Table of contents

1. Introduction
2. Are you a fitness beginner?
3. Are you sleeping enough?
4. Patience and consistency!
5. Do not forget to warm up
6. Train the right muscle groups at the beginning
7. Make sure you get enough recovery!
8. Always pay attention to nutrition!
9. Create a training plan
10. The right repetition range!
11. Avoid alcohol
12. Complete basic exercises
13. Our conclusion

The number of visitors in fitness studios is increasing rapidly and the interest in weight training and bodybuilding continues to grow year after year.

This is evidenced not only by the rapidly growing number of visitors to the Fitness and Bodybuilding Trade Show (FIBO) in Cologne (Germany), which set a new record with almost 100,000 visitors interested in sports and fitness.

Training goals such as muscle building, more strength and power, as well as increased fat burning or weight reduction are most frequently mentioned by gym visitors. However, many fitness newcomers often start their fitness training without a plan and without having informed themselves in advance about targeted training, let alone about the right diet.

Fitness beginners often believe that “a lot is worth a lot”. However, this is not true and will not help you to build up muscles or strength or to burn unwanted body fat! Especially at the beginning of training, fitness beginners with the necessary knowledge can make the best progress. False ambition or incorrectly performed fitness training can not only deprive you of the desired success, but also lead to serious injuries and overtraining with all its consequences for your health.

A fitness beginner is broadly defined as an individual who has been doing regular fitness training for less than 6 months. As a beginner, pay particular attention to learning a clean technique and execution of movement. False ambition is out of place here. Your joints, tendons, muscles and ligaments need time to get used to the new strain.

We want to make it easier for you to get started with fitness training with our 10 tips and advice and help you avoid the most common initial mistakes!

Athletes who struggle to build muscle often don’t recover as well as other athletes. If you don’t get enough sleep every night, it will significantly hinder your progress. You should get at least seven, preferably eight hours of sleep. If you immediately start training again before the recovery period is over, your body will be put under even more strain and muscle building will be prevented – this is not the goal. Pause, rest, regenerate and build muscle is the name of the game!

Note: We recommend 7-8 hours of sleep per night for optimal training results.

Building muscle takes time, just like losing fat, whether you find it easy or not. It requires patience, consistency and a lot of work. It’s an uphill battle. If your progress stagnates after a few months of training, you can increase the training weights, add new exercises to your training plan and optimise your diet. Just don’t give up! If you increase or reduce calories according to your goal (muscle gain or fat loss) and increase the intensity of your training, you will see more results!

Remember: Even if things don’t go so well, stay consistent and disciplined. The success will come all by itself.

Always start by warming up the muscles, as warm muscles with a good blood supply can absorb stimuli more quickly. Use one of the many cardio machines to warm up in your gym. At home, a skipping rope or jumping jack exercises are ideal for warming up the entire body quickly and improving blood circulation. Another effective and additional warm-up method is to do 1-2 very easy sets of 15-20 repetitions in the initial exercise. For example, bench press with the empty bar. Such warm-up sets or exercises can save you from painful injuries or muscle tears!

Remember: 5-10 minutes of relaxed warm-up before every workout is mandatory!

Always start by training the large muscle groups such as back, legs and chest! Thigh, latsimus or chest exercises are particularly suitable for a quick muscle build-up. When training these muscle groups, you automatically train smaller muscle groups such as biceps, triceps or shoulders. If you train your biceps first and then your back muscles, they will not be able to give one hundred percent because your biceps are already tired. Since the biceps are involved in the pulling exercises, the maximum weight can no longer be moved or used.

Remember: Always train large muscle groups first and then small ones!

In the meantime, it has been established that muscle growth can only be sustainable if there is sufficient time for regeneration. Therefore, always wait at least 48 hours or even more (which is especially recommended for beginners) before intensively training the same muscle again.

Sufficient sleep is also important for regeneration, as muscle regeneration is most effective in a long period of deep sleep. Remember that the muscle does not grow during training, but during the phase in which you regenerate, i.e. recover.

Remember: With training you only give your muscle the stimulus to grow, the actual growth takes place during regeneration.

Muscles grow especially fast with an effective combination of training and nutrition! Always make sure you eat high-quality food, which consists of sufficient protein (fish, meat, eggs, low-fat dairy products and protein powders), carbohydrates (wholemeal rice, wholemeal pasta, oatmeal) and lots of vegetables and healthy fats (coconut oil, olive oil, almonds).

It is also important to eat small meals frequently, as muscle building requires lots and lots of energy. The onset of hunger is an important sign that your muscles need new energy and building blocks in the form of protein. Check the internet or fitness magazines for the latest information on healthy nutrition for strength athletes, as these tips and advice are constantly changing due to new scientific research results, or have an individual nutrition plan created for you by our Sportnahrung Engel coaches.

Note: The importance of nutrition for training goals such as muscle building or fat loss is about 70%!

It is very important for beginners to create an individual training plan for your muscle build-up that specifies exactly on which days you want to train which muscles. When creating the plan, make sure that you never train the same muscles one after the other, but alternate muscle groups and exercises on the next training day.

It is best to get help in creating a plan from a professional before you copy a plan from a professional bodybuilder that will not get you anywhere or even lead you to overtraining!

If you train with too low a repetition range, the muscle build-up cannot be optimally developed. If you train in too high a repetition range, the desired muscle build-up cannot take place optimally either! We recommend you train in a repetition range of 8-12 repetitions! From time to time you can reduce the number of repetitions to 6-8 for basic exercises such as bench press, squats or pull-ups and increase to 15 repetitions for isolation exercises such as butterfly!

Note: 8-12 repetitions per set is considered optimal for muscle building.

If you train with too low a repetition range, the muscle build-up cannot be optimally developed. If you train in too high a repetition range, the desired muscle build-up cannot take place optimally either! We recommend you train in a repetition range of 8-12 repetitions! From time to time you can reduce the number of repetitions to 6-8 for basic exercises such as bench press, squats or pull-ups and increase to 15 repetitions for isolation exercises such as butterfly!

Note: 8-12 repetitions per set is considered optimal for muscle building.

Alcoholic drinks have a high number of bad calories, slow down your metabolism and interfere with your hormone balance! Alcohol also contains substances that lower protein synthesis and testosterone levels!

Basic exercises in weight training are squat, bench press and deadlift. With these 3 exercises you train several muscle groups at once.

With the squat it is muscle groups such as the quadriceps, leg biceps, gluteus as well as the lower back and trunk muscles. With the bench press it is the chest muscles, shoulder muscles and triceps muscles as well as the core muscles. With the deadlift exercise you train your entire lower body as well as the back muscles. The arms and shoulders are also involved. Basic exercises should always be done at the beginning of the workout!

With these 10 tips and advice, it should be easier for you as a fitness beginner to get started in the world of fitness training. Maybe these 10 tips will also answer some of your questions on their own. Follow these tips and advice and nothing will stand in your way of building muscle. Go for the iron – and do it right!

If you train with the necessary discipline and regularly follow our 10 training tips for beginners, you will certainly achieve the desired success quickly. In summary, the components training, nutrition and regeneration (sleep) are by far the most important pillars.

It is also recommended to avoid stimulants such as alcohol and nicotine, as these can not only have a negative impact on your health, but also on training results such as muscle building and fat burning.