God of Arms – Tobias Oyeyinka share’s insight on Building Muscle Mass

Exercise & Sports Science Australia reiterated that maintaining physical activity to support immune and mental health is important, even more so in troubling times. However, exercise needs to be done in the right way for each individual otherwise serious injury and health complications can result. We caught up with Tobias Oyeyinka, an Online Fitness Coach, Nutrition Coach, Celebrity Trainer and bodybuilder, to shed some insight on how he achieved and maintained his physique. 

Tobias Oyeyinka was born in Lagos but grew up in California and he is now based in Sydney Australia. He is a qualified fitness coach and a nutrition coach and the owner of ODM-FIT.

Pictured above: Tobias Oyeyinka

Hypertrophy Training 

We asked Tobias Oyeyinka how he built arms this size. Tobias said: “Hard work…Training your arms is similar to training the rest of your body, but the difference is how you stress the muscle and most importantly your diet program.” Tobias said his first rule for building muscle mass is something called “Progressive Overload.” He explains the concept: “This is where you gradually increase weights as you go up in sets. You want to ensure you avoid injury at all costs. You should focus on performing the exercise in a proper form and technique. Like everything worth having in life, building muscles and strength takes time, patience and consistency. I would start with a challenging weight load that I find difficult to complete 12 reps. I then work with that weight for a few or more weeks with the aim to reach 15 reps comfortably. Once I conquer this weight then I move up my weight. I will continue to do this until I am able to bicep curl my desired weight goal, which is currently 26kg/57.5lb.” 

Increasing Muscle Size 

A popular goal amongst men is to increase muscle size, whether it be lean muscle or bulk. Increasingly, women are finding building muscle more attractive, with many reporting that the practice makes them feel empowered and strong. We asked Tobias Oyeyinka for his thoughts on this topic. “I believe building muscle size shouldn’t be a gender thing, there are so many benefits to building muscle size. Men experience the same feeling as women when they build muscle. You feel empowered and strong, and I must tell you that it is one of the most beautiful feelings in the world. When you feel this way, you feel confidence within yourself, your self-esteem, self worth and sense of fulfilment significantly improves. It honestly changes your output on life. Also most people fail to understand that building muscle size will result in losing excess fat and significantly increase your mental health and your general well-being.” 

A  study from 2010 found that for maximum gains, there needs to be significant metabolic stress on the muscles, plus a moderate degree of muscle tension. Tobias explains: “When you weight train in particular – lift heavy weights, the contractile proteins in the muscles generate force to overturn the resistance provided by the weight. And in turn, this will result in stressing the muscles. This stress or mechanical damage to the muscle proteins stimulates a repair response in the body. The stressed fibers in muscle protein then leads to an increase in muscle size. It is important to note that you don’t really need to work your muscles until a point of failure, where you are physically and mentally unable to complete your programmed set. This is why I again would always recommend progressive overload.” 

Types of Hypertrophy

There are two main types of muscular hypertrophy, namely: Myofibrillar & Sarcoplasmic. Myofibrillar helps increase strength and speed whilst Sarcoplasmic increases energy storage and endurance. 

“When I Hypertrophy train, I mainly focus on load. I increase my weight to about 75-85% 1RM and I push to about 10-12 reps. For me, 12 reps is my cap during Hypertrophy training. Most people set their cap at 6-8 reps. For me that just doesn’t work. The main purpose of Hypertrophy is to increase strength, and avoid negative lifting. This is why i progressive overload. It allows me to gradually build strength so I am able to stress the muscle at its highest capacity, especially when you are training arms.” Tobias explains. He continues: “My arms exercises are: Traditional Biceps curl with supination during concentric contraction and I would hold for 2-4 sec at the concentric phase, then I follow a 1-1-1 temp. I do this to completely avoid free falling (momentum eccentric). I would do this for 15 reps, 4 sets. Then I would do pulley cable bicep curls (there are various contractions you can do with this) and I would follow the same pattern but the difference is, I forward-lean when I contract in concentric phase.”

 Guess how often this god of arms trains his arms per week? 4 days a week! 

A Few Words From The Founder 

“Whilst it is important to exercise, especially weight training, it is also very important to eat the right meal. Balance of the two would yield a great result both physically and mentally. For me, weightlifting is about my mental health. The bonus part of it is the physical appearance, so it is a win-win situation. Just like anything in life, whatever you set your mind to you will achieve. Gaining muscle mass can certainly be achieved through weightlifting, but you need to be patient, consistent and continuously challenge your muscles to see results. Most importantly, you should have a program to follow. I use my App ODM Fit App – On The Move (odm-fit.com) to train.” – Tobias Oyeyinka.