Once you have chosen what it is you want to work on your training then tracking your progress is key
-Focus on specific nutrient timing for yourself and find what gives you the optimal training effect
-Step outside your normal training regime and jump in with someone else.
-Tracking your training.
I get a few repeated questions every week, why are you always so happy? I’ve stalled on (insert name of exercise), how do I get more weight on the bar? And can you please take Emma Watson around Chichester as you are the coolest guy ever*
Anyhow I am always happy for many reasons, one is that I always look to improve and set new personal best’s in the gym. How Do I know I have improved, I keep a written journal of what I have done. I would not expect you to hit a new 1rep max on any given lift week after week as this would be dumb, whereas setting new rep maxes, 2-12 is a great way to go.
If I can not set a new personal best here, I look to either improve the volume of my session, think weight lifted x sets x reps and look to increase my overall volume over time. Lets say with my bench I could only do 100kg for 3 sets of 5 and 2 sets of 3, by the time I can use the same weight for all five sets and hit 5 reps, that’s a personal best. Score. Happy Dan.
Now go grab a diary (there are plenty of apps as well) and start recording your training
Peri-workout nutrition
It has been overhyped a lot, you must have a protein shake straight after you train otherwise you will shrink to the size of Gollum within minutes. Umm hold on, just eat/ get some type of food in around your workout and you will be fine.
Where I feel the complete benefits come from are your overall performance within the gym.
Here are 3 general camps:
1. Eat lots before hand so you have lots of fuel in the tank. If this is you, chances are you don’t need anything inside your workout or straight after. Up to four hours after is fine even.
2. Very little food before and after. You do not like having much food in your stomach because it makes you ill and you do not handle food too well after. I would say to try and have something inside your workout, a sports drink or the like would work well. Quickly digests and keeps our performance up throughout the session
3. Eat lots before and after. So you are a Nom-monster like myself. I like food before and about an hour after I train. But I find I do better having some simple sugars inside my workout, may be alight snack, handful of sweets or fruit but this is how I feel I perform my best.
You could be any one, or a bit of mix. Experiment, see which one allows your to have more consistent training sessions and allows you to feel better. Gaining muscle or losing fat has more to do with total energy expenditure than when you have those calories, but if you have better training sessions over time. That volume will add up and Boom, more awesome gains.
Training with others:
I’m a lone wolf, well a loner…. I mean I train alone. Most of the time. Mr. Social who wears his headphones and doesn’t really interact. I find it great when I train with someone else, they can offer words of incouragement, tell you lifts look to easy or even offer a new way of training.
Recently I found training with someone who was a bit more bodybulding oriented than myself got me doing a few super sets and drop sets that I had not done before. I was so sore for the next few days. Well, this may not be a sign to overhaul my training but something I now implement. I bigger muscle has the potential to be a stronger one… and I get to eat more doughnuts.
I had a lot of fun and try and get clients to team up sometimes when they have similar goals, they get more done and makes me as the Personal trainer feel super awesome about people making gyms friends, which I should work on, ha
*This is something I only ask myself, but yes I would