Increasing muscle volume, or muscle hypertrophy, is the primary goal of most exercisers when they first come to a fitness center. Also professional athletes, especially those who play sports in which some form of strength dominates need more muscle volume.
How does muscle hypertrophy actually occur? Hypertrophy occurs as a result of the body's adaptation to the "stress" to which we expose our body during training. The body responds to stress first with an alarm, then by adapting to the conditions and finally by improving its ability to be ready for the next workout. What type of training to use for muscle hypertrophy?
Most research confirms that for muscle hypertrophy it is best to use loads of 70 to 85% of 1 RM in training, that it is best to work first large and then small muscle groups and that it is optimal to do 3-5 exercises per muscle group in 3-5 series. . 1RM (repetitio maximalis) is the maximum weight we can handle.
However, no matter how good and effective a training program is, stagnation inevitably occurs after a while. Stagnation can occur for several reasons, but in this text we will deal exclusively with the issue of training. In order for our progress to be constant and to avoid stagnation, we must periodically change certain variables in our training program.
Training characteristics
The first variable we can change is the type of muscle contraction. In training with load, concentric and eccentric contraction are most often used, ie overcoming and relaxing, and most exercisers neglect isometric contraction, and it can certainly significantly contribute to the development of strength, and strength is an important prerequisite for the development of muscle hypertrophy.
The next variable we can change are the exercises we use in training. Many exercisers change their training systems, but always do the same exercises which in turn leads to stagnation. It is also important to change the order of their exercises, but multi-joint exercises should always be in the first place, followed by single-joint exercises. After that we have to deal with the training volume. Training volume consists of two components, scope and training intensity. When it comes to progression, we always increase the scope first, and only then the intensity of the training.
When we talk about the volume of training, we should take into account that muscle hypertrophy, among other things, requires hormones that enable muscle growth. First of all, I am thinking of testosterone, which is secreted the most in the first hour of training, which means better two training sessions of one hour than one training session lasting two hours.
The break between sets or between exercises is also one of the variables that we can change. The duration of a break in training for hypertrophy usually varies between 1.5-3 minutes. However, if we conduct training with a higher load, we can extend the duration of the break up to 6 minutes.
Then comes one of the most important variables, and that is load. We said at the beginning that the optimal load for the development of muscle hypertrophy is 70-85% of 1 RM, however after some time the muscle will not react to such a stimulus, at least not in the way we would like. Instead of continuing to conduct workouts with this load, we can conduct a 4-6 week cycle to develop maximum strength with a load of 90-100% of 1 RM.
Two chest training programs
The following example shows two chest training programs. The first program serves to develop muscle hypertrophy, and the second to develop strength. The cycle for the development of muscle hypertrophy (6-8 weeks) is followed by a cycle for the development of strength (4-5 weeks)
When conducting training it is advisable to have an assistant to help us do the last repetition.
This cycle is by no means recommended for beginners. After the cycle for the development of maximum strength, we can repeat the training cycle for the development of muscle hypertrophy, but it is to be expected that now 1 RM will be higher than before, ie that there has been an increase in maximum strength.
Finally, I must mention that muscle grows during rest, and most of all during sleep, and that rest as well as diet is an essential component on which our progress depends.
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