Training for Muscle Tone Instead of Muscle Mass

There is a huge difference between Muscle Tone and Muscle Mass. It can be very tempting to try to bulk up your muscles but it is better by far to concentrate on building muscle tone. In the following artcle by Rusty Moore he discusses best way to work on getting Muscle tone and the type of Exercises and reps you should be doing.

 

The approach between building mass and tone is extremely different. When you are shooting for mass, you are purposely trying to damage the muscle with a high volume of lifts…then you need to rest that muscle for a long enough period of time so it repairs itself. When you are going for muscle tone you want a lower volume of lifts each workout, but you want to work each muscle group more often.

So How Many Sets for Muscle Tone?

Contrary to popular belief, you want to keep the volume low when you are shooting for muscle tone. If the volume gets to high, you will damage the muscle and will be unable to work it frequently. I would recommend 2 Exercises per body part and just 3-4 sets.

How Many Reps in Each Set?

Very few people understand how effective low reps are for muscle tone. Low reps create harder contractions and over time, your muscle will display better tone. Feel free to include medium to high reps, but make sure you don't neglect heavier low rep training as well. Gaining strength at a low body fat level is a great way to look ripped!

Why Work The Muscles Frequently When Going For Tone?

This is one of the big keys to muscle tone, that I never hear personal trainers talk about. Muscle tone is basically the partial contraction of a muscle in a relaxed state, so your muscles are contacting a bit on their own even when you are completely relaxed. The way to increase this is to contract you muscles hard (workout) on a frequent basis. There are two reasons you want to avoid damaging your muscles. The first is that if you are sore, you will over-train if you work that muscle again too soon. The second is that you will be unable to get a hard contraction on a damaged muscle.

Avoid Going to Failure or Using Forced Reps When Toning Your Muscles

If you do a set to failure you are essentially "training your muscle to fail". This induces a large amount of damage, which is great for muscle mass but bad for muscle tone. Training for tone is similar to training for strength. Elite power-lifters rarely train to failure for the reason stated above. The problem is that your muscle will not contract as hard the following set. You want hard contractions when going for tone, so don't train to failure and don't even think of doing forced reps.

Here is Common Mass Building Split Routine

The "3 day split" is a common routine for muscle mass because it works well. A 3 day split simply means that all the muscles in your body are worked in 3 different workouts. So what a lot of people do is work chest, shoulders, and triceps on one day…back and biceps on another day…and legs and Abs on the third day. The great thing here is that since you are working only a few body parts in each workout, you can focus on blitzing each muscle group. You can really do a high volume of lifts for each muscle group which is the key to mass.

Muscle Tone Works Better With a "2 Day Split"

Since you want to work each muscle group more often when going for tone, you should try to split you workout over two days instead of three. The great thing here is that you don't need much recovery time when you don't damage the muscles.

Note: So you should have a good idea on how to setup a great workout routine. Remember, if you are going for tone, keep the volume of lifting low and work each muscle frequently. Since your time in the weight room should be brief, spend the extra time hitting cardio hard to burn off all that excess body fat to reveal your toned muscles.

 

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