift more weight at a given intensity, thus pushing for greater overload and muscle gain. More or less, 75% bench press can go from 100 lb x 10 reps to 110 lb x 10 reps.
Muscle growth is the “goal of many. Typically, many experts subject their clients to a week of learning the correct exercises and movement patterns. This is followed by 4 weeks of training for l” hypertrophy and then 4 weeks of strength training before starting the next training cycle.
The importance of sleep
Without going into technical details, some sleep stages help recover/repair body tissues and maintain hormonal balance. So, if you don’t get enough, high-quality sleep, you may lose in terms of muscle gains.
Sleep needs vary from person to person, but on average we should have 7 hours.
Some general tips for getting longer, higher-quality sleep are:
- Give yourself the opportunity to sleep by going to bed early
- Use the bed just to sleep to create positive associations.
- Always wake up early to increase your desire to sleep during the day.
- Avoid dozing
- Avoid caffeine 12 hours before bed to keep your body relaxed.
- Avoid screens an hour before bed or apply a blue light filter to help release melatonin.
- Include foods high in melatonin, such as dark red cherries, in your diet.
Consistency: The need for a regular training routine.
Many lifters start to train consistently but then start to lose their shots. To build visible muscles, a lifter should maximize resistance training-induced muscle protein synthesis for each muscle group at least once a week. Consistent practice can help a lifter continue to add muscle to the structure, rather than interrupting workouts and losing muscle.
Take-home message
Overall, the body has many muscle groups composed of muscle cells and microfilaments. These muscles are responsible for the movement of the joints.
These muscle cells are broken down through resistance training and then rebuilt larger and stronger using amino acids through supplements and a high-protein diet. Dietary protein targets of 1g/lb body weight, distributed throughout the day, should maximize muscle building.
Don’t forget that getting enough sleep is also essential for body recovery and hormonal balance. This can be improved by applying the advice we have highlighted. Last but not least, be consistent to keep increasing your muscle gains – makes sense, right?
Always consult a licensed trainer or healthcare professional before making significant lifestyle changes.
After reading this article, many will no longer have to say the words “Why I don’t gain muscle”.
If you have any questions about “using the product or” purchasing, please feel free to contact us directly.
Please remember that this article is not medical advice and is not intended to diagnose, treat, treat, or prevent any medical disease, disorder, or condition. It should never replace advice and treatment provided by your doctor or a licensed health care provider.
Reference
Duda, K., Majerczak, J., Nieckarz, Z., et al. (2019) Muscle and Exercise Physiology: Chapter 1 – Human Body Composition and Muscle Mass, 3-26
Wilson, J.M, Wilson S, Loenneke, J, et al. ‘Effects of amino acids and their metabolites on aerobic and anaerobic activity’. Journal of Sports Strength and Conditioning 34 (4): 34-48, 2012
Chaves, T.S, Scarpelli, M.C, Almeida, J.G, et al. Effects of overload progression protocols in resistance training on strength and muscle mass International Journal of Sports Medicine, 45(07): 504-510, 2024
Dattilo, M, Antunes, HKM, Medeiros, A, et al. ‘Sleep and muscle recovery: Endocrinological and molecular basis for a new and promising hypothesis’. Medical Hypothesis, 77(2): 220-222, 2011
