What are the differences between male fitness and muscle gain

Essentially, the relationship between the two is that of inclusion and being included. All active exercises with the purpose of improving physical condition and improving physical fitness belong to the category of male fitness, while muscle gain is only a highly directional subdivision goal in the field of fitness. The core is to increase muscle mass and shape muscle lines through systematic resistance training, nutrition control, and work and rest adjustments.

Last week I met a 99-year-old guy in the weight area of the gym who had just applied for a membership. He grabbed me and asked me, "Brother, I want to keep fit. Do I need to start taking protein powder now and train for 2 hours a day?" Isn't this a typical example of confusing muscle building with ordinary fitness.

When it comes to daily actions, the flexibility between the two is too different. If you have a lumbar prolapse due to sitting for a long time, or your blood lipids are a bit high during physical examination, you can go to the swimming pool three days a week and swim 1,000 meters, or dance for 40 minutes with an exercise class, or even walk around the park for half an hour after get off work. This is all serious fitness. The goal is to be comfortable and healthy. You don’t have to count how much protein you have eaten today, and you don’t have to force yourself to squat until you can’t get down the stairs. Just stretch your whole body after moving.

But if you are rushing to gain muscle, you won’t have such freedom. A little brother I took care of a while ago wanted to be able to hold up his cuffs when wearing a T-shirt in the summer, so he went to achieve the goal of increasing his arm circumference by 3cm. He ate 1.8g of protein per kilogram of body weight every day for 3 months in a row. He even counted the egg whites and yolks of the eggs he ate in the morning. During arm training, he pressed down the rope for each set. The last two movements were so shaky that he couldn't hold the handles, and he couldn't hold his watch for more than 45 seconds between sets. His arm circumference did increase from 32 to 35 in two months. But in the middle of the day when he went out to dinner with friends, he had to bring his own boiled chicken breasts, fearing that too many calories would be added to the cooking oil. If this was an ordinary fitness exercise, this would not happen.

Nowadays, many people in the fitness circle are arguing about this matter. Some people think that "if a man does not build muscle when he is exercising, then he is exercising in vain? If he practices for half a year, there will be no trace at all, and it is equivalent to wasted exercise." There is also another group of people who think that fitness is just to relax. Playing basketball for half an hour after get off work and climbing a mountain on the weekend is also fitness. It is not necessary to stick to the weight and calories, but it will take away the fun of exercise. In fact, there is nothing wrong with both of these statements. They just have different demands for fitness. There is no saying that one is higher than the other.

To be honest, I sometimes feel that regular fitness is like going out for a walk after a meal. Where you go and how fast you walk all depends on your mood. Comfort is the most important. Building muscle is like orienteering. The route, supplies, and pace must be planned in advance. If you go towards a clear end point, you may not achieve the desired results. I'm afraid that many people are new to sports and haven't figured out what they want, so they are misled by the Internet sayings that "fitness must have traces of training" and "men must have muscles". Originally they just want to move to loosen their muscles and bones, but they have to force themselves to follow the standards of muscle gain. In the end, they feel sore all over and don't feel accomplished. Instead, they don't want to move. Isn't this putting the cart before the horse?