As I was reading a recent Reddit post about a young guy with a brilliant transformation in just 4 months, I was reminded of just how counterintuitive things can be for many people.

There is a common assumption that this dude must live at the gym or work out all the time. A few responses, though, had correctly attributed it to what he had done right and that made the biggest impact. What he ate.

But why do we often think that building muscle happens in the gym?

The actual muscle growth happens outside of the gym. While lifting and being active is a crucial part of the equation, it’s not the whole story. As anyone that has tried to bulk up will tell you, they could spend hours upon hours at the gym and get little to no results. Unless their diet was on point.

So if it’s well-understood, why is the misconception still there? It’s because it’s easy to not do something if you think it’s too much work. You’ve probably heard it yourself.

“I don’t have the discipline to go the gym.”

“I don’t have the time it takes to get those results.”

The assumption is that it’s the hard work of going to the gym, lifting big weights for hours and hours, and pushing your body to the limits. The truth is that, yes it does take a bit of work, but it’s not as hard as most people think. The hardest thing is understanding what’s actually happening.

The reality is a lot more scientific.

If you’re really interested in the science, a useful article by Morton et al., (2015) is a good and not too heavy read. There are some pretty good intake recommendations too.

The gist of it is that growing muscle means building up muscle proteins faster than you break them down. And this process is most sensitive to nutrition. Couple that protein synthesis with resistive exercise and you’ll be surprised how quickly those chiselled muscles build up.

So if you’re looking to get bigger muscles, never forget about the most important thing. Eating the right building blocks your body needs to start the construction process.

And if you’re looking to really get down into it (i.e., how limiting amino acids work and how to stimulate muscle hypertrophy), stop by and speak with our nutrition coach, Lyle. The science behind growing muscles was a big part of his graduate studies so he’s a big nerd about this stuff!

Morton, R. W., McGlory, C., & Phillips, S. M. (2015). Nutritional interventions to augment resistance training-induced skeletal muscle hypertrophy. Frontiers in physiology, 6, 245.