QUESTION:
I'm 5'11" and weigh 155 pound guy who is lean and cut trying to build muscle. I currently work out 4 days a week and I am not sure if what I am doing is helping my muscle mass or hurting it. I am aware that you can possibly over trrain and hurt progress but I am not sure if I do that.
For example: Bicep workout:
Standing curls with curl bar. 3 sets of 10, moderate weight.
Standing dumbbell curls. 3 sets 10, 8, 6 weight increasing
Standing hammer curls. same sets
Cable "superman" curls same sets
"21's" 7 lower bicep curls, 7 upper, and 7 full
That completes my bicep workout and for chest I do around 7 excercises with 8-10 reps a set. I work other muscle groups too but for the sake of time I am not typing all of that....
Is this too much?
ANSWER:
Too much biceps exercises, yes. Lifting weights 4 sessions per week is not excessive and is all you need to build mass but your biceps only workout is a waste of time. Having a day devoted to biceps and other small muscle groups exercises have no place in a 4 day per week mass building program. Isolation exercises should be secondary or tertiary to compound exercises such as squats, lunges, presses, dips, rows and pulls.
Working one body part per session is not a good way to build mass. Try to work out so you're able to hit compound exercises with major muscle groups two or 3 times per week.
Your rep scheme is more of a strength/maintenance rep scheme than a muscle building one.
In order to put on muscle you need to have higher training volume. For example you bench 100 pounds for 3 sets of 10 reps is 3000 pounds of volume when you could have benched 3 sets of 20 reps with 80 pounds which equals 4800 pounds which is 62% more training volume. Try to change your rep scheme to higher reps 12-20 for a 4 week hypertrophy mesocycle and see how your body responds. It's really about how your body responds. Try to change your routine to incorporate more training volume and focus on eating enough calories and you should be able to put on lean muscle.
The fact that you mention training and neglected to mention diet at all would suggest that you're not very serious about it. As with weight loss, gaining mass is a matter of caloric intake. You could be doing underwater upside-down squats and still gain mass if you eat enough calories. For gaining mass it is best to eat 4-6 times per day 2 of those meals coming within 90 minutes of your workout and directly following your workout. Your meals should be packed with complex carbohydrates such as sweet potatoes, oats, brown rice and whole grain pasta and lean protein sources along with some fat.
If you want to gain muscle mass it is better to train 1x a week and eat properly than train 4 days a week while not eating enough calories, etc. Timing with your meals is also important as a regular eating schedule will help your body effectively synthesize your body's natural anabolic hormones and prevent catabolism from fasting. Things such as skipping breakfast, or even skipping a pre-bed meal is unacceptable if you really want to gain mass.
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