Progression in Resistance Training

You must have noticed the guys in the gym who always train hard, always train heavy, and always train the same. You may also have noticed that, no matter how long you have witnessed their training, they also always look the same.

There may be a number of reasons for lack of progress: inadequate nutrition or rest; poor timing of nutrition and supplementation; inappropriate exercises. Often lack of progress can be ascribed to poor knowledge, poor technique, and a lack of variety.

The body is a lazy organism. It is concerned with the conservation of energy and assiduously tries to cling to homeostasis, maintaining its biological state within pre-set parameters. Unless muscle fibres are stressed to the point of overload there will be no incentive for them to grow. If they are taken to the point of momentary muscular failure (or beyond, as with forced repetitions) the signal to grow is even greater (in the latter case up to 30% greater). To ensure muscular overload is progressive, leading to bigger gains, there are a number of variables that can be manipulated. For many recreational bodybuilders, however, it is always about increasing the weight at all costs.

In addition to poor exercise knowledge, poor form, and an ignorance of specificity, the other contributing factor to training plateaus is lack of variety.

If you perform the same routine week in, week out, there will come a point when you cannot increase the weight without sacrificing form. Your body will also quickly adapt to a particular way of training. If it is no longer taxed it will cease to develop.

In order to increase the intensity of a workout there are a number of variables that can be manipulated: resistance (weight), repetitions, rate (speed), rest (in between sets) and range of motion. Experiment with each of the “5 Rs”. Cut down your rest in between sets. The muscles won’t be fully recovered and will fail earlier in the next set. Move through a full range of motion (fully extend the arms at the start point of a biceps curl for example); sometimes pause along various points in the range of movement and allow the muscles to statically contract; exploit peak contraction positions; slow the movements down, control the negative. Sometimes use faster movements; sometimes work with heavy weights, but only if you can maintain good form. Experiment with high intensity techniques (rest-pause, supersets, pre and post-exhaust, negatives, static contraction etc). If you increase the intensity you may need to reduce the volume. Mike Mentzer advocated short bursts of extremely high intensity training using very heavy loads (with perfect form) and then leaving the gym to start the recovery and growth process. Dorian Yates, six times Mr Olympia, successfully exploited this type of training philosophy but there is, for the recreational bodybuilder, a caveat: Yates suffered his share of major injuries, including a detached tricep, and when Frenchman Francis Benfatto experimented with heavy training he seriously damaged his pectoral. If you use high intensity, don’t use it exclusively. Vary your training.

Don’t allow your workouts to become totally random, however. Follow a basic programme that gradually progresses resistance (consider using step loading cycles for 4-6 weeks). Intersperse your regular training with sessions of high intensity work. Don’t be afraid to modify your routine every 4-6 weeks. Listen to your body. Keep notes of how you respond to different approaches and mix your approaches. Francis Benfatto, who recently staged an incredible comeback at the Australian Grand Prix, makes the comparison between training and music:

“You don’t play with just one note of music, and we bodybuilders can’t play just with weights. We must play with technique, reps, speed, machines, dumbbells, barbells, inclines, declines, supersets, giant sets – everything. We must push our bodies with new things all the time so we can always progress.” (Flex, September 2006, p118)

With a combination of good nutrition, adequate rest, clear goals, exercise knowledge, good form and variety you will continue to make gains. Don’t be one of those people who always seem to be in the gym, always train hard, and seldom change their physiques. Think about what you want to achieve, study the most effective exercises and learn correct form (consider having a session on technique with a personal trainer who has knowledge of bodybuilding), manipulate the “5 Rs” and experiment with high intensity at intervals. Don’t worry about what everyone else is lifting. Focus on form – it’s all in the execution not the ego.

Diets Don't Work

Whilst the diet industry would like you to believe that you can shed weight by purchasing their products, it is unlikely that you will achieve any long-term benefits from the majority of diets and weight loss products on the market. Sustainable weight loss is best achieved by creating a negative energy balance – that is burn more calories than you consume.

The problem with traditional diets is that they often advocate eating fewer calories than those needed by the body to sustain its basic functions. If you consume fewer calories than this Basal Metabolic Rate the body will enter starvation mode and cling on to fat stores in an attempt to preserve life. If blood sugar levels drop as a result if inadequate nutrition, particularly for those on low carbohydrate diets, such as the Atkins diet, the body will create its own glucose for energy by scavenging amino acids from lean muscle tissue. This self-cannibalisation results in less lean muscle which consequently reduces the metabolic rate. In effect this means fat gain will happen even easier in the future.

A reasonable approach to sustainable fat loss has a number of elements. Energy out has to be greater than energy in. Rather than reducing your calories to amounts lower than Basal Metabolic Rate, additional calories should be burnt through exercise (incidental exercise such as walking to work and taking the stairs, or using the cardiovascular equipment in a gym).

Metabolic rate can be raised by increasing lean muscle tissue through resistance training (each additional pound of lean muscle burns approximately fifty calories per day at rest). Weight training also burns between 240 and 400 calories for a typical session.

Nutritionally, a balanced diet comprised of approximately 55-60% carbohydrate, 30% fat and 10% protein is recommended for health. There will be some variations depending on desired outcomes and exercise programmes. Carbohydrates should be from wholegrain, wholemeal sources and of low-medium GI (glycaemic index). Avoid simple sugars as these will spike blood sugar levels causing insulin production which will store the sugars as fat.

A useful aid to ensuring you eat enough to lose weight is the keeping of a food diary in which you record times, amounts and types of food eaten. For optimal results a programme of exercise involving both cardiovascular and resistance training is recommended. The anatomical adaptations that take place through a progressive exercise programme increase the ability of the body to metabolise fat as fuel whilst raising the metabolic rate and burning additional calories.