How do you get your muscles to grow bigger? That's simple! All you need to do is lift heavier weights each time you go to the gym. Everyone is aware of this. Simply keep getting stronger!
If you gradually increase your weight, this is known as progressive overload, and it is the catalyst for muscle gain, correct?
No, not exactly. The truth is that you can gain muscle without doing a lot of heavy lifting. Gain muscle without doing a lot of heavy lifting.
To be sure, increasing your lifting weight is one way to overload your muscles. It's the most well-known method, and it's particularly important in the early stages of your training evolution, when you're young, healthy, and have plenty of room for improvement.
The issue is, what happens when you can no longer increase the weight? "Just lift more weight" every workout sounds good in theory, but in practice, you can't always increase the weight.
As a beginner, you may add weight at every workout for weeks or even months (these are the "newbie gains"), but everyone eventually reaches a plateau where the weight becomes stuck.
Even when you break through those plateaus, which is possible with good programming and persistence, you get a little bit stronger, but then you hit more plateaus and plateaus more frequently. There is, of course, a limit to how much weight you can lift. You can't keep getting stronger indefinitely. So, what now?
Even if you manage to get a little stronger every year for decades – through your 20s, 30s, and even 40s – you reach your athletic peak at a certain age. When you reach that point, it becomes more difficult than ever to lift more weight, and your strength levels gradually decline as a result of normal aging. So, what now?
And what if you have an injury, tendinitis, a bad shoulder, or low back pain even if you're still in your youth? You can lift, but every time you try to lift more weight, the pain worsens. If you try to push through it, it knocks you out and you can't lift anything. So, what now?
You should increase your weight whenever it is safe to do so, but "just lift more weight" is easier said than done. Adding weight to the bar is a time-consuming process, and there are limits to how far you can go with this type of overload alone.
If your only goal is to lift more, you'll become frustrated, exasperated, and even despondent whenever you hit a strength plateau or are unable to lift more for any reason. You may believe you've reached the limit of your genetic potential and are unable to make any further progress. You may believe that you must be content with simply maintaining your current body. You may wonder if you're wasting your time at the gym and even consider quitting.
Most lifters end up in this depressing and discouraging place because of three issues, but there are solutions.
The first issue is that most people have been brainwashed into believing that increasing the weight you lift is the only way to gain muscle. This is not true, but it has been spread for years, often by trainers who have only a background in strength sports and not physique sports.
The goal of physique training is to transform your body's appearance rather than to increase strength. That is also what the average person desires. Most people aren't training to perform onstage, but they do want to look good in their swimsuit. When you consider the training specificity principle, you can see that always lifting more weight is not as important for muscle building as it is for strength sports.
True, when you get stronger, you usually gain muscle as well. What you must understand, however, is that lifting more is not the only way to gain muscle. The true secret to muscle gain is to apply the progressive overload principle.
That brings us to the second issue: most people aren't even aware of the distinction between progressive resistance and progressive overload. They are not synonymous! Lifting more weight is referred to as progressive resistance. Progressive overload refers to any increase in workload that your body has not previously experienced.
Lifting more weight is only one of at least eight types of progressive overload. Yes, you can gain muscle without doing a lot of heavy lifting.
The third issue, which leaves many muscle-builders dissatisfied with their lack of progress or inability to train around injuries, is that most people are unaware of or improperly employ the other seven progressive overload techniques. These techniques are frequently overlooked, underappreciated, or ignored.
Finally, you're about to discover how to use all of these overload techniques to gain muscle without lifting heavier weights. But first, let's go over the progressive overload technique again.
Increase the amount of weight (Progressive overload)
Make no mistake: progressive overload is an essential muscle-building strategy. Increasing the amount of weight you lift is widely accepted as the most effective type of overload – that is the first goal you should strive for. When you are unable to lift more weight, you must resort to other overload methods to continue progressing in some other way.
