As the creator of Upper Exercises, I want to provide you with the best information possible for packing on lean muscle.  Whether your hormonal environment isn’t quite as favorable or genetics was just out to get you at birth, one thing is for sure and that’s that you need to follow a slightly different set of weight lifting methods than those who seem to grow muscle overnight.

Luckily for you, you’re taking the time to do your research about weight lifting so you won’t be destined to a life where it seems like a strong wind might knock you over.

This is why Uppper Exercises is going to share these key articles to help you get started.

How To Get Bigger Arms

Six “Little-Known” Muscle Building Tips Part 1

Six “Little-Known” Muscle Building Tips Part 2

Get Big Muscles In 3 Simple Steps

Initial 5 Rules For Muscle Gain

How to Avoid Over Training

9 Easy-To-Make Muscle Building Growth Recipes

Learning The Muscle Fiber Types

Protein Powder, The Skinny Guy’s Guide To Protein Powder

6 Pack Abs - The Secret To 6 Pack Abs

Ab Exercises - The Best Ab Exercises

Top Ten Exercises for Your Upper Body Mass

Thanks for reading

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If you do a lot of significant pressing movements favor bench press plus military presses you may have been able to build a few mass on your triceps from which but if you want to go on your biceps to the following level you will want here 2 bodybuilding exercises.

Weighted Dips

Weighted dips can not appear sophisticated or be done on a elaborate machine but it’ll pack mass onto your triceps like no alternative muscle building exercises can. When your body is forced into movements that use many stabilizers and you actually have to push your body thru house it adapts quickly along with a muscle growth response. This works on the same principle as doing pull ups for shy, squats for legs, pushups, and deadlifts for total body mass. Nothing during the world works as well as these easy multi joint movements for developing [spin]bigger muscles[/spin] fast.

If you can’t do 6-eight reps of dips along with your own bodyweight then you may must do some strength work first. Let’s say every one you can do is three reps max. Do a workout where you do 8 sets of 2 reps with two minutes rest in between sets. Next workout do ten sets. Once you are able complete all 10 sets of 2 reps go to three reps for eight sets followed by another workout at 3 reps for ten sets. You are progressively doing extra actual dips every workout and increasing your overall strength. Once you are in a position to finish around forty total reps during a workout together with your own body weight you may be able to move on to the muscle building section and adding weight. You wish to perform around four sets of six to 8 reps total and adding to the resistance by tying plates round your waist.

Lying Triceps Extension

This is often another 1 of the perfect muscle building exercises for triceps. It’s also called “skullcrushers”. A curled bar works great for this. You can lie flat on a bench or with a slight decline. With the load over your head slowly lower it right down to your forehead while keeping your elbows in. If you let your elbows flare out too much you will flip it added into a pressing movement and then your shoulders and chest will be doing most of the movement. Keep the elbows tight plus don’t use too significant of a weight that you simply finish up sacrificing form. Do here for three-4 sets of six to 10 reps each. For some great variations on this exercise try using dumbbells on a decline bench. I’ve found this to be terribly effective at targeting the triceps.

You can also try Boot Camp Exercises with bodyweight exercises like pushups and close grip pushups to develop the triceps.

Only two Exercises?

Yes, do purely these two exercises until you’ve got engineered up a few mass on your triceps. Adding something added plus constructing it more difficult will truly slow down your gains. Here are the 2 best muscle building exercises to make your triceps get bigger fast. Keep increasing the weight and your arms can regularly adapt by getting bigger and bigger. Use this method to build muscle fast without Supplements and Prohormones.

Guys that spend all their time on the bench press without doing any rowing exercises will quickly end up with muscle imbalances and shoulder injuries. This will put pectoral building to a total halt so remember that one key to a huge chest is getting an equally balanced and huge back.

Muscle Building Exercises for Width

It’s important to build the back with a variety of exercises that will achieve width and thickness in the back. A good way to start off a routine is with pull ups done with a variety of grips. Any type of pull down exercise, chin up, or pullup will help get bigger the lats to give them impressive width. When you strike a double biceps pose you want thick slabs of muscle sticking out of the sides of your body giving you a V shape. If you ever join the military you will find a good Boot Camp Workout will have lots of pullups and will build you back fast.

