{"id":101361,"date":"2025-07-29T06:17:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-29T06:17:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/101361\/"},"modified":"2025-07-29T06:17:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-29T06:17:11","slug":"how-to-actually-build-muscle-when-you-work-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/101361\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Actually Build Muscle When You Work Out"},"content":{"rendered":"

This story is from Manual, GQ\u2019s flagship newsletter offering useful advice on style, health, and more, four days a week. Sign up here to get it in your inbox<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Whether you\u2019ve been lifting for years or you\u2019re just getting started, if your goal is to build muscle, you need to first understand that gaining size and gaining strength are two distinctly different things. Yes, lifting for muscle growth\u2014or hypertrophy, to use the scientific term\u2014will yield some strength gains along the way, and vice-versa, but the way you work out will primarily move you closer toward one goal or the other.<\/p>\n

So, what is the best workout routine for gaining muscle? Contrary to the well-calloused bro science of yore, it\u2019s got nothing to do with four sets of 10, tempo reps, or even specific exercises. In fact, gaining muscle is not so much about what you do, but rather how you do it. Put another way, the same exercise could be used to either pack on muscle or increase strength, depending on your approach.<\/p>\n

Consider the difference between bodybuilders and powerlifters\u2014two groups that rely heavily on the bench press in their training. \u201cA powerlifter is trying to lift as much weight as possible, whereas bodybuilders are trying to increase the size of their muscles.\u201d says Mathew Welch, MS, CSCS, ATC, USAW-1, an exercise physiologist at HSS<\/a>. \u201cDon’t get me wrong, the bodybuilders are going to get strong, but they’re not necessarily going to have the same strength as a powerlifter, and that\u2019s because the qualities that they’re training are very different.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe big take-home message here is that there’s no magical exercise for hypertrophy,\u201d says Luke Carlson, founder and CEO of Discover Strength<\/a>. Instead, what we do have is a handful of research-backed principles that you can use to optimize your existing workout for muscle growth.<\/p>\n

Hard reps equal hard muscle<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest scientific discovery in strength training of the last 15 years is that we sure don’t need very much of it if you want to add muscle,\u201d says Carlson. \u201cBut we\u2019ve got to do it harder than we ever thought.\u201d<\/p>\n

Research<\/a> shows us that muscle growth is driven by mechanical tension. Unlike time under tension\u2014the amount of time a muscle spends under load, which actually does nothing for hypertrophy\u2014mechanical tension kicks in the moment your reps begin to naturally slow down as you approach muscle failure. Trainers call these \u201ceffective reps.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEffective reps are defined as the last five or so repetitions in a set that brings the muscle to failure, and these reps are believed to provide the most stimulus for hypertrophy due to the mechanical tension being experienced by the active fibers,\u201d says Welch.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe closer you get to failure, the more motor units and muscle fibers you recruit, and the greater chance you have to increase the size of your muscle,\u201d says Carlson. \u201cThe most important element is whether you\u2019re getting close to muscle failure\u2014more important than how many sets you do or how many days a week you work out.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This story is from Manual, GQ\u2019s flagship newsletter offering useful advice on style, health, and more, four days…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":101362,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[1198,210,14979,67,132,68,1940,3149,17147],"class_list":{"0":"post-101361","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fitness","8":"tag-fitness","9":"tag-health","10":"tag-textbelowcentergridwidth","11":"tag-united-states","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-us","14":"tag-web","15":"tag-wellness","16":"tag-working-out"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114935067226885869","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101361","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101361"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101361\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101362"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}