ML Coaching
The 8 essential laws every successful weightlifter follows
1. Train consistently
Consistency is the basic requirement. If you train consistently every week, you'll see steady muscle growth over time. If you train twice a week, 52 weeks a year, you'll get better results long term than if you train five times a week for only 20 weeks a year. You can't go to the gym "every now and then" and expect real progress. Short intensive phases can be effective under certain circumstances, but consistency is more important.
2. Work hard AND smart
Hard training is good. Smart training is good. Combine both approaches and you get the best of both worlds. You should train hard, but you don't need to max yourself out at every session. Challenge yourself, but listen closely to your body and adjust your training to your individual daily condition when needed. You'll need to experiment a bit to find out what works best for you.
3. Stimulate the whole body's musculature
You should lift heavy weights to stimulate muscle growth throughout your entire body, but you should also focus on individual muscle groups when needed to address weak points. If a muscle is never worked, it can't grow. To make a muscle grow, it needs to be stimulated regularly. The deadlift stimulates numerous muscles across the whole body, which is why it's such a great exercise. If you don't do anything else, however, some muscles, like your biceps, would never reach their full potential. So make sure your training regularly includes different exercises that also train less-worked muscle groups.
One more note: if you want maximum muscle mass in a specific body part, make sure to perfect the exercise that activates that muscle the most. Hip thrusts trigger the highest activation of the glute muscles. So even if you regularly do squats and deadlifts, you should still include hip thrusts in your training if you want to get the most out of your glutes.
4. Improve base strength, especially in compound exercises
Progressive overload is the most important aspect of strength training. If you don't gradually add more weight and reps, you won't get stronger.
Most bodybuilders spent the first years of their training focused on building strength in the basic exercises. Strength forms the foundation for improvements in every other area. Before you can do something quickly, you need to be able to do it at a moderate speed. In strength training, you have to be able to do something once before you can do it many times. If you want to get the absolute best out of yourself, you need to do the exercises regularly, otherwise you won't see the progress you could be seeing.
5. Warming up is essential
If you don't take your warm-up seriously, it will end in disaster sooner or later. You can't just walk into the gym and lift heavy weights. Even if you manage one rep, your injury risk is enormously high. Depending on your condition and previous injuries, some people need 20-30 minutes to warm up, some only need 5 minutes. But everyone needs a certain amount of time to get their blood flowing and prepare their joints and muscles for lifting heavy weights. Ignore that, and you'll learn your lesson the hard way, guaranteed.
6 – Focus on clean execution... mostly
Technique matters, no question. But every now and then you can use a bit of momentum and not be quite so strict, in order to handle heavier weights.
In the gym, you'll typically see strength athletes who either focus fully on technique or barely at all. Some are very strict and stick to an almost robotic execution. Others would make far more progress if they reduced the weight and focused more on technique.
There's certainly some room to manoeuvre when it comes to clean and efficient exercise execution. It's been proven that a bit of momentum can even increase torque demand and muscle activation. Your technique will almost inevitably suffer a little if you want to test your maximum strength from time to time, a single-rep max never looks perfect. If it did, you could have loaded on more weight.
Most of the time, though, you should be very precise and focus on clean execution. You also need to learn which technique is individually right for your body. This is especially important for big exercises like squats and deadlifts, where the injury risk is significantly higher than with, say, dumbbell curls. If you don't pay attention to clean technique, it almost inevitably leads to pain and injuries that put an end to any progress.
7 – Daily nutrition habits matter
The best training in the world won't help you if you eat poorly, your hard work in the gym would then be for nothing.
If you want a body you can show off and to perform optimally, you need to take your nutrition seriously. You need the right amount of calories and the right combination of macronutrients. You don't have to follow your nutrition plan perfectly 24/7, but too many deviations will prevent you from reaching your full potential. Strategically supporting your nutrition with protein powder and essential fats is very helpful for muscle growth and recovery.
8. Sleep enough and avoid stress
If you don't sleep enough or feel constantly stressed, your body will work against you. Some people need more sleep than others, but you should absolutely make sure you get enough high-quality sleep. Be consistent with your sleep schedule if you want to see results.
As for stress, your goal shouldn't be to avoid it completely, but to optimize it. It's good to feel challenged, but the line is thin between good stress (like a great workout) and bad stress (like a 65-hour work week with negative colleagues). Try to focus on positive stress and analyze your habits and life choices. This is an often-overlooked area where many strength athletes could see immediate, massive improvements.
Looking for professional support with your fitness and nutrition plan to make fast progress? I'm happy to help as your personal trainer in Zurich. Just send me an email, I'd love to hear from you!