Have you been going to the gym regularly for months and haven’t been able to put on any serious poundage? If you answered yes to any of these questions, it’s time to take a step back and make some plans. Building muscle is not rocket science. There are four key factors that will mean the difference between building muscle and staying skinny. You have to ask yourself these four questions.
Is my diet optimized for building muscle?
It’s time to get out of the “3 meals per day” mentality. If you want to gain (or lose) weight you need to feed your body whole foods, six times per day. This means splitting your large meals up and eating about once every three hours. Not only is this good for your metabolism, but your body will use the foods instead of storing them as fat.
Your six meals per day should consist of mainly complex carbohydrates and protein. You should aim for at least thirty grams of protein per meal. High protein foods include lean meat, chicken, fish, egg whites, cheese and milk products. Complex carbohydrates are found in brown rice, brown bread and potatoes. Stay away from foods high in salt and sugar
Should I be using supplements, and when should I be taking them?
If you can afford supplements you should be using them. The basic three you should be considering are protein, carbs and creatine. Whey protein supplements are the fastest known way to deliver quality protein to your muscles. This makes shakes particularly effective after your workouts, when your body is craving protein for muscle re-growth.
There are three key times that supplements should be taken. First thing in the morning, after your workout and before bed. If your diet is up to scratch you shouldn’t need supplements at any other time. Don’t use supplements to replace meals. Supplements are supplements, not meal replacements.
Am I training hard and not smart?
The biggest mistake the new lifters make is thinking that the more they workout the bigger they’ll get. This couldn’t be further from the truth! Two basic rules you must remember when it comes to weight training. First, quality is better than quantity. Second, compound exercises are the kings of building muscle.
Compound exercises require at least two joint movements. Big compound exercises are the squat, bench press, wide grip pull up and seated row. These movements recruit many more muscles fibers to use to move the weight. This means more muscle groups are worked, the exercise is more challenging and the potential for growth is much greater.
Generally you should be doing three compound exercises for one isolation exercise. For example your back/biceps workout might consist of wide grip pull ups, seated row, bent over row and standing bicep curl. You might think this is not enough work for your biceps? Wrong. Your biceps are worked heavily in all over these exercises; the bicep curl just finishes them off.
The length of any training session should not exceed one hour. And you only need to train one muscle group once per week. This means a split routine should only need to be three days per week. In fact, most professional bodybuilders only train four times per week. Remember, it’s quality not quantity.
Do I get enough rest and recovery time?
When you workout you’re not building your muscles, you’re breaking them down. The reason why you looked “pumped up” when you’re in the gym is because your muscle tissue is swollen and damaged. Your muscles actually grow when you are resting. So in simple terms, no rest equals no muscle growth.
So take it easy when you’re not working out. Ease up on the cardio. And make sure you get plenty of sleep. Sleep is the body’s number one time for building muscle. This is also why it’s important to eat before bed, so your body has the fuel to repair muscle in your sleep.
Simple isn’t it?
So you can see that despite what you read in magazines or on the web about building muscle, it’s surprisingly simple. If you get the four aspects I have mentioned in this article right, you will build muscle. If you’ve got any questions, I’m available on the forum on my site. See links in my bio.

To supplement or not to supplement – that is the question on more bodybuilder’s lips than ever before. Are they safe? What works and what doesn’t?
Lets have a look at the basics.
There are various reasons why athletes may be interested in supplementation.
 Concern about getting adequate nutrients from our food supply.
 Suspicion of pharmaceuticals.
 Belief that diet alone will not achieve optimal nutrition
Supplements include the following:
 Vitamins  Minerals  Amino Acids  Herbs
The concerning thing about supplements is that anything classified as a dietary supplement is not required to meet any FDA or other standards! Think about that! there are no regulations in place that guarantee the safety or purity of something sold as a supplement.
They are also not made to meet the similar safety requirements as prescription drugs or any other manufacturing standards. They are not required to meet product potency or purity ratings and are not required to prove the effectiveness of any health claim that is made.
Studies suggest that a number of supplements may deliver on advertising claims. However, trainees are spending large sums of money on products that have little or no proven usefulness.
Personally I find the use of supplements over rated and as with strength training, supplementation asks the same question  “if a little is good then maybe more has to be better”
Supplementation and steroids started to proliferate when volume strength training became the training system of the day. Young strength trainees slaving in the gym for five to six days a week was seen as normal. All this without making any progress or putting on any size whatsoever.
They then turned to the latest supplement or steroid thinking that this is the magic bullet to put on that added muscle when all the time they were just plain “overtraining”
The cold hard facts are that the majority of the regular trainees in your gym are overtraining. The sad reality is that the type of training that you find in bodybuilding books and magazines (and used by the stars) are irrelevant to the majority of the population and has a high failure rate.
If more bodybuilders started using more infrequent, short, high intensity weight training sessions, followed by the required amount of time to recover and become stronger…
MOST OF THE WEIGHT GAIN SUPPLEMENTS AND STERIODS AVAILABLE TODAY WOULD NOT BE NEEDED.

