by Jason Medina

Created on: March 22, 2008

Gaining muscle is not that difficult to do, and gaining it fast is not much harder. It all boils down to a very simple equation: high intensity weight training combined with enough calories to feed muscle growth! In a nutshell, that is how muscle is built. There is nothing complicated and/or mysterious about it. If you train hard with the weights, and if you eat enough food, you will soon start to add muscle mass to your body. However, depending on your individual genetic makeup - which includes your metabolism, your individual body type, and your natural ratio of lean body mass to fat mass - how much muscle you gain and how quickly you gain it will vary.

Some people are born with bodies that are more conducive to gaining muscle mass than others. And many people can gain a significant amount of muscle without spending too much time training or worrying about their diet. And then there are the folks who train like a power-lifter - hoisting as much weight as they can and paying extra special attention to their diet - only to find that their gains are much more modest. That's simply a function of an individuals genetic makeup. We are all born with a certain body type, and while we can alter that body type and modify it to a degree, we can't entirely change it. Folks who tend to be skinny and wiry, the same folks who seem to be able to eat like a horse without gaining much weight, tend to be the one's who have the hardest time putting on muscle mass. On the other hand, the stockier and thicker individuals, the one's who seem to have a hard time keeping their weight down, are the one's who generally gain muscle mass the fastest. It's all in the genetic cards.

But no matter what your individual genetic makeup is, you can gain muscle mass. The key is to train hard, incorporating as many multi-joint exercises - bench press, squat, overhead press, military press, e.t.c - into your training, while at the same time eating enough calories to not only fuel your workout, but to also repair the damaged muscle fibers that result from weight training so that they grow back bigger and stronger! Now, many people go into great detail about the types of food you should eat, how much food you should eat, and when you should eat it. For the sake of simplicity, if you focus on eating high quality foods - lean meats, whole grains, lean dairy products, and fruits and vegetables - you can't go wrong. Keeping your diet as clean as possible will ensure that you are providing your body with the high quality nutrition that it needs, while at the same time minimizing any fat gain that is bound to occur as you put on muscle.

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