Many times during the journey to achieve fitness goals people will stall with their progress. They hit these plateaus and many times because of them will quit the pursuit of their goals. So, in order to combat these stopping points I thought I would write an article on a few things that you can do to break through your plateaus and never stop accomplishing your fitness goals.
- CHANGE YOUR WORKOUT ROUTINE!!!!!
I don’t know how many times I have seen people in the gym doing the same routine each time that they come in to workout. The human body is an exceptionally adapting organism and to think that doing the same thing over and over again is going to yield results is ludicrous. To create change in the body you have to challenge the body. This is also known as Wolff’s Law that states that adaptation happens in the body when the body is stressed. If you stop stressing the body with different an challenging workouts, then the body will stop adapting and you will reach a plateau. So, change your workout! Change the order, they type of exercises, time of day, speed, weight, intensity. If you workout is not hard, then you will have a harder time to reach your goals. - Increase your intensity
Although most basic information on exercise for health states that you should engage in moderate intensity exercise, moderate exercise will give you moderate results. Especially with regard to losing fat, you have to engage in high intensity exercise to get the results you want. Part of intensity is being willing to take your 10/10 (ready to pass out from working so hard) and reset it each time that you exercise. When you are engaging in high intensity exercise, I want you to think about the hardest thing that you have ever done and compare your current activities with that. If you are not close to the level of that hardest thing, that mean that you have more in you and can push harder. If you are pushing that hard, then I want you to mentally reset your level of difficulty each time to know that you can push beyond your limits. This will get you the results you want! - Posture
Your body’s metabolism is made up of a series of smaller local metabolisms based around the joints of your body. Any time your joints are not in alignment, that metabolism is lowered because the body is primarily concerned with trying to prevent that joint from moving further out of place. Unfortunately, joint mis-alignments are almost never isolated. If your shoulders are forward that will impact your entire spine and suddenly, you have lost a large number of local metabolism. So, if you spend some time focusing on improve joint position through a series of postural exercise you can easily improve metabolism and decrease the risk for injury. - Cardio
Cardiorespiratory exercise is great for the heart and lungs, but when it comes to breaking plateaus, losing weight, or gaining muscle, moderate level cardio is not going to cut it. The concept of the “Fat Burning Zone” is a myth because you would need to perform hours and hours of that type of cardio to effectively reduce fat in the body. In order to create effective fat loss with cardio you should be performing High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT). Now there are a variety of HIIT, but the concept is still the same in that you alternate between high and low intensity. This can be done on a cardio machine, running outside, or body weight exercises. Check out this body weight cardio circuit I created here. - Resistance Training
What I feel is even more important than cardio is resistance training. Cardio is great because it benefits a huge number of systems in the body, but only through resistance training can you create more muscle. More muscle equals a higher resting metabolism that allow you to burn more fat while resting. Additionally, after resistance training you can create a boost in resting metabolism for 24-48 hours after your workout, but cardio only results in a few hours of increased metabolism. - Core Stability
Focusing on core exercises that are based around stability can help to increase the strength around the spine. This can allow for progressively more weight to be moved by the body through the extremities because the rest of the body can stabilize to allow for more effective strengthening away from the core. This doesn’t mean to go do 1000 sit-ups because they are not functional. It also doesn’t mean that you should focus only on the core. Instead, focus on maintaining core stability through all of your exercises. This allow for an abs workout while getting other parts of the body worked out as well, and also results in higher caloric burn during your workout. More core strength also translates to a decreased risk of injury to the lower back.
I hope that you find these tool to be helpful in breaking through your plateaus. If you are interested in a more in-depth program to help push beyond your limits check out http://budurl.com/TheFatLossSolution.
Cheers to your health,
Lynk
