Josiah Pacheco senior project 1/19/15
Muscle Growth Did you ever put in time in the gym and not see any results after weeks or even months of weight lifting? This may be beacuse you are not lifting weights in proper form or maybe you are not eating how you should. It is also possible you could be doing a combination of both incorrectly and you just have not noticed yet. Whether you just lift wights once in a while for fun or if you are trying to become a professional weight lifter you must understand the basic components about how muscles grow and how to feed and maintain them with proper nutrients.
When lifting weights it is extremely important you use a proper form and technique to maximize muscle and strength growth. Whenever you are about to lift weights you should always take 510 minutes of an aerobic exercise to warm up your muscles. After warming up you should never jump to the heaviest amount of weight you can lift, not only can you get yourself hurt but you are also, not helping your muscle grow and retain proper form. If you are using momentum to get a rep in that is a clear sign that you are lifting too much weight.
While lifting weights you must always increase the ammount of weight you are pushing by the smallest increments possible. Think about it if you are lifting ten pounds and you only add ten more pounds, you may think that is a small increase when really that is double the amount of weight you were pushing. This can get you very hurt and also give you some very oddly shaped muscles. Annother important factor for you to know if you are starting weight training is proper breathing. You should always be inhaling when lifting the weight then
Pacheco 2
exhaling as you are going down in your rep. It is important you do not overlie breathe this can lead to you getting a light head or even passing out.
Muscle growth can be confusing but with my help you should be able to understand how it works. There are many different types of muscles in the body but I am going to talk about how skeletal muscles work. Your bodies skeletal muscles are made up of sarcomeres and myofibrils which create the base unit for contraction. There are 650 skelatel muscle in your body that contract when motor neurons tell them to. The more weights you lift the faster you get at reacting meaning the faster your muscle will grow so the stronger you will get.
After you workout your body heals and creates new fibers which stick together and cause you to “get bigger”. when the rate of muscle protein synthesis is at a higher rate than that of the protein breakdown is when muscle growth happens. In order for even this to happen you must first consistently be putting new strain on your muscles. Strain is important because it changes homeostasis in your body, and this disruption sparks muscle growth. So the saying “more pain more growth” can be true, but you do not ever want to put too much strain on your muscles and cause tearing.
Have you ever done an intense workout and felt sore when you are all finished up?
This special muscle pain is known as muscle damage and actually helps your muscles grow because it sends out signals to your immune system to react to, and sends the satellite cells to work. Satellite cells are the base cells for muscles and act as stem cells to them. You do not need to be in pain after every workout for this beautiful process to take place but you may start to stop noticing the pain because you can adapt to it.
Most people have never heard about metabolic stress. well metabolic stress is the
“pump” you feel while working out, many bodybuilders believe they look bigger when going through this process and it has been scientifically proven to be true. This metabolic stress
Pacheco 3
causes swelling around your muscle which helps muscle growth without causing your muscle cells to get bigger.
This process is usually known as sarcoplasmic hypertrophy and
