Five Muscle Building Mistakes & What To Do About Them

By Poliquin™ Editorial Staff

4/16/2013 4:08:11 PM

Pack on muscle and lose fat by avoiding these five common mistakes to building the best physique. Building muscle while simultaneously losing fat is a delicate balance. If you make slight errors in your training, you can halt all progress in its tracks. This article will tell you how to sift through the lies and misconceptions about training to achieve optimal fat loss and muscle building results.

Mistake #1: Neglecting The Anabolic Hormone Response To Training
There have been loud rumblings in the muscle-building research world stating that testosterone, growth hormone, and IGF-1 don’t play a critical role in building muscle. The “hormone hypothesis” of hypertrophy—the widely accepted view that anabolic hormones build muscle—is being challenged because there is evidence that it is possible to increase strength and build muscle without the presence of the anabolic hormones.

However, by achieving robust elevations in the anabolic hormones at key moments, you will gain MORE muscle and lose MORE body fat. Pretending these hormones don’t matter, or blatantly training in a way that makes your body catabolic and “overstressed” by doing cardio every morning on an empty stomach is a mistake!

Two things have been shown by the research on this topic:

1)    Resistance training can result in a post-workout increase in the anabolic hormones, testosterone, growth hormone and IGF-1. This is undeniable. In addition, numerous studies have shown a correlation between the magnitude of anabolic hormone response and the increase in muscle size and strength development.

2)    It is possible to increase muscle size in the absence of any elevation in hormones. For example, insulin-like growth factor-1 doesn’t appear to be necessary to build muscle. However, the presence of IGF-1 can lead to greater muscle gains for the more advanced trainee.

In regards to testosterone, strength and muscle development are consistently associated with the presence of testosterone (suppressing testosterone release in young men doing resistance training leads to less muscle development). Studies tend to show a strong association between testosterone levels and strength and muscle gains. Athletic performance also correlates with testosterone.

However, there is a great variety in the magnitude of testosterone (T) response between individuals, and in some cases the T response doesn’t relate to muscle growth. Likewise, the research is not conclusive as to the type of training program that results in the greatest T response. Trends suggest that hypertrophy-style training elicits a larger T response than strength-type training, but this appears to be individualized with different trainees responding diversely.

What To Do About It: There is a hormone response to training. Believe it and train for it. Every workout should by intense, focused, and programmed to elicit anabolism. The individual anabolic hormones, testosterone, growth hormone, and IGF-1 respond somewhat differently to training.

For growth hormone, focus on short rest, moderate to high loads, and extreme metabolic stress. For testosterone, favor heavier loads with slightly longer rest. For IGF-1, manipulate tempo with bottom position pauses in the squat, for example.

Use this information to inform your programming, while paying attention to how your body responds individually. For example, studies of rugby players illustrate that some men have a “low” T response: They experienced the greatest increase after an explosive power training protocol of 5 sets of 3 Olympic lifts at 85 to 95 percent of the 1RM. The rest of the players had the greatest T response to 4 sets of 10 at 70 percent of the 1RM.  

Mistake #2: Ignoring Workout Nutrition
Protein synthesis and muscle growth can double when you take the right dose of protein after training. Ignoring this, or getting a poor quality protein can significantly inhibit your training gains. Likewise, taking carbs before your workout or dosing with protein multiple times throughout the day when your primary goal is fat loss can make your body hold on to fat and make you tired during your workout.

What To Do About It: Recent research has revealed the following significant points:

•    Achieve a threshold dose of at least 10 grams of essential amino acids (EAAs) at least 6 times a day, of which one of those is a post-workout whey protein shake of 20 grams. Get your EAAs from meals of meat, padding any meals that don’t achieve the 10-gram dose with EAA capsules.

•    If you are already lean and your goal is to pack on muscle mass, you may want to try dosing with 20 grams of whey every 3 hours on training days because this has been shown to optimally rebuild muscle and lean tissue after training.

•    Whey protein is superior to all other protein sources for muscle building and fat loss because it triggers greater protein synthesis than casein, soy, and pea protein, and it is not as allergenic as soy and casein. If you can’t take whey, take EAAs with extra leucine for best muscle building results.

•    If you are lean, take whey or EAAs with a high-quality carbohydrate supplement to produce the greatest release of insulin post-workout for greater protein synthesis.

For example, a recent study found that young men who took carbs with whey after hypertrophy-style training for 12 weeks experienced less cortisol for a more anabolic environment post-workout. But, if your primary goal is fat loss, ditch the carbs and stick with protein.

Mistake #3: Doing Too Much Cardio
Doing any cardio other than sprint workouts will significantly hamper your muscle building efforts. Adding aerobic training to a muscle building routine is a bad thing. Depending on the volume of cardio you do, you can completely negate your muscle development, or at the least, reduce it by 50 percent.

This is the reason that strength training is appropriate for endurance athletes—they don’t want to increase body weight because even if it’s muscle, they fear it will make them slower. A number of studies show weight lifting won’t cause hypertrophy if endurance training is done concurrently—athletes get stronger, just not bigger because the aerobic training “turns off” muscle building pathways and promotes catabolism or muscle loss.

Even if you aren’t doing endurance training and just want to lose fat, anything longer than 25 minutes of steady state exercise has been shown to inhibit muscle building. A recent study compared the effect of combined strength and cardio training with just strength training in recreational athletes. Results showed that the strength-only group gained muscle and increased quad and hamstring cross-sectional area by 50 percent more than the strength-cardio group, which gained no muscle.

What To Do About It: Just stop! Ditch anything that resembles low, moderate or steady-state cardio in favor of high-intensity sprint interval training. Sprint training should never take longer than 25 minutes total and should be metabolically taxing to produce a significant anabolic response so you still build muscle.

