The 3 Elements Required For Building Muscle Mass

November 4 2013

The 3 Elements Required For Building Muscle Mass

Can’t seem to build more muscle mass no matter how much time you spend in the gym? it’s downright frustrating when you stick to a proper physical fitness routine centered around strength training only to discover little-to-no change in your muscle mass. Some people automatically throw in the towel and give up on their fitness goals after such abysmal results. Before giving up, though, you should first check to make sure you are incorporating all 3 elements necessary for building mass into your lifestyle.

#1) Strength Training Exercise

The first, and most obvious, element that’s necessary for building muscle mass is strength training exercise. Some people constantly head over to the treadmill, elliptical or other cardio-based machines and wonder why they aren’t gaining muscle. The fact is that cardio will actually force your body to burn some if its muscle mass rather than gain it. There’s certainly nothing wrong with some occasional cardio, but your physical fitness routine needs to be centered around high-intensity interval training (HIIT) exercises.

#2) Nutrition

A second element that’s necessary for building more muscle mass is nutrition. And no, scarfing down processed fast food meals for your lunch and dinner doesn’t count as nutrition. If you’re trying to build muscle mass, you need to nourish and provide your body with the appropriate vitamins, minerals and compounds it needs to grow. Build your diet around lean meats, fresh vegetables and whole grains. Avoid refined sugars (small amounts of fruit sugars is okay), sodium and fat.

Be sure to check out our previous post for easy ways to increase your daily protein intake. When your trying to build muscle mass, protein is hands down the most important nutrient to include in your diet. A good rule of thumb is to consume about 1-1.5 grams of protein per pound of body weight each day. If you weigh 200 pounds, for instance, you should consume 200-300 grams of protein.

#3) Recovery

Last but not least is recovery. Lifting weights at the gym will only progress your muscle mass so far; recovery is necessary to physically ‘rebuild’ the torn and damaged muscle fibers. One of the biggest mistakes people make when trying to build muscle mass is visiting the gym each and every day to perform strength training exercises. This may seem beneficial, but it actually slows down your progress by preventing your muscles from recovering.

Allow at least 48 hours for recovery in between bouts of HIIT workouts. This will ensure your muscle fibers are strengthened and ready for another solid workout session.