It's a good time to be involved in the health and fitness world. It seems as though we are constantly provided with new tools and techniques that help us create variety and new stimuli for the body to adapt to.
I just worry that we're getting carried away.
It's hard enough getting people to commit to a program for long enough for it to work without having personal trainers changing their training method based on what's the new flavour of the month.
You know what I mean - one month it's all stability ball work (you know...for balance and functional strength), then it's Crossfit (cause you have to train for multiple qualities at once), and then German Volume Training is where its at.
It's enough chopping and changing to give an ADD kid a head spin.
All of this is done in the name of variety, and seemingly in spite of results.
While I certainly don't have anything against the tools or techniques mentioned above (I use many of them myself) I do have a problem with the lack of focus on one goal, and one program to achieve that goal.
Let me tell you something that will cut down your gym time, and speed up your results.
Tools and techniques don't matter as much as principles
As long as the principles outlined below are adhered to, it doesn't matter what methods or tools you're using.
If you were to look at the top coaches and trainers programs as a whole, you would see that they all would obey the majority of the principles outlined below - regardless of what style of training they use.
Here are principles -
Progression
You should be getting stronger, faster, more conditioned or better looking as the weeks progress. If you're not, then the training program is flawed and needs to be re-examined. If you're training for strength then you sure as hell better be adding weight to the bar (even if it's only a little each week), otherwise you'll never overload your body enough to adapt.
No one ever became good by staying in his or her comfort zones.
Specificity
Specificity is simple - you should be training in a way that's conducive to your goals.
If you want to lose lots of weight fast, then pumping out 1 rep max squats probably won't help. Likewise, if you want to get super strong, then 15 rep sets probably won't help, nor will running 5kms each day.
Variety
Plateaus are inevitable...and might I add, a pain in the backside for most people. Plateaus are your body telling you that it needs some variety thrown into your program because it's so used to the current regime that it can no longer adapt to it.
Your body gets used to the rep range first, and the exercise second. As a general rule of thumb I update my clients' programs every 4 weeks (updating the exercises, not the style of training - yes, there is a difference).
Not only does this constantly force the body to adapt, but it also provides the client with a fresh set of exercises to learn/keep things interesting. The trick is to change exercises just enough to keep things interesting, but keep them the same just enough to ensure that they have enough exposure to the movement to get stronger at it.
Quality vs Quantity
This is a big one.
I don't care what kind of quantities you're producing (i.e. kgs lifted, number of reps, distance ran etc.) if you're not producing quality first and foremost. If technique isn't being executed perfectly, then the numbers mean nothing to me.
If quality isn't being maintained then you'll end up hitting a plateau too fast, getting injured, or both - not to mention that you'll look like a fool to anyone in the gym who has half a clue!
So in short, tools keep things interesting, but don't work unless you obey the simple principles of training. Likewise, there are endless styles of training and methods out there, and most of them work, but none of them work forever - sometimes you have to change things up, but not before you've given a program time to work.
Think about this -
Alwyn Cosgrove gets results using his metabolic strength training.
Craig Ballantyne gets results using mostly the body weight circuits from his Turbulence Training system.
Pavel Ts.. gets results using sessions that are dominated by kettlebells.
Dr John Berardi of Precision Nutrition focuses on nutritional habits, changing only one at a time, but achieves unbelievable results that stay with his clients for years.
Crossfit, done right, works.
All of these have varying, and seemingly contradicting, styles of training - but they all get results. And unreal results at that.
The one thing they all have in common is that they stay true to the principles outlined above, and they educate their clients in the importance of changing lifestyle habits, not by promoting quick fix plans.
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