The training state of the subjects enrolled in the study has a major outcome on muscle growth results. Untrained subjects or people who have never lifted weights will make greater gains in strength and muscle growth than well-trained athletes. Untrained subjects, or what the industry calls newbies, make unbelievable gains in strength and muscle size when exercising.
NEWBIE GAINS: HOW LONG DO NEWBIE GAINS LAST SUMMARY
- Newbie gains or those who have just started working out make incredible gains in strength and lean mass compared to advanced athletes.
- Trained athletes will have a much harder time increasing muscle growth because there is a “ceiling effect” they are reaching.
- When reading a research paper. Make sure the study used trained athletes to make an accurate comparison of the study results.
WHAT ARE NEWBIE GAINS?
The training state of the subjects enrolled in the study has a major outcome on muscle growth results. Untrained subjects or people who have never lifted weights will make greater gains in strength and muscle growth than well-trained athletes.
Untrained subjects, or what the industry calls newbies, make unbelievable gains in strength and muscle size when exercising. When untrained athletes first begin weight training, the first few weeks of resistance training result in large increases in strength, mainly increased through neurological adaptations (the nervous system learns a new movement), while gains after that are primarily because of increases in muscle. (1,2) Newbie gains 3 months into a new training program make incredible gains in strength and lean muscle mass compared to a advanced athlete who has been training for several years.
It’s like watching a new baby learn to walk because he is trying to teach his nervous system to coordinate with his muscles to move. The same process takes place when you are starting to lift weights. You are teaching your body an entirely new movement pattern which it must learn.
Remember when you first started working out, your strength seemed to skyrocket? Well, that’s because your nervous system adapts and enhances neural pathways in your muscles. The nervous system can increase muscle strength in response to resistance exercise by increasing the speed of the impulse or the strength of the impulse.(3) Strength increases result from your nervous system’s ability to perform an exercise movement better.
MUSCLE GAINS FOR ADVANCED ATHLETES ARE SLOW
It’s not uncommon for untrained subjects to achieve as much as 40% strength gains. However, trained and elite trained athletes can make strength gains of ~16% and 2%, respectively. (4) Untrained subjects’ muscles grow quickly due to starting a new program. This is commonly called Newbie Gains.
NEWBIE GAINS BEFORE AND AFTER
Untrained athletes have greater increases in muscle protein synthesis, whereas trained athletes have a dampened effect. For trained athletes, it’s much more challenging to gain muscle. There is a “ceiling effect” for trained athletes; they reach the upper limit of muscle growth mainly due to genetics and a dampened anabolic response to resistance exercise, so gaining muscle is much more challenging. After a period of months, newbies also experience a dampening effect in protein synthesis and gains in lean muscle and strength similar to advanced athletes.
KEY POINTS
- Trained athletes will have a much harder time increasing muscle growth because there is a “ceiling effect” they are reaching.
REFERENCES
- T. Moritani and H. A. deVries, “Neural Factors versus Hypertrophy in the Time Course of Muscle Strength Gain,” American Journal of Physical Medicine 58, no. 3 (June 1979): 115–30.
- Per Aagaard et al., “Increased Rate of Force Development and Neural Drive of Human Skeletal Muscle Following Resistance Training,” Journal of Applied Physiology (Bethesda, Md.: 1985) 93, no. 4 (October 2002): 1318–26.
- Thomas R Baechle, Roger W Earle, and National Strength & Conditioning Association (U.S.), Essentials of Strength Training and Conditioning (Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics, 2008).
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