Proper Natural Progression

Ajouté : 2026-05-28

[00:00:01]Hey folks. Uh fig I'd take it out today.

[00:00:06]Take it out to the garden. Obviously last week we were sat in uh my living room. So I thought let's carry that on a little bit. I quite like this setting.

[00:00:16]But I thought this would make a a nice setting to speak about progression and just relaxing a little bit because I think certainly from what I felt growing up in my 30s I felt a lot of societal pressure and expectations um which caused me a lot of stress mostly self-induced stress because life was basically fine had a good career uh teaching and I had money and things were going well Um but there was always despite things going well, despite promotions, despite you know achievements, there was always that hidden voice in the back of my mind which told me I had to do more. And that was something which I didn't really come to terms with until much later on in my life where I became more at peace with myself and kind of where I'm at now. I mean, I don't think I'll ever escape being that kind of type A personality, but it's certainly softened over the years. But I've learned to tame it. But when I was younger, that was something that caused me a lot of stress, uh, self-induced stress. The more I achieved, the more I wanted. And sort of that, uh, that cycle kept repeating itself. And the problem with that is there's no real end because once you achieve one plateau, you're immediately climbing the next one. And so there's never really any time to sit and smell the roses, as it were.

[00:01:40]Um, and part of that I think bleeds over onto YouTube and the fitness industry.

[00:01:48]Certainly in the time when I was more of a YouTube consumer rather than a creator, I saw this big push over the last 20 years, 25 years to progress because that was a central component was progression. And this idea that you had to essentially force progression by doing more volumes, escalating volumes for example, or just adding weight to the bar using um loose form and cheating the weight up to get more reps, to get more weight.

[00:02:18]You look at the old videos of um like Ronnie Coleman, Ranch Warren train, and that was kind of what we grew up with and that was the sentiment throughout YouTube um over the last 20 years or so.

[00:02:28]And I think it's still there in some circles. We are starting to fight back against it now, which I think is productive. But I want to just stay on that for a moment and just speak about pressure and the will to succeed, the will to win, the will to progress.

[00:02:42]Because a lot of that, a lot of those kind of people are those type A personality people. They tend to find themselves on YouTube where they push the same message, but this time within the realm of lifting weights and progression. And so you have this push for progression. And what's been quite good recently has been this push back against progression at acknowledging that progressive overload is more a outcome. Now I think that's not the full picture. I'll expand on that later, but it's been nice to see that to push back against some of the self-induced pressure and the self-induced um stress which can be caused and the problems with training that can be caused by adding weight to the bar too soon. So what I want to speak a bit about today is some practical solutions for how to approach your training and how to approach progression and why actually being a lot more patient and a lot more reserved when it comes to your progression can help you out a lot. And I would say that's true not only in in training but also in life as well.

[00:03:44]Certainly if somebody had told a younger faz to just sit and smell the roses a bit more often and just calm down and realize that things were basically going okay um and not to always push for the next step. I mean I think it's it's fine to be driven. I think it's fine to have goals but certainly it's important to have a balance. So an analogy that I use with my clients quite a lot is climbing a mountain. You know let's say you're climbing a mountain.

[00:04:11]If you hit a plateau, if you reach a plateau, typically speaking, you don't immediately go for the next leg up, you know, you sit, you take a breather, right? You sit, you smell the roses, you take a breather, you have a cup of tea, get your flask out, have a chat with your friends if there are any. Um, you get ready, and then you go for the next climb up. Now, that's not how we approach progression. And I think that's wrong. And for the most part, as soon as people hit the top of a weight range, they go up. And I think that's where we create problems. And so what we want to do for the most part is not only, and this is where the practical element comes in, not only do we want to wait until we've hit the top of the range with a given weight, we also want to wait until that set has gotten a little bit easier. So, if I was to give you some like like an example with some numbers just to help you kind of visualize this. This is what I say to my clients. Let's say we're working in a rep range of four to six reps. Okay?

[00:05:11]We're just doing one set. All right?

[00:05:14]What I want you to do is once you've added weight to the bar and the reps drop, I want you to spend some time on that weight building those reps back up.

[00:05:24]Maybe the reps have dropped to five.

