3 Reasons You May Be Hitting The “PLATEAU”
Reasons you see progress stalling and ways to fix them!
We have all been there, that season of training where it seems that progress is stuck in wet cement. Weights don’t go up, energy seems non existent, and any shred of motivation just doesn’t seem helpful. Well the upside to this is that these things can be fix with some simple habits and practices set in place.
1. SLEEP | GET THOSE DREAMS
Sleep is probably the most common thing as I coach I see athletes either struggling to get enough of or not taking as serious as they should. Coming myself from someone that struggle with sleep habits for years and saw my results and goals begin to suffer for it, I can testify to how making a change to my sleep completely revamped my ability to train.
1a. ROUTINE | PREDICTABLE
Something most of us have, whether that is the daily routine to the gym, work or even setting up for a lift, it's something we all do. So why is that sleep isn’t one of those routines? During sleep, even more so REM sleep our testosterone outputs are at a high helping our body recover and regulate the things we put it through while training, and with the absence of that proper sleep we lose our best recovery method.
A few things that have helped me and with help you establish better sleep.Routine again is first. Even if daily that time in which you go to sleep varies it is about doing the same thing every time, this helps start to calm your brain much like a pavlov’s dog response. For me that looks like this.-Check Emails-Program(work)-Shower-Brush My Teeth- Make the bed-Sleep
It may seem silly but as soon as I begin that routine my brain starts to help me get tired and prepare me for bed.
1b. DISTRACTIONS | BLACKOUT
This one is simple, keep it dark and cool. Put away technology, tv, phones, tablets and any ambient light. Having a Cool and Dark place helps allow your body to fall and stay into adequate sleep cycles.
1c. BREATHING | RELAXATION
To often going to bed I am distracted and my mind racing and that has lead to many a sleepless or interrupted night. Mark Divine Owner of http://sealfit.com/ has a box breathing method that I have learned and practiced and has begun to help my fall directly asleep even when my mind is ever wandering.
2. NUTRITION | WINDOW OF GAINS
Nutrition, BOOOORING or at least that is how it gets written off most times by people. I am not talking the “Diet” or the “Cut” but more the timing and intake of ENOUGH Macronutrients before and after training. Far too often I see so many people under eating or eating the wrong things in the wrong timing or combination. Easy place to start is to get a Body Scan to determine BMI, BF% and Baseline Macro intake needed. Easy way to do this is contact or head to your local Complete Nutrition as your first scan is free, from there you have to numbers needed to seek the right intake. “Where do I go from there?” There are many options, one that I have been using or seen being used by over hundreds of Athletes are the RP Templates from http://renaissanceperiodization.com/, you can purchase their templates in which you can input your info into the sheets and depending on your goal it will help you develop a habit of timing and intake to fuel your session and recovery.
3. CONSISTENCY | STAY WITH IT
We are humans specifically AMERICANS want those “instant results” or proof that what we are doing is working and most programs and trainings are not and will never been an overnight success or put 10lbs of muscle on you or drop 10lbs of body fat or add that 20 lbs to your total of lifts. It takes work, lots of fucking work and above most other things we have talked about in this blog this is where I see athletes fall off the fastest behind nutrition. I have not(or at least to my knowledge) see or heard of any program that will produce major results in even 4 weeks time. You must stick to it, not miss a day, not skip a day, you must stay the course. I can go on and on for days about the point of consistency but then this blog would turn to a novel. Find your program and see it through, trust the process, work hard and yield the results.
I hope our ranting has been helpful and I hope that you are able to seek and find guidance through this. If you have more questions or want more input into programs, nutrition and other questions please don’t hesitate to contact us!
