ML Coaching
In this blog, I'll expose one of the biggest training lies. It's about varying your training, a much-discussed topic. So what's actually right and what's wrong?
Variation is extremely important for training progress
You've probably read on many websites that you should completely change your training plan every 4 weeks. At every place I've ever trained, the 4-week rule seems to be the universal formula. If you do it differently, your training progress supposedly stalls. The mantra goes: change up your training so your body doesn't get used to it and new stimuli can be created.
Let me be open here: you can't make such a blanket statement, it always depends on the individual. In the opinion of many experts, including my own years of experience, this claim isn't correct.
Neural adaptation within 4 weeks...
Why is it a training lie? Let's picture ourselves in the gym. Your trainer gives you a new training plan, you're now in week one. Bench press is on the plan.
Your performance output will be pretty poor, simply because the exercise feels unfamiliar and there are still technique errors. That's completely normal, since your body has to draw on new movement patterns it isn't used to yet.
A few weeks ago, after years of taking a break from it, I started barbell incline bench press again. Normally I can bench press over 160 kg.
It turned out that 90 kg for 10 reps was already a big challenge for me.
You notice, in the first week, even my performance is modest. In the second week it already feels better, you've already gotten a bit used to the movement pattern and you're more in a flow. As a result, you can increase your weights. In the third week your nervous system is even more efficient: there's better synchronization of muscle fibers and more fast-twitch fibers can be recruited. Look at that, in the third week you can significantly increase your performance.
Have you gained muscle mass by now? No, because this is purely neural adaptation without significant muscle growth.
By the fourth week, the neural adaptations are complete and progress slowly stalls. Most people can no longer increase their performance in the fourth week.
Time for a change after 4 weeks...
Since progress stalls in the fourth week as described, the training plan gets changed. New exercises and new methods come into play. In the first week, performance is modest again because everything feels unfamiliar. In week two you slowly settle into a flow, you make your first bits of progress. Week three is the week with the biggest progress due to fast neural adaptations. Week 4 is when the first stagnation hits.
It's always the same pattern, you're essentially going in circles, since you never really built new muscle mass and most of the adaptations were neural in nature.
Why do so many neural adaptations happen?
During strength training, your body is under constant stress, and it will adapt so that it's better prepared and can handle the same stress situation better.
In this and many other processes, your body always looks for the easiest solution. Improving neural efficiency is the easier solution for the body than building new muscle mass. Picture the process of building new muscle compared to improving neural pathways. Which is easier? The answer is obvious.
Furthermore, your body would need more energy in the future if it built new muscle mass. So it will definitely try to avoid that, unless it has no other choice.
If it has the choice between building muscle mass and neural adaptation, in most cases it will prefer the latter.
Force your body toward muscle growth
For you to actually build muscle mass, your body literally has to be exhausted from neural adaptations. Only then will it build muscle mass.
That's why the rule is: once you hit your first plateau in your new training plan, the door opens for muscle growth, provided you train regularly and hard.
Look at the training plans of the strongest, most muscular guys. They change their training plan very rarely.
Is no variation the way to go?
You're probably thinking now, "okay, so I'll just train with the same plan all year", no, that's not what's meant either.
Let me come back to strong guys like Arnold Schwarzenegger or Dorian Yates. What do they do to stimulate muscle growth? They mainly play with volume, meaning they change the number of sets per exercise and also the rep scheme. Every now and then the training method changes too, but the basic exercises are always kept and rarely swapped out.
So what does this mean for you? If your goal is fast neural adaptation (which can make sense especially in strength sports like Olympic lifting or powerlifting), you can change exercises more often. If, on the other hand, you want to gain muscle mass, you shouldn't change exercises too frequently.
Targeted variation
The key to success lies in targeted variation, meaning you keep the basic exercises in your plan, but change the conditions, training methods and loading schemes.
For example, you could use chains or power bands on the bench press to load the strength curve differently. Another option is switching intensities (different rep ranges) from week to week to drive muscle growth. Or you use drop sets and other intensity techniques, there are many options, but always keep the basic exercises in your plan.
At this point I'd like to thank you again warmly for reading my blog. Thanks also for sharing my article on social media.