This is one question that is asked quite often because of the fact that we are faced with so many misconceptions when referring to martial artists and the connection to muscle. Some of them are incredibly muscular while others do not seem to have too much muscle.
We should highlight the fact that there are many different martial arts out there and that they have different requirements, different practices and various training routines. With this in mind, it is quite obvious that your martial arts training will be completely different based on what you are going to choose to practice.
Martial Artists And Muscle Building
One thing you most likely do not know is that there are martial arts in which you can actually go through a bodybuilding routine and you will not be affected by it. Not all the arts stay focused on the speed that is necessary to deliver particular blows.
If you walk into some of the really good gyms from around the world, you will notice that there is muscle building equipment in them. It is not at all difficult to find clips of the top martial artists from all around the world working out in a bodybuilding gym. However, everything depends on the type of art that you train with. We can say that some of the martial arts will actually use bodybuilding in order to gain more muscle mass. However, others utilize strength training routines.
Strength Training For Martial Artists
The real truth of the matter is that martial artists do not actually need really large muscles. Their practices will always rely on strength, even in the full contact martial arts. Because of this, strength training stands out as being far more important. It is vital that you understand this one factor.
The strength training routine that you go through is not the same one that you see when you watch strengthman competitions. It is always combined with cardio, flexibility and conditioning. It is quite important that you take all the time that you need to realize what type of training you need for your type of martial art but the biggest possibility is that you need some sort of strength training.
Conclusions
To put it as simple as we can, martial artists build muscle in a similar way to how all other people build muscle. However, the training routine is properly adapted to the exact type of art that is practiced. This practically means that you can easily put on more muscle mass as a martial artist while not losing what you need to actually practice.