Lack of sleep
If you regularly lack sleep, you will not achieve significant results in muscle building. 8 hours of sleep per day is the minimum required for a bodybuilder
Muscles grow not during exercise, but during rest. At rest, microdamages to muscle tissue received during the active training process heal, and the number of muscle fibers at the sites of rupture increases. Sleep is a natural part of recovery from heavy exercise and is the time when the body rests best.
During sleep, the level of anabolic hormones increases: growth hormone, testosterone, which directly affect the increase in muscle volume and strength. The level of the stress hormone cortisol, which destroys muscles, on the contrary, decreases. A good night's sleep stimulates the production of neurotransmitter chemicals: dopamine, adrenaline, norepinephrine, which increase the effectiveness and safety of strength training, are responsible for coordination, muscle contraction and maintaining high energy levels.
Lack of sleep causes physical, mental and nervous exhaustion, provokes the release of large doses of catabolic hormones: cortisol, glucagon and catecholamines. A state of lethargy prevents full work in the gym, reduces concentration, endurance and strength indicators.
Do not neglect rest, otherwise no matter how hard you train, your muscles simply will not have time to recover, and therefore grow. And it’s simple: when you want to sleep, you don’t want to train at all!
The brain and muscles work differently
Admit it to yourself, how many times have you come to training and been in the clouds because of family problems, failures in personal relationships or difficulties at work? Surely neither 1 nor 2, but periodically, but at this time the body performs hard physical work.
Disconnect your brain from the outside world while training, combine the strength of your whole body to achieve the main goal of going to the gym - growing muscle mass. A properly tuned psyche is a powerful weapon for pushing the development of strength and muscle volume.
Learn to fully concentrate on the muscle being trained and the load you are performing and the result will surprise you.
Lack of calories
The key to progress when building muscle mass is proper nutrition. Remember the golden rule: for muscle growth you need a surplus of calories, consume more than you burn during the day. Anabolic processes require enormous amounts of energy. With a calorie deficit, the body does not build muscle, but gets rid of muscle fibers that it is not able to provide energy.
For muscle growth you need a 10-20 percent surplus. On average, this is 400-500 kcal above the daily norm
It is important to monitor the balance of proteins, fats and carbohydrates in the diet. Otherwise, you risk building not muscle, but fat.
- Carbohydrates are a source of energy for the body. With their deficiency, weakness and apathy occur, and the desire and strength to train disappear. To gain muscle mass, you will need 4-6 g of carbohydrates per 1 kg of body weight. To avoid gaining too much, exclude fast carbohydrates from the menu, giving preference to slow ones.
- Proteins are the building material for muscles. It has been scientifically proven that muscle growth begins with the consumption of 1.5-2 g of protein per 1 kg of body weight.
- Fats are important participants in the synthesis of hormones and the most easily accessible source of energy. 1 g of fat contains 9 kcal, which is more than 2 times the calorie content of proteins and carbohydrates. You should only consume the right fats, the sources of which are vegetable oils, fatty fish, and nuts. Fats account for about 30% of the daily diet.
If you want to build voluminous, sculpted muscles, provide your body with energy for construction!
Standard of living
This is a very abstract and multidimensional concept. But its essence comes down to this: in order for your muscles to become larger, you need to create more and more greenhouse conditions for them. That is:
- Rest more and more
- Be less and less nervous
- Work less and less
And so on. In other words, you need to “sharpen” your life more and more to suit your training. It is clear that few people can afford this. Well, ladies and gentlemen, your body doesn’t care about your life’s difficulties and problems. Want even more muscle? Then please provide even better conditions for their growth.
For example, to gain the first 5 kg of muscle, you can get by with seven hours of sleep a day. But for the next five kg, the body will need to sleep 8–9 hours a day. And for the next 3 kg, he will want to not only sleep 9 hours a day, but also work not 10, but 7 hours a day. And be less nervous. In short, something like this))
Cardio overload
The primary purpose of cardio training is to burn excess calories and lose weight.
By doing too much cardio, you significantly increase energy expenditure, burning resources that could be used to build muscle tissue.
The added volume makes recovery from strength training more difficult. Adaptation mechanisms in response to strength and aerobic training differ; the body rarely manages to equally fully develop both strength and endurance.
Moderate integration of cardio into your training process helps improve your results by enhancing the effects of strength training. 2-3 aerobic workouts per week are the best harmless option for accelerating muscle growth.
