Many people who train either want to get bigger, build muscle, get stronger, faster or lose weight. For those who are trying to get bigger and appear more muscular, did you know that there are some muscles that you can develop to make you look bigger than you are?
Ever notice how some people look like they weigh at least 200lb but only weigh 170lb? I used to watch a lot of wrestling and there were some guys who looked like they were 230, but only weighed 200lb. Why is that? They have developed what I like to call the illusion of size. Have trouble gaining weight? Or want to look bigger without gaining weight? Do you want to create the illusion of size? If you said yes to any of these questions then keep reading.
If you want to create the illusion of size then you have to forget about training arms everyday or whatever everybody else is doing. Having big arms compared to the rest of your body will make you look narrower which can actually make you appear smaller.
I will provide a list of certain muscles that you must develop in order to look bigger than you really are.
What people have to understand is that bodybuilding is all an illusion and there are ways to look bigger than you do now. Things like your shoulder width to waist ratio and stuff of that nature all come into play when people first look at you so if you want to look bigger than you do now then continue reading!
Looking big from the front isn’t enough. It doesn’t matter how wide you look from the front when your back has no thickness and looks like a piece of paper from the side. To create the illusion of size you will have to look bigger from all angles.
So here it is:
1) THE LATISSIMUS DORSI IS THE BIGGEST MUSCLE IN THE UPPER BODY & THE WIDEST MUSCLE MUSCLE IN THE HUMAN BODY
Developing big lats will have a bigger impact on the way your upper body looks more than any other muscle group. If you want to stretch out your t-shirt then big lats can help you get there faster than big arms. If you want to go from a medium t-shirt to an X-large then you need to train your lats very hard because they will cover a lot of the mass in your upper body.
The best exercise for wide lats would be pull-ups and chinups with a variety of grips. Once you can get 15 picture perfect reps then you can start adding weight.
If you want to have huge lats then your goal should be to do pull-ups with an additional weight of half of your bodyweight attached to a dip belt for a set of 10.
Ex: if you weigh 200lb then your goal should be to eventually do weighted pullups with 100lb attached to your waist for a clean set of 10 without sacrificing form or range of motion.
The lats will help contribute to the V-taper and help you look a lot wider than you are right now. There are high lats and low lats, these are determined by your genetics so you will have to work with what you have and accept the insertions. They both have their pros and cons. Whatever cards you were dealt with, you still want to do the best with what you have to bring up those lat wings!
Another great way to build big lats is by doing high rep pull-up sets without weight. If you are able to do 4 sets of 25 reps and get the 100 total in less than 5 straight sets then that will contribute to some great growth too.
The lats respond to a variety of rep ranges so make sure that you get strong on moderate, high reps and occasionally low reps.
2) DEVELOP YOUR UPPER BACK FOR IMPROVED POSTURE AND BACK THICKNESS FROM THE SIDE & BACK VIEW
The upper back consists of the traps, rear deltoids, rhomboid minor, rhomboid major, infraspinatus and other muscles. Not only does a big upper back look good from the back and sides, but the traps will also pop up from the front which will make you look bigger all around.
Combine a big upper back with wide lats then you will be huge! I really don’t think people understand how much potential the back has to grow, it consists of so many muscles that it must be trained hard.
For a big upper back you will need to do some form of Deadlifting. I don’t really care which one you do just as long as its heavy and done for low reps (high rep deadlifts can be used if you are more advanced).
I personally don’t do conventional Deadlifts, instead I do Rack Pulls and RDL’s, they are both great options.
The rack pull is a great exercise to overload your upper back and you can use a lot of weight too.
Your goal for Deadlift variations should be to pull 2.5x your bodyweight for a set of 5 reps.
If you can do that then your upper back will be a lot stronger and bigger than it is now.
Snatch-Grip Shrugs are also a great exercise for the upper back, if you can do them with 2.5x your bodyweight for a set of 10 then your traps and upper back will be a lot bigger as well.
3) WIDE SHOULDERS MAKE YOU LOOK HUGE FROM THE FRONT AND BACK
If you want to look big from the front and back then wide shoulders are a must. Wide shoulders might not be that noticeable from the side view but they are still important for creating the illusion of size.
If you want big shoulders then the two most bang-for-your-buck exercises are military presses. For big shoulders you should aim to military press your bodyweight for a set of 10. Ex: If you weigh 225 then your goal should be to Military press 225 for 10 reps.
4) OUTER QUAD SWEEP
Its actually only recently that I really started to understand the importance of the outer quad sweep. I always did heavy posterior chain work like RDL’s, Hip Thrusts, GHR’s, Weighted Back extensions, Pull-through and hamstring curls so my posterior chain looked good and my quads looked alright but my legs still looked small and skinny.
Then I started looking at the anatomy of the quads and I wanted to know which of the 4 parts of the quads (quadro = 4) had the biggest illusion of size and it was definitely the vastus lateralis (at least in my case).
The reason why the vastus lateralis makes your quads and your overall legs look so much bigger is because of the way that it makes the quad stick out. You can kind of call the vastus lateralis the shoulders of the lower body because of the way they give your quads that width from the front and back.
The best ways to train the Vastus Lateralis for the outer quad sweep is to do quad dominant exercises with your heels very close together but your toes are flared out a bit to the side. This style of quad dominant training can be done on Squats, leg presses or even Hack Squats. If your levers and body proportions can’t tolerate the Squats with a close stance and Hack squats are giving you knee pain then your best bet would be to do leg presses with your heels close and feet a bit out.
Yesterday was my first time doing the leg press with the emphasis on the outer quad sweep and my thighs look a lot bigger already so imagine if you put years and years into it. Many people actually get great results from these because most people don’t train for outer quad sweep mass and others don’t even know what the Vastus Lateralis even is!
If you develop your lats and shoulders for the upper body while bringing up your outer quad sweep on your lower body then you will have that X physique that most people strive for. Yes I did state above that the V taper is great but when trying to create the illusion of size the X-taper is a lot bigger.
On the same token, you don’t only want to train your vastus lateralis because you don’t want to develop imbalances in your lower body so do it in a way where you aren’t jeopardizing yourself in the long run. Also don’t forget to train your posterior chain just as much as your quads to prevent knee pain and other imbalances as well.
5) STAY IN THE 12-16% BODYFAT RANGE (and a bit higher for women)
People all over the internet and YouTube are always saying that if you want to create the illusion of size then you have to lower your bodyfat levels below 10%. There’s one thing that they forget to mention:
This advice sucks for drug free lifters.
If you are a natural lifter and you decide to go to 7% then you may look a lot leaner but you will also lose a shitload of size which is not good for creating the illusion of size. Not to mention that going under 10% is very unhealthy and can cause problems such as erectile dysfunction but that’s a topic for another article.
The body is also more anabolic in the 10-15% bodyfat range and it is a pretty healthy range for most people too.
The reason why the 10-15% bodyfat range is best for drug free lifters is because you can’t be super lean and super big at the same time but at this bodyfat range you can kind of get the best of both worlds. I think that 13% bodyfat is great for males, females can go a bit higher.
If you are at 13% bodyfat you will still have some abs and good definition but you won’t be sacrificing your size either. If you don’t care that much about your abs then the 14-16% range could also be good.
Of course there are many exceptions to this rule because some people look great at 18% because their fat may be stored in their thighs or arms instead of their belly.
Conclusion:
I hope that you learned a thing or two about creating the illusion of size, remember that bodybuilding is a big illusion and its not about how much you weigh but how much you look like you weigh that matters.