When you can, add weight to the bar (or lift the next heavier set of dumbbells, use the next plate on the weight stack, and so on). If you do the same number of reps as before with a heavier weight and the same good form, you have overloaded your muscles, and your muscle development will increase if all of the other factors necessary for growth are in place.
As previously stated, you will not be able to increase the weight you lift at every workout, and the longer you have been training, the slower the increases will be. That's when the other seven progressive overload techniques come in handy.
1. Increase the number of reps with the same weight.
One method for gaining muscle without lifting heavy is to simply keep the reps consistent and overload by doing more reps.
It only takes one more rep in perfect form with the same weight to increase the volume of the workout and successfully apply progressive overload. For example, if you performed 8 reps with 200 pounds for three sets, your total amount lifted ("tonnage" or volume) is 4,800 pounds (200 X 8 X 3). If you add a rep to each workout and work your way up to 9, 10, 11, and then 12 reps, you'll have increased the volume to 7,200 pounds over the course of five workouts. Is that an overabundance? Yes, it most certainly is.
Two of the most significant advantages of increasing reps are that you can almost always do one more rep somewhere in your workout with little effort, and making progress at every workout keeps you highly motivated. Furthermore, working in higher rep ranges is less taxing on the joints than traditional heavy-load strength training, which is typically done in the 4 to 6 rep range. Sets of five, for example, are widely recognized as optimal for building strength, but what if your primary goal is to build muscle rather than strength?
The ideal rep range for muscle building is generally accepted to be 8 to 12 (some say 6 to 12) reps, and you should focus your training in this range. However, new research suggests that using a variety of rep ranges is best for muscle building. The strength zone (low reps, heavy weight), the hypertrophy zone (medium reps, medium weight), and the metabolic zone are all included (high reps, light weight).
Anyone who experiences joint pain when training in the low rep, heavy weight zone will be relieved to learn that great muscle gains can also be obtained by working in the hypertrophy and metabolic zones. According to new research published in the Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research, high repetitions in the 15 to 20 and even 25 to 30 range produced muscle growth when the sets were worked hard, to fatigue.
It is not ideal to do high reps exclusively unless absolutely necessary, but the important thing for making gains is progression, and increasing reps at the same weight, regardless of rep range, is a simple, proven way to do so.
2. Increase the number of sets performed at the same weight and reps.
There's always the chance that you won't be able to increase the weight or reps. It becomes more difficult for advanced trainees to continue adding weight, reps, and muscle mass than it is for beginners. This is where the advanced lifter begins to employ other overload strategies in order to continue gaining muscle.
Doing more sets is one of these methods. If you go from 3 sets of 200 pounds for 10 reps to 4 sets of 200 pounds for 10 reps, your volume has increased from 6,000 pounds to 8,000 pounds. Is that an overabundance? You betcha!
Up to a point, volume is directly correlated with muscle growth, so any increase in volume, whether it's more reps, more sets, more exercises, or a combination of the three, can potentially increase muscle growth if it's more than you were doing before.
The disadvantage is that adding sets lengthens your workouts, which is inconvenient for people who are short on time. You also can't keep increasing sets indefinitely – there comes a point of diminishing returns, and eventually overtraining.
However, if your current program only uses a low or moderate volume and you're stuck on the weight and/or reps, adding one more set is as simple as adding one more set. Furthermore, many coaches believe that this is the most effective way to gain muscle without heavy lifting.
3. Increase the number of exercises you perform.
Increasing the volume by adding more exercises is another option. 4 sets of 10 reps on the bench press with 200 pounds, for example, equals 8,000 pounds lifted. Assume your bench press is stuck at 200 pounds for 10 reps, but you add an incline dumbbell press as a second exercise. If you use 60-pound dumbbells for three sets of ten reps, you'll have a total of 9,800 pounds. Is that an overabundance? It most certainly is.
