Possessing the biggest muscles doesn’t make you the strongest athlete!
Keith Baar is a molecular biologist studying how the body responds to training. As he explains, the last 10 years have seen a number of discoveries that are changing the way we train for strength
The last ten years have seen a huge increase in our understanding of what makes a muscle bigger and reminded us that a bigger muscle isn’t always a stronger muscle. This research directly affects how and when we train and what and when we eat in relation to training.
Immune system and muscle growth
Over the years, we’ve learnt that in order for muscle to grow normally we need an intact immune system. Strength athletes that take anti-inflammatory drugs might do more than dull the pain after a hard workout. By decreasing inflammation, we might actually be preventing normal muscle growth in response to resistance exercise. Research shows that our immune system is needed to increase muscle mass, which means that strength athletes should stay away from anti-inflammatories during training.
Hormones and muscle mass
In the noughties, Dr Espen Spangenburg conducted research that showed neither insulin nor IGF-I is needed to increase muscle mass and strength. Together with other research in this area, these findings suggest that most hormones aren’t important in training-induced changes in muscle size and strength.
This statement is still quite controversial.
Obviously, hormones play an important role in how big and strong our muscles are and how big and strong they can get, but we are learning that hormones are not as important as we once believed.
For instance, we have known for 15 years that IGF-I can make muscles bigger. As a result, a number of high profile athletes have used insulin and IGF-I to try to increase their muscle mass and strength. However, what Dr Spangenburg showed was that even though IGF-I and insulin were important in determining the size of muscles before training, the amount of increase in muscle mass and strength was the same in mice who had no insulin and IGF-I present naturally as those who had these hormones present.
This is similar to testosterone. We know that testosterone determines that on average a man’s muscles will be bigger than a woman’s muscles. However, we also know that men and women increase their strength the same amount through training. This means that testosterone is not needed to increase muscle strength in response to training but instead sets the upper limit of muscle size.
Testosterone, IGF-I and similar hormones determine how big our muscles are before we start training. But it is now becoming clear that hormones don’t affect how much muscle mass we can add through training.
This should reassure strength athletes that hard training and proper nutrition are all that they need to gain muscle mass and strength!
courtesy of WWW.PPKONLINE.COM
