Muscle Fiber Weight Training

Muscular Hypertrophy Requires a Scientific Approach

Dec 15, 2008 Chris Christian

Gaining muscle size and strength can easily be achieved by employing proven techniques. Understanding how muscles grow will help you make your muscle grow.

Building muscle via weight lifting is the goal of many. Understanding the science of the movements, maximizing your efforts and energy expenditure and getting the most from each repetition, will make your program a success.

The human body has three types of muscle tissue: smooth, cardiac and skeletal.

Smooth muscle tissue, mainly found in the walls of hollow organs such as the stomach, intestines, bladder, uterus and blood vessels. Cardiac muscle is found only in the heart.

Skeletal muscle tissue is responsible for all voluntary movement of the body. Maintaining, conditioning, strengthening and building are also characteristics of skeletal muscle tissue.

Skeletal muscle tissue is divided into two classification; slow twitch or type-I fibers and fast twitch or type-II fibers. The contractile speed of the muscle fibers of a muscle determine it’s classification. The contrast between type-I and type-II fibers is mechanical in nature. Type-I fibers contract and relax much slower than type-II fibers and thus have a high tolerance for aerobic activities. Type-II fibers on the other hand, are quick contracting and high-force producing muscle fibers that fatigue much faster than type-I fibers.

Since muscle fibers are the major component in muscle hypertrophy, training them correctly will greatly increase the results of your conditioning program. Research suggests the following scientific principles for muscle hypertrophy:

• Exercise choice- exercise choices for muscle hypertrophy involve selecting movements that will meet that criteria. There are hundreds of exercises to choose from, therefore select movement that are contingent upon training experience, available equipment and available time.
• Exercises order - there are many ways to determine which order exercises are executed. One very common approach is to perform all larger muscle groups i.e. legs, back and chest first and progress toward the smaller muscles i.e. biceps, triceps and calves. Other techniques to consider include alternating one upper-body with one lower-body exercise, doing a push exercise and then pull exercises or performing power exercises followed by core and smaller muscles.
• Load or intensity- described as the amount of weight assigned to a specific set of movements. Since the intensity of the load determines the neurological as well as muscle fiber recruitment, it can be considered the most important aspect of the training program. Load should be a percentage of the 1rep-max that allows for 6 to 12 repetitions.
• Sets per exercise- the number of set is directly relate to the intensity level of the work. The more sets executed the higher the intensity of the workout. For muscle hypertrophy 3 to 6 set should be performed of each muscle group.
• Rest between sets- the rest period assigned to muscle hypertrophy is generally between 30 seconds and 1.5 minutes. Full recovery is not suggested or required for it does not produce the environment conducive to muscle hypertrophy.
• Tempo or speed- since muscle fibers contract at different speeds (based on the intensity of the movement), optimum speed will result in maximum muscle fiber stimulation.
• Range of motion- the range of motion of a movement determines the percentage of muscle fibers involved in a movement. Executing all movements with a full range of motion ensures maximum muscle fiber recruitment.

Following the guidelines outlined here is sure to add a few pounds of muscle to your frame. If your current program is not producing don’t waste another rep, make the adjustments and watch your muscles grow.

"Some people like my advice so much that they frame it upon the wall instead of using it." -Gordon R. Dickson

Source: Essentials of Strength Training and Conditioning

The copyright of the article Muscle Fiber Weight Training in Fitness is owned by Chris Christian. Permission to republish Muscle Fiber Weight Training in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

Train according to muscle fibers for max gains.