[00:05:25]Okay? Build them back up. Get to the top of the range. Get to six. Now, I don't want you to add weight straight away at this point. What I want you to do is once you've got those six reps, I want you to stay there until it feels easier.

[00:05:39]Stay there until it feels almost too easy and then add weight. Now, for those of you who are a bit more um detail- minded and need the details, you may want to wait until the set feels more like an RP8 rather than an RP 10.

[00:05:55]Okay? So, the first time you do the weight, maybe it feels more like an RP 10. Okay, after a while you want it to feel like an RP8 or let's say first time you hit that set for a set of six it feels like a zero. Well, you want to stay there until it's more like a one or two. So, practically speaking, if you're looking for a guideline, you know, sometimes analogies don't always hit.

[00:06:14]So, if you're looking for a concrete guideline, but bear in mind there's some flexibility here as well. There should be should always be some flexibility.

[00:06:21]Wait until it feels almost too easy, then add weight to the bar. Now, that accomplishes a couple of things. First of all, it means you can maintain a high degree of quality of set. Okay? So, you're always going to be in position where you feel in control of the weight.

[00:06:36]You're not just hanging on for dear life. You have good set quality because that's important. You have to have good set quality. The muscles that are intending to do the work need to be the ones that will fail or get close to failure. They need to be the limiting factor. So, if you're doing a row, your upper back muscles better be the ones that are doing the majority of the effort. or if you're doing a bench press or a chest press, it better be your chest doing the majority of the work.

[00:07:00]Now, if you get into a situation where you add weight to the bar too soon because you're really invested in going up in weight, we might bleed into a situation where rep quality goes down.

[00:07:12]We use a bit of momentum. We start to shift our position. We start to shift our form. And before we know it, the stimulus to the muscle which you're trying to target goes down. Even though the weight on the bar is higher, we can run into a situation where you're hitting weight for a set of six, which was looking really good. You add weight to the bar, your reps drop, your form craters, and all of a sudden the muscles that were supposed to be doing the work are no longer doing the majority of the work, using momentum, your lower back's getting into it. Any number of other factors could occur, which mean that your quality of your set is going down, and the target muscle isn't really getting the stimulus it needs. Now, the consequence of that, of course, is you're going to stop growing. You stop growing because all of a sudden, the muscle that you're trying to build is not the limiting factor. So, ultimately, you're holding yourself back even though the weight on the bar is higher. And I'll give you a real a real simple example of this. So, me and my uh my old training partners, we quite like the prime seated row. Now, we're at the point where we're both using about six plates on that. Okay?

[00:08:15]I've always had better form, always had strict form. my form is pretty good and I make sure the upper back is doing the work. He's always, and this is very common for a lot of my training partners over the years, he's always tries to keep up with me. So, he'll insist on doing six plates as well, even though he swings it with his back. Now, the consequence of that for him, because he's not a six plate puller, he's kind of pretending to be a six plate puller.

[00:08:40]The consequence of that for him is he gets elbow pain and also his back stops growing because it's not his upper back that's doing the work. It's not his upper back that's being the limiting factor. He's added load to the bar where he shouldn't be. He is at a load where he shouldn't be. So his lower back is doing a lot of the work and on top of that he's getting shoulder pain. He's getting elbow pain. Now that's a double whammy for him. So no longer are the muscles that are supposed to be doing the work and getting the stimulus. No longer are they getting the stimulus. And in fact, he's just he's just in a lot of pain. This has been, I would say, you know, a fairly common scenario with with old training partners. As much as I warn them against it, they don't want to listen because they want to keep up. They feel like if they're handling the same weight as me, they're going to grow the same. But you've got to go at your own pace. And that's kind of part of the message, whether it's in the gym or whether it's in life, you've got to go at your own pace. Um, so what you want to do is you want to make sure you're going you're using form which allows you to target the muscle and you want to make sure you're staying with that weight until it feels almost too easy and then going up in weight because that ensures the next leg up isn't this jarring addition of weight which can change your form and can make you compensate via other movement patterns and behaviors which actually take stress. stress off the muscle and potentially leave you with uh handling more weight than you need to at that point which can increase stress on the joints and it can cause pain which can then make you aggressive other ways.

