3 Things for Continual Progress in the Gym

Here are 3 more tips from the great Charles Poliquin on how to make continual progress in the gym.

3 Things for Continual Progress in the Gym

Tip 1 – never increase the quantity of training at the expense of quality

Some days your strength may be up but your work capacity is down. Don’t drop the intensity, drop the volume. For example, let’s say you did bench and got 100kg x 5 reps for all 5 sets on Monday. Then on Thursday you do the same workout and do 100kg x 5 reps for 2 sets, then the third set you only get 1 rep. Stop there, no garbage sets.

It won’t do you any good to lower the weight and then proceed for the next two sets. It will just tap into your recovery and make the next session a struggle as well.

Tip 2 – 2% rule of progress

You should be able to add 2% more to the bar or add an extra rep every workout. If you are unable to do this then you are not recovering properly between workouts. It could be from not sleeping well, not eating enough, eating poor quality foods, spending too much time in front of screens, to name a few things.

So if you squat 100kg for 5 reps in workout one then in the next workout you should be able to squat 102kg for 5 reps or 100kg for 6 reps. This is why it is important to record all your weights and reps correctly so we can monitor your progress and use the correct loads.

Tip 3 – you have to take the time to lay the foundation

Be patient and take your time getting strong. Everyone who decides they need to get stronger wants it immediately. This is not the way to go about it and will often lead to stagnation and injury. You are better off bringing up your weak points and then progressing from there. We do this in your programs but for those of you on distance programs the next thing is to ensure you have perfect technique on each rep and don’t “cheat” do lift a load that you aren’t capable of doing with correct technique. You want to work to technical failure not absolute failure.

Getting strong takes many years of consistent hard work. It isn’t something that will happen in 12 weeks. Sure you will improve from your starting point but to get really strong takes a long time.

Total Health Performance Centre

Are you being coached when you train?

ALL of our members are individually coached throughout every session.

They have their own program (not a generic group one the trainer comes up with 5 minutes before the session) and they have their own nutrition plan (not a print out from the internet).

Does your gym do this for you? @totalhealthperformance

PROBLEMS #6 THE GYM HOPPERS

PROBLEM #6 THE GYM HOPPERS

March 15, 2017

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Gemma Smith

What I’m talking about here are the girls that jump from gym to gym or from trainer to trainer or program to program and don’t give it long enough to see the results.

The most frustrating part of being a coach or trainer is when you get yo-yo clients that bounce from one idea to the next. They come in saying “my friend is a bodybuilder and they said I need to take BCAA’s”, “I looked on Google and it says I need to do cardio everyday”, “a fitness model I follow on Instagram has a donut everyday and still loses weight”.

I don’t care what your friend says, I don’t care about what Google recommends and I definitely don’t care about some fitness model smashing donuts every day. You came to me with a goal and I gave you my way of getting there. If you think you can do better by listen to your mate or following the fit chicks on social media, then why are you here?

There are so many programs and trainers out there that have different ways of getting you to your goal. Some use cardio and some use weights, some like the calorie model and some like the ‘clean’ options. It’s not to say that one way is better than the other, but rarely do people commit to one way for long enough to truly see if it works for them or not.

Results aren’t overnight and they’re going to take more than a few weeks to see and maybe even more than a few months. You need to set yourself a time frame and goal to match that and make it clear to yourself and your trainer or coach or whoever you’re using. If you don’t reach your goals and you’ve done everything you needed to by the end of your time frame then you can move on and try something else.

Most clients that I see leave or jump around because things get hard, because the trainer called them out on their bullshit, because they didn’t lose 10kg overnight, because they don’t like what they heard, etc.

The ones that stick it out are the ones who see the greatest results and are the type of people that don’t give up, they don’t make excuses, they just get in and get it done. They take responsibility for their actions and would never point the finger because they made a mistake. They are realistic, the commit and they give it their all. If there is a roadblock or something halts the progress then they or their coach assesses the situation and makes necessary changes.

Have a goal, set a time frame and follow the plan. 

#teamthp

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