What Is Myofibrillar Hypertrophy?
If you are thinking about building your muscles, then you have probably heard the term myofibrillar hypertrophy. In definition, the term is used to describe muscle fibers becoming abnormally large. But, fitness enthusiasts just refer to it as muscle growth. If increased strength is the focus of your long-term fitness goals, this may be an option that you really want to consider.
What Is Myofibrillar Hypertrophy?
It is what occurs when the muscle cell fibers increase in size and strength.
Another way to build bigger muscles is through sarcoplasmic hypertrophy, which focuses on increasing the volume of the muscle cell fluids, such as water, glycogen, and minerals, over the muscle cell fiber.
“When you are focusing on building muscle mass, that type of muscle growth is known as “Sarcoplasmic Hypertrophy.” What this means is that your muscles will fill up with fluid.” – Fitness B&W
The Benefits Of Myofibrillar Hypertrophy
Myofibrillar hypertrophy may not build as big of muscles that sarcopasmic hypertrophy does, but it does create stronger muscles. This is why bodybuilders with a ton of muscle have less overall strength than people who have built up their muscle fibers. When you build stronger and more dense muscle fibers, your performance improves and you are able to lift heavier weights.
This doesn’t mean that you don’t build muscle. You still build the attractive looking muscles that make you look strong, healthy, and fit. In fact, for many people, that is a huge benefit of myofibrillar hypertrophy and why many programs like SpecForce Alpha focus more so on it. You don’t get the big puffy muscles. While some people find the big muscles aesthetically more pleasing, many people would rather just have stronger muscles than big muscles.
The Drawback Of Myofibrillar Hypertrophy
This process will take a lot longer to show results because, until it is necessary, the size of your muscle cells will not increase. This is why people who want to show off their muscles may not want to focus solely on myofibrillar hypertrophy and, instead, try to also build the volume of the muscle cell fluid.
How To Build The Strong But Non-Puffy Muscles
Lifting heavy weights with very low reps is the best way to increase the muscle fiber. When you lift very heavy weights, you overload your muscle fibers and apply trauma to them. Your body sees this as an injury and then tries to ensure that you don’t go through the injury again by building more and stronger muscle fibers. To continue this process, you have to continue overloading your muscle fibers.
It is important that you focus on adequate nutrition and rest during this time. If you do not provide your body with both of those during the time that the muscle growth is actually occurring, then it cannot build more muscle fibers or stronger muscle fibers correctly.
“This adaption, however, does not happen while you actually lift the weights. Instead, it occurs while you rest.” – Built Lean
It is also important to note that as you build new muscle cell fibers, you will also build up your muscle cell fluid a bit as well. You cannot totally just build one without the other. However, most of the gain in the muscle will be in the fibers and not the fluid.
It All Depends On Your Goal
If your long-term goal is to build strength, then you will want to focus on myofibrillar hypertrophy. Some people combine lifting techniques to create a strong but well-defined muscle. The end results is a muscle that will still not be as strong if you were to focus on myofibrillar hypertrophy only.
