Thread: Muscle Mass

You make no mention of your lifting routine. How often do you lift? How often do you train each muscle group? What type of exercises do you perform? Do you trainwith high intensity?

It doesn't make sense to rely on prohormone products this early in your lifting career, they are best suited to those with at least a couple of years of training under their belt. The On Cycle stuff strikes me as very over priced with relatively low doses of PHs, particularly when taken orally. The NO products are also very questionable in their effectiveness. Stick to the basics like whey protein and creatine. They are tried and trusted and have a lot of research behind them.

Train hard, eat well and have patience and I'm sure you'll develop the mass you desire. Don't rely on PH or steroids for gains at this point, you have to develop all the mass you can naturally before you consider those options.

Thanks, I lift 4 times a week, I work Back on Mondays, Chest on Tuesday, Shoulders, and arms on Thursdays and Legs on Fridays it is the same every week. I focus on each area very intensly. I workout hard for about 1-1/2 to 2 hours on each of those days. I am not seeing any gains. I do understand the not relying the stuff yet, but I would like to start making some progress and do not seem to be improving.

Yes the NO2 and ON/OFF is overrated and overpriced not happy at all with.

The creatine I am getting ready to load on again.

Thanks again

Your split looks pretty good. I would definitely reduce the length of your workouts as its very hard to work intensely for two hours. Focus on high intensity with medium volume. Make sure you focus on compund exercises, e.g squat, deadlifts, bench press, shoulders press etc, worry about isolation exercises later. Also remember to constantly change your routine, vary reps, sets, intensity, exercises and the sequence of exercises, that will shock your muscles into growth.

Also make sure you eat protein and simple carbs within 45 mins of exercising, this is when protein synthesis and insulin sensitivity is at its highest.

Packing on muscle takes hard work, good nutrition, rest and patience. Good luck!

Thanks Redspy, will heed the advice. Thanks again..

Redspy, below is the routine I do weekly, you said to mix it up to shock the muscles, if you don't mind a little advice, that would be great... I am not sure the best way to mix it up to still produce the greatest mass gains. Thanks in advance..

Back
Pull Down 3 sets of 10
Bench Dumbbell Rows 3 sets of 10
One Arm Row 3 sets of 10
Bent Over Rows 3 sets of 10
Bench Dumbbell Pull Ups 3 sets of 10
Close Grip Pull Down 3 sets of 10 1 set to failure

Chest
Flat Press 3 sets of 10 1 set to failure
Dumbbell Flat Bench 3 sets of 10
Dumbbell Pullover 3 sets of 10
Dumbbell Fly’s 3 sets of 10
Incline Bench Press 3 sets of 10
Weighted Ab Crunch 3 sets of 10

Shoulders, biceps, triceps
Standing Dumbbell Press
Dumbbell Side Raise
Rear Delt Bent Over
Standing Curl
Reverse Curl
Concentration Curls
French Curl
Press Down
Traps
One Arm Reverse Extension


Legs
Squats
Leg Press
Hip Extension
Lunges
Calf Raises

Hey Aoshi

Your training volume still seems on the high end, I would seriously consider taking a hard look at this. 4 sets to postive failure will be more anabolic than 14 sets shy of failure. Blast those muscles and get the hell out of the gym

Here's an example of what I would do for back. First create a varied pool of exercises for width and thickness, e.g.

T Bar Rows, Seated Cable Rows, Barbell Rows, Dumbell Rows, Lat Pull Downs (various hand placements) Deadlifts, Hammer Strength (machine) Pulldowns, DB Shrugs, Machine Shrugs etc etc.

Then during a your back workout select 3-5 of those exercises, perhaps 3 sets each and then select your rep range. So for one workout you might do the following:-

T-Bar rows 3 x 8 (for lat thickness)
Seated Cable Rows 3 x 8 (for lat thickness)
Wide Grip Lat Pulldowns 4 x 8 (for lat width)
Deadlifts 3 x 8 (for lower back strength)
DB Shrugs 3 x 8 (for Traps)

Next workout you would select different exercises from the pool and increase the reps to 10, or occassionally take them down to 6. Some workouts train all sets to failure, other times only the final set of each exercise. This way you are constantly shocking the muscle, it doesn't have time to get used to your routine.

Also you could occassionally incorporate advanced techniques like drop sets, forced reps, pre-exhaust etc.

Finally make you sure you use strict form and refrain from cheating. It's no good swinging huge weights if they're not overolading the target muscles. I usually aim to lift the weight in a slow and controlled manner, 2 seconds to raise the weight, 1 second to hold it in the contracted position and 3-4 seconds lowering it. Occasionally I lift them in a much more explosive manner to help develop speed and power.

I'm not an expert by any means but hopefully some of the above will help out......