A Beginner's Guide To Building Slabs Of Serious Muscle

If you are someone who has recently started lifting weights with an ambition to build a good physique, there is a good chance the following has happened to you. You went to the gym for 6 days a week, did all the bicep curling possible, ran miles and miles on the treadmill followed by a thousand ab crunches like your trainer suggested, and still look the same months down the line. Well, if this describes you, then this piece is right up your alley. The common fallacy that most beginners fall victim to is that they do not give importance to the basics and start following trends. There is a good chance that the person they follow either has much more training experience than a beginner does or they are trying to sell them something. © Youtube I am not writing this piece to take a dump on social media fitness celebs but rather putting a point across. A simple analogy here would be the process of constructing a house. Would it make sense to start designing the windows before you have built a house? Exactly my point here! Build a strong foundation and aesthetics will follow suit. What are the things you need to focus on? 1. Lift heavy 2. Get stronger 3. Rest 4. Do it consistently Doing hundreds of bicep curls and thousands of ab crunches are not going to aid the cause here. So, which exercises work best, you ask? COMPOUND EXERCISES Compound exercises help you become stronger and lift heavier in the long run because: 1. They stimulate more muscle per exercise 2. They engage your core and stabilizers 3. They are more functional 4. They have a carryover effect So, having a workout plan focusing more on compounds will help you lift heavy and get stronger. Compound exercises can be split into three sub-groups namely Leg exercises, Push exercises, and Pull exercises. The leg exercises will help you target the leg muscles, push exercises will help target the upper body muscles and the pull exercises help you target the upper body muscles, required for pulling. As a beginner, you are more sensitive to growth and you can build more muscle compared to someone who has been lifting for over 8-to-10 months. Therefore, it makes more sense to incorporate one compound exercise for legs, push, and pull muscles in every workout. Additional ab work can be done if desired but you can definitely skip the bicep curling as you will be engaging them in your pulling exercises. The Best Picks A few of my favored exercises for these movements are: Legs - Back squats, Deadlifts, and Bulgarian split squat. Push - Bench press, Overhead press, and Incline bench press. Pull - Pull-ups, Barbell rows, and T-Bar rows. Abs (optional) - Reverse crunches, Weighted crunches, and Planks. For a beginner, using these principles, a workout plan would look like this: Day 1 - Squats, Bench Press, Pull-ups, and (optional) Reverse Crunches. Day 2 - Rest Day 3 - Deadlifts, Overhead press, Barbell rows, and (optional) Weighted crunches. Day 4 - Rest Day 5 - Bulgarian split squats, Incline bench press, T-Bar rows, and (optional) Planks. Day 6 -> Rest Day 7 -> Rest Day 8 -> Repeat You can do 3 to 4 sets of these exercises for 8 to 10 reps. The rest period between these sets can be anywhere between 3 to 5+ minutes if needed. Do not follow the 'rest is for losers' mentality and get back to the next set in 30 seconds. © YouTube Two reasons: 1. These are not bicep curls! You are engaging more muscles per exercise. Your body will take time to recover. 2. The entire purpose of intensity will be defeated as shorter rest periods will screw you over by killing intensity. Rest days will ensure you are not building a lot of fatigue and that all your sessions can be done with maximum intensity rather than it feeling like a punishment. This workout will not only help you grow better but your strength gains will go through the roof as you are building a strong foundation as opposed to doing a hundred curls and a thousand crunches. Go ahead, plug in this plan, and start building some serious muscle. Author bio: Pratik Thakkar is the co-founder and director of GetSetGo Fitness, an online fitness company. He is regarded as someone who will make it easy for you to understand the process by putting things in the right context and providing science-based recommendations for natural bodybuilding. You can reach out to him at pratik@getsetgo.fitness.