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August 27, 2020November 11, 2023

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Testosterone and Building Muscle

Testosterone is one of the most important tools in your body to grow, repair, and thrive. Testosterone is certainly a primary hormonal driver of muscle growth. Chemically, testosterone is a steroid. Biologically, it’s an androgenic (male) sex hormone. Men and women both produce testosterone, with the typical adult man producing about 5-10 milligrams per day and the average adult female producing at least 10-fold less per day.

What Does Testosterone Do?

Testosterone can enter cells passively and bind to androgen receptors that act directly upon the nucleus of a cell. It can also serve as a prohormone in sex glands and tissues such as your skin, hair follicles, and fat.

In adults, testosterone has effects across the body:

Muscles: Increases protein synthesis, and increases muscle mass and strength.
Body Fat: Blocks the uptake of fat and storage of fat, and increases the number of fat burning beta-adrenergic receptors.
Brain: Improves cognition, memory, sex drive, and affects feelings.
Heart: Increases blood flow and cardiac output.
Bone: Increases red blood cell production and bone growth, and maintains bone density.
Male Sex Organs: Supports sperm production and viability, and promotes penis growth and erectile function.
Skin: Supports collagen production and produces hair.
Kidneys: Produces erythropoietin (EPO), which stimulates red blood cell production.

Testosterone and Muscle Growth

Testosterone directly effects muscle growth by binding to receptors on the surface of muscle cells and amplifying the biochemical signals in muscle tissue that result in protein synthesis. Testosterone also increases levels of another growth factor, called growth hormone, that the body releases in response to exercise. Like testosterone, growth hormone increases protein synthesis and can result in increased muscle growth. By boosting protein synthesis in skeletal muscle, testosterone increases both the rate and extent to which muscles adapt to exercise. Testosterone is also anti-catabolic because it blocks the ability of catabolic hormones like cortisol to bind to their primary receptors. Thus, testosterone is both an anabolic and anti-catabolic steroid. This makes it fundamental for building and maintaining muscle mass, and for rapid exercise recovery.

How Testosterone Boosts Endurance: Testosterone increases EPO, which stimulates red blood cell development. More red blood cells means more oxygen carrying capacity within the blood and to working muscles. Injecting adult rodents with testosterone has even been shown to increase the number of fat-burning and energy producing factories (mitochondria) present within cells, and improve mitochondrial function.

How Does Testosterone Affect Body Fat, Weight, And Body Composition?

Low testosterone in men increases fat and weight gain, reduces caloric expenditure, increases the prevalence of blood glucose disorders and insulin insensitivity, and otherwise negatively affects metabolic control. In women, unusually high testosterone has many of the same negative effects.

Collectively and in both sexes, testosterone acts directly within your central nervous system (brain and spinal cord) to regulate metabolism, affecting how well your body burns calories and maintains healthy blood glucose levels.[8]

Considerations

Though the role that testosterone plays is important and significant, it is only one of many factors that controls muscle growth. Other growth factors include insulin, insulin-like growth factor 1, hepatocyte growth factor, fibroblast growth factor and growth hormone. Outside of an athlete’s body chemistry, his nutrition, quality of sleep, training experience, discipline and quality of training plan all play important roles in muscle

SKIPPING BREAKFAST

Eating a nutritious breakfast is always a good way to start your morning. Because your metabolism slows down during sleep, eating can fire it up and help you burn more calories throughout the day. According to Rush University Medical Center, “When you eat breakfast, you’re telling your body that there are plenty of calories to be had for the day. When you skip breakfast, the message your body gets is that it needs to conserve rather than burn any incoming calories.”

so it’s about more than just eating something in the morning. If you grab a sugary donut or eat a muffin in the car, you’re setting yourself up to crash later. Instead, choose something with filling protein and fiber like eggs, yogurt and berries or whole-wheat toast topped with peanut butter.

LACK OF ACTIVITY

Going from your office chair to your car to your couch can lead to a very sedentary routine. And sitting for extended periods puts your body into energy-conservation mode, which means your metabolism can suffer. According to the UK’s National Health Service, “Sitting for long periods is thought to slow metabolism, which affects the body’s ability to regulate blood sugar, blood pressure and break down body fat.”

LACK OF STRENGTH TRAINING

Cardio is great, and it can quickly burn calories, but once you’re done running or cycling, your calorie burn quickly returns to normal. When you do HIIT and resistance-based workouts, however, your calorie burn stays elevated for longer as your muscles repair themselves. Per the American Council on Exercise (ACE): “Strength training is a key component of metabolism because it is directly linked to muscle mass. The more active muscle tissue you have, the higher your metabolic rate.” And, according to ACE, a pound of muscle burns an additional 4–6 calories each day compared to a pound of fat.

LACK OF PROTEIN IN DIET

Protein feeds your muscles, promotes satiety and is an important component to sustaining a healthy weight. Eat too little, and you may have trouble building or maintaining muscle mass — and per the above, we know muscle’s importance to metabolism. Also, protein requires more energy to break down than carbs or fat, so you’ll actually burn more calories during digestion.

HYDRATION

In a study published in The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, researchers found drinking 500 milliliters of water (about 2 cups) increases metabolic rate by 30%, and that spike lasts for more than an hour. So, drink water throughout the day to stay hydrated, and you’ll get the added benefit of a boosted metabolism.

STRESSING OUT

When stress levels increase, your body produces a hormone called cortisol. Cortisol leads to increased appetite, makes us crave comfort foods, decreases our desire to exercise and reduces sleep quality — all things that negatively impact metabolism. So, while you can’t always control your stress levels, managing stress can go a long way toward protecting your body’s internal fire.