As a natural-for-life bodybuilder I need to gain every advantage and explore every option possible when trying to build muscle. This means that any training/nutritional strategy that I can implement that will force my system into an anabolic state has to be utilized consistently if I have any chance of pushing my physique to greater levels of drug-free development.

One of the best methods I have found for inducing new growth is the use of "stretch under tension". Now, I must warn you that this is no ordinary form of stretching, and is not part of any kind of warm-up or cool-down from exercise. Rather, it is a vital part of your actual workout! What you need to do to make use of this technique is to pick one exercise per workout (for each muscle group that you are training) that has a strong stretch component. Some examples would be DB flyes for chest, seated cable rows for lats, sissy squats for quads, stiff leg deadlifts for hams, and overhead DB extensions for triceps. Now, instead of performing the movement at a normal rep cadence you will utilize a tempo of 2/4/X, which means lowering the weight slowly over 2 seconds, holding the deep stretch for 4 seconds, and then exploding (with control) out of the bottom using only muscular power (no cheating or jerking). By doing this you will be forcing the muscle to undergo an intense and exaggerated stretch using the tension that the weight provides, which has been shown to stimulate both the natural release of the powerful growth hormones IGF-1/MGF and the proliferation of satellite cells! These are absolutely essential ingredients in the process that leads to efficient and rapid muscle hypertrophy! So, you now have your mission... stretch to grow!