When you startbodybuilding training, with a specific objective, many of you ask yourself the question about the time frame to seeresults. After only a few days or weeks, many are already impatient and long to see realphysical evolution. However, to be in shape, your training will have to be regular, that you spend time there.

Optimize your sessions for an evolution in bodybuilding

What training frequency?

Depending on the pace of life, work, their personal situation, beginners start with 3 full-body sessions per week. This rhythm allows you to keep intermediate rest days. After 4 to 6 months of this well-conducted routine, the number ofsessionsincreases to 5 or 6 per week, always keeping at least one day of well-deserved rest. During this phase, the sessions will no longer be based on the full-body. You will train and target specificmuscle groupstoprogressfaster.

How long per session?

If you want togain muscleor gain mass, don’t train like a marathon. The goal here is not to be as enduring as possible and to last several hours.

For the purpose of muscle gain, it is counterproductive. Indeed, if you opt for aprogramto developmuscle volumeand strength, the ideal is not to exceed 45 minutes. After this time, the growth hormone peak is reached. The body begins to produce the hormone cortisol (stress hormone) which lowers testosterone levels.

It is therefore necessary to optimize the session time as much as possible! You have 45 minutes in front of you totrainintensely, with a higher number of sets or heavier loads, and a reduced recovery time between each.

Bodybuilding rest?

To grow well, themuscleneeds rest. We often think, wrongly, that if we train every day, for a long time, and that we load heavy, the muscle will grow. It’s wrong ! If you are overtraining, the muscle will have a hard time growing. Prioritizing quality recovery and reasonable rest periods betweensessionsallows you toprogressfaster.

At first,trainingevery other day is a good option, allowing you to recover from muscular exertion. Then to evolve, the number of sessions increases while the rest days decrease. It is still essential to keep one or two days of rest in the week, because it is precisely during periods of rest that hormonal activity and testosterone production are boosted, thus allowing the body to fix proteins and increasemuscle gain.

How long to see the evolution in bodybuilding?

When you adopt this type oftraining, you increase your cardiovascular capacities. Medium to high intensity builds your core muscle and increases VO2 Max. You will see that over the weeks, you will be less out of breath, you will recover faster between each series, and naturally, you will increase the loads by about 10% each month.

Only, even if you feel stronger, thephysical resultssometimes take longer to appear. For visually visible results, 4-8 weeks may be required. For measurable results in terms of centimeters, it may even take several months. But the work is not in vain. As the weeks go by, you reduce fat mass andgain muscle. Your weight stabilizes, and then only gains pounds of muscle.

Evolution of strength training over time

Pleasure or pain?

This is the question that is regularly asked bybodybuilding enthusiasts. Should we take precautions with all these potentially “dangerous” exercises inbodybuildingor on the contrary continue to have fun?

The back squat, the deadlift, the deadlift with straight legs, the rowing yates, the rowing bar, the military press,… All these exercises deemed dangerous, and unsafe to allow you toevolvewithout risk of physical trauma ( back problem, posture, tendon or muscle problems) in the long term.

However, should everything stop overnight? The answer belongs to each of you, because this choice is yours and yours alone, since it involves risks.

Initially, these risks must be assessed after a good year oftraining. No need to be alarmed if you are a beginner, this subject does not concern you immediately, since you have not yet integrated heavy loads or machines.

If you don’t have any specific weaknesses, if you don’t have any medical problems, postures or other individualities that could facilitate injuries on these exercises, then there is nothing to panic about if you have been practicing for 6 months. bar rowing to build your back. On the other hand, you can be certain that by doing deadlift for more than 5 years with heavy bars, with bad posture or forcing on an unsuitable morphology, you will injure yourself.

Training Risk Assessment

You have to assess the risks as youprogress, adapting them to your objectives. If you plan on 1 or 2 years of fitness, this discussion has little interest for you. If you have more or less 5-yearobjectives , then these risks will have to be taken into consideration.

It is worth remembering that these exercises (back squat, rowing yates, heavy barbell rowing, deadlift, straight leg deadlift, military press) are always more traumatic than others for those who are just starting out and do anything on it, with bad technique.

Lumbago, tendonitis, low back pain quickly arrived, although ultimately not very dramatic in the short term. It is therefore necessary to make allowances to keep a maximum of pleasure intraining, both by avoiding injury, and by doingexercisesthat you like.

Strength training with barbell and dumbbells

You should know that working only on guided machines for a beginner or even intermediate practitioner is much less effective, and does not guarantee theevolution of an optimal strength training. By training with dumbbells and a free bar, you recruit more muscles, especially stabilizing muscles since you must constantly manage the inertia and balance of your different movements, which is absolutely not the case on a machine. guide which automatically cancels this work by its assistance.

Many machines have not been designed for your morphology, so without knowing it you may be working on positions on which you make a partial movement, with a mediocre amplitude which is therefore also less effective. Instead of training the shoulders, you partially train the pectorals, instead of training your back, you train your biceps, this is what will happen if the seat, if the structure of the machine is too large or too small for your body type.

If you are not able to know if a machine is suitable for you, it is better to use free loads

Do you have to use a smith machine?

The answer as always is not ready-made and does not apply to everyone, even if the security aspect of the guided framework would like all beginners to get started without exception. As always, everyone shouldtailor their training to their own needs.

The free bar bench press may seem more risky, when in fact it is probably the use of a guided bar that can cause more trouble than it protects you from it. The problem with the use of the guided comes from its “forced” vertical movement which does not respect the natural biomechanics of the shoulder. You therefore impose on your arms and elbows a trajectory that does not take into account the asymmetries between right shoulder and left shoulder and therefore force them to compensate on other joints. In other words, this compensation increases the risk of injury.

On the other hand, if you already have problems with your shoulders, favor the use of free weights rather than imposing additional joint stress on yourself which risks aggravating the problems.

The smith machine is a good tool for experiencedathletes. Master the free weight movements andexercises first before you start.

In summary on the evolution of bodybuilding

We can never repeat it enough, but thisevolution of bodybuildingdepends on each individual. Whether it’s based on yourgoals, your starting weight, your abilities, everyone perceives their development differently.

However, it is recommended for everyone to respect anorder of evolutionin terms of accessories and machines so as not to injure yourself and to really see your body change. Consider taking a picture of yourself every week or month, which will be visually more striking than measuring your muscles.