Tip Are You Strong Enough to Build Muscle Search Skip to content Menu Menu follow us Store Articles Community Loyal-T Club Loyal-T Points Rewards Subscribe to Save Search Search The World s Trusted Source & Community for Elite Fitness Training Tip Are You Strong Enough to Build Muscle Whether you' re a newbie or an advanced bodybuilder here' s why you need to reinforce your strength base by Eric Bach November 26, 2017August 18, 2019 Tags Bodybuilding, Powerlifting & Strength, Tips, Training It Starts With Strength If you're a newbie, getting stronger is the most important thing you can do. Training purely for strength while eating a muscle-building diet will lead to slabs of lean mass simply because your body isn't used to the high-stress environment of proper training. Strength is also important for those who've been around the block, but the mechanisms for hypertrophy are a bit different. Once you've built a sufficiently strong base, heavy strength work helps you build muscle through two mechanisms: Building more strength allows you to lift progressively more weight for more volume. For example, you might go from bench-pressing 80-pound dumbbells for 3 sets of 10 to 100-pound dumbbells for 3 sets of 10. This gradual improvement leads to a much greater overload stimulus. Heavy strength work improves muscle fiber recruitment. Using hypothetical numbers, you could go from recruiting 40% of the muscle fibers in your chest to 70%. The more muscle fibers you recruit the more you can train. So, strength is still important even for the advanced lifter. But instead of being the primary muscle builder, heavy lifting allows you to improve muscle fiber recruitment to engage more muscle fibers and improve work capacity to fatigue more muscle. Rookies need to lift heavy to build muscle. Veterans need to lift heavy to make all subsequent training more effective. Get The T Nation Newsletters Don' t Miss Out Expert Insights To Get Stronger, Gain Muscle Faster, And Take Your Lifting To The Next Level related posts Training The Best Damn Workout Plan For Natural Lifters Bodybuilding is full of programs used by "enhanced" lifters, but most people don't take drugs and can't get good results. This effective program is for them. Bodybuilding, Training Christian Thibaudeau July 14 Training Tip Ankle Mobility Soft Tissue vs Joint Restriction If you have ankle mobility issues that affect your squat, you need to determine what kind of problem you have before treatment. Here's how to do it. Exercise Coaching, Mobility, Tips Dr John Rusin October 2 Training Bodyweight Isometrics for Improved Strength Hardcore bodyweight isometrics will make your whole body stronger. Here’s how to do ‘em. Powerlifting & Strength, Training Adam Vogel & Michael Campanella January 20 Training 40 Movements for Rapid Strength - Part 2 Over the past few years I've seen many lifters and coaches discussing the seemingly strange movements I prescribe for strength development. Many of these guys are grasping the big picture but missing many of the finer points. To remedy this, I've written this "toolbox" series to help experienced lifters fill in the blanks and newer lifters learn about some very effective exercises. Training Dave Tate October 18