Billy Garnon’s seven tips to gain amazing muscle

While many people struggle with weight loss, there are some for whom the struggle is putting on weight. William ‘Billy’ Michael Garnon, a Master Physique Elite Trainer shares the secrets of gainin

Billy Garnon | Updated: August 28, 2014 11:22 am

While many people struggle with weight loss, there are some for whom the struggle is putting on weight. William ‘Billy’ Michael Garnon, a Master Physique Elite Trainer shares the secrets of gaining muscle and bulking up with us:

For some people it can be quite hard to add size or put on weight. Metabolism in the right individual can play a part although this would be a small minority in the grand scheme of things. The reality of it is people don’t 1. eat enough to sustain muscular hypertrophy and 2. train hard enough for the purpose of muscular gains.

Just adding calories won’t help

Simply loading up on calories won’t help you gain more muscles. While we do need to consume more for a calorific deficit to add size, it all goes back to the way we train and rest in and out of the gym.

Ditch steadystate cardio, try HIIT

Cardio in respect of muscular gains is vital for cardiovascular health and should not be overlooked in general health. Now, there will be better training programs to help with building/maintaining muscle but in general, long steady state cardio of duration will not add a significant amount of muscle to anyone without some sort of force behind it. HIIT on the other hand is great for fat loss and is backed up by scientific fats. It also enhances muscle endurance, retention and definition. Try adding some HIIT to your training program 2-3 times a week and reap the benefits.

Weight train four times a week

For me four times a week of weight training with an alternate rest day in-between is a bare minimum. I guess three times for a beginner would be a good starting point with alternating an upper-lower system but I would personally advice lifting at least four days a week with a lot of overload on the muscle (lifting to your highest capacity).

Don’t fall into the overtraining/under-recovery trap

Overtraining does happen to lot of people in this day and age and it’s mostly due to not listening to your body. I have a saying that you can never ‘overtrain’ just ‘under-recover’. Under-recovery includes can be due inadequate rest, lack of sleep or poor nutrition and supplemental. What I’m saying is that unless you’re really overexerting yourself daily in the gym and not taking the appropriate rest in between, then yes you will overtrain and that can be dangerous. Overtraining/under-recovery could lead to lethargy, constant tiredness, muscle fatigue, injuries, lack of mental alertness and even a drastic drop in weight.

Heavier weights necessarily don’t add bigger muscles

It’s not entirely true that heavier weights equal bigger muscles. It’s actually the rate of tension the muscle endures in the training program that will depend on muscular gains. Of course if the weight you’re using is too light then you’ll need to lift heavier to see bigger gains. One perfect program to gain muscle is my good friend Neil ‘Yoda’ Hill’s program Y3T which involves nine weeks of training of three cycles each.

What is Y3T? In this regime each cycle, consists of three weeks, where the first week involves compound exercises (more than one joint and muscle group) with heavy weights, the second week has a mix of compound and isolation (one joint and muscle group) using a moderate weight while the third week comprise of a mix of compound and isolation exercises with a focus on higher reps and high intensity.)

Eat frequent, small meals

You should have 4-7 meals a day including shakes and 4-5 big healthy meals per day. You might find it difficult to digest so much food in the beginning of your program. While eating frequently won’t directly give you bigger muscles, it will you become fitter and healthier by taking care of your blood sugar levels, facilitating insulin release from food, keeping your hormonal responses in check and helping with protein synthesis. To create the ideal body, you have to train smart as well as hard and learn to listen to it.

Supplements will push you on

Supplements are not the be all and end all to gain muscle mass. They will however help when added to a good training program and correct nutrition protocol. For me I like to add protein powders like Creatine, beta aniline and L-Gluatamine and maybe a Vitargo (slow releasing carbohydrate) or some post work out sugars.

Along with aforementioned tips, here are some cardinal sins:

Not getting enough rest or nutrition
Spending hours at the gym
Doing too much cardio
Not following a training regime which allows muscle hypertrophy

Do any of the above and you will not GAIN muscle.

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Published: December 4, 2013 9:53 am | Updated:August 28, 2014 11:22 am

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