Of course, adding exercises has some of the same advantages and disadvantages as adding sets. You can't keep adding exercises indefinitely because you'll eventually overtrain. Furthermore, your workouts will take longer, so if time efficiency is a priority, you may want to use the other overload methods on this list.
4. Increase the frequency with which you lift the same weight.
According to the most recent research, many bodybuilders have begun to increase their weekly training frequency above the old popular method of once per week per muscle growth. Some people train each muscle once every 4 to 6 days, while others work each muscle twice a week.
Some of the studies that have encouraged people to lift more frequently are based on the protein synthesis theory. However, it's also worth noting that increasing your training frequency is a form of progressive overload. Many lifters have been so preoccupied with increasing weight that they have completely overlooked this obvious option.
If you keep your entire workout the same – same exercises, sets, reps, and weight – but change your split or weekly training schedule so that each muscle is worked more frequently, you will usually see a significant increase in muscle growth just from that simple change.
This method, like increasing sets and exercises, has some limitations. In most cases, more workouts are required each week, but going to the gym 6 days a week, or even 5 days a week, is not feasible for everyone. If you try to maintain the same volume, the workouts can become very long, and longer workouts may not be practical for some people.
5. Lift with better form and a stronger mind-muscle connection.
An overemphasis on strength frequently leads to an obsession with always lifting heavier, even when you're not ready, which leads to compromising form – a major muscle-building mistake.
You may think you've achieved success in your training by adding more weight to the bar, but if you cheated on form, there was no true progression. It's phony progress – ego stroking. Cheating usually results in less tension on the target muscle and an increased risk of injury or joint pain.
Once a foundation of strength and muscle size has been established, many advanced bodybuilders place less emphasis on increasing the number of pounds lifted as their primary progression strategy and more emphasis on improving their form. Their goal is to improve repetition quality and muscle tension by strengthening the mind-muscle connection.
Both psychologists and exercise physiologists have conducted extensive research on this topic and found that "attentional focus" (mind-to-muscle connection) can increase muscle activation.
Although we may not be able to quantify repetition quality as easily as we can track weights, sets, reps, volume, and frequency, improving repetition quality is unquestionably another method of overload.
Furthermore, this is a critical strategy for advanced physique athletes, older lifters, and anyone suffering from joint pain that prevents them from performing maximally heavy lifting (because the focus goes more on quality of reps than quantity of weight).
6. Complete more work in less time.
The term density in weight training refers to how much work you can fit into a given amount of time. Weight training density can be increased by doing the same amount of work in less time, more work in the same amount of time, or more work in less time.
The primary method used in the gym is to shorten the rest period in between sets. Density can also be increased by using the superset technique, which involves performing two different exercises back-to-back with little to no rest in between. Density training also includes tri-sets, giant sets, and mini-circuits.
When maximum strength is the goal, it is well known that longer rest intervals outperform shorter rest intervals. If the rest interval is too short, fatigue from the previous set limits the amount of weight you can lift on the next set. This is why powerlifters rest for long periods of time, usually 3 to 5 minutes.
Recent research suggests that 3 minute rest intervals are superior to 1 minute rest intervals for muscle growth and strength. However, research shows that trainees can successfully use autoregulation to manage their rest intervals by feel, resting as little or as long as it takes for the fatigue from the previous set to dissipate between sets.
If you condition yourself to gradually reduce rest intervals while maintaining the same or a higher workload, this increase in density is another type of overload that can induce muscle growth without any weight increase.
While using progressive density, you will not achieve maximum strength, but if you are not a purist strength athlete, this should not be an issue. This is a muscle-building exercise, not a powerlifting exercise.
Two more advantages: this overload technique is joint-friendly because progression is achieved without heavy weights, and high density training is time-efficient, unlike some of the other methods. In fact, workouts may become shorter rather than longer.
If you want to use the overload principle to gain muscle but are unable or unwilling to increase the weight, you now have seven options. These are practical techniques, and the majority of them can be quantified with numbers, allowing you to track your progress precisely.