Most people are looking for a muscle building program that will help them gain muscle not fat. In truth, there are no set weight training routines that will allow you to gain muscle not fat. When it comes to gaining muscle without fat, the most important factor will be your diet. Lets go into more detail on how you can gain muscle without putting on too much fat
Gain Muscle Not Fat
Is it possible to gain muscle and not fat? In all honesty, its extremely hard for you to gain muscle without putting on any fat unless you are a complete beginner with very little experience in weight training. Beginners can often lose fat and build muscle at the same time during the early months of their training but this will not last forever. So what if you are not a complete beginner, can you gain muscle without the fat? In theory no but in reality its definitly possible.
If you think about it, you should not be able to gain muscle without fat. To put on muscle mass you need to be eating more calories (calorie surplus). This means your eating over your bodys maintenance level of calories each day, and should result in weight gain. Although these additional calories are needed to gain muscle you are still eating in a calorie surplus and your body will be looking to store any calories it doesn’t need as fat.
To prevent this from happening you will have to be pretty much spot on with your calorie intake each and every day. However if you think about it, the bigger you get (muscle wise) the more fat/mass your body will naturally have to help protect internal organs and muscle. In my opinion you can easily gain muscle without looking like you have gained any fat. Lets take a look at how:
Clean Diet. In order to minimize fat while gaining muscle you should clean your diet up and cut down on the additional calories you consunme. A lot of people make the mistake of eating too much food when trying to gain muscle. They hear phrases such as ‘to get big you need to eat big’ and immediately think they need to be consuming thousands and thousands of calories a day to gain muscle. This is not the case.
Your body requires around 500 calories above its maintenance level to build muscle. If your taking in way more than this then you should expect to gain a lot of fat as well as muscle. Eating in a sensible way like this is often refered to as clean bulking as your only taking in the required amount of calories to help you gain muscle. Sure you can take in more but this is not likely to help you progress any quicker in your training.
Keep track of your weight. To gain muscle not fat, you should keep a close eye on your weight each week. Weigh yourself once a week first thing in the morning. Ensure you weigh yourself on the same day, same place and same time every week for more accurate results. If your gaining more than 1.5 pounds a week then the chances are your putting on fat as well as muscle.
On average try to put on 0.5-1 pound a week. Your weight can fluctuate quite a bit so it may be a good idea to calculate your progress in 4 week cycles. For example, if after 4 weeks you have managed to put on around 4 pounds then its safe to say you are minimizing fat gain as much as possible. If you’ve put on 8-10 pounds then its safe to say a fair amount of that weight is fat.
Add cardio to your routine. Everyone should incorporate some form of cardio into their routines whether thier looking to build muscle or lose weight. Cardio brings with it a whole host of benefits for both your body and your health so its well worth adding it into your routine. After all, who wants to gain muscle but at the same find it hard work jogging to the end of the road?
Cardio can also be used in your routine to allow you to eat more in your diet and can help you recover faster between weight training workouts. If your new to cardio follow the information provided on cardio for beginners to help you get started or check out the cardio section of the site for more detailed information on cardio routines you can perform.
Get yourself on an effective weight training routine. Of course to gain the muscle in the first place you will need an effective weight training routine that will allow you to build muscle and progress. Pick a routine on our page weight training routines that build muscle to help get you started if you do not already have a set routine in place. Allow sufficient time between your workouts to allow your muscles to fully recover and avoid overtraining.
Hit each muscle group hard once a week and switch your reps up between the 5-8 rep range and 8-12 rep range when required. Push yourself to add more weight or perform more reps each workout. This is known as progressive overload. Always look to progress in your training if you can. This is how muscle is built. Muscle is not built by lifting the same weight or performing the same number of reps for months on end.
