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Increase your Muscle Mass! “You and I both know that bodybuilding is a sport that is lived 24/7. It encompasses almost every aspect of our lives.”

Alexander Fedorov - Universal Nutirtion Athlete

I hear it as I walk into the gym. I hear when I come out of the grocery store. Everywhere I go, the usual comments are," That guy is thick” or "He's as fuckin' wide as he is tall". At 5'5" and 245 pounds, I just nod my head. But there's always that one or two a day. The true future Animals who approach me and have the balls to ask, "What does it take to build that thick mass?" This is the same question I got asked a lot in The Cage. Well guys, this article is for you. If you came to my seminar at the Arnold Expo, then you're slightly ahead of the game. Even so, I'm gonna break it down for everyone who has the brains and stomach to gain mass my way, the Animal way.

You and I both know that bodybuilding is a sport that is lived 24/7. It encompasses almost every aspect of our lives. The synergy of training, diet, and recovery is what makes up the lifestyle that we lead. All three aspects are of equal importance and value, but here we're gonna focus on training, answering the question of how to train when your goal is to gain thick, dense, crazy mass. Alright, no more bullshit. Let's get into it…

How many reps should I do? In my experience, the muscle grows best in the 6-12 repetition range. If you're still asking, "Is it 6 reps or 12?" I'll tell you that as long as your reps fall between 6 and 12 you should be stimulating muscle growth to maximum capacity. If you can perform more than 12 reps on a set, the weight is too light, so slap on another plate. On the other hand, if you pick up a weight and fail to complete 6 reps, put it down, get your head screwed on straight, check your ego, and grab a weight that you can handle. Where does the 6-12 range come from? Keep this in mind. Distinct rep ranges yield unique physiological changes. In others words, the number of reps you do affects your body in different ways.

In general, a rep range of 5 or less will increase strength with lesser increases in size. This is why many powerlifters are powerful, but they don't have the muscle size of bodybuilders. Doing more than 12 reps improves your muscular endurance. This means the muscle becomes better at doing the reps and there is little improvement in size and no real improvement in strength. That brings us to the 6-12 range. Performing 6-12 reps is kinda the best of both worlds for size and strength, with size (which is the goal) being the prevailing adaptation.

Just in case there are any doubters out there, let me make this point. Most of us have heard that the body is made of slow twitch and fast twitch muscle fibers. Slow twitch are controlled by smaller motoneurons and smaller bundles of nerves. Fast twitch require large motoneurons to control large, thick muscle fibers in the body. Therefore, there are different fibers in the body controlled by small and large bundles of nerves. Obviously, as bodybuilders (with our goal being to gain size), it is important to know what fibers to train and how to train them.

Alright, I'll just come out and say it. Training slow twitch fibers when trying to gain mass is a fucking waste of time. As I said before, slow twitch fibers are targeted in a rep range greater than 12 and that would improve your muscular endurance. You are basically building a resistance to fatigue which is not our goal. High rep training recruits smaller bundles of nerves and generates lower force to perform the exercise. Obviously, this does not maximize the muscles' potential for size.

Fast twitch fibers are classified as either 2a or 2b. Type 2a fibers are the first to come into play in the 6-12 rep range. If you put the weight down when you just start to fatigue but before approaching failure, then you have primarily worked the 2a fibers. Now this is fine if you're training for a fitness competition. If the same set is taken to failure (you can't get one more rep on your own), then the 2b fibers come into play.

Hitting the 2a isn't a complete waste of time, but it definitely isn't maximizing your potential for size. Compared to slow twitch, 2a fibers do recruit larger nerves and more force is generated. But the reason you are not maximizing your size is because 2a fibers can only grow up to 25% of their original size. That should slap you in the face like a ton of bricks.

After humping his ass to the gym 4 to 5 days a week and being disciplined on a diet, the best a beginner with a 12” arm can expect is growth of 3” (25% of 12) or an arm that measures 15”. I don't know too many top bodybuilders satisfied with 15” arms. A final characteristic of 2a fibers is a very important one. These fibers can adapt or lean towards slow twitch or fast twitch 2b fibers. How you train determines which way they will gravitate towards.

Now 2b fibers are the growth fibers - the fibers that need to be targeted and blasted in order to develop that freaky fucking size and mass. So let's take a look at 'em. 2b fibers have the best potential for growth. While you may grow from regular sets applying moderate intensity, significant growth will occur only when a set is taken to failure. That means using a weight heavy enough to make the set most difficult and reaching failure in the 6-12 rep range.

Remember, type 2a do all the work unless the set is taken to failure. The 2b fibers come into play at the end of a set. The last few reps target the 2b fibers and are the growth reps. If you correctly target the 2b fibers, they are capable of 100% growth. That means you can take that same arm that originally measured 12” and transform it into a 24” gun. That 24” arm is definitely a reward that would get my ass in the gym everyday. What about you?

So to answer the question of how many reps should be done to gain size, the answer should be real obvious: 6-12 reps will maximize your muscles' potential for size as long as you take the set to failure within that rep range. Brothers, I can't make it any more straightforward than that. In part two, I'll talk about the many different training styles that can be used to target the body's 2b fibers. The style that I recommend guarantees that you will maximize your potential for growth.

Click Here for Part 2

Tags: Bodybuilding Life

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