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Building muscle, like any other type of exercise, requires that you follow some basic principles. Here are several commonly agreed-upon tips to help you build muscle fast:

Just like anything else, consistency is a key element in being successful, and your workout will be no exception. A full commitment is required to give yourself the best odds of success. You need to develop a consistent workout habit. A general rule-of-thumb is that it takes about two weeks to develop a habit – good or bad! If you can regularly hit the weights on an every-other-day regimen, you’ll be well on your way to establishing the consistency you’ll need to be successful.

If you can train at least 3 times per week, that should provide you with enough muscle-building stimuli to start and maintain the hypertrophic (muscle-building) process. It also gives your muscles a day in between workouts to recover. Remember, muscle growth doesn’t occur during exercise; rather, it occurs during the post-workout healing and rest process. Don’t shortchange yourself there.

Don’t let your weight lifting workouts go too long, and never let them exceed an hour. A thorough strengthening workout routine can be accomplished easily in 30 minutes or less, particularly if you only pause for less than a minute between sets, which is desirable. If you feel any sharp pains, stop your workout immediately and try to find out what the source of the discomfort is coming from. Further exercising can make a bad situation even worse, so listen to your body for warning signals.

From purely a workout perspective, muscle growth occurs when you perform a high volume of ‘work’ at a medium, increasing intensity. ‘Volume’ here means the number of reps and sets you perform, and the ‘intensity’ variable is how much weight you’ll lift. All beginning strength trainers should begin their workout regimens using a ‘high volume, medium intensity’ approach. Over time, as your muscle mass begins to build, gradually keep increasing the intensity factor a little to keep sustaining your progress.

Weight lifting and cardio exercises work at cross purposes against each other. Strength training is an anabolic process, meaning that physical and hormonal processes work together to increase protein-based muscle mass. On the other hand, cardio exercises are catabolic in nature, which means they tend to break down muscle protein in an effort to burn calories. If your primary goal is to build muscle, take it easy on the cardio. If, however, weight control is your mission, cardio comes first, only to be augmented with some light strength training.

Drinking an adequate amount of fluids may seem like a no-brainer, but it is key to your workout’s ability to help you build muscle. Increase your fluids intake before, during, and after all workouts. Remember that dehydrated muscle tissue takes longer to repair itself, slowing muscle growth. Also, waste products from the metabolic processes that are occurring during exercise are excreted and need to be flushed out of your system. Drinking plenty of fluids help get the job done.

In addition to fluids, your body needs the right kinds of fuel to assist the muscle building process, so eat before and after your workouts. Since it takes the human body about 1.5 hours to digest a meal, wait that long after eating before starting your strength training regimen. As you burn through those calories, your body gradually becomes glycogen deficient. Glycogens are basically carbohydrates, and if you don’t replace them soon after finishing your workout, muscle tissue starts breaking down searching for another energy store. The easiest approach is to drink some hi-carb fluids after your workout. Eating fruit is also a great approach.

As difficult as it is these days to maintain a balanced diet – and particularly for strength trainers – you may want to consider filling in some of those nutritional gaps with antioxidants and high quality vitamin supplements. So-called free radicals are molecules that tend to destabilize other molecules, and taking antioxidants such as Vitamins E, C, and A can prevent further damage to muscle tissue that’s just been through a hard workout. Glutamine and selenium are also very beneficial.

If you follow these basic muscle building tips, you’ll enjoy a safer and more effective workout!

Author Rocco Polagamo used to be a thin, pencil-neck dweeb until he tried to build muscle how the real strength trainers do! Read his and other articles on how anyone can build muscle fat loss with great tips from the pros!