|
|
|
|
How Stretching Can Explode Your Muscle Growth!
When you think about gaining muscle, stretching is probably not the first thing that pops into your head. But did you know that stretching plays a critical role in building muscle?
Every muscle in your body is enclosed in a bag of tough connective tissue known as fascia. Fascia is important for holding your muscles in their proper place in your body.
But your fascia may also be holding back your muscle growth. Think for a moment about your muscles. You train them and feed them properly. They want to grow and will grow but something is holding them back. They have no room to grow!
Because fascia is so tough, it doesn’t allow the muscle room to expand. It is like stuffing a large pillow into a small pillowcase. The size of the muscle won’t change regardless of how hard you train or how well you eat because the connective tissue around your muscles is constricting the muscles within.
The best example of this is the calf muscle. The lower leg is riddled with fascia because of its tremendous weight-bearing duties in the body. It is because of this fascia that many trainers have great difficulty developing their calves.
The solution: stretching.
Using the pillowcase example from above, imagine you can expand the size of the pillowcase by stretching it. Suddenly, the pillow within has more room and will expand to fill that new space.
By stretching your muscles under specific conditions, you can actually stretch your fascia and give your muscles more room to grow.
The key to effective fascial stretching is the pump. The best time to stretch to expand the bags that are holding in your muscles is when your muscles are pumped up full of blood.
When your muscles are fully pumped up, they are pressing against the fascia. By stretching hard at that time, you increase that pressure on the fascia greatly, which can lead to expansion of the fascia.
One of the major reasons Arnold
Schwarzenegger had such incredible chest development was that he finished his chest workouts with dumbell flyes, an exercise that emphasizes the stretched position of the pectoral muscles. He would pump his chest up full of blood during the workout then do flyes, holding the stretch at the bottom of the flye. This gave his chest room to grow to amazing proportions.
Fascial stretching is more rigorous than regular stretching but the results can be amazing. When you stretch hard enough to cause the fascia to expand, you will really feel it! When you are stretching the fascia, you should feel a powerful pulling sensation and pressure as the muscle works against the fascia to expand it.
Be sure you do not stretch so hard that you cause the muscle to tear or cause injury to yourself. You will rapidly learn to distinguish the difference between a good stretch and a bad stretch. You should not feel any sharp pain, just a steady pull.
Hold each stretch for at least 20 to 30 seconds as you must give your fascia time to be affected by the stretch. Stretch hard like this only when you have a fully pumped muscle as you must give your fascia a reason to expand. If your muscles aren’t pumped, just stretch normally.
You can find instructions for stretching at:
http://www.fitstep.com/Library/Info/Stretching1.htm
One set of hard stretching after each set you do for a muscle group, besides the obvious benefits of increased flexibility, can have an incredible effect on the size of your muscles and their further ability to grow.
About the Author
Nick Nilsson is Vice President of BetterU, Inc., an online exercise, fitness, and personal training company. Check out his latest eBook "The Best Exercises You've Never Heard Of" at http://www.thebestexercises.com or visit http://www.fitstep.com. You can contact him at betteru@fitstep.com or subscribe to BetterU News, his fitness newsletter at betterunews@fitstep.com.
|
|
|
|
|
| How To Gain Weight and Build Muscle Fast |
| A complete and FREE guide on how to gain weight and build muscle. Weight gain diets, bodybuilding supplements and targeted weight training for the ... |
| www.gain-weight-muscle-fast.com |
|
| Build Muscle |
| Can a post-exercise supplement help you build muscle faster, ... And one of the biggest debates centers on how much protein you need to build muscle. ... |
| www.thefactsaboutfitness.com |
|
| Build Muscle UK - The home of free muscle building and fitness advice! |
| Build Muscle UK, here we have an ever growing world gym directory, free training tips from our members and the chance for aspiring models to appear in our ... |
| www.buildmuscle.co.uk |
|
| Building muscle...weight lifting routines, tips and nutrition |
| Build muscle fast using weight lifting routines and muscle building tips that work. Muscle building programs and nutrition. |
| www.building-muscle101.com |
|
| Health-and-Fitness - Build-Muscle Ezine Articles |
| EzineArticles.com allows ezine or email list publishers to upload or download free expert content that can be used within email newsletters or websites. |
| ezinearticles.com |
|
| Building Muscle Lose Fat Gain Muscle Bodybuilding Portal - Home |
| Ten Eating Tips To Build Muscle Fast! ... By the time you finish reading this you will have the basics down to eating to build muscle fast! ... |
| www.gainmuscleandlosefat.com |
|
| Protein by the hour: build muscle by knowing what type of protein ... |
| Protein by the hour: build muscle by knowing what type of protein to eat—and when to eat it - Fuel from Mens Fitness in Health & Fitness provided free by ... |
| www.findarticles.com |
|
| Run to build muscle: turn your cardio into a resistance workout ... |
| Run to build muscle: turn your cardio into a resistance workout and get the best of both worlds - Cardio Clinic from Mens Fitness in Health & Fitness ... |
| www.findarticles.com |
|
| Build Muscle Fast - BodyBuilding Workouts - Strength Training Tips |
| The most powerful muscle building and strength increasing information. Strength training techniques and principles in this book will change your body and ... |
| www.seriousstrengthtraining.com |
|
| Build Muscle | How To Build Muscle | Building Muscle | BodyBuilding |
| Learn how to build muscle mass fast with these powerful muscle building articles, tips, and workout programs for building muscle from trainer and ... |
| www.shawnlebrunfitness.com |
|
| build muscle on 43 Things |
| William Butler Yeats. RSS 2.0 button (What is RSS?) First added to PhreeStyle's list. build muscle. People doing this: ... |
| www.43things.com |
|
| Go Ask Alice!: Losing fat and building muscle mass: Can this be ... |
| I have heard that it is not possible to both lose fat and build muscle mass simultaneously: ideally, a person should do cardiovascular exercise with dieting ... |
| www.goaskalice.columbia.edu |
|
| Go Ask Alice!: Wants to build muscle mass through weight lifting ... |
| Dear Alice, I am a twenty-nine year old woman. I am interested in increasing my muscle mass. Could you please tell me what steps to take in weight lifting ... |
| www.goaskalice.columbia.edu |
|
| Bodybuilding.com - Complete Muscle Gaining Supplement Guide ... |
| However, they will definately help you build muscle a lot quicker. ... You can't build muscle without it! You will want to take in about 1-2 grams of ... |
| www.bodybuilding.com |
|
| Quickest muscle building techniques...Building muscle losing fat |
| Ironpower's Quickest muscle building techniques...Build muscle lose fat, best foods, diet, exercise, supplements. |
| www.ironpower.biz |
|
| How to Gain Muscle |
| Learn how to gain muscle from your About Exercise Guide. |
| exercise.about.com |
|
| How to Build Muscle |
| How to Build Muscle. ... How to Build Muscle. So many of us want to lose fat, we forget about the people out there who'd like to gain a few pounds. ... |
| exercise.about.com |
|
| HOW WOMEN BUILD MUSCLE |
| File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML |
| Your browser may not have a PDF reader available. Google recommends visiting our text version of this document. |
|
| Free weight training workouts and muscle building routines |
| The all natural Optimum Anabolics Challenge is now in full swing, 9 weeks of ultimate natural training to build muscle and burn fat using the most effective ... |
| www.muscleblitz.com |
|
| Build Muscle Lose Fat - Turn Fat Into Muscle - Building Muscle And ... |
| Also get our special diet meal planner software, a convenient tool for meal preparation and diet evaluation for those who follow the build muscle lose fat ... |
| www.trulyhuge.com |
|