HOW TO JUMP START YOUR TRAINING
By: Poliquin Group Editorial Staff
Be honest: When it’s time for your workout, do you always
jump in with enthusiasm? If not, don’t feel too bad – you’re not alone. If
you’re like most of us, when your workout was new and the changes were fast and
furious, you couldn’t wait to pump iron. Now, if your progress has slowed, your
motivation may need a jumpstart.
Welcome to the Club
It’s no secret that retention rates at commercial gyms are
extremely low – in fact, 50 percent of new signees quit their gym memberships
within the first six months, according to a study by the International Health,
Racquet and Sports Club Association. Poor retention is the reason club owners
can (and do) oversell their memberships. They know that most of their clients
will seldom use the facilities, so they can offer great membership rates (look
for especially good deals at the beginning of the year).
But it’s not just newcomers who have problems getting
involved in pumping iron – it’s also those who have been exceptional athletes
or weight trainers in the past.
Think of all the athletes who retire and wind up neglecting
all forms of exercise, eventually becoming as puffy as marshmallows! Serious
swimmers, gymnasts and figure skaters may find it difficult to return to their
sports after they have recovered from injuries. Chronic pain, especially in the
low back, is a common explanation (or excuse) for poor exercise adherence – but
there’s also mental trauma.
Trainees may have a hard time getting started again if all
they can remember is how difficult and painful their workouts were. For them, the
bad times outweigh the good times. They may avoid training altogether. Case in
point: Olympic swimmers.
Sherm Chavoor, who coached Olympic phenom Mark Spitz,
observed that many of his elite athletes would delay getting into the water –
they would procrastinate by the edge of the pool before finally jumping in.
Chavoor’s workouts were extremely long and rigorous, and the swimmers knew that
once they hit the water, the hard work was about to begin. Their problem was
not that they were unclear about their goals but that they had developed a
negative mindset about the work needed to achieve them. Negativity is a trap
for many of us.
Let’s look at a workout approach designed to get it back.
Getting Back in the Saddle
The word intervention in popular culture refers to treating
disruptive behaviors, such as drinking, by doing an “intervention” that
interrupts the behavior. This could involve family members making sure that one
of their own doesn’t drink, or checking the person into a rehab center where
the individual’s condition is closely monitored by physicians and mental health
care professionals. The point is to break someone of their bad habit. In the
case of a procrastinating trainee, the intervention needs to disrupt an
unwillingness to work out. What’s needed is a fresh, new start.
Here’s the thing about working through difficulties to get
results: Athletes who are willing to pay high-profile personal training and
strength coaches do so because they want to achieve exceptional results fast.
Very fast. The catch is, anyone expecting great results has to be compliant –
especially if the trainer is not always around. And that requires a different
mindset – a positive mindset about training.
If you’ve slacked off at the gym and don’t have a high-level
trainer whipping you into a training frenzy, ease yourself into a comeback. Try
a short intervention program that makes weight training enjoyable again. This
program is even good for personal trainers who find it hard to train after
working in a gym all day. After a few weeks of these easy workouts, you’ll be
bitten by the weightlifting bug and ready to work hard again.
This approach is different from the usual way a beginner or
a detrained individual would work out. For rapid results in adding muscle mass
and losing bodyfat, it’s best for those trainees to focus on multijoint free
weight exercises such as squats, deadlifts, chin-ups and bench presses – their
workouts might even include some strongman work. They would use supersets,
relatively higher reps and short rest intervals.
To use this program, you’ll do pretty much the opposite of
what is normally prescribed for a beginner or detrained individual (you might
consider this type of approach the “anti-Poliquin Principles” training
protocol). You will perform single-station training, focus on machine
exercises, and use light weights and low reps to avoid any sense of a pump or a
level of volume that would activate the sweat glands. A higher-rep, isolation
exercise to correct a structural balance problem can be thrown in, so if anyone
questions what you are doing, you can always say, “Rehab” or “Prehab,” and be
left alone. And the training sessions are short, like 25 minutes. Here’s a
sample workout designed to be used twice a week:
A. Step-up,
Dumbbell, 2-3 x 5, 1020, rest 2-3 minutes
B. Lateral Raise,
Machine, 2-3 x 5, 3020, rest 2-3 minutes
C. Close-Grip Lat
Pulldown, 2-3 x 5, 3020, rest 2-3 minutes
D. Dumbbell Incline
Bench Press, 2-3 x 5, 3020, rest 2-3 minutes
E. External
Rotation with Dumbbell, Arm Abducted, 1-2 x 12, 3020, rest 2 minutes
Because the weights are so light, an appropriate warm-up
would consist of chalking your hands, and the cooldown would be to wipe that
same chalk off your hands. A post-workout shower is probably not necessary
(unless you didn’t have time to wash your hair in the morning), but it wouldn’t
hurt to splash on a little Aqua Velva (or Chanel No. 5 for women) behind your
ears as evidence to your friends that you’ve trained. A post-workout shake?
Sure, if you’re thirsty.
If you’re currently pumping out reps with gusto, this wimpy
workout is not for you. But if your motivation has stalled and you want to ease
back into the gym, give yourself a break. After a few weeks, you’ll find
yourself wanting to start training again seriously. This workout is only an
intervention, not a lifestyle.
No comments:
Post a Comment