REASONS YOU'RE NOT GROWING

REASONS YOU'RE NOT GROWING

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Haven't seen any new muscle for months? Eliminate these common mistakes, and start building some serious mass today.

By Stuart McRobert

Are you making tangible gains - week in and week out? Yeah, right! If you're like most bodybuilders, you've run into a zero-progress rut before.
Unfortunately, even the most precise application of cutting-edge training and diet techniques can leave you feeling disgruntled and looking de-muscled. To make physical improvements on a regular basis, you need to eliminate all sources of error in your routine. In fact, the difference between success and failure is so small that if you're making just one of the nine mistakes in this article, you could be severely limiting your bodybuilding progress. Take a critical look at your daily routine to identify which of the following errors you're guilty of, then take action!

Mistake: Using the same weights, week after week
When's the last time you made some really big gains in the strength department? So often we fall into a pattern, continually choosing the same weight for an exercise instead of challenging ourselves by trying to move up. While getting stronger isn't directly equated to building bigger muscles, it's certainly linked; if you don't build up to lifting a considerable amount of weight for plenty of reps with perfect form, you'll never develop impressive size.

Corrective Action: Continually doing the same weight, same sets, same reps week after week, even when you aren't making progress, isn't the optimal way to train. Instead, you need to incorporate the concept of periodisation into your training. Cycle periods of strength training (1-6 reps per set of basic compound exercises, striving to increase your max lifts), bodybuilder-style training (a mix of compound and single-joint exercises for 8-12 reps per set, using moderate to heavy weights), and strength-endurance training (12-20 reps per set of lighter, but still challenging, weights). For example, you can do one month of strength-endurance, one month of bodybuilder-style training, and a third and final month where you drop the reps and push to increase the amount of weight you lift per exercise.

Mistake: Using weights you can't manage properly
While getting stronger is important, poundage at all costs is a definite progress-killer and can result in an injury that takes you out of action. Many bodybuilders use weights they can't handle with good form; surely you've seen the guys who load up a barbell with a plate or more on each side, then try to perform standing curls in which every muscle is working except their biceps. Impeccable exercise form - no body english, no yanking, no dropping, no heaving, no excessive ranges of motion, no blasting into a rep - is pivotal to training safety.

Corrective Action: Cut back your working weights by 10%, tighten up your form, then gradually build your weights back to where they were - and beyond - while maintaining that perfect form. Your reward will be new growth.

Mistake: Not allowing adequate recovery time between workouts.
Rest generously between workouts. Despite adequate recovery time being so pivotal, many bodybuilders minimise recovery time and maximise workout frequency. This may lead to inadequate results. Muscles grow between workouts, not during them. If you frequent the gym so often that they reserve you your own parking space, you may want to drastically cut back on your training frequency for a while.

Corrective Action: For a change, try weight training on just three days each week, and resting on the other four days. You can divide your overall programme into three routines, such as (a) abs and legs, (cool.gif back and biceps and © chest, delts and triceps, and hit each bodypart just once a week. Or you can try splitting your programme into two parts/routines, for example (a) thighs, back and biceps and (cool.gif abs, calves, chest, delts and triceps, and alternate the two workouts, thus hitting each area three times every two weeks. Or try one option for one month, then the other for a month, to see which works best for you. Growing serious mass requires serious rest. Too much training means too little rest.

Mistake: Avoiding the "hard" exercises
"I can't do squats - can't we just use the leg press?" "Deadlifts? Just the sound of that sounds wrong. Hey, let's do some pull-downs." Most people in the gym have either said that to a training partner or thought it to themselves. It's the same reason most people at your gym are rather small. Big, compound free-weight movements lead to big mass gains. The major muscle-builders are exercises such as squats, deadlifts, bench presses, military presses, dips, rows and pull-ups. These are the ones you have to become very good at if you want big muscles.

