Are You Sabotaging Your Gym Progress

Weight training is a kind of stress. When your muscles, as well as tendons, bones and internal secretion glands are exposed to the stress of resistance training, they fatigue and break down a bit. The organs and tissues subsequently recover and become stronger than before.

What is progressive overload

In order to get stronger, the body has to experience conditions that are increasingly more difficult. If month after month you just go for the pump with your 3 sets of 12 at 200 pounds, guess what will happen? Your body will not change. The simplest way would be to just add more weight to the bar on your bench presses. However there are other ways to make the training conditions harder.

[You don't want to be left out of the club when it comes to progressing on your goals, right?]

Ways to progress

The simplest way to progress is to do for example 3 to 5 reps or 8 to 12 and aim at hitting one more repetition the next time you are in the gym. For instance, 200 pound for 3 reps, next workout 200 pound for 4 reps, etc. Or if you go for the hypertrophy inducing rep range – 10 reps at 200 lbs, next workout 11 reps, you get my point. Add reps. Another way is to try to add weight to the bar or machine. Yet another way is to try to do more total reps (which means sets X reps)with the same weight. You can also try to finish the same workout in less time. These are all ways to make the conditions harder on your body.

How often can you progress

This depends mainly on how close you are to reaching your genetic potential. Beginners can and should strive to progress with each session, sometimes even daily. Intermediate trainers usually can increase the resistance once every 5 to 7 days. Advanced athletes are happy to improve once every 4-6 weeks. Olympic/Pro level trainees strive for annual progress or even plan their ascent in 4 year cycles for the Olympic games. You should strive to progress as often as possible for your condition. Trust me, you will save months and years of frustration in the gym if you focus on progress.

[I decided to share the video because I love it! The Beastie Boys were one of the first bands I really liked back in 8th grade and sabotaging reminded me of their hilarious video]

Image credit: elward-photography nickolette

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