For example, a program that was shown to significantly increase GH, T, and IGF-1 was doing four sprints in decreasing distance order as follows: sprint 400 meters, rest 4 minutes, sprint 300 meters, rest 3 minutes, sprint 200 minutes, rest 2 minutes, and sprint 100 meters. You are done in less than 15 minutes total.

Mistake #4: Not Taking Advantage of the Metabolic Effect of Hypertrophy
Anaerobic training causes the build up of metabolites like lactic acid, which enhance muscle growth.

An example of how to apply the metabolic effect of hypertrophy is with a moderate intensity (60 to 80 percent of the 1RM), a fairly large volume, and short rest periods to create metabolic fatigue rather than central fatigue of the nervous system. As oxygen delivery is reduced and waste products accumulate, higher threshold motor units are recruited leading to greater growth.

The effect of hypertrophy-style training is as follows:
•    Post-workout elevations in GH are caused by increased lactate and hydrogen build up in the blood that reduce protein degradation.
•    A reduction in muscle pH and a decrease in myostatin gene expression due to short rest periods, leading to enhanced muscle growth.   

The error in training for hypertrophy comes when you always train with the same rep and moderate load range with 30-seconds rest.  Never doing heavy load training means you’ll never tap into those highest threshold type II muscle fibers that have the greatest capacity for growth.

What To Do About It: Get a periodized program that uses training cycles focusing on a variety of rep and intensity ranges. Heavy load training to build up the nervous system will promote adaptations that can help you build bigger muscles once you return to training in the “hypertrophy” range. Alternating cycles of 9 to 12 reps with cycles of 4 to 8 reps is the quickest way to gain lean muscle mass.

Occasionally doing sets of 20 to 50 reps can also boost mass gains in muscles with a relative higher proportion of slow twitch muscles like the quadriceps. On the flip side, using high reps for hamstrings, which are typically at least 60 percent fast-twitch, would be a waste of time.

Mistake #5: Ignoring Muscle Building Techniques—Eccentrics & Drop Sets
You can get a lot of muscle growth out of modifying tempo, volume, and intensity. But, training the exact same lifts for months on end leads to diminished returns because the muscles get conditioned to the movement by the “repeated-bout effect” so that you cause less muscle damage. For athletes, the repeated-bout effect is a great way to decrease soreness, while building strength, but it’s not good if your goal is body composition.

What To Do About It: Periodize your training for growth, and as you get training years under your belt, use specialized training techniques such as drop sets, forced reps, and heavy eccentric negatives to get the greatest hypertrophic response.

Using these techniques in a periodized program will generate growth through the mechanisms discussed above and recapped here:
•    Mechanical tension, which causes muscle fiber damage and maximal motor unit recruitment, leads to more muscle growth.
•    Local muscle damage leads to the production of growth factors that stimulate protein synthesis.
•    Metabolic stress from a buildup of lactate and hydrogen ions due to anaerobic energy production triggers the release of the most anabolic hormones.

Do heavy eccentric training with a load that is 20 percent greater than your concentric 1RM, building up to 50 percent of the 1RM. Use a slower eccentric tempo of three to four seconds for the greatest muscle gains.

Forced reps will enhance hypertrophy by recruiting more motor units: for example, for a program that includes 4 sets of 12 of the leg press, and 2 sets of 12 of the leg extension and squat, identify the maximal load you can perform for 12 reps. Then increase that load and perform 12 reps, getting assistance when necessary.

Use a style of drop sets that has been shown to be especially effective: Try a high-intensity set followed immediately by the same exercise at a low-intensity with 50 percent of the 1RM to produce maximize cross-sectional area muscle growth.

References

Schoenfeld, Brad. Potential Mechanisms For A Role of Metabolic Stress in Hypertrophic Adaptations To Resistance Training. Sports Medicine. 2013. 43, 179-194.

Schoenfeld, Brad. Post-Exercise Hypertrophic Adaptations: A RE-Examination of the Hormone Hypothesis and Its Applicability to Resistance Training Program Design. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2013. Published Ahead of Print.

Schoenfeld, Brad. The Use of Specialized Training Techniques to Maximize Muscle Hypertrophy. Strength and Conditioning Journal. August 2011. 33(4), 60-65.

Schoenfeld, Brad. The Mechanisms of Muscle Hypertrophy and Their Application to Resistance Training. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. October 2010. 24(10), 2857-2872.

Meckel, Y., Nemet, D., Bar-Sela, S., Radom-Aizik, S.  Hormonal and Inflammatory Responses to Different Types of Sprint Interval Training. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2011. 25(8), 2161-2169.

Beaven, C., Cook, C., Gill, N. Significant Strength Gains Observed in Rugby Players After Specific Resistance Exercise Protocols Based on Individual Salivary Testosterone Responses. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2008. 22(2), 419-425.

Beaven, C., Gill, N., Cook, C. Salivary Testosterone and Cortisol Responses Following Four Resistance Training Protocols in Professional Rugby Players. Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research. 2008. 22, 426-432.

Moore, D., et al. Daytime Pattern of Post-Exercise Protein Intake Affects Whole-Body Protein Turnover in Resistance-Trained Males. Nutrition and Metabolism. 2012. 9(91).

Kazemzadeh, Y., et al. Effects of Carbohydrate-Protein Intake During Exercise on Hormonal Changes and Muscular Strength After 12-Week Resistance training. Journal of Basic Applied Scientific Research. 2012. 2(6), 5945-5951.

Churchward-Venne, T., Burd, N., et al. Supplementation of Suboptimal Protein Dose with Leucine or EAAs: Effects of Myofibrillar Protein Synthesis at Rest and Following Resistance Exercise in Men. Journal of Physiology, 2012. Published Ahead of Print.