How to adjust workouts?

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To adjust your workouts effectively, you can consider a comprehensive approach involving various aspects of exercise scheduling and execution:

  1. Design your training program considering your goals, available days for workouts, and workout duration. Select exercises that balance movement patterns and muscle groups, ensuring no excessive stress on the same joints or muscles over time. Prioritize exercises based on your fitness goals, and decide on suitable volumes and rest intervals that align with your objectives. Managing potential obstacles proactively enhances adherence to your training plan 1.

  2. Consider different schedules if you have varied time commitments. For example, a three-day-a-week protocol can cover essential fitness goals like aesthetics and longevity. If you can dedicate more time, you might expand to four days with varied focuses such as strength training and endurance activities to keep the schedule flexible and tailored to recovery needs 2.

  3. Balance specificity and variation in your workouts to prevent overuse injuries and ensure consistent progress. Over-emphasizing the same exercises can lead to plateauing and injuries, whereas too much variation might not provide enough targeted stimulus for significant improvements. Adjusting modifiable variables like workout volume, intensity, and exercise types is critical for achieving desired adaptations 3.

    Designing Your Training Program

    Andy Galpin provides a step-by-step guide to designing a well-rounded and effective training program. He emphasizes the importance of selecting exercises that balance movement patterns and muscle groups, and prioritizing exercises based on the identified goal. Galpin also discusses how to select the appropriate volume and rest intervals for the desired adaptation. Finally, he advises on how to anticipate and manage potential obstacles to adherence.

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    Dr. Andy Galpin: Optimize Your Training Program for Fitness & Longevity | Huberman Lab Guest Series
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  4. Progress strategically with exercises by increasing complexity gradually. For instance, progress from assisted versions of an exercise to more challenging forms, like adding weights or increasing repetitions. This method helps prevent injuries and ensures continuous improvement 4.

  5. Modify volume and intensity periodically to prevent overtraining and stimulate continuous improvements. Implementing a progressive overload by increasing the weight or intensity, followed by a deloading phase, can foster better results and recovery 5.

  6. Exercise selection should be varied across the week rather than within each workout. Balance the types of movements to engage different muscle groups and movement patterns effectively. Adjust according to facility constraints—like home workouts with limited equipment—and personal preferences to maintain enthusiasm and compliance 6.

By addressing these key aspects, you can design and adjust your workouts to be more effective, enjoyable, and sustainable.

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