Weighted pullups are the king of bodybuilding exercises to develop width in the back muscles. They are the best exercise to make the lats develop quickly. Pull downs and reverse pull downs are also a solid exercise for the back but start off by building your core with pull-ups and adding weight around your waist as you progress.

Muscle Building Exercises for Thickness

Aside from having width it is crucial to add thickness in the back muscles. This is best done by various rowing exercises. Barbell rows, dumbbell rows, and cable rows are very effective at developing the thickness of the back and assisting in balancing out the muscle development in the shoulder joints. A general rule of thumb is for every set of chest pressing exercises you do you should match it with some type of rowing exercise. The pushing and pulling muscles must remain in balance.

Another one of the best muscle building exercises for the back and overall body is the deadlift. The deadlift will build up the entire back from the top the lower back and spinal erectors. This is an amazing exercise that will build all around mass across the entire body.

A simple routine for building a huge back could include 4 sets of pull-ups, 4 sets of bent over rows, and 4 sets of deadlifts. This will work the back from the major angles adding all around development. To add variety change up the grips of the exercises, the order the exercises are done in, the reps, and the rest between sets. Consistent workouts in the fitness center with these bodybuilding exercises will get you that V tapered back you’ve been wanting.

If you have a wide back but fat waist you will still need to lose belly fat to get the v taper look. Check out these Abs Reviews to show you a way to get ripped abs to go along with a wide back.

This is one of the best articles on getting bigger arms. There is a lot of people out there that just do not like work there legs with heavy weight. Read the article to find out why.

How To Get Bigger Arms
by Mike Geary, Certified Nutrition Specialist, Certified Personal Trainer and creator of the Truth about Six Pack Abs.

1. Do more heavy squats and deadlifts!

Yes, I know this sounds crazy since squats and deadlifts don’t directly work your arms (except for the grip and forearm strength needed to deadlift heavy weights)… but it’s true that regularly performing heavy squats and deadlifts can indirectly help to make your arms bigger and stronger.

The reason is that heavy squatting and/or deadlifting forces the body to release muscle building hormones such as testosterone and growth hormone depending on the resistance level, rep range, rest period, etc.

Generally, heavy weights, lower reps, and longer rest periods stimulate testosterone release, whereas moderate weights, higher rep ranges, and shorter rest periods help to stimulate Growth Hormone release. Therefore, combining both styles of training into your routines on either different days of the week or different cycles, can help to maximize both of these important muscle building hormones.

2. Try my arm-blasting, hormone-maximizing combo sets!

In theory, I think this style of combo I’m going to show you can work well to stimulate some new growth in your arms if you’ve been stuck at a plateau. In practice, I’ve actually SEEN it produce results!

My technique involves combining a heavy squat or deadlift (in a very heavy weight and low rep range) with a single-joint exercise for the biceps or triceps (in a higher-rep “pump” style fashion).

So here are 2 ways this could work in separate workouts for example:

Alternating sets (exercise 1a, rest 30-60 seconds, exercise 1b, rest 30-60 seconds, repeat for all sets)

1a. Barbell back squats — heavy challenging weight - 5 sets of 3-4 reps/set
1b. Barbell or dumbbell curls (or any bicep single-joint exercise) — 5 sets of 12-15 reps/set; going for “pump”

So you can see how this unusual style of supersetting (or rather, alternating sets), actually combines a testosterone stimulating full body exercise done at a heavy weight with a single joint (isolation) exercise that has the intention of creating more of a bodybuilding “pump”.

The other reason this style of alternating sets works is that the single-joint exercise is almost like an “active rest” while your entire body and CNS recovers from the demands of doing heavy, heavy squats.

The same style can work with deadlifts combined with a triceps exercise… for example:

1a. Barbell deadlifts — heavy challenging weight - 5 sets of 3-4 reps/set
1b. Triceps single-joint exercise (lying dumbbell extensions, cable pressdowns, etc) — 5 sets of 12-15 reps/set; going for “pump”

Again, this seems like an unusual combo for alternating sets, but actually works out quite well, because after deadlifting very heavy weights, performing a high rep “pump” exercise for the triceps is a welcome relief for your body and your mind to help recover and get ready for the next set of heavy deads.

