How To Get Stronger AND Bigger Muscles (4 Things To Avoid)

Some people’s muscles tend to get stronger but not bigger over time. There are several possible causes for this. But, in general, it’s because they’re training in a way that emphasizes strength vs muscle growth – even if they’re unaware of it. If you’re not gaining muscle mass, but, instead gaining strength, you’re likely making this mistake too. But don’t worry. By the end of this video, you’ll know 4 ways that’ll help you prioritize muscle building vs strength – and that, when done together, will prevent you from getting stronger but not bigger.

The first reason why you’re getting stronger but not bigger is your training is more geared towards improving your strength rather than size. You want to fully activate your whole muscle to maximize growth. The last 5 or so reps performed in a set is where this happens. These are called “effective reps”. When using lighter weight, the first several reps that you perform are not as effective for growth. The last several reps provide the most gains. On the other hand, when using a really heavy weight, you’re able to fully activate the muscle much earlier on because it needs all the help it can get to lift that heavy weight. But, as a result, you’re not able to do as many reps. In this case, you're not exposing the muscle to enough of these “effective reps” to maximize growth. Meaning? Do more sets with a slightly higher rep range (6-12 reps) and less sets of very heavy, low rep training (2-4 reps). Your strength gains may slow down as a result, but your muscle gains will benefit considerably.

The second reason for stronger but not bigger muscles is “artificial” strength gains. This is where on paper you may be lifting heavier weights, but in reality you’re cheating to get there. You’re incorporating more momentum, using less range of motion, performing your reps faster, and recruiting other muscles to help you out. So whenever you decide to add more weight to an exercise, pay very close attention to how you perform the exercise with the new weight and ensure that every little detail in your execution remains the same. Otherwise, the only thing you’ll be growing is your ego.

The third reason you’re not gaining muscle mass, but, instead gaining strength, is because of something called neurological adaptations. When you first do a new exercise, you’ll get stronger rapidly. This is not because your muscle got a lot bigger, but is because your brain’s ability to activate that muscle during the exercise has improved (i.e. neurological adaptations). This period lasts about 8-12 weeks. But the good news is, AFTER you’ve maxed these out, further increases in strength are mostly because of increasing muscle size.

This is one of the reasons why it’s so important to stay consistent with your exercises week after week. If you’ve only been in the gym for a few weeks or have recently re-introduced a new exercise into your regimen, this is a likely explanation for why you’re experiencing a ton of strength gains with not much muscle to show for it. In this case, the most important thing is to not give up, your gains are just around the corner.

The final cause is VERY common but the easiest to fix; you’re not eating enough. It’s important to eat enough when you’re trying to prioritize muscle building vs strength because muscle growth requires having enough energy available. Now although in certain scenarios you definitely can build muscle while in a calorie deficit, being in a calorie surplus does appear to optimize the muscle building process and seems to become more and more important as an individual becomes more trained. Meaning, that when it comes down to it many of you watching simply just need to eat more. But this doesn’t mean simply adding an extra 1,000 calories to your daily intake. That’ll lead to a lot of fat gain instead of muscle.

A good recommendation if you haven’t been gaining weight and increasing in size is to take your current caloric intake and increase it by approximately 10-20%. This small bump should help to provide you with the energy needed to maximize the muscle building process while also limiting excess fat gain.

Implement what I went through in this video to start training in a way that prioritizes muscle growth vs strength and you’ll visually start seeing the results you’re after. And for a step-by-step program that takes care of all of the guesswork for you, then simply take our free analysis quiz below, and we’ll show you what approach will best help you attain a lean, attractive looking physique:

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