But as soon as the cardio load becomes too great, strength progress stops, the entire effect of strength training comes to naught.
Set your priorities correctly, focus on strength training and muscle work!
4) Genetic predisposition.
In weight gain, factors such as genes play a very important role. This can be explained by the fact that there are three types of human body structure: ectomorph, endomorph, and mesomorph. The differences between these types lie in the construction of the skeleton, muscle corset, etc. Of all the above body types, the most difficult to gain weight for is the ectomorph. Often this body type has a fast metabolism, and even with the consumption of fast carbohydrates, an increase in fat tissue does not occur.
Incorrect technique
Often, slow muscle growth is a consequence of improper exercise technique. The load goes to other muscles, and not to the one you work so diligently. Accordingly, such training is of no use. In addition, the risk of injury increases.
Violation of technique often happens in the last repetitions, when the strength is already running out, and you want to take the weight at any cost. Over time, initially incorrect execution ceases to become a habit, and the body automatically repeats the programmed program every workout. Experts recommend starting with light weight equipment, perfecting each movement, and then moving on to more serious loads.
Train correctly, and the results will not keep you waiting!
What am I doing wrong?
No, don’t think about it, I’m not asking myself this. This question often arises in the minds of trainees who do not achieve their bodybuilding goals. And this is a fairly common situation, because the genetically gifted guys for whom almost any training and nutrition program works can be counted on one hand.
And the rest of the masses are forced to shovel mountains of techniques before they find the one that will grow muscles. And even here we come across a bunch of pitfalls such as:
- A huge number of articles on the Internet and magazines, which often contradict each other
- Many false and fraudulent training and nutrition programs that can lead you astray
Lack of knowledge
Lack of knowledge leads to illiterate construction of the training process. As a result, you spend a lot of time in the gym, but are frustratingly marking time.
Typical mistakes of novice bodybuilders:
- No load progression. The key to success in building muscle mass is a gradual increase in working weights and the number of approaches. If nothing changes from workout to workout, the muscles have no incentive to grow.
- Same type of training. Repeating the same exercises in the same sequence after a couple of months leads to stagnation. Don't let your muscles adapt; addiction is an obstacle to progress.
- Overtraining. Heavy long workouts, a lot of exercises and a lot of approaches lead to the fact that the muscles stop growing, since the volume and intensity of the training program exceeds the recovery capacity.
- Copying training schemes of champions. Beginners who thoughtlessly apply the program of recognized bodybuilding stars are doomed to failure. Professional athletes have worked for decades, rarely without steroids to achieve better results. Remember: the program must be selected strictly individually, taking into account the characteristics of the physique, training schedule, and level of the athlete.
Ignorance of the basics turns bodybuilding into aimless weight lifting. Having initially secured the support of a competent trainer, you will receive an optimal training program, a precise training plan with detailed exercises, the number of approaches and repetitions, and control of the correct weights. Follow the recommendations of a professional, and you will quickly gain valuable experience!
Ignoring basic exercises
And this is understandable, after all, these are hard exercises that make you sweat and drag your feet from the gym, why overwork yourself if you can do isolated exercises, it’s easier and more convenient.
Only in reality it’s not like that, it’s the same thing as when you’re preparing to run forward, but you jump on the spot and wonder what I’m doing wrong and why my muscles are growing slowly.
Deadlift will give good growth to all the muscles of the body, I know a person who diligently did shrugs to develop trapezius, but somehow it didn’t work out, but as soon as I started doing deadlift, they began to grow.
The squat is a huge boost to the legs and butt, and the stronger the core muscles, the more they help the additional muscles handle heavier weights, opening the door to the land of big muscles.
pull-ups are much better than lat pull-downs, as they provide a powerful push to broaden your back and are a good way to get into the famous rear view triangle.
Banal laziness
You lift irregularly, skip classes, work carelessly in the gym - forget about moving forward. You need to want to train, and not do it through force, otherwise nothing will work out.
If you don’t want to keep a diary of classes, you won’t be able to clearly monitor the dynamics of the results obtained and manage the workload.
In sports, everything is interconnected. To get a good result you need to work hard and hard!
If you spend too much time on your phone, studying theory and choosing an effective program for yourself, every day while putting off real training until tomorrow, your muscles will not grow. Stop thinking, it's time to act. Don't wait until Monday to get started! Go to the gym and bring your plans to life. It is important to overcome yourself, and the reward will be a beautiful body and pumped up muscles, the envy of everyone around you.