3. Food, food, food!

Remember that the title of this article meant that your goal was to add more muscle SIZE to your arms, and in order to add muscle to your body, you need to be in a slight caloric surplus.

Ok… so the first 2 tips might have been a little unusual, but this one should be obvious.

Although it IS possible for some people (especially beginners) to add muscle mass while reducing calories below their maintenance levels, it is extremely hard for any type of hardgainer to build any muscle at all if your calories aren’t high enough. Remember, we weren’t talking about a fat loss routine here… we were talking about gaining muscle and getting bigger arms… so that is going to require some extra calories above your maintenance.

Don’t go crazy and think this means eating tons of junk food… you should still stick to clean healthy foods.

I wouldn’t obsess over exact ratios of carbs, protein, or fats either… your body needs all 3 for different reasons… protein as the building blocks of muscle; carbs for muscle glycogen, energy during the workouts, and insulin response post-workout; and healthy fats to help maximize your muscle building hormones.

This is more than just about arms and pecs though… if you’re dedicated to building a ripped, strong, powerful body from head to toe, I HIGHLY recommend my good friend and colleague Vinny D’s program here:

Vince’s muscle building program Build More Muscle Size with NNMB

Hope you enjoyed the article and have fun with the training!

Feel free to email (or facebook it, tweet it, etc) this link to any of your friends that might want to build bigger arms or more muscle overall.

Thanks,

Mike Geary
Certified Personal Trainer
Certified Nutrition Specialist
Author - The Truth about Six Pack Abs

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In order to gain muscle mass you need to do compound lifts with heavy weight. Here is a list of my favorites.

1. Bench Press
2. Incline Dumbbell Press
3. Military Press
4. Upright Rows
5. Bent Over
6. Weight Pull-ups
7. Weight Dips
8. Weight Chin-ups
9. Squats
10. Dead Lifts

Just using these core exercises with heavy weights can produce great and fast results. The key is make the most out of every set while using proper form.  And yes make sure that you work your legs.  This will stimulate your upper body to grow.

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By Vince DelMonte

So you think you know everything about building muscle? If you have read everything, tried everything and heard everything about muscle building but still resemble the silouette of a Calvin Klien model instead of a buff fitness model than I promise these three ‘little-known’ muscle building tips will accelerate your muscle gains immediately!

1. Body Weight Training

This was once a popular muscle building technique but is very commonly ignored. Why? Perhaps because most body weight training is simply hard and can put a dent in your precious ego! As far as I am concerned, if you can not work with your own body weight than you have no freaken business using external loading such as barbells and dumbbells.

It’s incredible how many attempt to use heavy weights with a microscopic range of motion but can’t do a set of push ups, a squat to the floor or even one chin up. Don’t get me wrong, there is definitely a place for external loading with heavy weights but not until you have the ability to master the following bench marks:

Males should aim for 1 set of 80 push ups, 1 set of 20 chin ups, 1 set of 20 1-leg squats, 1 set of 40 dips and 1 set of 20 pull ups.

Females should aim for 1 set of 40 push ups, 1 set of 5-10 chin ups, 1 set of 10 1-leg squats, 1 set of 10-15 dips and 1 set of 3-5 pull ups.

These standards will ensure a solid foundation of general fitness and muscular endurance and lead to building muscle mass more easily in the following stages of your weight training program.

2. Flip Your Program Upside Down Every 3 Weeks

This is an extremely powerful tip to building muscle mass, not to mention one of the easiest tricks to ensure your body side-steps plateaus forever. Consider that you have been training your chest shoulders and triceps every Monday. In you next phase, three weeks later, you should do the complete opposite. You will train your triceps, shoulders than chest on Friday. This will prevent plateaus because each muscle group will have an opportunity to train completely fresh.