The bottom line on weight gain supplements
 Before taking a supplement try to make modifications to your diet that might achieve the same goals.
 Only choose products that show the amount of active ingredients on the label that are required.
 Be aware that “natural” does not mean ‘safe’
 Some herbal supplements may have unpleasant side effects.

Listed below are some popular bodybuilding supplements available on the market today:

Creatine monohydrate
Creatine was first introduced to the market place some eight years ago and has since become the most popular bodybuilding supplement of all time.
Creatine is said to significantly increase lean muscle mass, improve performance, increase energy levels and speed up recovery rates. Creatine also stimulates the uptake of amino acids in the proteins, which means that the more that it’s used the more muscle that may be grown.
Dosage: A loading phase of 20grams a day for the first five days then a maintenance phase of 5grams a day from then on.

Whey Protein isolate
The highest yield of protein currently available and is extracted from milk. This is another popular supplement for athletes and bodybuilders because of its high proportion of amino acids. It is supposed to be high in potassium, which is essential for muscle growth and is an antioxidant and a good immune system builder.
Dosage:  20gms – 100gms a day.
Tibulus Terrestris
Tribulus terrestris is a plant that grows in many tropical and moderate areas of the world and is very rich in chemical compounds such as saponins, flavonoids and alkaloids.
Tribulus terrestris is supposedly a testosterone enhancer. and increases sex drives in both men and women.
Dosage as per bottle.

Glutamine
Is a non-essential amino acid, which makes up to 60% of the amino acids in the bodies muscles. Glutamine containing products are protein shakes and good quality protein powders; it can also be added to protein shakes for added potency.
Dosage:  5grams to 15 grams per day.

So please remember a supplement is something added to the diet to make up for a nutritional deficiency or imbalance they are not intended to substitute for eating a balanced diet.  If they are to be taken at all they should only be used to supplement the diet and not replace it.

If you’re serious about making a solid commitment to a muscle-building program, you need to be very careful of who you take advice from. Bodybuilding and fitness is literally a multi-billion dollar industry with new websites popping up every single day. Many of the so-called “experts” out there really don’t have a clue of what they’re talking about and are only motivated by pushing expensive pills, powders and “miracle programs” on you that you don’t really need. If you don’t watch your step you may end up falling for some fatal muscle-building pitfalls that will literally destroy your gains and prevent you from ever achieving the impressive, muscular physique you desire. In this article I’m going to expose 4 very common muscle-building myths in order to keep you on the proper path to the mind-blowing muscle and strength gains you deserve.
Myth #1: In order to build muscle, you must achieve a “pump” during your workout. The greater the pump you achieve, the more muscle you will build.
For those of you who are just starting out, a “pump” is the feeling that you get as blood becomes trapped inside the muscle tissue when you train with weights. The muscles will swell up and leave your body feeling bigger, tighter, stronger and more powerful. While a pump does feel fantastic, it has very little, if anything to do with properly stimulating your muscles to grow. A pump is simply the result of increased bloodflow to the muscle tissue and is certainly not indicative of a successful workout. A successful workout should only be gauged by the concept of progression. If you were able to lift more weight or perform more reps than you did in the previous week, then you did your job.
Myth #2: Building muscle will cause you to become slower and less flexible.
This one goes back to the old days when people described bodybuilders as being “muscle bound” and “bulky”. Contrary to what you may think, building a significant amount of lean muscle mass will actually speed you up rather than slow you down. Muscles are responsible for every movement that your body makes, from running to jumping to throwing. The bottom line is that the stronger a muscle is, the more force it can apply. Having stronger, more muscular legs means increased foot speed, just as having stronger and more muscular shoulders means the ability to throw farther. Strong muscles are able muscles, not the other way around.
Myth #3: You must always use perfect, textbook form on all exercises.
While using good form in the gym is always important, obsessing over perfect form is an entirely different matter. If you are always attempting to perform every exercise using flawless, textbook form, you will actually increase your chances of injury and simultaneously decrease the total amount of muscle stimulation you can achieve. Remember, we are not robots! It’s very important that you always move naturally when you exercise. This could mean adding a very slight sway in your back when you perform bicep curls, or using a tiny bit of body momentum when executing barbell rows. Loosen yourself up a bit and move the way your body was meant to be moved. Obsessing over perfect form will actually work against you rather than for you.
Myth #4: If you want your muscles to grow you must “feel the burn!”
This is another huge misconception in the gym. The “burning” sensation that results from intense weight training is simply the result of lactic acid (a metabolic waste product) that is secreted inside the muscle tissue as you exercise. Increased levels of lactic acid have nothing to do with muscle growth and may actually slow down your gains rather than speed them up. You can limit lactic acid production by training in a lower rep range of 5-7, rather than the traditional range of 10 and above.