[00:10:13]So far up until now and I have gone back and forth over this so many times nobody has come up with a good reason for why you should cheat your form. No one has. Um and I've heard this any which way. Couple of years ago, there's a big push about cheating form and how that can a enable you to get the most out of your muscle. I don't buy it.

[00:10:36]Never seen it work. Never seen it. I've never seen it offer anything that a good hard set done with good form where the muscle you're trying to target is limiting factor is just taken all the way, you know, to failure or close, whatever your whatever your chosen is.

[00:10:51]have never seen a good argument or in practice never seen a good reason for why cheating would be a better way to do things.

[00:11:01]All you're going to do for the most part is transfer stress onto other muscles because they have to come in. That's what's extending the set is other muscles coming in and that takes stress off the target muscle. So, I've never seen it as a good compromise. is always reduce tear stress on the muscle because very few people implement cheating right at that moment when the target muscle has failed or is close to failing.

[00:11:25]Normally people implement cheating way too early and ego gets in the way. They cheat to get more weight on the bar.

[00:11:31]That's the practical implementation. I do know that um Jeffrey Jeffrey Verit Scoffield GVS he made a big push on this a few years ago and listen GVS knows what he's doing I'm sure. And if he can do that, if he can implement the cheating at the certain point where the target muscle has already been exhausted and he's getting a bit more out, then fine. But I'd say for the vast majority of people, that's a very advanced skill.

[00:11:50]And I think most people kid themselves when they're doing it. And essentially what they end up doing is just cheating way too early. It's a bit like a training partner coming in and um forcing reps out before you finish the set. It's just going to ruin the quality of that set and it's not worth it. So that's what I see happens to most people. For most people in that moment when you're your brain is all firing on all cylinders and in that moment they just come in a bit too quickly with the cheating. So just to wrap up this first kind of section, my my message is this. Um when your set hits the top of the range, stay with it for a while. Wait till it feels easy and then add weight. That will do two things. It will allow you to maintain the quality of your set, but also it'll mean that the next leg up is not so jarring. See, with all my clients, they're thinking about the next 5 pounds, the next two and a half kilos.

[00:12:46]I'm thinking for them the next 10 kilos, the next 20 pounds. So, I'm trying to think a few moves ahead. So, ultimately, you want to try and maintain that performance.

[00:12:56]You're not at the top of the mountain when you add another 2 and a half kilos to 5 pounds. There is a lot more to go.

[00:13:00]So, I'm always thinking about a few moves ahead. So to ensure that you have the least jarring progression, you want to just make sure that you wait until the set's easy. Okay. Now, in terms of sort of just to wrap this up, like practically what that looks like, I released a video probably last year on monthly progression, the idea of this double progression done on a monthly basis. And I still stand behind that. I think if you're not very good at doing this, yeah, and if this is a new concept to you, if you've come from the school of thought of just add weight whenever you can, it's not a bad way to do things, just decide that you know what, the month of June, I'm going to stay on this weight and just let it get easier and easier and easier.

[00:13:40]if you're not very good at gauging it on in the moment because you've got to think in the moment. You've got to think like right in the moment when you're all hyped up on caffeine, when you're all thinking in your mind about battling demons and fighting dragons, you've got to make the sensible choice. And let's face it, how many of us are good at that? Unless you're very experienced, you're probably not going to be that great at doing that. So, it's not a bad idea to just outsource your thinking alto together and just say, "Right, I'm going to just progress once a month."

[00:14:08]So, in that month, you spend some time building the reps up to the top of the range and then staying there, making it feel a lot easier. That's not a bad way to do things. Now, that's not always going to be applicable for every exercise and for every person, but the monthly rule is not a bad one for big compound exercises. Now, when it comes to smaller exercises like isolations, arm work, especially side delt work, it might take two or three months. You know, bear in mind I speak to predominantly a natural audience, so it's probably going to take a bit more time, but that's fine. You know, you can give it more time. Um, the other way to do things is simply to go up when things feel almost too easy, and that's not a bad thing. You know, a weight that was a stimulus 3 weeks ago is still going to be a weight that's a stimulus today.

