Like my first two articles that describe the first three steps to fitness for men and women, this article isn't going to be a step by step plan of what to eat and how to exercise to look and feel better. Rather, it'll help put you on the path where you can achieve such things. I do think I need to justify why a 48 year old guy who is part owner of an office supply store is giving fitness advice in the first place. Besides the fact that I look the part, I've spent over thirty years and many dollars on videos, books and trainers to achieve goals that include gaining weight and strength for college football to losing fat for natural body building competitions. I haven't spent the money on the certifications that prove my knowledge and allow me to add letters after my name, but that doesn't seem to stop people from asking me for help and advice.
The fourth step to fitness for men and women is to plan for continual progress in your weight training. Your body is programmed to die. Beyond that certainty, some habits, exposures and conditions will quicken the process and make aging more burdensome than it needs to be. But your body is also programmed to adapt, as a golden brown tan so simply and visibly demonstrates. The profoundness of this second certainty has been lost on those of us who believe that weight training and exercise are options while living in today's society.
The fact that we don't need to exercise in order to physically exist in our world makes it no less important. When you plan for and appropriately apply increasing levels of stress to your body through weight training, your entire body including everything within it will adapt by growing stronger and more resilient. But, doing the same exercises without some plan for progression won't be enough to continue this benefit. You couldn't sun bath for 15 minutes every day for a month and expect to get as dark as someone who exposes their skin to continually longer doses of radiation each day for the same month. Your skin will adapt and get dark enough for the daily 15 minutes of radiation at some point early in the month and then it won't need to adapt any longer.
The key to stimulating adaption is to apply a new stress or more intense dose of an existing stress. The same principals hold true in your fitness quests. The adaption necessary to increase strength will lead to greater and more visible fitness results as well as help postpone the effects of old age and death that are inevitable and hastened by those habits, exposures and conditions that we sometimes enjoy but also are sometimes forced to endure.
The most effective training plan is to simply increase the weight each time that you are scheduled to perform a lift. This is called Linear Progression, and it should be everyone's first plan. Mark Rippetoe explains Linear Progression, and much more, in his book Starting Strength. The inherent problem with the training program is that it can't last forever.
But, progress doesn't need to be continuously linear. The body can have increasing stress applied, and adaption result, in cycles. The key to adapt and progress throughout the training cycle is to be consistent to the training plan. The starting and ending strength points of the plan are mostly irrelevant. Stay true to the training plan that you are following and resist being enticed by other people's goals. Mark Rippetoe's book Practical Programming is an excellent resource to learn about adaption, training cycles, and training plans
You can reach Mark by emailing him at mark@bulldogop.com. Mark is part owner of Bulldog Office Products, a regular working guy who knows what works for him and others like him, and not a personal trainer. Starting Strength books and videos can be found at Starting Strength Products. I'm not affiliated with the company in anyway besides really liking their products.
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