MUSCLE BUILDING 101: Back to basics

Building muscle mass and toning your body isn’t easy. There’s more to building muscle than lifting heavy weights. At the same time, there’s no need to immerse yourself in complex science as some bodybuilding sites would have you believe. Below are just a few tips on how to actually build muscle.

Eat more

Bulking up requires eating bulkier meals. You need to be upping your calories in tune with your workouts. You can find calculators online that can tell you exactly how much calories you should be consuming along with meal plans that can help you to get this calorie intake. Try to stick to healthy foods when eating more (i.e. more natural foods, less processed foods) to help you build muscle and not fat.

Get more protein

Protein is important for repairing and building muscle. Protein powder supplements are one of the fastest ways to get the protein you need into your body after a workout. You should aim to take protein supplements 15 to 60 minutes after a workout – this period is known as the ‘anabolic window’ and is when it will have the most effect.

You can buy protein powder and find shake recipes online.

Go heavy

When it comes to healthy bodybuilding, many experts agree that it’s often not about how many reps you do, but the amount of weight you’re lifting. Pushing yourself to lift the heaviest weights that you can could have more impact than doing lots of reps with lighter weights (plus you’ll be improving your strength, not just your physique). Of course, heavy lifting needs to be done safely – this is why things like form and having a spotter are so important. It’s important to know your limits too as you can go too heavy and cause yourself an injury. A personal trainer might be able to help you find the heavy-but-not-too heavy balance.

Target multiple muscle groups

Don’t just focus on exercising specific muscles individually. Some of the best muscle building exercises are those that target multiple muscles. This is because exercising the connectors between muscles can be just as important in exercising the muscles themselves. Squats, deadlifts, pull-ups and bench presses are all exercises that target multiple muscles at a time. Focusing specific days on legs and upper body is still a good idea. Just don’t focus an entire workout around biceps or quads.

Get your rest

It’s important to get enough rest between workouts in order to give your muscles enough time to heal. Fail to give yourself enough of a rest and you could cause yourself an injury. Sleep is very important – if you’re upping your exercise, you also need to be upping your sleep. Those late night gym sessions on a weekday aren’t always the best option for this reason (unless you’re able to get a lie in the next day).

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Your health and fitness is all about mindset too:

Through the TravelFit Global podcast, we’re able to delve deeper beyond our usual interview formats in our Entertainment and Health articles with this special series of audio podcasts of about half an hour to an hour each episode. Wellbeing and mental health in my view are intertwined into our daily lives as we explore the stories of prominent corporate, sports and lifestyle personalities. Our guests open themselves up intimately sharing with us the darkest moments behind their biggest successes. Hopefully you can walk away with something valuable to think about and maybe apply in your own daily life.

This page is updated as new interviews come out so bookmark it and check back in.

Enjoy the show:

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Winson Lam, an actor. model, content creator, business owner of Cali studio and Envisage clothing recently appeared on Ninja Warrior Australia. We talk about the adversity and challenges as an Asian Australian in mainstream media and how he used typecasting and stereotypes to his advantage – creating a niche that would define the calibre of brands he represents including Dominos Pizza, Toyota, Culture Kings, Acai Brothers, and Honda.

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Today, influencers, music artists entrust him with the responsibilty to bring their vision and stories to life such as Steve Cook, Gymshark, Tommy Jeans, GoPro, Under Armour and many more.

Zac Deane: TV presenter, Actor, Model and Wellbeing guru chats about his up bringing at a younger age being bulled at school and feeling out of place and lost in life. He was influenced by his upbringing to change his life for the better which led to him pursuing acting, multi level marketing and health and wellness coaching. We talk about creating self awareness to achieve more clarity and fulfilment in your own life, why we all need a positive connection environment, being a connector and what healy the frequency healer is all about.

Nick and Femi were recent contestants in the TV Series The Amazing Race.

We talk about what their experience was like, the opportunities it has opened and their up coming podcast about to be released.

If you want to understand why you may act in certain ways, why training and nutrition is so important, and why we as a society lose 50% of our IQ when we are stressed, than this episode is for you….

Michael Adams (aka. The Flying Kiwi) is an inspiring and humble human on a mission to help people with intellectual disabilities and physical impairments to reach the world platform for powerlifting at the Special Olympics.

His years of experience as a personal trainer and coach has led to the hosting of powerlifting competitions for these strong determined powerlifting legends.

Kwame Duah is a world champion bodybuilder, health and fitness influencer, ninja warrior and down to earth legend.

We talk about his own training and nutrition, his own obstacles he has had to face with keeping a strong mindset throughout a bicep tear that could of ended his career, what he has planned for his future and how training should be about self contentment rather then seeking gratification from other people to train.