For the muscle to repair and grow, you need to FUEL yourself with PROTEIN and for women it needs to be within a 30-45 minute window directly after training.
When we train, we are actually BREAKING DOWN muscle, not actually building it.
Whaaaaat? I know it sounds strange, but in the gym when we train, heavy enough that is, we are actually creating tiny little tears in the muscle fibres. This creates an inflammatory response to help to heal the muscle and repair.
If you don’t fuel within this window, your body starts to go into a state of breakdown, which means your muscle will break down and not grow. What a waste!! LITERALLY!
Why do we want muscle to grow?
Because more muscle improve your metabolism, immune function, reduces joint pain, improves posture and so much more.
Another big problem that we see with clients coming to us because they are not getting results is, training too intensely for their body. This can come in the form of too many training days in the week, or simply following terrible trends like HIIT or Crossfit methods. These methods will put your body into a state of stress due to too many training days being encouraged in the week and not enough recovery days to promote the muscle repair, growth and healing. In the beginning they may start working, but over time you can start to see hormonal problems, weight GAIN from the body being in stress, injuries and pain from not allowing the body to heal. Or simply not turning up to sessions for fear of the days of pain that are about to come!
‘Recovery is just as important as training’
So how do you not rip yourself off in the gym and create a healthy balance to training for your body?
You start to train and eat because you love your body and not because you hate it. Too many people are trying to cut calories because they feel fat and believe that it will help them lose weight. It will in fact do the opposite, especially if you are risking your pre and post training meals.
Show me somebody training and I can tell you if they are training out of self love or hate. TRUST ME. I used to be in the latter group and it wasn’t fun. I recall going for 10k runs with tears streaming down my face because I wanted to punish myself. Or smashing myself in the gym for 90 minutes because I thought I was fat. Oh I’m so glad those days are over.
In terms of training and how many training days are too many. It depends!! Every body is different and has different needs and outcomes based on our physiological load (stress load) , our body type, our nutritional plan and of course the type of training that you are doing.
Here’s a rough guide!
If you are a healthy person
You might aim to train with weights 4 x a week then add some recovery cardio in on the other days like walking, swimming, yoga or ELDOA.
If you are just starting out and not particularly active
You might start with 2 full body strength days and one day of Yoga, ELDOA or Stretching to ease your body into the training. You’re actually better to do this than going full hog right away. Full hog will add that stress to the body and essentially rip yourself off. What a waste of precious time! After 6 weeks, add another training day, then another and watch your body change!
If you’re already training and wanting to see more STRENGTH & MUSCLE GAIN (tone) – let’s say you’re already training 3 times a week and your body is handling that well. Good recovery etc. You might add a leg training session to your week to up the anti. Legs in particular are a big calorie burner for those wanting fat loss!
If you on the other hand are already training 5-6 days a week and have hit a plateau.
Drop your sessions down to 4, feel your body release tension as your body recovers properly, you reduce stress, you can hit your gym sessions with much more energy and strength and you will not only gain some precious time back in your week, but you will start to see those results again.
Remember when we add more training, we need to add more recovery, walking, stretching, mag baths.
At H.A.I.L Fitness, we thoroughly assess each client before they begin training with us to assess their body and ability before recommending which and how many sessions to attend. This way, we get you fitter, healthier and reduce that inflammation in your bod without wasting your precious time and you get better results by doing less.
The above suggestions are a rough guide, but if you need help determining a game plan for you, book in a chat with one of our team and find out how you can start gaining your results and not waste your precious time.