Some people have more robust immune reactions to muscle damage, and are better able to repair and replace damaged muscle fibers, increasing their muscle-building potential. The body responds to the demands you place on it. If you tear your muscles up, eat right, rest and repeat, you'll create the conditions to make your muscles as big and strong as possible.
It is with muscles as it is with life: Meaningful growth requires challenge and stress. You have JavaScript disabled. Menu Main menu. Watch TED Talks. Jeffrey Siegel. Details About the talk. Although a nutritionally balanced and calorically adequate diet is required to achieve optimum muscle growth, it may be less efficient in terms of protein deposition than a moderately restricted diet.
Muscle and bone deposition, however, can be limited on severely restricting the dietary intake. Although fat deposition is the first tissue to suffer on a severely restricted diet, muscle and bone follow next with the nervous system, brain and eyes being the last systems to be affected.
Abstract This paper first reviews muscle growth and then considers the influence of exercise in growth.
Publication types Review. In order to produce muscle growth, you have to apply a load of stress greater than what your body or muscles had previously adapted too. How do you do this? The main way is to lift progressively heavier weights. This additional tension on the muscle helps to cause changes in the chemistry of the muscle, allowing for growth factors that include mTOR activation and satellite cell activation.
Muscular tension also most dramatically effects the connection of the motor units with the muscle cells. Two other factors help to explain why some people can be stronger, but not as big as other people. This local muscle damage causes a release of inflammatory molecules and immune system cells that activate satellite cells to jump into action.
Typically soreness is attenuated over time by other mechanisms. After more investigation, it seems as though they were onto something. Metabolic stress causes cell swelling around the muscle, which helps to contribute to muscle growth without necessarily increasing the size of the muscle cells. This is from the addition of muscle glycogen, which helps to swell the muscle along with connective tissue growth. This type of growth is known as sarcoplasmic hypertrophy and is one of the ways that people can get the appearance of larger muscles without increases in strength.
So now that you know the three main mechanisms of muscle growth, the next question is: how do hormones affect muscle growth? Hormones are another component largely responsible for muscle growth and repair because of their role in regulating satellite cell activity. Testosterone is the main hormone that most people think about when working out with weights, and there seems to be some validity to the thought that testosterone increases protein synthesis, inhibits protein breakdown, activates satellite cells, and stimulates other anabolic hormones.
Testosterone can also stimulate growth hormone responses by increasing the presence of neurotransmitters at the damaged fiber site, which can help to activate tissue growth. The IGF regulates the amount of muscle mass growth by enhancing protein synthesis , facilitating glucose uptake, repartitioning the uptake of amino acids the building blocks of protein into skeletal muscles and once again, activates satellite cells to increase muscle growth. If you do not provide your body with adequate rest or nutrition, you can actually reverse the anabolic process and put your body into a catabolic or destructive state.
The response of muscle protein metabolism to a resistance exercise bout lasts for hours; thus, the interaction between protein metabolism and any meals consumed in this period will determine the impact of the diet on muscle hypertrophy. For instance, men have more testosterone than women, which allows them to build bigger and stronger muscles.
Muscle hypertrophy takes time and is relatively slow for the majority of people. People will generally not see visible growth for several weeks or months as most initial changes are due to the ability of your nervous system to activate your muscles. In addition to that, different people have different genetics, which range from hormonal output, muscle fiber type and number, along with satellite cell activation, that can all limit muscle growth.
This requires that you take in an adequate source of protein especially essential amino acids and carbohydrates to help facilitate the cellular process of rebuilding broken down muscle tissue. For muscle breakdown and growth to occur you must force your muscles to adapt by creating stress that is different than the previous threshold your body has already adapted to. If you want an easy-to-follow program to lose fat and build muscle, check out my Week Body Transformation Program.
Have any questions about how to get muscles to grow? Leave a comment below. Show 5 References. I understand, muscle cells breaks down during work out and they rebuild later, ensuring muscle growth. My question is — Still, only when we at least for me work out, the working muscles seems to be in its best shape and bigger.
My biceps looks big and toned, only when I am working out for biceps, which is same for all my body parts. Why this, if the muscles are only breaking down at this point, while working out? I really have no idea what this is referring to. John, great article!
Will combining weight lifting in the morning and cardio exercises in the afternoon prevent me from getting the necessary rest? In addition, will working out through slight soreness help alleviate and expidite my recovery or hinder it?
Third is really are you taking in enough calories overall. The epsom salt baths should help as it allows for an increase in magnesium which has been shown many people are deficient in. Hope that helps. Justin — Glad you liked the article. Breaking up the weight lifting in the morning and cardio in the afternoon should be sufficient time for you to rest and recover.
As for working out through slight soreness, you should be able to workout at a moderate level and that will help to speed up the recovery process, but too intense and it might hinder it. The repair process involves fusing torn muscle fibers back together, as well as laying down new proteins within each muscle cell. Keep in mind that the above is a tremendously simplified version of what actually happens in your body after a weight training workout.
In reality, the process includes more than just your muscles -- your nervous system, circulatory system and endocrine system all contribute to muscle repair and growth. Read more: Exactly how to build muscle faster. There's no one muscle-building timeline, because several factors affect your ability to build muscle mass, including:. Your protein intake: While all macronutrients have their roles, protein is king when it comes to building muscle.
Your muscles need adequate protein to repair themselves after the stress of weight training. Without enough protein, muscle growth stagnates. Your calorie intake: If you don't eat enough calories on a daily basis, you won't build muscle even if you eat a lot of protein. To build muscle, your body must create new tissue, and it can't create something from nothing. Extra fuel from extra calories expedites muscle recovery and growth.
This is one reason many people never reach their muscle growth goals -- they aren't willing to deal with the extra body fat that comes along with a muscle-building phase. Your sleep schedule: Lifting weights while sleep-deprived isn't a smart strategy.
You might see some gains, but you definitely can't optimize muscle growth when you don't give your body a fighting chance to recover.
Your lifting routine: If you're trying to build muscle, you should know about two key strength training concepts: frequency and volume.
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