How to retain muscle strength without bulking up?
Jan.08, 2010 in
Best Muscle Building Workouts
I found out that unless you “tire” your muscles during a workout, as you get older you lose the strength in them. How can I prevent this without making my arms bigger? Regardless of what anyone says, I know if I were to use high weights my arms would look huge. I have manly broad shoulders that I have been able to downplay because I’ve only toned my arms my using low weights and high reps. But can this prevent muscle tissue loss? I’ll say it right now, I won’t use anything more than 10 pounds or I will start looking like a man.
January 8th, 2010 at 5:36 am
u need to tone ur muscles. use low weights but alot of reps
January 8th, 2010 at 6:11 am
If you don’t want to bulk up, I recommend not using weights at all, weights are supposed to make you bulk up, no matter how low. But to keep your muscles toned and in shape, you can run, or do regular exercises not involving weights. I personally like tennis, crunches, push ups, etc. They are all good to keep your body toned up without bulking up. Hope I was of help.
January 8th, 2010 at 6:24 am
Well, it’s difficult to maintain strength without pushing your muscles.
I would say it’s very possible to control the bulking with your diet.
Ultimately, if you take away the calories, no matter what you do, you won’t be able to build muscle. You’ll even start to lose bulk as your body will be breaking down your muscle tissue for fuel.
If you controlled your diet but increased the weight, I guarantee you would get better results without gaining weight.
Precision dieting takes a lot of hard work and experimentation mind, but it would definitely work.
A good example of this: I was reading Rennulf Fiennes, the Arctic explorer’s autobiography, and they showed a picture of him at the end of an expedition in the antarctic. It was truly shocking how gaunt he looked. He very much resembled a skeleton. He must have been medically on the very edge of death from being underweight.
Yet he was still capable of man hauling a 450lb sledge across Antarctica, which he describes as being “like dragging a bathtub filled with three fully grown men across the Saharah desert five times in a row”.
So I would say refusing to use more weight is very much closing a door you haven’t properly looked through yet.
Also losing *some* strength with age is inevitable.
I would say the best you could do without using heavier weights would be stay active, keep doing what you’re doing and the strength loss will be minimized as best as possible.