Intensity = Immensity

This is the first thing I want to mention in here because it’s
absolutely crucial to muscle building. It also builds on what you
have already learnt about the body’s response to muscular stress.

If you think back, you’ll remember that the body builds muscle due
to increased periodic stress. So it makes sense that to build
maximum muscle, you need to stress your muscles out as much as
possible while you’re in the gym.

This means that you need to lift heavy. I don’t care if you’ve
heard that low weight, high reps is the way to go. Use your brain,
think back to the reason why muscle grows in the first place. I’m
sure you’ll see the light.

Now, heavy is a relative word. What is heavy to me may not be heavy
to you. So what do I really mean when I say you need to life
"heavy"? Well, basically, you need to lift a weight that you can’t
perform more than 8 or so repetitions with.  I’ll go into depth in
a moment, but for the moment, just accept that if you can lift a
weight more than 8 times, you’re not lifting heavy enough.

It should also mean that by the end of your last set, you should
have lifted to failure. This means that no matter how hard you try,
you simply cannot lift the weight again. If need be, use a spotter.

This is someone who is there to help you with the final couple of
reps. It is especially useful for exercises that could result in
injury if you didn’t have a spotter, such as the bench press. Just
make sure the spotter only helps you when you really need it, he’s
not there to get a workout while you’re lifting.

I like to use 2-3 sets because I believe it gives your muscles
enough time under stress. Some people say 1 set is enough and I
think 1 set is definitely better than 10, but I still say 2-3 is
the optimum amount of sets. By the last couple of reps of your last
set, you should be really struggling to lift the weight on your own.

Also, intensity means that you are lifting with "high" reps. I
don’t mean you grab a 2lb dumbbell and do 500 reps with it, that’s
not going to stress you out at all. It will make you tired and give
you a great burn, but that’s about it.

What I mean by high is between 6-8 reps. Performing 1-4 reps of an
exercise is a great way to increase your strength (more on that in
a minute) but it’s not enough to stress your muscles out. 2-3 sets
of 6-8 repetitions is just enough time under stress for your
muscles to get stressed out completely, without going completely
stupid and end up needing to be wheeled out of the gym on a trolley.

Progression

This is the next point I want to strongly get across to you. While
intensity is extremely important, it’s easy to forget something
that’s pretty simple. As you lift the weights and your body adapts
itself to the new situation, you’ll find yourself becoming stronger.

As you become stronger, what was once an intense workout for you
will become an easy workout for you. So it is key that you
continually progress. If you want to hit a plateau and stay there,
fine, don’t lift any harder. But if you want to smash your plateau
and build more muscle than ever before, you are going to need to
focus on this word: progression.
   
You need to be able to go into the gym and do more work than you
did the last time. This doesn’t mean you drop the weight and up the
reps, it just means you either do 1 more rep using the same weight,
or you increase the weight.

It doesn’t matter how much you increase the weight by, over time,
it will really begin to add up. This is also going to help you
naturally build up your strength, while still keeping the goal of
muscle size as a priority.

There’s a popular Japanese word that gets around a lot in corporate
circles. It’s "kaizen". Basically, what this principle is all about
is just improving each day. Proponents of kaizen say that if you
can just improve a tiny little bit each day, the company will
improve greatly over time.

And so it is with building muscle. It doesn’t matter if you can’t
increase your lifts by 5kg every day, as long as you just improve
by the smallest of margins.

This is how I usually tell people to do it. Start lifting a weight
that causes you to fail on your 2nd or 3rd set of 6 reps.

Eventually, you will be able to do 7 reps, then 8. When you get to
this point, I suggest increasing the weight to a number that only
allows you to lift for 6 reps again.

Then you just repeat the cycle. When you hit 8 reps for the first
time, up the weight the next time you perform the exercise. Pretty
simple huh? While it is a simple concept, I can’t stress it’s
importance enough, so make sure you heed this advice.

I hope you got something out of that Lewis, if you have
any questions for me, just send over an email and I’ll do my
best to answer it in a future newsletter.

Lift hard and have fun!

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==========================================
Sarah, CPT
Lewis, Publisher
www.articles.atozfitness.com
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