Can strength training increase muscle mass?

In most cases, scientific strength training can indeed effectively increase muscle content, but this is not the iron rule of "just lift iron and you will gain weight". It must meet many prerequisites.

The muscle-building logic of strength training is simple to put it simply. It is to cause tiny damage to muscle fibers through resistance stimulation. The body will automatically repair these damages during recovery, and will also thicken the muscle fibers a little extra. With repeated stimulation and repair, muscle mass will naturally slowly increase. Anyone who has practiced for a year and a half can basically understand this rule.

I once trained a young man who had just graduated. He was 176cm tall and only 118kg. He took off his clothes and could clearly see his ribs one by one. At the beginning of the bench press, the empty bar was shaking so hard that he almost fell over. I followed the upper and lower limb differentiation plan three times a week. Each training session was controlled to about an hour, and I rested for one and a half to two minutes between sets. In terms of diet, he ate enough 1.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight, and the calories were about 300 calories more than his daily consumption. In half a year, his weight increased to 136 kilograms, and his body fat rate dropped by 1.7 percentage points. His arm circumference became 4 centimeters thicker, and he could wear short sleeves to create a clear outline. The weight gain was basically all muscle.

Of course, there are always friends who say that they have been practicing strength training for more than half a year, but their muscles have not increased at all, and some have even lost weight. This is not really because strength training is useless, but most likely because some link has dropped. Last year, a girl came for consultation. She said that she went to the gym for an hour every day to train her buttocks, legs and upper limbs. However, in order to fit into an XS size dress, she only ate 1,000 calories a day. She didn't even dare to eat one more egg. During the physical test, she found that she had lost almost 1 kilogram of muscle mass. In fact, it's like if you want to build a house, you hammer and tear down the old foundation every day, but never bring in the cement bricks. Let alone building a new house, you will have to use up the old foundation.

There are also many people who say, "After the age of 30, your metabolism is broken, and you can't build muscles even if you practice strength." This is actually a bit absolute. There is a 61-year-old man in my neighborhood. He only started using dumbbells after he retired. At first, his shoulders shook violently when he exercised with 5-kg dumbbells. After practicing regularly for 3 years, he can now bench press 60 kilograms. His physical muscle mass is higher than that of many 40-year-old men who sit in the office every day. It’s just that the anabolic level of middle-aged and elderly people is indeed lower than that of young people, and the rate of muscle gain is much slower, and they require longer protein intake and rest time. As long as the method is right, they can still grow considerable muscle mass.

There is a pitfall that is easily overlooked. Many people practice for a year or two without any response. They always train with the same weight and the same number of sets. The muscles have long adapted to the intensity of stimulation and will naturally stop growing. Just like you walk the same commute every day, no matter how long you walk, you will not be able to train for a marathon. You must gradually increase the weight and adjust the training plan to continue to give the muscles enough growth signals.