The fitness lifestyle is not all Instagram likes and upper body selfies (stop skipping leg day, bro), you also need to do some actual work to get the body you want and reach your health goals. After all, what good is spending all that time in the iron jungle if you don’t have a long-term goal to work towards?
Yet sometimes, working out is simply not enough to get you a sculpted six-pack, especially when you’re doing it wrong.
So, here to help you get your fitness journey back on track are five signs telling you your workouts are doing you more harm than good and it’s time to find a new program.
Your performance and progress are stagnating
Unless you’re on some serious anabolic gear, in which case you can expect to beef up simply by lifting the remote, progress is bound to come slowly and over a long period of time. As any awesome personal trainer will tell you, better performance comes with hard work, persistence and dedication, so don’t lose hope if you’re not seeing results after a week of training.
However, if you’ve been pounding the weights for months, and you still fail to see progress in terms of performance and aesthetics, then the time has come to reassess your training split. Perhaps you’ve been saving yourself too much and haven’t pushed your body enough, or maybe you overdid it without taking adequate supplementation and now your CNS and muscle tissue cannot recover properly. Either way, you need to change your routine.
You have a tough time recovering from your workouts
Speaking of recovery, it is the single most important aspect of fitness that will determine your progress and allow you to reach your goals. Numerous factors will influence your recovery rate, including nutrition and sleep, but nothing will be able to make up for a poorly-structured training program.
With that being said, there are plenty of useful apps that can help you keep track of your performance and optimize your recovery so that you can come back to the gym stronger than before. However, if you’re constantly feeling tired and unmotivated to work out, then the time has come to change your training split and reevaluate the effectiveness of your diet plan.
Your fitness goals don’t match your diet plan
You know what they say, fitness is 30% gym work and 70% nutrition. Your diet plan will directly affect your performance in the gym, as well as your overall health and well-being, so optimizing your nutrition is of the utmost importance if you want to stay in the fitness game long-term.
This is where Australian fitness enthusiasts make all the right choices, as they focus on eating quality, protein-rich foods that will help them reach their goals. Healthy eating doesn’t have to be a chore, though, as you can find healthy ready meals in Melbourne that are tailor-made to fit your type of training, personal preferences and long-term fitness goals. Remember, vigorous training means little without a healthy diet plan to fuel your body and your workouts.
You can’t find the motivation to work out
It’s not unheard of for a training routine to become dull and tedious. In fact, professional bodybuilders regularly have to find new hobbies and interests in order to avoid losing their minds due to the repetitiveness and mundanity of their profession.
If you’re finding your workouts to be a chore, having to drag your ass to the gym every day, then it’s about time you switch things up. If your routine is still effective though, then at least dedicate one day in the gym to doing something completely different, such strongman training, or hitting the heavy bag for a couple of rounds.
You’re constantly getting injured
Continuously getting injured is a pretty good sign your fitness routine is not sitting well with you. Remember, you’re in this for the long haul, and you cannot afford to spend months fixing broken joints, torn muscles or bulging discs, all the while having to refrain from training. Not only will your physique suffer, but you will have to build everything up again and again until your body simply gives out. Instead, why not change up your routine and tailor your approach to fit your long-term goals – take it slow, be consistent, and don’t be a meathead.
Finding the best fitness routine to guide you to your long-term goals is certainly not an easy task, and it does require plenty of trial and error, as well as constant learning to discover the most effective approach. Fortunately, if you heed these warning signs early on and make the right changes from the start, you will have no problem taking your fitness game to the next level.
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