If you’ve spent any time in the bookstore browsing through magazine articles on bodybuilding, you’ve no doubt come across some pretty strong claims about how the latest supplement fad can provide you with unbelievable results. You may have also seen some recommendations on improving your workout technique and other such advice.

What was probably missing from the discussion is the importance of a solid recovery phase when embarking on a new strength training or bodybuilding program. If you seem to spend all your time in the gym without making any progress, or if your initial muscle gains have reached a plateau, take a moment to think about your recovery plans (or lack thereof).

If you know how muscle grows in the first place, you should understand why a recovery period is so important. It has to do with our body’s basic need to survive. If you want muscle to grow, you have to challenge it beyond its previous limits. By lifting heavier and heavier weights, the muscles will grow in response to these challenges.

In fact, the muscle fibers are actually being broke down at the cellular level. The body rebuilds these muscle fibers in order to prevent the situation from happening again. This is why you continually have to increase your weights if you want your muscles to get bigger and bigger.

If you don’t give muscles rest in between your workouts, they will not be ready the next time you put them under stress. If you continue to work out without giving your muscles rest, you will really hurt your progress.

As a matter of fact, some well known muscle building experts recommend only training a few hours per week. Too many people go way over this because they think that more is always better.

Along with simply having a pause in between your workout sessions, you need to make sure that you’re getting plenty of sleep as well. Sleeping, not just resting or taking it easy, is crucial for muscle growth to occur as effectively as possible.

Sleep helps the body repair itself, which is absolutely relevant to the topic of muscle building. Your muscles need to be rebuilt bigger and stronger, and proper recovery methods are crucial to help this happen.

If you are trying to build muscle, there are exercises that can help you get the most out of your workouts. Some moves are definitely more effective than others in helping you achieve your goal.

What are the keys to building muscle and keeping it on?

1. Supersets work complementary muscles one right after the other.

To get the best results from your workout, make them short and difficult. Building muscle is not about marathon-length exercise sessions but about challenging your muscles.

Supersetting is the best way to exercise for muscle building. When you superset, you do two exercises consecutively and skip the rest periods.

Supersetting involves working two different muscle groups. In between sets, there is a very short rest period. The benefits are that you work more muscle in less time and reduce your risk of injury because the strain any given muscle or tendon is less intense.

An example of a superset is pairing bicep curls with tricep kickbacks. You can also work back and chest muscles together or quads and hamstrings. You will see results more quickly and make your workouts much more efficient and safe.

2. Increase workout intensity with compound exercises.

Building muscle fast requires very intense, very difficult exercises for the body. The good news is that your workouts are shorter ? only about 35-40 minutes.

A great way to both increase your intensity and see results is to use compound exercises, in which more than one muscle is required to do the move. Some examples are:

* Walking lunge with overhead press

* Completing a pushup with side planks

* Pairing squats with overhead presses

* Doing lunges with bicep curls

* Executing pushups with one armed rows

Compound exercises help you improve balance and coordination and functional fitness, as well as reduce your risk of injury. Your workouts will be much more efficient, which means you will see results sooner.

3. Rest to allow muscles time to rebuild.

It is important to build rest into your workout routines. Your muscles develop when you are resting, not when you are working them.

Daily workouts or working the same muscles in consecutive workouts causes your muscle building efforts to stagnate. You are not giving your muscles the chance to grow.

Try this routine for effective muscle building:

* Exercise only three days per week.

* Assign each part of the body one day (shoulders, triceps, and shoulders on day one, back and biceps on day two, and legs on day three).

* Build in rest periods.

* Start over again!

Working out according to a schedule like this can help you build muscle more effectively and keep your body injury-free.

When you add supersets, compound moves, and rest into your workout, you will be able to build muscle fast. These are the most effective means of increasing your workouts’ potency.