"How To Structure A Killer Workout For Maximum Gains In Muscle Size & Strength!"

Dear Fellow Muscle-Builder,

In Lesson #1 we talked about the importance of tracking your progress in the gym and why this is the most critical overall factor when it comes to gaining muscular body weight. You absolutely will not experience any appreciable gains in muscle size unless you place the majority of your focus on moving more weight for more reps each week. If you aren't tracking each and every workout in detail then you're flat-out ignoring the very foundation of the muscle growth process.

But that's only part of the story in terms of the workouts that you perform in the gym...

In this week's installment we'll be going a bit more indepth and addressing the specific aspects of how to plan out a proper workout schedule.

The manner in which you construct your workout routine will make the difference between success and failure, and you must make sure that you are following all of the proper guidelines if you want to see significant results.

The reality of it all is that most people have no idea how to structure an effective workout and severely limit their gains as a result. Most people simply enter the gym with only a rough plan in mind and aimlessly toss weights around for an hour or two without any sound logic or reasoning behind what they're doing. In fact, some people design their workouts in such a manner that they actually lose muscle mass and strength.

I receive hundreds of emails each and every week from aspiring trainees all over the world, and when I see the workout routines that the vast majority of them are using it literally makes me cringe in my seat. I would guess that around 95% of lifters make at least one or more of the following mistakes when planning out their routine...

They choose the wrong exercises
They spend too many days in the gym
They training each muscle group too frequently
They perform too many total sets per workout and per muscle group
They fail to execute the workout with a sufficient level of intensity
They training for excessive periods of time

The list goes on and on.

The reality is that working out requires real effort, and it's only fair that all of your effort is put to the best use possible. So that being said, here are a few sure-fire guidelines that you should follow in the gym in order to achieve the best gains you possibly can...

Focus on compound, free-weight exercises.

There are two main types of exercises you can perform in the gym: compound exercises and isolation exercises. Compound exercises are those that involve the use of multiple muscle groups, while isolation exercises only involve the use of a single muscle group.

For example, a bench press is a compound exercise because it stimulates the chest as well as the shoulders and triceps. An example of an isolation exercise would be a bicep curl, as this exercise stimulates only the biceps.

In order to achieve the greatest gains in overall muscle size and strength, you should be putting most of your focus on basic, freeweight compound exercises. Forget about wimpy little pec-deck machines and tricep kickbacks. If you want to see BIG gains you must perform the BIG lifts. Here are the basic movements that you should be focusing on...

Squats
Deadlifts
Bench Presses
Barbell Rows
Overhead Presses
Chin-Ups
Dips
Stiff-Legged Deadlifts
Lunges
Leg Presses

These movements will stimulate the greatest total amount of muscle fiber and will have the greatest overall anabolic effect on your body. They should form the cornerstone of any effective workout routine. Isolation lifts can still have their place (movements such as barbell curls or tricep extensions) but certainly not in place of these proven compound lifts.

Train with 100% intensity on every single set.

Your muscles grow by adapting to stress, plain and simple. When you lift weights, you create small micro-tears within the muscle tissue, and your body responds by rebuilding the muscles larger and stronger in preparation for the next workout.

In order to achieve the most dramatic response from the muscles possible, you must always train with full effort and intensity. This means that for every set you perform in the gym, you must continue until the point of concentric muscular failure.

Concentric Muscular Failure: The point at which no additional positive repetitions can be completed using proper form despite your greatest efforts.
In other words, you must perform each set until you are physically unable to complete any additional reps using proper form. In doing this you will place your muscles under the greatest amount of stress possible and the body will respond in the most dramatic fashion.

Simply entering the gym and "going through the motions" will NOT get the job done. You have to earn your muscle gains, and the truth is that most people just plain don't train hard enough.

Train each individual muscle only once per week.

When it comes to training for muscular size, more is certainly not better! You must let go of this traditional way of thinking and realize that in order for your muscles to grow, they must be given proper recovery time.

If you train too often you will prevent your body from rebuilding your damaged muscles, and you will interfere with the muscle-growth process as a result. Because of this, you should only train each individual muscle group once per week. As long as you train with 100% intensity and effort you will not require any more than this.

Do not spend excessive periods of time in the gym.

As far as each individual workout is concerned, you should always try to complete it within one hour. This doesn't include warm-ups, but comes into play beginning with your first high-intensity set and ends with your final high-intensity set. As your workout drifts beyond the one-hour mark, your mental focus and intensity will rapidly decline. Your body will also secrete a powerful catabolic hormone called "cortisol" which will stimulate the breakdown of muscle tissue for energy.

If you're looking to build and maintain as much lean muscle mass as you possibly can, you must avoid cortisol at all costs. By completing your workout within one hour you will keep your body in an optimal hormonal state and will prevent yourself from overtraining.

Do not go overboard on training volume.

The reality is that most people train with far too much volume by performing way more sets than they really need to. Your goal in the gym is to simply "spark" the muscle growth process, and this can be accomplished without performing endless, unnecessary sets. If you always train to muscular failure, you simply do not need to perform very many sets in order to stimulate new muscle growth. If you perform too many sets you'll simply be eating into your all-too important recovery time, and this will be counterproductive to your gains.

Let go of the "more-is-better" mentality. Building muscle is about quality, not quantity. I would recommend that you perform no more than 7 total sets for major muscle groups (like the chest, back and thighs) and no more than 4 total sets for the smaller muscle groups (the shoulders, biceps, triceps, abs and calves). And remember, this is total sets per workout, NOT total sets per exercise.

Wrapping It Up

Those are some basic, highly important guidelines to follow in the gym in order to see the best results that you possibly can.

This lesson has given you a basic overview of proper workout structure, but if you're interested in learning the exact step-by-step details including the optimal sequence of specific exercises, which muscle groups to train and on which days as well as the exact of number of sets, reps and rest periods to perform for maximum results, then check out my highly popular program, The Muscle Gain Truth No-Fail System.

It can be downloaded in less than 5 minutes and literally covers everything you'll ever need to know to build muscle mass and strength as quickly as you possibly can.

The package comes with a ton of incredibly valuable bonus items, and you'll also gain instant access to my Online Muscle-Building Video Lesson Series where you'll learn the most effective ways to train your chest, back, shoulders, arms, legs and abs with a special online video lesson specifically dedicated to each muscle group.

Click Here for more details and get started right away.

So, when structuring your workout routine, always remember to:

Focus on basic, freeweight compound exercises
Take all sets to positive muscular failure
Train each individual muscle group only once per week
Complete your workout within one hour
Perform no more than 7 total sets for large muscle groups and no more than 4 sets for small muscle groups

Keep an eye out for the next lesson in this series where I'll teach you about one absolutely critical aspect of building muscle, and why it will literally make or break your success.

Best regards,

Sean Nalewanyj