The 7 Essential Elements To Build Big Muscle

By: Tony Farrell

To build big muscle is no mean feat. You need to know the right approach and then build your foundation properly.

If you're going to build muscle mass, then freestyle exercises are not appropriate. Freestyle exercises have their place. They build a solid foundation for beginners wishing to take up bodybuilding. They can be used with your current bodybuilding workout routine. But, they do not build big muscle.

Where you want to become big, or bigger at least, you need some sort of resistance. It really depends on your goal. You need weight resistance that focuses on each muscle area individually, in order to build big muscle.

So you use weights for this purpose. Using this resistance against each muscle area you want to develop, you'll build big muscle. To do this you'll need different exercises, so that you can focus that resistance on each muscle target.

1 -- Choose Your Bodybuilding Workout Exercises: If you're a beginner, I suggest that you begin working on these particular exercises, as they build the foundation for big muscle:

• Bench Press (works the chest, shoulders and triceps)
• Barbell Rows (back and biceps)
• Squats (legs and lower back)
• Overhead Press (shoulders and triceps)
• Curls (biceps)
• Dumbbell Press (triceps)

For the more advanced bodybuilder, just make sure that the exercises you chose are focusing fully on each muscle group and are working for you. Sometimes your body becomes immune to exercises after doing them for some time. Therefore they are not as effective anymore.

All you need to do is to change that routine. Try different exerises. This will be a shock to the body, causing these new exercises to be more effective, helping you build big muscle more effectively.

As a matter of fact, you should change your bodybuilding workout routine regularly so as not to allow your body to become resistant to the effects of each exercise.

As for beginners, you must work on your chosen exercises before moving onto an advanced training program. Your body must become used to this workout first.

Before starting any sort of workout, what should you do?

2 -- Warm up:

I can't stress this enough. One of the biggest causes in muscle fatigue, and poor muscle response, is lack of a good warm up. The amount of time spent on a warm up session varies. If it's cold, you should warm up for about ten minutes. If the room temperature is warm, and your body is warm too, maybe around five minutes will do. But...

For best results, you've gotta do a good warm up first!

If this is your first time training, my advice is to find a good gym with professional coaches, to guide you properly as you begin your journey into building big muscle. You'll start off with light weights and machines. Increasing the weight resistance as you make suitable progress.

As your body becomes more conditioned to using weights, and the amount of weight increases, so too will your ability to perform heavier workouts. Thus, allowing you to build big muscle.

If you're a little more seasoned, then you'll know what I'm talking about... don't you? You do, don't you?

3 -- Build Big Muscle Mass: This is where you use heavy weights. This means that the weight you lift is sufficient to challenge you. I suggest that you don't move beyond 12 reps. So, the maximum you should be able to lift is up to 12 repetitions of any one exercise. If you are going over that, then the resistance is minimal. Therefore not effective enough in building the big muscle you desire.

When I suggested that you do 12 reps, I mean that you should be fatigued by that stage. So much so, that doing a thirteenth rep would be near impossible. This is known as training to failure.

4 -- Do Not CHEAT: Yep... you heard right. When performing an exercise, a person's natural tendency is to cheat a little. Because the weight is so great, it's easier to cheat a small bit and use your own weight to nudge the heavy weight to where you want it to go.

5 -- Be Strict: For example, lets say that you're curling a barbell (for biceps). You start off well. The lift is pretty ok and you are only using the muscles that are required for this exercise. But, as you go through a few reps, the weight appears to become heavier. It's not. It's just you're becoming more fatigued.

As you reach the higher reps, the natural tendency is to give it a little hand, causing the effect of the exercise on that muscle to greatly reduce as you are not restricting the exercise to that muscle.

Be strict. Don't give in to the urge to do this. It takes a great deal of personal discipline to make sure you don't cheat. Take this advice and you won't go wrong. In this case, when faced with the option of taking the easy way out or working through it the hard way --

Opt for the hard way. It has the most profound effect. It is the way to achieve your goal of building big muscle!

6 -- How To Get over This: It's still not easy, but it helps -- I look at the number of reps I need to perform. When you really look at it, "12" is not a big number, is it? So, I look at it as a small thing.

As the urge to cheat kicks in, I say to myself:

"12 is not a big number - I'll be there is a few seconds"

Try it. See how it works for you. Cheating can lead to --

7 -- Injuries: The other negative aspect of heavy weight training is injuries. Usually caused by jerking heavy weights, cheating, strain and overall poor performance of these exercises.

Reduce the likelihood of it by being more careful and training in the proper manner. This is why that I suggest beginners seek professional help, especially where they have never done any sort of physical workout with weight resistance training before.

In summary, here are the 7 elements to build big muscle --

1. Choose your bodybuilding workout routine.
2. Warm up first.
3. Build big muscle mass.
4. Do Not CHEAT.
5. Be Strict.
6. Prevent yourself from cheating.
7. Avoid injury.

Stick with these helpful hints and they will help you stick with you your routine that will help you achieve your goal to build big muscle.