Muscle mass doesn’t grow simply because the weight on the bar keeps going up. Dave Wiemann learned this the hard way: 2.5 years of training, yet only modest results. It wasn’t until he met bodybuilding legend Paul Dillett that he understood what was missing.
Why doesn’t muscle mass grow even though you train hard?
Most bodybuilders do workouts that are too heavy, too often. It sounds paradoxical, but it’s true. When the weight is too heavy, assisting muscle groups have to step in — the target muscle doesn’t actually do the full work and therefore doesn’t get the full dose of growth stimulus.
Before meeting Paul Dillett, Dave Wiemann put the main emphasis on lifting heavy weights. “According to most people, that’s how you get big,” he admits. Paul proved the opposite to him — by using a light weight instead of a regular barbell and rotating the wrists and forearms in a certain way, it was possible to fully isolate and exhaust the deltoid. Unbelievable: even though the weights were tiny, they felt like a ton with Paul’s method.
How muscle mass really grows
Paul Dillett himself was once tall and bony. He, too, believed at first that heavy weight was the only way. His main influences — Joe Weider and Lee Haney — showed him a different mindset: intensity doesn’t mean maximum weight, but maximum connection with the muscle.
People were often surprised at how lightly and how rarely Paul trains. Sometimes, when he felt he didn’t want to work out, he would simply walk out of the gym. Muscle mass grows when training is targeted and feel-based — not when the body is wiped out every time.
Exercises: deltoids, triceps and legs
Deltoids
- Stand between the cable stacks and do a cable crossover — sit down on the bench and bring your arms up across the front of your body until the muscles reach maximum contraction.
- To reach maximum contraction, you don’t need to bring your arms all the way behind your body. A partial range of motion is enough.
- Keep the muscles working with continuous repetitions — don’t pause.
Triceps
The cable pushdown is very well suited to building overall triceps mass:
- Grip the bar with moderate firmness.
- Bring the bar down to chest height and press your forearms against your sides.
- Push your forearms down and lock the weight out in the bottom position.
- Hold the peak triceps contraction for a second or two.
- Simply rotating the wrist isolates the inner, outer and medial heads.
- Let your forearms slowly rise to chest height and repeat.
Legs
- On the leg press, sometimes all it takes is changing your toe position to shift the training load to the inner or outer side.
- Use only as much weight as lets you keep good form and still fully exhaust the muscle.
- Never finish in the bottom position.
- Make every repetition controlled and slow.
- Feel the muscle working — focus mentally on the specific muscle area and isolate it from the others.
- Don’t count repetitions. Go all the way to the muscle burn.
Paul Dillett distilled his philosophy into seven principles:
- Reduce the weights you’ve been using.
- Use excellent form.
- Always go all the way to the muscle burn.
- Don’t count repetitions — forget about them altogether. What matters is building the muscle, not stopping after a set number of repetitions.
- Train by feel. If you can’t feel a certain movement on a given day, do other exercises that day.
- Experiment and find the exercises that work best for your body and your goals.
- Be patient. Paul didn’t come close to getting this big in one year. Building a big physique takes time — you can’t rush it.
FAQ: muscle mass and isolation training
Do light weights really help with muscle building?
Yes — provided the muscle is fully isolated and works in a controlled way through the entire range of motion. The feeling in the muscle matters more than the weight on the bar.
How many repetitions should you do?
Repetitions aren’t counted. Train until the muscle burns — that’s the only measure that truly counts.
How long does muscle building take?
It took Paul Dillett himself years. Building a big physique takes time and consistency — rushing leads to injuries and disappointment rather than results.
Let’s build muscle mass for real! ArtGym
Author: From the magazine “Atleet”, joker
Source: WHO – physical activity.
