Why Muscles Aren't Growing: Free Weights vs. Machines - Understanding This Key Point
Hello everyone! I'm your loser editor, Fireman. For many beginner fitness enthusiasts, it's important to prioritize using free weights for training. Nowadays, technology is very developed, and the fitness equipment produced are much better than in the past. However, according to human evolution, human muscles are used to overcome gravity, not to overcome resistance produced by machinery. So, to make muscles bigger, you should do weight training. Such as dumbbells or barbells, rather than relying on machinery.
According to statistics, most bodybuilding champions used to be involved in weightlifting. They forced muscles to coordinate and balance the weight of the barbell. Training with light weights and multiple times cannot make muscles grow. In large muscle groups free weight training, such as deadlifts and squats, a large number of muscles are simultaneously used and stabilized, which increases testosterone. Isolated equipment training or free weights cannot produce the same level of testosterone. Testosterone helps us synthesize muscle, and the more testosterone in the body, the easier it is to synthesize muscle.
Fitness is not just about making muscles stronger or bigger; it's also important to develop the overall shape of muscles. Free weight training allows fitness enthusiasts to isolate specific muscles at will through various creative ideas and constantly exercise their bodies. Free weights can also accommodate people of different heights, different weights, and different body proportions, such as long arms, short arms, long legs, and short legs, to achieve complete exercise effects. Many equipment are just designed to meet the needs of the average customers in a commercial sense.
I don't oppose using fitness equipment. Most of the equipment are the essence of technology. Fitness equipment has experienced wind resistance and water-blocking periods, and now they have returned to their original design but are a thousand times better. The top technology requires tremendous effort to produce excellent and easy-to-use equipment. A long time ago, someone welded a few simple iron bars together to make equipment. If you can't operate it smoothly and the movements aren't standard, it's likely to break down in three or two days. This era has already disappeared.
Actually, without leg extension or leg curl equipment, it's impossible to develop perfect quadriceps. Or without chest press and lat pulldown equipment, it's impossible to isolate the inner chest muscles completely. If you occasionally use equipment training to replace your body's accustomed free weight training to stimulate muscle growth, the muscle growth rate will increase. A good fitness plan includes up to 30% or 40% equipment training. Of course, using barbells or dumbbells for barbell rows is better because they can better independently and stimulate the biceps. But if you don't use lat pulldown to train the back latissimus dorsi or don't use lat pulldown to press triceps, it's difficult to achieve the desired effect.
Moreover, the resistance of fitness equipment is always along a horizontal plane. This means that muscles must exert force in the way that the equipment requires, otherwise there is no effect. However, this resistance doesn't require muscle control and coordination, so fewer muscles are stimulated. Strength training's essence is to use as many muscles as possible. Therefore, equipment has no advantage.
Muscles become stronger by resisting gravity. If we lived on the moon, the muscles we need would be only 1/6 of those on Earth. Because Earth's gravity is greater. But if we lived on Jupiter, our muscles would be like elephants to walk. When we lift things, we feel the sensation of weight. But when we push an object along a track or push against a wall, the situation is different. It's about resistance, not gravity. This means that muscles are actively cooperating.
If we don't have the free weights we want at the training location, we can't change anything. So, use whatever you can use to complete your training. The principle is to complete the training. Africans can develop strong muscles without any advanced equipment. Any available thing can work. As a fitness enthusiast, this is what we should care about.
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