Overcoming Exercise Plateaus

Plateaus can be very frustrating. They are also a very normal part of an exercise or weight loss program.

A good definition of a plateau is that “we have reached a state of little or no change after a time of activity or progress”.

Because of that definition I like to look at a plateau as a good thing. So, congratulations to you for your hard work and success. Now let’s take a look at how we can break through your plateau and move to the next level.

When hitting a plateau with your fitness program we have come to a point where our body has adapted to our program and we need to change things up. The muscles have what’s called “muscle memory” and sometimes we can make some minor tweaks to change things up. This usually has to do with either increasing our intensity, duration or the mode.

Overcoming Weight Training Plateaus

For instance, our intensity of weight training would be how many pounds we are lifting. So, we can change our intensity by going from say 5 pound to 7-pound weights. This can be done while leaving the duration which could either be the number of repetitions say 10 reps or sets say one set the same.

We can increase duration by increasing reps or sets. So, say we are doing 10 reps we can increase to 15 repetitions. Also, we can change the amounts of sets we are doing from 1 to 2 or 2 to 3 sets.

We can also change the mode of exercise. If we are currently using dumbbells we change the mode to using rubber tubing.

Remember with weight training the prescription is every other day with a day of rest in between.

Overcoming Aerobic fitness Plateaus

We will again work with the same premise as with weight training. This is to change either or a combination of our intensity, duration or mode.

If we have a walking program and want to change the intensity we can do this by stepping up the pace let’s say from 2.5 mph to 3 mph while keeping the duration let’s say 20 minutes the same.

We can change out duration or time by going from 20 minute to 30 minutes. Or we can change the times per week. People with Diabetes should shoot for five days a week

We can change the mode of our aerobic type of exercise which would be say going from walking to cycling.

Other Measures for Success

Remember all the benefits you get from exercise. Weight loss is very important but the benefits to your exercise program and areas for success are many.

Lower Blood Pressure

Lower Blood Sugar

Increasing HDL or the good Cholesterol

Reducing Pain

Improved Mood.

I want to leave people with this thought. In Oprah Winfrey’s weight loss journey she referred to and explains this beautifully with the following formula.

Power = Strength/Time Power equals strength over time.

Meaning that if you keep doing the right thing you will gain strength. Are we going to plateau at sometime; absolutely! But if we keep doing the right thing our strength is going to become power!

Good luck and thank you!