How To Determine The Correct Training Frequency

“If after you exercise, your bath and your rub-down, you feel fit to battle for a kingdom, then your schedule is right. ” (p 150 Liedeman Secrets of Strength) 

In very few cases more is better. Often, more just leads to either quick burnout or the slowing down of one’s progress. Having fitness as my passion since around 2007 and spending most of my adult life in the military I’ve experienced, seen, and read a variety of things in the realm of fitness as it pertains to frequency and improvement. 

During my freshman year indoctrination period(Plebe summer) at college we were all split into running groups during morning physical training. Our running groups would be based on our runtime from the Navy physical readiness test which was a mile-and-a-half run. These running groups were intervals conducted every other day and in between would be unit runs (30+ people in formation) which were a slow jog.

The groups were led by upperclassmen who were training us for the summer and various other staff. It would be short periods of jogging combined with periods where the upperclassmen at the front would just take off and we would have to try and keep up. It was tough and although I saw initial improvements after a while it just wore me down. I recall during one of these days the running group below us that should have been going slower caught up to us. This felt like a major achievement for them as I recall one of my friends who was in the group gloating over the fact that they had caught up to us. Maybe there’s more to this than meets the eye. It's possible that the leaders of my group didn’t time the runs to jog accurately but I noticed other things starting to suffer around this time and it became a little easier for me to get sick. 

What am I trying to get at? Although this was a boot camp-like period and should be tough to the point of wanting to quit, these experiences can better help us to understand any type of physical training as a whole. The bottom line is that if you’re not progressing, if you’re feeling more lethargic as time goes on, you might be training too much.

And this goes with whatever training plan you have. Whether you are using grease the groove aka training strength as a skill, micro workouts, or high volume training. The workout provides the stimulus for growth. This growth can be disrupted in a multitude of ways. Therefore rest is an important component.

This will not only be in the form of sleep but in the days between workouts. Along with rest, getting nutrition is an important component as well.  Start the workout, make it intense enough to send the right signal, rest and eat properly until you train again.

“A muscle will not increase in size and strength after demands have been made upon it until it is thoroughly rested. With the Functional Isometric Contraction System, although the muscles may be worked to their limit for one supreme effort, they do not become tired. New growth in the cells and muscle tissues take place at once.” (p 5 Hoffman Functional Isometric Contraction) 

Until next time…