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The football players, pro wrestlers, and MMA fighters you see on television may be packing serious muscle. But if you’re a guy in your teens, you have some body-building advantages they would love to have.
During your teen years, you’re in a phase of your life when your body wants to grow. You’re churning out hormones that are specially designed to help you get bigger. And right now you may be able to take in a huge amount of food and use it to build a strong body.
But it's easy to make mistakes in your quest for muscle. Here's how to avoid those errors.
Following these steps will help you give your muscles the exercise and the fuel they need for getting bigger.
1. Get a checkup. If you’re new to exercise or you have any health issues – especially heart problems or conditions that affect your muscles or joints – get a physical exam by your doctor or other health care provider before you start a muscle-building program.
2. Skip the shortcuts. As you’re starting on your path to bigger muscles, focus on the basics, says Shawn Arent, PhD, a certified strength and conditioning specialist and associate professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey. Spend your energy working out and eating right – not chasing fancy supplements. And don’t even think about using steroids, he says. They can do serious damage to your body now and in the long run.You don't need steroids to build better muscles. During puberty, your body naturally pumps out testosterone. This hormone encourages your muscles to grow, says William Roberts, MD, a professor of family medicine and a youth fitness expert at the University of Minnesota.
3. Build a solid program. When you're starting out, avoid tossing together bits and pieces of different weight-lifting programs you see in magazines, Arent says. Instead, build a basic core program that includes bench press (for your chest), squats (legs), deadlift (legs and back), and shoulder press (shoulders and upper back). As you master these, or you start playing a sport that requires specific strengths, you can add more complex lifts.
4. Get enough calories. Do your parents give you a hard time about eating so much? If you’re training hard, politely ask them to give it a rest, says Roberta Anding, MS, RD, a dietitian who works with athletes ranging from high schoolers to the Houston Astros and the Houston Texans. You need calories for growth and performance!
As a growing, active guy, you may need about 3,000 calories or more each day. Anding's tips:
5. Feed your muscles when they’re hungry. Another muscle-building hormone your body produces is insulin, Anding says. It makes your muscles soak up sugar, proteins, and other components that make them bigger and stronger.
Insulin is extra-effective right after a workout. So within 30 minutes after a workout, eat a blend of carbs and protein. Some options:
But too much protein can actually harm the body and have serious effects on your kidneys. So don’t eat too much of it.
Here are five things NOT to do when you're working on building strong muscles:
1. Don’t hurt yourself trying to look cool. You know those guys who always moan and strain in the gym until they’re red in the face? Don’t be one of them. “The kids who get into the ‘I can lift more than you’ and try to do their one-rep max on the bench can tear something or injure themselves by being unnecessarily competitive,” Roberts says. An injury can make you lose valuable training time. So always stay within your limits and work with your coach or trainer.
2. Don’t try to figure it out on your own. Bad form while lifting can also get you injured. And when you’re using sloppy technique – say, leaning back and jerking up the dumbbells while doing biceps curls – you’re not focusing the load on your target muscles. Instead, you’re bringing in other muscles and making them help with the exercise.
Seek out a qualified trainer with good credentials at your gym, or talk to coaches at your school who know what they’re doing in the weight room. Ask for lessons on how to properly do all the common lifts.
3. Don’t overdo protein. We said it before, just a few paragraphs ago, but we'll say it again -- too much protein is bad for you. ?“Kids see these high-protein diets in muscle magazines and think ‘Muscle is protein, so I need to get a lot of protein to get a lot of muscle,’" Arent says. “If they’re training a lot, they do need more protein than the average individual, but it’s not a ridiculous amount.”
Aim to get about 1.6 grams of protein each day for each kilogram that you weigh. We've done the math: Look up your weight and get about this many grams of protein per day:
4. Don’t overtrain. A hard weightlifting workout breaks down your muscles. When your body repairs them, they get bigger and stronger. This process requires rest. So just lift two to four days a week, Arent says. And don’t work the same muscles two days in a row.
5. Don't skimp on sleep. You probably like to stay up late. But “kids who get enough sleep are going to have more vigor and train better,” Roberts says. So if you want big gains in the weight room, make sleep a priority.?