[00:14:51]I'll give you an example of that. So, um, recently I went up to five plates on the Atlantic chest press. Okay?

[00:14:59]It's, um, you know, reasonably heavy weight for me. Um it's it's close to the most I've done locally u over the last couple years. Um and I stayed with that weight for something like nine sessions which for me is about three or more weeks be and I stayed at the top of the range not just not just with the weight but I stayed for that weight for six reps just getting easier and easier and easier imperceptibly easier. stayed at the top of my chosen weight range until it felt almost too easy and then I added weight on and the next weight increment was child's play. It was easy. But again, I'm going to do the sensible thing. I'm going to stay with that for another month and I should carry on making nice small incremental gains. So, in the end, what this does, this patience, what it does is it makes your training a lot more enjoyable. Yeah. It allows your joints and tendons time to adapt because that's a major thing. You don't want to get a a large cause of tendinitis is not just poor form, it's load management and not giving your body enough time to accustom itself to the load. Not just the muscles because they recover quite quickly. They adapt quite quickly, but the joints and tendons.

[00:16:06]We're not all thick Doran Yates wristed individuals. We need to give our joints time to adapt to the load as well. Um, and it keeps workout quality high so that the next weight increment is not so jarring. You can maintain that form. you can maintain uh how it looks and the stimulus you get from it and overall it leads to faster progress. So yeah. Yeah, that's that's something which I I wish I had done more of when I was competing still, you know, when I was in my 30s, early 30s. I wish I'd taken that more relaxed approach to things because the messaging back then was very different. And you know, I do think it's it's turning around. We're now delving into a better message of progressive overload being both the outcome and the driver of growth. Uh, and I'll touch on that just before I leave because while I do like the focus on everyone saying progression is the outcome, um, progressive overload is the outcome of good training. I mean, I I'll also push back on that a little bit as well because I think it's both.

[00:17:06]It is definitely the outcome. Like once you've trained for a while and things feel pretty good, you will have gotten stronger. Therefore, you'll be able to demonstrate progressive overload has occurred. Totally on board with that. No disagreements at all. But then what happens? What's the next step? We don't just sit there. Like what do you do when 100 kilo for six feels easy? That's the top of the range. What do you do? Like yeah, you could add reps. Of course, you could add pauses, but generally speaking, the next step up is adding weight once the weight is too easy. You have to increase the difficulty. So for my mind, I'm still of the opinion that progressive is both the outcome and the driver. Because a very simple question to ask people when they say that progressive load overload is only the outcome is to say, well, why I'd wait?

[00:17:55]Why I'd wait then? Right? Why add weight? If it's just the outcome, why wait? Why didn't we all just sit there?

[00:18:02]Why do we bother getting strong?

[00:18:06]Because you've got to keep adding weight. Remember, progressively is is a long-term thing. You got to keep adding weight. So, for my money, it's both. And I know I'm going to get some push back on that. So feel free in the comments, go go nuts. Whatever you want to do. I'm sure you guys will defend your favorite influencer and who says that it's only the outcome. But the fact of the matter is just think about that. If it's only the outcome, why bother adding weight?

[00:18:30]Because you add weight so you can stay in the rep range, so you can keep challenging the muscle. Because that is part of progressive overload. It is both. It's not just the outcome. So anyway, I'll end there. Those are my thoughts. I mean, I don't think that final point adds much to the discussion to be honest because it's mostly a theoretical point. It doesn't really mean it doesn't really make any change practically. And like I say, I I like the focus on progressive being the outcome because it's a nice push back to the very driven type A adding weight to all costs type of mentality that we've had over the course of the last 20 years. So hopefully you guys found that video useful. Um really what this was was a cause and a was a call for more patience when it comes to progression and understanding that once you've hit the top of the range with your given weight, you don't have to add weight.

[00:19:18]What you should do instead is that final progression factor. Wait until it feels easy.

[00:19:26]Wait until you go from something like a 10 R to a 8 R or a zero sorry um zero R to 2 R or a 10 RP to to 8 RP. Yeah.

[00:19:37]Okay. Right guys, I'm going to spend a bit more time in the garden. So have a good day.