5 reasons you keep hitting plateaus in the gym

1. You’re trying to lose weight and push performance at the same time.

You can do both, up to a point. But to lose weight, you need to be in a caloric deficit. And to continually see improvements in the gym, you need to be eating enough. So if you’re dieting, do so. And if you’re trying to do more with your body, fuel it like an athlete.

2. You completely change your workouts every few weeks.

Adaptation takes time. More than a couple tries at the same workout. You need high quality sessions, stacked up over extended periods of time in order to see results. And those efforts need to get gradually more difficult. This is called Progressive Overload. And it’s the cornerstone to seeing long lasting progress in the gym.

3. You don’t track your lifts.

Every rep of every set should be tracked. That way, you know what you need to do in order to progress from the session prior. If not, you’re shooting into the dark. And when you track your lifts, you’ll notice that you probably make more progress than you initially thought. It may not come in the form of massive increases in weight, but even just adding a rep or 2 is progress. Keep stacking micro progressions to crush plateaus.

4. You’re not training to failure.

If the needle isn’t moving, time to have a reality check. Are you training hard enough? Like, honestly? Most exercises in the gym should be pushed very close if not to failure. If not, you’re missing out on the most effective reps at eliciting adaptation. Next time you train, go until you can’t. And then go one more rep. You might surprise yourself.

5. When something hurts, you skip it entirely instead of modifying.

There’s more than 1 way of training a body part. In fact there are heaps of ways. Niggles and pain are a normal part of the training process. So it’s important to use an exploratory approach in your training. Experiment to see what feels good, and what you can tolerate to push hard. And for goodness sake if your knee/ shoulder/ back hurts don’t just skip it altogether.

Also Remember: Theres nothing wrong with hitting a plateau. It’s a normal part of the training process. And when you experience one, stick with it for a few weeks. Sometimes you just need to dig your heels into the dirt for a bit in order to break through it.

If you have a question pertaining to your own training or rehab, shoot me a message and I’ll get back to you 🤝

Michael