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Progressive Overload - A Case
Study…
Here’s a real life example of how you can apply progressive overload immediately to your muscle building workouts... A few years ago, I was working with a client who was having a very hard time building any muscle mass at all. One of the very first things that I do when I begin working with new clients, is take a look at their current training regimen to see exactly where they’re starting out. After taking a look at what this guy was doing, I was dumbfounded as to why he was not able to gain even a little bit of muscle from the workouts that he was currently performing. Everything seemed to be accounted for – from number of exercises, number of sets, number of reps, rest intervals all the way down to the total duration of the workout. After taking a look at his current workouts, I gave him a quick call to make sure that he was eating enough of the right kinds of foods to build muscle mass. It turned out that he was doing a great job of managing his nutrition plan. In short, everything seemed to be adding up. It took me quite a while to figure out what was going on, but I eventually decided to hit the gym with him to observe him running through one of his current workouts.
This is where it finally started to make sense… It seemed like he was training with a weight that was pretty light. Especially light for a guy his size. When I asked him why he was training with such light weight, he told me that it was easier for him to get through his workouts if he took it “easy” on his body. He mentioned that he had started out training heavier, but he did not like dealing with the muscle soreness that this caused. I quickly went on to explain to him how the muscle building process works – everything from training and stimulation to nutrition and muscle soreness. While he seemed to understand what I was telling him, he began to shake his head in refusal of ever training heavy again! I had to come up with a solution that would allow him to apply progressive overload in a way that would minimize
his muscle soreness and maximize his results. I also knew that I had to keep it simple and easy to implement. After his first workout, I explained that the goal of his next workout was to attempt to apply progressive overload to his muscles by increasing the number of repetitions that he was able to perform with the same weight. A week later when the next workout came along he still seemed to be in good spirits and approached his workout with more desire than he had the first week. Not surprisingly, he was able to complete 3 more repetitions for each of his work sets. This put him close to the high end rep range of his prescribed workouts but not quite all the way there. Before he left the gym we established that his goal for next weeks workout was to be able to complete the maximum number of prescribed repetitions for each set of his workouts. As expected, the next workout went well with my client hitting his goals with ease. Unexpectedly, before I had a chance to talk with him, he told me that his body felt ready to go up in weight – and that he was excited to give it a shot…I couldn’t believe my ears! This progression continued for a few months while my friend went on to build a bunch of muscle. After about 2 months of training this way, he was able to develop quite a bit of knowledge about how his body worked and build an impressive amount of muscle. We both decided that he really didn’t need me around anymore. While I was sad to see him go – I loved the fact that he now held the knowledge to change his body at will for the rest of his life, without having to hemorrhage money on scams and empty promises. He understood exactly how to apply progressive overload to his workouts in a way that worked for him. The Take Home Lesson From This Progressive Overload Case Study
2.) You don’t need to lighten the weights and perform set upon set of high repetition low weight workouts in order to “shock your muscles” into growing. Not only does this not work for muscle growth, but you’ll get burned out eventually. 3.) While some muscle soreness is to be expected – you don’t need to go on feeling sore and achy all of the time in the name of progressive overload – you just don’t need to! Learn how to listen to the cues that your body gives off. If you are still sore, don’t train that body part until the soreness goes away. 4.) You can practice this method of training overload with any muscle building workout and achieve phenomenal results! While it’s commonly accepted in the fitness and bodybuilding community that 6 – 12 repetitions is ideal for muscle growth, I really feel that the 4 – 8 rep range is the muscle building sweet spot where you can consistently increase your strength and pack on muscle mass. But it’s also ok to go ahead and experiment with other approaches once in a while. (just keep it somewhere in the 6 - 12 rep range!) 5.) Often times it’s not the workout that’s holding you back, but the approach that you take towards implementing the workout that holds you back. 6.) Consistently apply progressive overload and training overload to each and every workout. Go into each workout expecting to apply overload to your muscles. Otherwise you’re just wasting your time! More Bodybuilding Workouts And Program Design Articles... |
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