4 Rules for Building Muscle

By Bill Willis, BSc, a PhD candidate at The Ohio State University.

Four Indispensable Rules for Building Muscle

With the huge amount of articles on muscle building that are published in the muscle magazines on a monthly basis, most beginning bodybuilders suffer from a case of “information overload” when it comes to seeking information on taking their physique to the next level.

Solid, valuable tips on building muscle written by true experts are often drowned in a sea of BS, with self-proclaimed “experts” of questionable credibility flooding the information-pool with misinformation.

Everyday Guys Follow Workout Routines of Bodybuilders

Making matters worse, the most useless muscle training info often comes from the fitness magazines which report the training practices of the top pro bodybuilders, resulting in the all-too familiar situation where the average (natural) trainee emulates the routine of his favorite pro bodybuilder on Steroids, becoming over trained, injured, and burned out rather than huge and ripped.

While there is a million different ways to train for muscle building and most likely half of them will work, there are several fundamental rules for building muscle that will never change. If these rules are followed when designing a new muscle building program or making changes to your existing plan, the pitfalls of expending huge amounts of energy and time on a failed training program can be avoided, following these rules can your physique to the next level.

One Hour Rule for Muscle Building

Testosterone levels increase during an intense weight training workout, peaking at roughly 45 minutes and drastically decreasing below baseline after the 1 hour point. Two-three hour workouts lose muscle.

If the workout is completed in the one hour window of opportunity, your workout will be much more effective. We build muscle when testosterone is high. When testosterone is low, we lose muscle. The 2-3 hour workouts so commonly followed by overzealous guys trying to build muscle result in more muscle breakdown than building. We not only need to repair existing muscle tissue damaged from the workout but we need to add new muscle. If your training is breaking down more muscle than it is building, the best you can hope for is to break even in the muscle mass department. Keep your workouts short, and to the point. If you can’t get it done in an hour, you are either doing more work than necessary or talking too much.

Big Muscles Lift Big Weights: Train to Build Strength

We all want to get bigger to win the bodybuilding show, or get the girl. The problem is most guys are tapped out when it comes to muscular size because strength is a limiting factor. Training for muscular hypertrophy (size) involves different methods than training for pure strength.

6-15 Rep Range

To train for hypertrophy, rep-ranges in the 6-15 rep range are generally more effective than the low-rep strength training that the typical power lifter would use. It is often overlooked that strength is relative; if you can bench 300 pounds once you might use 225-240 for hypertrophy training. If you increase your bench 1-rep max to 350 with a strength training phase you will not have gained much in the size department.

But with your newly built strength you are now using 280 pounds during your next hypertrophy-training phase. Your chest, shoulders and triceps will have drastically increased in size with the increased strength in moderate rep-ranges. Get strong to get big.

Building Muscle is All About Nutrition

There has been a debate on the actual importance of nutrition vs. training methods for building muscle as long as guys have been lifting weights. To end the debate, they are both equally important. If you do not have the nutrition to support your training methods you will never reach your goals.

The average 1-3 meal/day, fast-food eating guy can walk into a gym and begin the best training program ever designed to build muscle. He will put on a few pounds of muscle and get marginally leaner as an adaptation to the extra work, but will never build a quality physique.

If you want to look like the guys in the muscle magazines, you need to get it done in the kitchen, not only the gym. It is easy to go to the gym and do an intense one hour workout several times per week. The chalenge is being dedicated to your diet every day, 7 days a week, year-round. Your hard work in the gym simply sends the message to your body to change. Nutrition makes the magic happen. This is not easy, but with a little planning and preparation you can stick to your diet plan and take your physique to the next level.

Follow the diet plan I give my clients who want to build muscle whiles staying lean.

Avoid Alcohol to Get Chicks

Most aspiring college guys who lift weights want to be huge, but party like crazy, binge-drinking from one-up to a few times per week.

If you want to be the most ripped, muscular guy on campus is it not going to happen if you get drunk even once/week. While a couple social drinks can actually be healthy, getting completely trashed can knock down your testosterone levels for 3-5 days. Testosterone builds muscle. The more testosterone have, the bigger and leaner we become. You cannot expect to make any significant progress if you have the testosterone levels of a 12-year old girl for most of the week because of that big party Saturday night.

Your diet may be perfect, and you may me training like an animal, but get drunk every week and you are wasting your time. While giving up beer may be hard to swallow, you will need to make a choice to drink only in moderation if you want to be any different than the other guys on campus who is spinning their wheels at the gym. The hot chicks and all the extra attention you will get with your perfect physique far outweigh drinking until you puke and being hung-over the entire next day.

You will meet way more women if you are muscular and ripped than if you are fat and drunk. Drink at bars because you are shy? Get some balls and talk to her! It’s way easier to get her number if you are not drooling all over your self and slurring your speech.

While there are many other details to consider when putting together your muscle building program, the above rules will never change. Individual genetic makeup, lifestyles, and schedule requirements require unique training methods. Follow these rules religiously and continue to seek out new information when designing a training program for your unique requirements; just because it worked for somebody else does not mean it will work for you. Train hard and smart to take your physique to the next level.

Because this can only be addressed on a case-by case basis, it is recommended that you consult with a competent personal trainer on this matter. Often for a reasonable fee an entire diet, supplement, and weight training program could be mapped out in a 30 minute to 1 hour phone or email consultation. This will save you tons of money you would have wasted by seeking to find a plan that works for you by trial and error.

Read this story on Spending Money on a Personal Trainer if You Already Have Muscles.

Bill Willis is based near The Ohio State University in Columbus Ohio and offers diet plans and online fitness routines to both beginners seeking to gain muscle and advanced weightlifters who are advanced in their training. Contact Bill for a customized diet or routine at:

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