Top 10 Body Building Tips for Beginners

So you’re ready to pump iron, get jacked and look like some kind of superhero—minus the spandex. Awesome. Keep in mind that though a sculpted muscular body looks great, it isn’t an overnight process. In fact, it requires dedication, discipline and patience, plus a whole heap of determination.

If you think working out in the gym, or your home gym, is going to be the most difficult thing you’ve ever done, think again. In the larger scheme of things, working out is the easy part. The hard part is to maintain consistency for many months, keep eating well, and look after your general health.

If you’re a new to the world of bodybuilding and wondering how to get started, then you’ve come to the right place. Here are some tips to get you moving in the right direction.

Consult Your Healthcare Professional

It is advisable to consult your healthcare professional before starting any kind of exercise regimen, especially if you’re a smoker or have a medical condition. It’s always better to be safe than sorry. Discuss your long-term fitness goals and get their advice on what you should be wary of. Take this for example, Sally has a history of serious flue infections, and wants to start an intensive aerobic exercise program in the middle of winter. As this type of exercise, especially at this intensity, will likely result in increased cortisol levels and some degree of immune suppression, it would be advisable to support Sally's immune system with specific nutrients and herbal medicines and start at a light intensity—certainly not every day.

Make a Workout Plan

To keep motivation high, chart out some short-term as well as long-term goals. These may relate to body composition, strength or length of training sessions or intensity. It is important that you set realistic goals and avoid overestimating yourself. You will have to take into account your current health condition and then decide where you would like to see yourself in the next 3 months, the coming year, and further on.

The idea is to make sure that you stay focused with achieving your goals. And this focus can come from setting some achievable goals that you can tick off and give yourself a pat on the back over. There could be nothing worse than trying to work towards goals that are unrealistic, or take too much time and energy to achieve. After all, we want this program to be sustainable, and not interfere too much with work, family, and life in general, otherwise, it will create too many hassles for us and won’t be something we can enjoy long term.

Stick to the Basics

It makes sense to master the basic exercises first that match your goals, and then move on to more intermediate or advanced ways of training. Doing too much too soon can put you at an increased risk of injury and lead to overexertion. It can also be frustrating trying to master, say for instance, the exercise depicted below, when push are all you need for the time being. Some of the basic bodybuilding movements are the squat, deadlift and bench press.

You probably don’t need to do this any time soon.

It’s also important to learn a few proper warm-up exercises, as these are non-negotiable when starting a workout. Choose your warm-up exercises depending on the workout for the day, and some stretches too that will loosen the muscles you are targeting during the workout.

Also focus on getting the right form. This is absolutely critical if you want to get good results and avoid injury. Bodybuilding is all about working the muscle and getting a good contraction, not necessarily about how much you can lift. For this, good technique and light weights to start are an absolute must.

Eat Healthy

Building your body is not just about working out. Your diet has just as much to do with it. You can do the most rigorous workouts imaginable, but without good nutrition to support you, results will be incredibly slow, if at all noticeable. Needless to say you need to eat healthy and cut down on junk food. 5 to 6 small meals per day is perfect, evenly spaced out, each with a source of quality protein. Avoid staying hungry for long periods, and avoid overeating or binge-eating.

Get your fair share of macronutrients (protein, carbs, fat) and micronutrients (vitamins, minerals, phytochemicals) from fresh fruits and vegetables every day. Consume foods rich in lean protein, low glycemic index carbohydrates and healthy fats.

Protein is especially essential when building muscle. It can be found in chicken, fish, eggs, pulses and legumes, dairy products, and nuts.

For gluten free, remove the bun.

Supplement Your Diet Correctly

At times, whole food alone can feel like not enough to fulfill our nutritional needs. It is important, however, to provide your body with all the nourishment it needs to keep it fuelled. Certain health supplements can help you meet your daily nutrient intake. Using the right supplements can ensure that you get enough nutrients that you need to function well as well as to aid you in terms of strength, speed of recovery, and prevention of injury.

There’s no need to spend a lot on a broad range of complex supplements. As a beginner, you may go for a few foundational products, the important ones, like protein powder, creatine supplements and essential amino acids.

Be mindful of their dosage though and consult an experienced friend or your fitness instructor in choosing the right supplement for you. Or, alternatively, contact us here, at Sportys Health.

Get Enough Sleep

Getting enough rest is a very important aspect of muscle building. When you perform heavy resistance training, you actually create tiny rips in the muscle, called microtears. Your body needs time to repair and rebuild this damage, and sleep is a crucial part of this process.

A lack of sleep will not only limit your muscle growth, but also have a detrimental effect on your health and may even compromise your immune system. Make sure not to push yourself too hard when you are just starting out. Make sure and get enough rest between sets when working out. This will give your muscles time to recover while still keeping them fatigued.   

Training too hard?

Don’t Train Everyday

As a beginner, your routine shouldn’t comprise more than 3 to 4 workouts per week. Spending more time than required in the gym can be counterproductive. You would probably get better results committing that extra time to learning about nutrition, or doing some extra food prep. Just make sure you work each muscle group at least once per week. That should be good enough for starters!

Increase the Weight Gradually

Do not make the mistake of working out with heavy weights right in the beginning. Monitor how much you can lift with each exercise and increase the weight slightly every 2 weeks. Doing so will help you build stamina as well as gain muscle mass.

Ideally, avoid this.

Build up the Calories

To build muscle, you will have to eat more calories than you burn. To do so successfully, find out your basal metabolic rate (BMR) using a calorie calculator and work out accordingly. Remember, if you’re inactive for most part of the day, you’ll need fewer calories and if you’re highly active, you’ll need more. Do make a point to consume healthy nourishing calories, however. Junk or empty calories may make you feel good in the short term, but they will come back to haunt you in the end.

Be Patient

All of us want instant results. But building your body from scratch will take months of sincere effort for the results to start showing. So don’t expect to bulk up overnight because that’s not going to happen. Be patient and your efforts will pay off in good time.

Think Wholistic

Yeah, wholistic health doesn’t sound too bad ass, right? But if you want the hard earned muscle that you’ve build in the gym to last, then you have to take into consideration the health of your entire body—not just your muscles. This is the difference between getting jacked for a few months, and building foundational health to support sustainable muscle that can last a lifetime. Think about it. When you’re young, considering where you’ll be in 30 years may not be at the top of your list of priorities. However, what you do this year, will impact your health in far-reaching ways. So to build muscle in a healthy way that keeps you well-nourished and ultimately happy, is a win-win. Yeah, the process may be a little bit slower and take some more consideration, but the results will be worth it. You’ll get to keep those results for longer.

Conclusion

To keep your body fit, working out and eating healthy go hand in hand. And so does looking after your general health. Bodybuilding is more than just eating everything and lifting as much weight as you can. For beginners who want to build muscle, it’s important to follow an exercise regimen that caters to their physique and general health. They also need to take it easy at the initial stage, so that they can crank it up later. Adding patience, restraint and commitment to your cause will slowly but surely help you get to your goal. These may not sound like the most exciting qualities for a bodybuilder, but trust me, they’re worth it.