The bodybuilding world is all about lifting weights, doing crunches, push ups and taking muscle building supplements. You will hardly ever find the word cardio in their daily fitness routine because doing aerobic is seen as wastage of your time which you could have used for more useful muscle gaining exercises like weight lifting. But, not many bodybuilders are aware about the importance of cardio to gain muscles and that doing high intensity cardio in smarter way can actually help you in the process of gaining muscles faster.
Most of the muscle builders think that running a lot of miles in their treadmill for a long time is one of the best cardio for your body but there are also other ways to reap its benefits without wasting your day off running over a moving belt. I have mentioned here a few cardio that will help your overall body and also aid in the process of muscle building through heavy and intense workout sessions:
Recuperation or recovery
This type of cardio mainly involves cycling, walking, jogging and stair climbing. It increases blood flow to the working muscles very efficiently. This action helps in recovering from the high intensity strength training that you carry out during your workout sessions. So, allowing your muscles to recover through cardio is a great way to help build muscles more efficiently.
Alactic intervals
High intensity interval training
High intensity interval training, also known as aerobic and anaerobic interval training involves conditioning exercises of intense variations. This involves longer and harder sprints that can be carried out by running or cycling intensively on an exercise bike. It is then followed by a resting interval which is equivalent to twice or thrice the sprint time. So, if you do intensive cycling for 1 minute then you have to take rest for 3 minutes. This exercise will benefit you mostly at the beginning and if you have body fats then this is one of the most perfect ways to lose them and start gaining muscle mass instead. However, it should also be observed that this cardio is done only twice a week or thrice a week at the beginning. It is because this type of cardios creates a burning sensation in your muscles which can have a reverse effect on your muscle building process.
Besides accelerating your muscle building process, cardio also improves your overall health by improving your heart muscles. It helps your heart in pumping more blood for your body by expanding the ventricles and as result, the blood flow in your entire body increases instantly. So, it is not harmful to do cardio every once in a while even if you are in the process of bodybuilding.
