When you first start training, everything is new and exciting. Every week you make significant progress; learning new movements, lifting heavier weights and picking up new skills…
But these “beginner gains” don’t last forever (unfortunately)!
There will come a time in everyone’s training life where they experience lulls. This could present as a few different things but typically the weight doesn’t go up as quickly (or even goes backwards) and you may see worse scores on retests.
This is completely normal. It’s impossible to make progress every single week. Even month to month it can be hard to see any of the dials going in the right direction. There comes a point where you reach a bit of a balance. Let’s say you train 3x a week and you generally eat similar kinds and amounts of food. At some point your body adapts to the 3x week stimulus and your food intake keeps you fuelled enough but not too much to gain weight (or lose).
If you get to this point and ride it for a while then technically you’re still making progress, you’re getting older but your fitness is staying the same…
But, we want to keep seeing the needle moving in the right direction so we need to break through these lulls. At this point you can do one of the following:
- Increase your training volume – if you can add another 1 hour of training per week then you’re increasing your output by 33%
- Pay attention to your nutrition – you may need to get more protein to get stronger or reduce calories to drop some body fat
- Increase your recovery – more sleep may enable you to train at higher intensities which will yield better results
- Change the stimulus – every 6 weeks we change our training focus at Defy to try to avoid some of these lulls
But what if you already train almost everyday? What if you’re in a lull at that point? Well this does happen. 10 years into consistent 5+ days a week training, you may start to stop seeing much progress at all. At some point there’s a maximum amount of fitness that can be achieved based on X amount of hours training. I’m not sure how many people truly reach this point but a change of stimulus can certainly help here too. Even a couple of weeks away from the gym could help with recovery so you can push through some barriers when you return.
It’s important to remember that even if you’re not making progress currently – that shouldn’t be a catalyst to quit. Your workouts are having a positive impact on your health, even if the results aren’t visible by way of progress in your particular goal.
Sometimes, we just need to keep doing what we are doing and the progress will be seen further down the line. Unfortunately, it’s not linear. Sometimes you ride a wave of progress and sometimes it can feel like you’re trying to run through mud.
Switching things up too drastically can be a detriment to the path that you were on, so “getting on with it” can be the best course of action. Obviously if you work with a coach, they can help you determine what the best action is for you.
Ultimately it comes down to having the right mindset. Yes, you’ll experience lulls in training. They will be frustrating as your hard work doesn’t seem to be giving you any rewards. Stick through it and have a look to see if you can do one of the things mentioned above. Can you add a day a week or focus on your recovery more?
Play the long game, stay consistent and you’ll be successful.