Let’s say you are training your back, biceps, forearms and abs on Friday. Than you will train your abs, forearms, biceps, and back on Monday (in the opposite sequence). You will literally switch everything upside down. Again, this will ensure that these muscles receive an opportunity to train first in the week when your body is the most fresh.

You will curse my name when you blow the heck out of the smaller muscles first and than train the larger muscle groups last. Yes, I know this months issue of Bodybuilders Digest said to never train the smaller muscle groups before your larger muscle groups. I have heard it before so stop analyzing, trust me and give it a try. You be the judge and don’t be surprised if you see new levels of muscle mass and strength after this one technique.

3. Spend More Time At The Grocery Store

If you are serious about building muscle, accept the fact that you will need to spend more time than you do right now in the grocery store. Have you ever opened the fridge for something to eat and all you found was Aunt Wilma’s Thanksgiving turkey leftovers with mold on it? Ever gone into the cub boards and discover only a few leftover bags of potato chips from last weeks Super Bowl party?

To ensure a optimal environment for building muscle and fat loss you must ensure your cub boards and fridge are constantly stocked. This will mean more frequent trips to the grocery store. Chuck the crap that is in your kitchen right now and replace it with good stuff and keep on replacing it. Don’t ever let that supply of good food run low.

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By Vince DelMonte

So you think you have heard everything there is to know about muscle building? If you have read everything, tried everything and heard everything about muscle building but still resemble the silouette of a Calvin Klien model instead of a buff fitness model than I promise these next three ‘little-known’ muscle building tips will accelerate your muscle gains immediately!

4. Never Train More Than 2 Days Consecqutively

But the bodybuilding magazines say to split up my program into 5 seperate days… Yes, I am more than familiar. I call these 5 day splits ‘drug programs.’ They treat your body simply as a ‘muscular system’ and neglect the other systems such as your central nervous system, hormonal system and immune system. Each of these systems have a unique part in muscle growth. Not to mention that these ‘drug programs’ only work if coupled with a few thousand dollars a month on drugs.

Just because you trained your chest on Monday does not mean your immune system, or hormonal system or central nervous system has FULLY recovered. What happens when you return to the gyn NOT FULLY recovered? Will you be able to lift more weight?

If you are not able to lift more weight than guess what happens to your level of fitness? It certainly will not go up because you will be depleting your energy reserves further into a deep, dark hole called ‘over-training.’ If you can not lift more weight or ‘out-do’ yourself from your previous workout than how do you expect to create any NEW muscle? It is literally impossible. Taking a full rest day every two days will minimize the chance of overtraining and ensure your energy reserves are replenished.

5. Go Home If You Are Not Stronger Than Last Workout

Multiple choice question:

Q. You train your chest on Monday and you averaged 4 sets of 8 with 225 pounds on bench press. This workout would be considered a personal best. Your following chest workout, let’s say five days later, you come to the gym with great anticipation to out-do your last workout. To your disappointment you discover that you can barely do 4 sets of 8 with 185 pounds this week. What happened?

A. Your body had not fully compensated from the previous workout and required a longer recovery period.

B. Who cares! You toughed it out and made the most of the workout.

C . Complain to the gym owner that his weight plates are messed up and you want a refund on your gym membership.

If you picked A than say hurray and pat yourself on the back. The rational decision would be to admit the recovery error, assess the factors that could of resulted from not fully recovering (did you take all your supplements, did you sleep enought, did you follow your nutrition plan etc) and plan for success next time. This is the ‘trial and error’ process.

The emotional and irrational trainee would take option B and slug it out. Consider what is actually happening when you take this approach to your workouts:

1. You will be using weights within your threshold so your muscles will simply laugh back at you because there is no new unaccumstomed stress on your muscles. Remember, your muscles only grow if you give them a reason to.

2. You will be training in the hole and prolong the period of time that it takes to come out of the hole and supercompensate.

3. You will have no new muscle to work with because you have not fully recovered or grown bigger so it will be literally impossible to lift more weight or more reps.

4. You will be using your precious energy reserves, that could be going towards building muscle, instead to fueling an useless workout.

