How to Quickly Build Muscle This Spring

Apr 20, 2016 by Marcin

Spring is here and even in the areas that are too cold right now it’ll be time to hit the beach in just a few short weeks. That means making sure you look good with your shirt off, meaning it’s time again to put down the snack foods and hit the gym. Let’s talk about a few important tips and tricks to make sure you get the success you’re looking for to get you beach ready in short order.

 

Get the Protein You Need

Building muscle requires protein, and if you’re looking to make some gains you’ll need quite a bit of it. If you’re lifting regularly you should add about 200g of protein to your diet every day, which is about 800 calories. That can come in the form of meats or nuts, or, if you’re not into cooking and buying expensive ingredients all the time, a protein supplement.

 

Getting the Weight Right

There’s a lot of information out there on the internet about what the “right” amount of weight is for someone at any given point, but there’s a relatively simple rule of thumb for building muscle. Maximize the amount of time and the amount of tension you put on your muscles. Building muscle requires going for heavy weights on low reps, but it’s important to make sure your muscles are actually working the whole time. That means go as heavy as you can control, and not heavier. Out-of-control muscles aren’t working as hard as they could be.

If you use momentum to “cheat” when you’re lifting, or you can’t lower the weight in a controlled manner, you’re actually reduce the amount of time that your muscles are doing work. If you find yourself doing this, you should go lighter.

Conversely, if you aren’t feeling significantly challenged by an 8-10 rep set, it might be time to increase weight. Staying in this weight sweet-spot maximizes the amount of work your muscles will do in a workout, and puts you on the fastest path to building muscle.

 

Getting Muscle Definition

As you put on muscle over the next while you’ll notice that the weight you gained over the winter isn’t really going away, and your new muscles might not show as nicely as you hoped. Now’s the time to get cut. Muscle definition is about reducing fat without depriving your body of nutrients. A good way to do this is by taking a fat burner, which are usually made from green coffee beans, garcinia cambogia, chromium picolinate, or other mild stimulants that essentially just boost your metabolism to help you burn off some extra energy.

Control your diet while taking those, and start adding in cardio to your workouts to burn extra calories. This combination will greatly accelerate the rate at which you can get lean. Some more great advice on on getting cut is Bodybuilding.com’s guide here