Corrective Action: Squat. Deadlift. Bench press. And push yourself, striving to move some real weight. You don't need to move the equivalent of a Volkswagen or anything - take it slow, give yourself a chance to become accustomed to these movements, and don't be a wimp in your workouts by switching your dips for cable pressdowns because you "feel a bit tired."

Mistake: Not giving 100%
If you're loafing in the gym - chatting with your training partner, flirting, revelling in your biceps as you flex in front of the mirror - you'll never get far in the growth department. While you don't have to train till you literally drop, you do have to train hard.

Corrective Action: Concentrate on the exact moment you find yourself in, and put everything you have into every set, every rep. Don't do five or six sets half-heartedly, lazily going through the motions, when you can do 2-3 sets of heavy, highly intense reps, going to the brink of failure - and sometimes beyond.

Mistake: Neglecting your health
Without good health, you can't train consistently. Without training consistency, you can't make notable progress. And without good health, your body can't recover optimally. Good health is at the bedrock of bodybuilding. Don't wait until you no longer have your health before you appreciate it.

Corrective Action: Look after yourself so you minimise your chances of getting injured or ill. Avoid harmful activities and environments - jumping out of a plane with no parachute? Bad idea. Swimming in a lake in January? Uh-uh. Teasing a pit bull? Well, you get the point. Even overtraining can make you sick, as it helps to suppress your immune system. Take care of yourself, and then you can take care of your training goals.

Mistake: Sticking with a plan or exercise that's not working
Too many people find a programme in a book or magazine, then stick to it with the fervour of a religious zealot, despite their better judgment. While you don't want to use this as an excuse to stop doing the more difficult exercises, if an exercise is seriously causing you pain or is not working the intended muscle, there's a problem.

Corrective Action: Personalise your programme, finding what works best for you. There's probably no single workout that works well for everyone. Even good programmes have to be fine-tuned to "fit" the individual user - in other words, personalise the factors of exercise volume (sets and reps), training frequency and exercise selection. If an exercise that you've been performing with good form is hurting you (as in the bad kind of pain) even after trying sensible modifications, drop that exercise before it drops you.

Mistake: Selling yourself short
Setting limits on yourself is the surest route to failure. Don't expect the impossible, but believe you can achieve a lot. Arnold used to envision his arms growing as big as mountains when he trained his biceps. Surely he didn't expect they would grow to that size, but he certainly left that option open. If you think that the biggest your arms will ever grow is 16 inches, it's highly unlikely you'll ever stretch the tape past that point. Set your sights high, and you'll be pleased with the results.

Corrective Action: Set realistic but challenging short-term goals: 10 pounds on your bench press, a quarter-inch on your upper arms, etc. Give your absolute best effort to reach those targets, then set new goals. Be driven. To measure your progress toward those goals, write them down and keep a training log, recording all your rep counts and poundages used. As the weeks go by, you need to be able to see small but gradual improvements in weights lifted and/or reps performed.

Mistake: Treating nutrition as a "nice-to-do" rather than a "need-to-do"
Nutrition may be last on this list, but it should be first when it comes to your bodybuilding plan. The road to more muscle is littered with people who failed to reach their destination because they mistakenly thought that working out was the only prerequisite while completely ignoring their nutrition. What you eat, and when you eat it, is a huge factor in bodybuilding. Muscle doesn't grow out of thin air, so to gain size you must consume a slight caloric surplus; those calories must be high quality to provide the abundance of nutrients needed to recover from hard training.

Corrective Action: Feed your muscles 5-6 times a day. Consume 1 gram of protein per pound of bodyweight. Cut down drastically on unhealthy fats - margarine, fried foods, foods that contain hydrogenated oils (check labels!) - and enrich your diet with healthful fats like virgin olive oil and omega-3 essential fatty acids from flaxseed oil and oily fish such as salmon and mackerel. Additionally, eat generous daily helpings of vegetables, fruit and unrefined grains. If your diet is lacking in variety, take a daily multivitamin to ensure that you're getting adequate amounts of the vitamins and minerals that are essential for muscle growth.
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