5. You will lose motivation and grow frusturated and confused because of your lack of progress.

This is a very tough and mature training decision one must face. After commencing a workout, if you discover after a few sets that you are on tract for a crappy worout than I would suggest to drop the workout and go home. Plan to come back the next day. If your goals are to simply train to train, than you will probably not follow this rule. However, if your goal is to get huge muscles and pack inches of new muscle onto your frame than this is a critical training decision.

To ensure your trip to the gym does not go in complete vain – have a flexibility session to make use of the time and than try and pick up the cute receptionist phone number on your way out!

6. Find a mentor

What does this have to do with muscle building? Everything – finding a mentor can make all the difference in how much muscle you build! If you plan on becoming successful in the gym than surround yourself with someone who has already walked the path. Would you agree that the quickets way to achieve success is to find somone who has gone before you and done what you want to do – and model them.

So why do millions of fitness enthusiasts wander aimlessly following generic advice in text books, magazines or websites? Although these methods of learning can provide a theoretical perspective, they are absent in accountablity, a formal system, time and financial comittment and assessment of performance.

A wise mentor will guide you step-by-step of the way with a formal system that includes a higher level of comittment and accountablity on your part. You will be required to fulfill tasks, change habits, meet deadlines and perform at a higher level than you would without a mentor.

The premise of having a mentor is that he has been there and done that. He has walked in your shoes and will give you the appropriate advice in a timely fashion. If you do not perform and follow the advice than you are wasting the mentor’s time and he will ‘fire’ you! If you do perform and follow his advice than you will be successful and build the muscle you deserve in less time!

Serioulsly consider hiring a fitness coach, a personal trainer or anybody who has done what you wish to do and be prepared to elate the same results!

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By Vince DelMonte

Do you know what it really takes to build big muscles? Do you think it’s as simple as buying a gym membership, training each body once per week, slamming back some protein shakes and trying to eat as much chicken and tuna possible? Viola, you are big enough to enter a bodybuilding contest. Can you imagine it was that easy to build big muscles? Unfortunately, your monthly gym membership, regular weight training workouts and casual eating habits, isn’t going to cut it. Here are five simple steps to getting big muscles fast :

Squat and Deadlift

Squatting and Deadlifting are known as two of the Big Three exercises that are responsible for power and mass muscle building. Consider these two animal exercises the kings of the jungle! Without them, you do not have a chance of survival. These two exercises alone, work out about 75% of your entire musculature, including your traps, shoulders, arms, back. Gluts, hams, calves and core muscles.

Not to mention the degree of intensity, squats and dead lifts force your body to release greater volumes of growth hormone, which results in bigger muscles all over your body. This spillover effect results in strength gains in all you other lifts which translates into a more muscular you! Squatting and dead lifting are especially critical for hard gainers because of the hormonal spikes affecting the entire body.

Stick to Compound Exercises

What is going to isolate more muscle fibers? A bench press or cable cross over? A military press or lateral raise? A chin up or bicep curl? A dip or tricep kickback? If you ever hope to get big muscles than compound lifts are not optional, they are mandatory. Stick to squats, leg presses, deadlifts, bench preses, barbell rows, pull ups, chin ups, over head presses, and dips.

If all you do is concentrate on building your puny muscles like arms and calves, then you will end up with exactly what you focus on – puny muscles!

Keep Your Rest Periods Honest

When was the last time you were in the gym and you watched the average guy time his recovery with a stop watch? Stop watches are not just for endurance athletes but should be used by every person who is serious about building big muscles.

Generally, the closer you lift to your one rep max, the longer the rest period and the higher the number of reps, the shorter the rest period. This is a crucial variable, which is often overlooked, yet will determine whether you create the correct training response.

For example, if you are training for maximal strength which requires at least 3-5 minutes rest between sets and you are only taking 2 minutes, you are not giving your nervous system an honest workout. If you are training for muscle size which requires shorter 30-90 second style recoveries but are gazing at the cute girl on the elliptical letting your rest periods carry over these ranges, you are not giving your metabolic system an honest workout.

