I’m always surprised by the number of people I see who find themselves in the same environment at the same time each day, wearing the same outfit; listening to the same music; performing the same exercises in the same order, same weight, same number of repetitions and the same number of sets over and over for months — even years — at a time. While I certainly admire their commitment, I still wonder how they do it without becoming incredibly bored! They probably stopped seeing results after the first couple of months. Many of them complain of knee, elbow and shoulder pain due to repetitive stress leading to tendonitis and bursitis.
Here is the key to avoiding burnout and injury: variety! Changing things up will keep you away from the dreaded plateau, boredom and a plethora of soft tissue injuries. Variety can also cut down the length of your workouts.
Try to remember the first cup of coffee you ever had. It probably made you feel pretty hyperactive, jittery and anxious. After a few weeks of drinking coffee, you needed to supersize your cups. The stimulant that once gave you that sudden energy rush stopped having the same effect. Unless you want to spend hours in the gym lifting tons of weight, you have to find a way to avoid becoming acclimated, which happens quickly with the same old routine. By switching different exercise variables, you can avoid hitting a strength plateau without having to continuously add more weight and time to your workouts.
But variety doesn’t mean walking into the gym with reckless abandon. To properly apply my techniques to your workout, try changing two to four variables each week:
1. Weight
2. Sets
3. Reps
4. Rest times
For example, one week you may choose to perform five sets of 25 reps with a rest time of 90 seconds in between sets. The following week, you might increase the weight and complete four sets of 20 reps with only a 60-second rest time between sets and carry on accordingly every week to build strength and tone your muscles.
The variables are not limited to things you can count during your workout. Here are some other variables you can manipulate to change your workout experience and keep it fresh:
1. Music
2. Workout partner
3. Time of day
4. Location
5. Cadence
6. Muscle splits (the combo of body parts you work that day)
7. Implement (dumbbells versus barbells, cables versus body weight)
8. Base (bench, ball, stand)
Remember, for your body to keep changing, your program has to keep changing.
Via: Harley Pasternak
