Training Methods to Maximize Your Growth

Many people jump at the thought of doing anything possible to achieve greater muscle growth. Unfortunately, for many, they think there’s some quick fix or secret that they’re missing out on. The truth is that time, consistency, and effort are the major contributors. But then there are training methods that can be applied to your workouts to further help the process along.

This article will look at five of the top training methods you should be using to maximize muscle growth to help you see better gains.

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1. Try Utilizing Compound Sets

When striving for muscle growth, you need to think about implementing intensity multipliers. In the first of our training methods, compound sets can be included in your program.

A compound set combines two exercises for a single body part back-to-back. For instance, if working the biceps, this could be a barbell curl followed up immediately by incline curls.

This kicks the intensity up and only provides your muscles with minimal rest by moving fluidly from one exercise to the next. You want to fully stimulate the muscle fibers until complete exhaustion sets in.

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2. Start Including Drop Sets

For some reason, drop sets are one of the forgotten training methods that spark new muscle growth. Similar to compound sets in that you’re doing multiple sets consecutively, drop sets differ in that you’re doing the same exercise, only lowering the weight slightly. 

Using the biceps as our body part, you can take a standard dumbbell curl and start curling the weight until you can’t do any more reps with good form (try to hit between 8-12 reps to promote hypertrophy). 

Once you cannot complete another full rep, rack the dumbbells, and lower the weight 5-10 pounds (for larger muscle groups, you may wish to drop the weight more than 5-10 pounds to extend your sets) and do another set until you reach failure. Once achieved, count that as a single set and rest.

If you want to intensify the set further, you can include additional drop sets before resting.

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3. Focus on Negatives

An aspect of training that doesn’t get the proper attention is the negative portion of a movement. Focusing on the negative is one of the best training methods for promoting muscle growth.

The most damage done to muscle fibers actually comes from the negative (also known as the eccentric) portion of the movement. In the case of the biceps curl, this would be where the arm and weight are slowly lowering back down to your sides, and the muscle returns to the stretched position. 

Rather than allowing gravity to merely let the weight fall, resist the weight and gravity by slowly lowering the weight down for a count of five seconds. You will feel an intense burn in the muscle. 

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4. Use Forced Reps with a Workout Partner

During a normal workout, you probably end your set once you reach failure and cannot complete another rep. With forced reps, you’re pushing your body past failure with the help of a workout partner. 

Using forced reps as one of your training methods to stimulate muscle growth will help completely annihilate your muscle fibers and break them down more so than if you were training without a partner.

To complete forced reps, your training partner is going to help you through the contraction phase of an exercise, and you’ll resist the weight on the eccentric portion. 

For example, you can use a barbell biceps curl where, once you hit failure, your workout partner will come in to help you bring the weight up and fully contract the muscle. They will back off during the eccentric portion and allow you to control the weight back down.

Try to complete 3-5 additional reps using the forced reps training method.

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5. Leave Nothing in the Tank with Partials

Last on our list of training methods you can include in your program to help increase muscle growth are partials. 

The key with partials is to control the weight and refrain from using other body parts or momentum. When looking at a biceps curl, it’s easy to rack the weight when you are fatigued and reach failure. But if you want to intensify your set and promote muscle growth, you need to push through.

Rather than ending your set, complete quarter or half-reps until you cannot complete another rep. 

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