Muscle Building Story: How to Build a Real Man

 　　It seems unbelievable now, but I gained nearly 100 pounds (1 pound ≈ 0.45 kilograms) of muscle in the first four years of training, and this achievement was achieved in a "gym" that could only accommodate two beds in a seaside town in northern Norway with a population of 5,000.

　　In 1990, when I was 16 years old, I weighed over 130 pounds. After training with my brother in that simple gym for 4 years with the simplest equipment, my weight increased to 225 pounds. I have always believed that as long as we have a scientific and reasonable training plan and can persist in hard and tenacious training for a long time, our muscles will grow rapidly.

　　1. Hard training

　　Before I was 16, I was a football and ski jumping enthusiast. After starting bodybuilding training, I gained 25 pounds in the first year. Maybe my body is suitable for bodybuilding, so I can easily grow muscles even if my movements are irregular. Over the next three years, I developed a "rapid muscle mass building plan" and strictly followed the principle of complete recovery from hard training to achieve muscle gain. I gained another 70 pounds of muscle.

　　The reason why I was able to gain muscle quickly is first of all due to the lot of fitness knowledge I accumulated from various bodybuilding magazines, and also to my idol Arnold Schwarzenegger and his movie "Pump Iron".

　　Even though I live in a small town in a remote part of Norway, I often try to apply the techniques, methods and principles taught by bodybuilding experts and celebrities in magazines in my training. I often like to train with heavier weights because I grow faster than my peers and have become stronger. Since the gym is small, I can only use two benches as barbell supports for squats and nothing else. I didn't have a "barbell" until I saw Arnold doing barbell squats in the movie "Mercury."

　　The climate in Norway is cold, so I warm up for 10 minutes before each training session to ensure that nerve Muscles are fully mobilized. In addition, I have to do my parents’ work while training, because they don’t support me in bodybuilding. Those who think that they cannot practice bodybuilding without a good environment and equipment, don’t worry. I think the conditions and equipment you have must be much better than mine.

　　2. Use the “pyramid” training method

　　In the first four years of bodybuilding training, I mainly wanted to make myself stronger as soon as possible, and to have muscles like Arnold Schwarzenegger as soon as possible. At the same time, I also took into account the proportional development of muscles in various parts of the body.

　　Since I was young, I did the movements faster in the early days. Now I prefer to use a slower speed. At that time, assisted rep training was very effective in increasing muscle size. Now it is no longer the method I use to build high-quality muscles. I believe that assisted rep training should be controlled. It should not be used in the last few times of each set, but should be tried to do a few more times at the end of each set. The focus should be more on putting pressure on the muscles and avoiding injuries.

　　At that time, in addition to muscle shaping exercises (such as chest presses and concentrated curls, etc.), I mainly used Wade's pyramid training method to gradually increase the stimulation of muscles and achieve rapid muscle growth, which means that the weight should be increased group by group and the number of times should be gradually reduced. Using this method of training, I first use lighter weights and higher reps to warm up the muscles at the beginning of each exercise, and then increase the weight group by group until the maximum weight is reached, and then decrease it. In the "spire group", I can safely do 4-6 times. I think higher reps (12-15) combined with lower reps (4-6) build quality and stronger muscles. I started using the pyramid training method when I was 16 years old, and I use it frequently now.

　　3. Norwegian intensity

　　I particularly like what Arnold said: "If you want to be a champion, you must suffer pain and break through the obstacles on the way forward. ”With his encouragement, I would train with high intensity no matter how bad the conditions were. I do a lot of forced reps, working with drop sets, and occasionally super high intensity to really shock the muscles.

　　If you like, you can also try doing crazy shock training, just do it occasionally (once every 2 months for each body part) and allow adequate recovery time (1 week). For shock training for my back, I can do 30 sets of pull-ups with different grips or deadlifts with very heavy weights. On double-arm training day, in order to shock the muscles, I can do 20 sets of barbell curls, sometimes not counting the number of sets, until muscle failure. I believe that shock training, although difficult to recover from, is more effective in building muscle more quickly.

　　To take advantage of high-intensity training, you also need to have a training partner who can stick with you through hard training. When I was doing high-intensity leg training, my training partner would come up with some excuse to not train with us out of fear of pain, like a knee injury or something. Later I thought that the reason he didn't want to train with me was because I was better at it than he was, or that I could tolerate pain and pain better than him. Thanks to the "love" of pain and pain, my strong will and quality enable me to always overcome the obstacles of pain and pain, thus becoming an excellent bodybuilder.

　　4. Find the most appropriate training method

　　“The "Quick Muscle Building Plan" was what I used when I was 17-20 years old. This plan can also help many novices avoid mistakes in training. It allows the muscles to have sufficient time to recover after high-intensity training. I follow the training schedule of my first year, practice 4 times a week, and practice each body part 2 times a week. Each training session uses only moderate intensity to stimulate the muscles, limiting the amount of exercise, and only doing 2 exercises for each part. When I need to increase intensity and volume, I work on one major body part at a time. This means training 5 times a week and only targeting one body part once a week, except for calves and abs.

　　It should also be noted that even though I was only 17 at the time, no details were overlooked. For example, many experienced bodybuilders only do 3-4 sets of exercises for the legs, but the legs are not a small area like the lateral head of the deltoid muscle. The biceps femoris is much larger than the biceps brachii. If you do at least 10 sets of exercises for the biceps brachii, why not do more than 10 sets of exercises for the biceps femoris? ! At the same time, I never neglect training the trapezius and rear deltoid muscles.

　　I love having a strong and well-proportioned chest. I always use Monday as my chest training day and always eat a little more on Sunday so I feel extra strong when I do bench presses on Monday. But I never did any additional exercises for my chest and always trained all body parts hard and regularly. I clearly understand that if you want to become an excellent bodybuilder, you must develop balanced muscles in all parts of the body. I'm happy that I was able to keep my physique in proportion from the start, and I'm confident that it will continue throughout my entire bodybuilding career.

　　5. California Dream

　　At 20 years old I weighed over 225 pounds and started preparing for my first bodybuilding competition. When I was 21 years old, I participated in a local bodybuilding competition and won the championship. From this, I came up with the idea of ​​developing my career in the United States. I first went to the Temple Gym in Birmingham, England, and vowed to become a top bodybuilder. Last year, my dream finally became a reality when I trained at Venice Gym in California, just like Arnold Schwarzenegger did in the movie "Pump Iron." My goal now is to become the best professional bodybuilder I can be as quickly as possible.

　　Despite this, I have never forgotten how as a teenager, in a shabby, gray and cold "gym", through hard and unremitting efforts, I finally ushered in the day when my dream came true. I hope you can do what I have done. A person should always look for something that can provide motivation for your will and body. As long as you keep going down-to-earth, you will be able to gradually get closer to your goal.

　　Guide to Quick Muscle Gaining

　　1. Basic training: The training plan should be developed around various basic compound movements, such as squats, deadlifts and bench presses.

　　2. Continuous strengthening: Use the pyramid training method until you use heavy weight to do 4-6 times/group.

　　3. Standardized movements: The movements should be standardized, and focus completely on the muscles being trained. Do not move the weight arbitrarily.

　　4. Reasonable diet: Make sure you get enough protein and carbohydrates, and master scientific diet methods.

　　5. Establish staged goals: Each training stage must have clear goals. Keep trying to stress the muscles with heavier weights and more intensity.