Build Muscle Quick

Posts Tagged ‘cortisol’

Spending hours in the gym to build muscle up and not making progress? Excellent news! There is a very good chance that you are struggling to build muscle up for one very important reason. Once acknowledged and dealth with properly this knowledge can boost your progress a great deal. For many beginning bodybuilders this will be the first time they have heard of it and as such it could beneift them greatly.

So what is the secret? A new amazing routine or something?

No absolutley not. It has been ignored by many a weightrainer even though it has been known about for a long time.

What precisely is cortisol?

Cortisol is a human hormone secreted throughout the day and produced in response to weight training or other types of stress. Levels of cortisol decrease steadily througout the day so are lowest in the evening.

What is its role exactly?

Well, it actually improves short term memory, helps detoxify the liver and aids in regulating the blodds sugar levels. However it can increase blood pressure and reduce bone density if your cortisol levels are excessive, although this is not normal. However critically it does diminish muscle because it aids in the body using muscle for energy rather than fat. This is why your workouts should not be more than one hour in duration. After this they will actually be inhibiting their progress not speeding it up!

Here are a few guidelines to ensure that you are not wasting your time trying to build muscle up:

1) limit your cardio workouts, too much cardio causes the body to release cortisol which as explained is not what we need.

2) Cortisol levels also increase due to caffeine intake so try to keep this to a minimum.

3) Make sure your workouts take less than an hour. wear headphones if this helps you to stay focussed.

4) Stress causes the body to release more cortisol too so try to relax, although granted this is easier said than done.

5) Eat small regular meals because infrequent meals make the body think it is starving and will thus try and use uneccesary muscle for energy before using fat reserves by releasing more cortisol.

6) Sleep. This is when your muscle building hormones peak and your cortisol levels are highest so shot for 8 hours sleep.

With those no nonsense muscle building tips in mind you should be able to give your workouts a great boost now you know how to gain weight fast more efficiently.