Muscle building programs are mostly created by weight lifters who have discovered “their way” to building big muscles.

However, in some cases these muscle building programs don’t work. Why?

Here are 4 reasons why the programs may not have worked.

#1: Your Program Isn’t Working Every Muscle

Have you ever trained on weight lifting machine? They only work one muscle. These machines are a major reason why the programs do not work. They don’t give the ability to develop many muscles together, which would be the best way to train. Free weights let you do compound exercises, letting you build many muscles at once. You will be able to perform squats and dead lifts which will be very beneficial to many muscles. Using free weights allows you to develop stability and also strengthen your joints. They are all around better for you.

#2: The Workout Time is Not Spent Effectively

You may have received your program from someone who was using the program daily, for hours on end, that may have lived in the gym daily. If you are looking for the short program, an hour or less for a few times a week, this program will take you that much longer in order to develop the goods. You need to find something that will be beneficial no matter how much time you have. This could be solved by using more weight with less reps and sets. This is much faster and more beneficial than those long, muscle straining programs out there that work your muscles to death and leave you in pain the for the next two days.

#3: You are Not Incorporating Enough Intensity

A good muscle building program should have a high amount of weight, while using less reps and sets. Programs using 50% of your one rep max are a waste of time. Your target should be to life around 80-85% of your 1 rep max. If you use less weight, you will see slight improvement until the improvements will stop. Its like your body will have become immune to lifting such a small amount of weight.

#4: Get Enough Rest

When you workout, remember to leave time between exercises to let your body settle and start to rebuild. Rushing to your next exercise will not benefit you, and ultimately might hurt you as it will strain the muscles.

When you are done with your workout, make some time to rest and take a nap. You just put your body through hard work and now it needs time to cool down and rebuild. At night, make sure you are achieving 8+ hours of sleep, if possible. Relax anytime during the day and make sure to keep a low stress environment, which is best for fast muscle growth.

If you want to hear more tips to having a good muscle building program, check out: DoubleYourGains’ 3-5 Beginners Strength Program.