Weight Training Tips and Articles

Building Bigger Pecs

Building bigger pecs is something that most men who weight train want to do. Thick, powerful looking chest muscles are a must for an optimal muscular physique. Most weight trainers also enjoy doing chest exercises. However, to succeed at building bigger pectorals there are some things you must do.

You must focus on compound chest exercises for building bigger pecs. They’re the exercises that will help you build the most strength and size. This means that bench pressing exercises (flat, incline, and decline) and dips should make up the majority of your chest workouts. Save flyes and cable crossovers for the end of your workouts. You must actually build bigger pecs before you try to add shape to the muscles with isolation chest exercises.

Another great tip for building bigger pecs is to use proper form on your exercises. The bench press is, without a doubt, one of the most abused weight training exercises there are. So many weight trainers will do anything to lift more weight when they bench press. However, constantly cheating will only lead to joint pain or an injury. On the bench press and all other chest exercises you must focus on doing full repetitions with complete control of the weight. You will build chest strength if you perform these exercises the right way. This gain in strength will lead to you building bigger pectorals.

You must train with high intensity to build bigger pecs. If you always stop short of failure your chest won’t be forced to adapt and grow. Try to get as much as you can out of every single set you do. For most chest exercises this means that you’ll need somebody to spot you for safety. Have your spotter assist you for an extra rep when you reach positive failure.

Another key to building bigger pecs is to regularly switch things up. If you always do the same exercises for the same amount of sets and reps your body will get used to it and you’ll hit a plateau. Try a chest weight training routine where you do a workout with high reps and light weights, one with medium reps and medium weights, and one with low reps and heavy weights. Your chest muscles won’t get used to always doing 8 to 12 reps on every set and you’ll build bigger pecs. You should also regularly switch the exercises you do. Switch between decline bench presses and dips every other workout. You can also do dumbbell bench presses on a core ball every now and then.

To succeed at building bigger pecs you also need to avoid overtraining. Doing 20 or 30 sets per chest workout is just too much. You can actually get a great workout from 10 total sets for chest or even less if you work hard enough during each set. You also need to give your chest enough time between workouts to recover and grow. Training the pecs every 5 to 7 days depending on how much you do per workout should be enough.

As long as you follow these rules, you’ll be on your way to building bigger pectoral muscles.

Natural Muscle Building

Nowadays, pro athletes are constantly getting caught using steroids and other performance enhancing drugs, and it can be confusing for the average weight trainer. It’s gotten to the point where many people believe that you can’t succeed at natural muscle building. Nothing could be further from the truth.

It can be tough for young beginning weight trainers to see that most (maybe all) professional bodybuilders are using steroids, growth hormone, and other drugs to build muscle. A lot of average joes are even using these drugs to build a muscular physique. However, it’s so much better for your health if you try for natural muscle building. Since steroids will lower the amount of testosterone your body produces, your levels of this hormone will drop considerably if you stop taking them. This means that you’ll never have to worry about the massive drop in your testosterone levels from having to quit steroids if you follow a natural muscle building routine.

One of the biggest keys to natural muscle building success is to not overtrain when you lift weights. Anytime you see a professional bodybuilding routine in a book or magazine, you have to realize that there’s a good chance that it’s a steroid users routine. These drugs help people recover much quicker from intense weight training, so these routines may include as much as 30 sets or more for each muscle. This is way too much for anybody who wants to succeed at natural muscle building. You’ve probably seen guys at the gym who lift for 2 or more hours per workout, doing set after set of every exercise, yet never build any real size and strength. Your muscles grow when they rebuild after being broken down from intense weight training. The muscles are forced to adapt. If your muscles don’t recover because you’re doing to many exercises and sets, you won’t get bigger and stronger.

Along the same lines, you need to take days off of lifting altogether for natural muscle building. If you weight every single day, you won’t be giving your muscles the recovery time they need to rebuild.

Taking both of these factors into account, to succeed at natural muscle building you shouldn’t do more than 10 to 12 total sets per muscle. If you can weight train with high intensity during every set, you may want to do even less than this. You also don’t want your weight training workouts to last more than 45 minutes to an hour. If you train hard, this is plenty of time.

Weight training 4 times a week should be enough for natural muscle building. If you split your routine 3 ways you’ll train each muscle every 5 or 6 days. If you don’t do too many sets, this should be enough time for your muscles to recover and grow.

Your diet also plays an important role in natural muscle building. You’ll need to get plenty of protein in your diet. The best sources of protein include lean red meat, chicken, fish, and egg whites. If you aren’t getting enough protein from whole foods, you should purchase some protein powder.

Besides protein powder and maybe creatine, you don’t need to buy every overhyped supplement for natural muscle building. Most of the supplement ads that you see in bodybuilding magazines are extremely exaggerated. Save your money for the new wardrobe you’ll need when you succeed at natural muscle building.

Best Triceps Exercises

When it comes to building bigger arms, the biceps seem to be king. Many weight trainers focus most of their arm building efforts on biceps exercises. However, the triceps actually make up more of the upper arms size. Because of this, you need to do the best triceps exercises for optimal arm size.

The close grip bench is considered one of the best triceps weight training exercises. It will certainly work your triceps muscles hard. However, you will be working the inner pecs when you do close grip benches, and you may feel pain in your wrists if you lower the bar all of the way down to your chest. If you want to avoid these things, you can try another one of the best triceps exercises - reverse grip bench presses. It’s basically a bench press done with an underhand grip on the bar. Once you learn how to do these right, you won’t feel it as much in the chest or the wrists.

Triceps extensions are among the best triceps exercises and can be done many different ways. The most popular form of triceps extensions are called “skull crushers”. These are basically lying triceps extensions. They get their name from the fact that you have to lower the bar to your head. Overhead triceps extensions done with a barbell, dumbbell, or cable are also very popular.

Some of the best triceps exercises involve cables. You’ll see many weight trainers doing triceps pushdowns, usually with a straight bar. Another popular variation is to do them with a rope. Both of these exercises will allow you to contract the triceps muscles hard at the end of a rep. They make great finishers to a triceps workout.

Many of the best triceps exercises can be done one arm at a time. Overhead triceps extensions with a dumbbell in one hand and kickbacks are the most popular. You can also do cable exercises one arm at a time.

Once you start doing the best triceps exercises, you’ll certainly notice an overall increase in the size of the upper arms. Do these exercises with high intensity to coax them into more growth.