Lastly, how do you know if you are truly stronger if you do not monitor your rest period? For example, let’s say last week you bench pressed 135 pounds for four sets of ten. This week you bench pressed 145 pounds for four sets of ten. Assuming the rest period was identical for both workouts, this is a tremendous improvement and a measurable sign of improvement! However, what if you took an extra minute or two between each set on the recent workout? This means that you did not actually become stronger. You just had a longer rest period!

Conclusion

You now know that building big muscles is not easy as showing up at the gym and throwing back a few protein shakes. Apply these three simple steps in your next program and I promise that you will start building brand new muscle all over your body!

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Rule #1:

Get in the gym and get out! That should be your motto from this day forward. Repeat it. Breathe it. Live it. Weight lifting is a calorie expensive activity and you need all the calories you can get at this point. If you are burning it up in the gym every single day, how do you expect to grow? You won’t. You grow when you are resting and generally, the skinnier you are, the more rest you are going to need. Now, that doesn’t mean you should park it on the couch for a few days in between your workouts. It simply means that each weight lifting should not consist of set after set after set. Followed by a rest break to talk to that hot receptionist and then back to another twenty sets. No, you’re workouts need to consist of ten-twelve or fewer sets where you are pushing yourself to the MAX. There is no room for sissy, light-weight work in your weight lifting program.

Which brings us to Rule #2:

Ditch the isolated exercises. Who needs them? You certainly don’t. If your workouts normally include bicep curls, followed by tricep kickbacks, followed by leg extensions, followed by chest flys, followed by… you get the picture, you’ve got to change this pronto.  Remember, you’ve only got so much time you are allowed to be in the gym for. Don’t you want to get the biggest bang for your buck?  Likely you do, so that means focusing on compound lifts only. This includes weight lifting exercises such as squats, bench presses, deadlifts, rows and military presses. Become friends with those exercises and you will have new muscles in the picture soon enough.  Toss the five day split program, get yourself on a good upper/lower or full body workout program and you have found the key to unleashing new muscle mass. Now onto the next significant point. Cardio.

Rule # 3.

I know, I know, you want to be big, but you don’t want to be fat.  Let’s not worry about that at this point, because you and I both know you are a long ways from fat. Gaining fat weight is going to be more a concept of diet than anything else so as long as you are being smart in the kitchen, you don’t need to perform hours of cardio to remain lean. Cardio is just going to further burn off precious calories that could have gone towards building you new muscle mass. For you, calories are a hot commodity and should not be spent on the treadmill. If you want to keep up some cardio for general health sake, fine, but limit this to two or three twenty minute sessions per week - TOPS. And make it low to moderate intensity as well.  The only place you are to be intense is in the weight room.

This leads to rule #4.

REST! You’ve put in your effort at the gym, fed your body with some good food and now what? Plans to go out partying all night with your buddies? You might want to rethink that.  While you definitely want to maintain your social life while trying to gain weight - and you should - it should not come at the sacrifice of sleep. Sleep is primetime when it comes to your body repairing itself and growing stronger so short-circuit sleep and you are short-circuiting your results. Just don’t do it. Period. It’s that simple.

Get ready for Rule #5.

Technique.  Ever seen that guy in the gym who is hoisting so much weight on his barbell for barbell curls that it looks like he’s got more momentum going on than the Gravitron at the fair? He’s pretty much working every muscle in his body except his biceps. Not so beneficial.  Not only that, but give him two weeks and a hundred bucks says he’s out with back pain. You must maintain proper form throughout your weight lifting, not only to prevent injuries but also to see the muscular gains you are looking for. If you cheat form, you are only cheating yourself.  If you don’t know what proper form is yet, book a session with a trainer or find yourself a spotter who can help you.

And now, bonus rule #6

Find a mentor.  You want someone who’s been there, done that. They used to be a skinny bastard just like you and they’ve managed to overcome the curse and now tip the scales and dominate the weight room.  This guy will do wonders for your motivational levels. Don’t feel like lifting? Have a good look at his body.  You’ll want to pick that weight up after that. Furthermore, he can let you in on some of his tried-and-true secrets that just might be key for you as well. Good Luck, UpperExercises.net

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