If you’ve been consistently working out for a long period of time, it’s likely that you’ve experienced a fitness plateau in your journey. In this article I am going to identify what a fitness plateau is, and how you can break through to continue making progress and seeing results.

What Is a Plateau in Fitness?

A fitness plateau happens when you stop experiencing changes from your workouts. When you start working out for the first time, you’ll make progress very quickly. On the right training program, you’ll likely lose some fat and gain some muscle within the first 1-2 months. It’s usually around the 3 month marker that you experience your first fitness plateau. You stopped losing weight and gaining muscle. You didn’t stop working out, but you stopped experiencing the results that were getting you to your goal.

How to Break Through a Plateau

The stronger you get, the harder it is to get stronger. This is essentially the reason for fitness plateaus. When you go from zero activity to working out two to four times per week, your body will change to adapt to that stress and performance demand. Breaking a fitness plateau requires a workout program aligned with your goals that progresses over the weeks, months, and years to continue challenging you at an intensity that will deliver results.

1. Change Up Your Routine

I used to be a group fitness instructor. I love group fit. Group fitness classes are motivating, challenging, and wonderful because you don’t have to think about what you’re doing. You just do as you’re told. However, taking group fitness classes is what causes a lot of people to get stuck in their first fitness plateau. 

You may see some weight loss and muscle gain when you first start, but all of these classes are essentially cardio/endurance, and do little to nothing for your strength. Even classes that have you use weights typically don’t provide enough rest for you to lift heavy enough to promote muscle growth if you’re no longer at a very beginner level of training. Unfortunately, leaving a workout feeling super sweaty and gassed does not necessarily mean it was effective. It’s not indicative of getting you the results you want. 

If you’ve been doing group fit classes, HIIT workouts, etc., and have fit a fitness plateau, it’s time to change up your routine.

2. Try Something You’ve Never Done Before

Doing the same thing and expecting different results is the definition of insanity. If you are looking to get toned, increase your speed, move pain free, increase your mobility and stability, you need to try something you’ve never done before. 

This could look like incorporating power and explosive work into your workouts. This could be lifting heavy-ass weights for the very first time. You could change up your runs to include more speed work to bring down your mile time. 

All of these are fitness goals. Setting a goal for your training is how to break a fitness plateau. Goals will get you doing things you haven’t done before, which your body will need to change in order to adapt and overcome. Boom. Progress.

3. Focus on Progressive Overload

One of my favorite ways to combat fitness plateaus is by progressive overload. Stay consistent with your workouts. Find a strength training program that fits your goals. And then, decide how you are going to make the workouts in your program harder week by week. 

You can progressively overload by increasing the weight you are lifting for your exercises. Start by increasing your upper body weights by 2.5lbs-5lb week over week, and your lower body weights by 5lb-10lb week over week. 

Increasing weights isn’t your only option for progressive overload. Maybe you are working out at home with minimal weights. In this case you can work with tempo – slowing down and increasing time under tension for each exercise. You can add repetitions. Minimize rest time between exercises. And once you feel like you’re hitting your next fitness plateau, change up the technique you’re using to progressively overload.

4. Rest

Did you know that muscles grow when you’re sleeping? That’s right, one of the best things you can do for your body when you’re trying to get toned and defined is get efficient sleep. When you lift weights, you’re breaking down your muscles. You have to be working out at an intensity that’s challenging enough to damage your muscles if you want them to grow. That’s very important. 

Equally as important is giving them the time they need to recover and repair. Sleep is when those muscles have the opportunity to get stronger. Muscles need time to recover from the stress of your training so that they can perform better next time. If you can get at least 7 hours of sleep every night, you’ll be ready to progressively overload to make growth and progress in your next workout.

5. Work With a Coach

Working with a personal trainer or coach is a great option for breaking your fitness plateau. If you feel overwhelmed after reading this article, that’s normal. There’s a lot of technicalities when it comes to breaking your fitness plateau for the simple reason I brought up earlier: the stronger you get, the harder it is to get stronger. Working with a professional who knows how to take your goals and put together a workout program to get you the results you’re looking for can be a huge help for breaking through your fitness plateau.

Keep Pushing Your Progress Forward

The most crucial part of any fitness goal is consistency. When you hit a fitness plateau and you’re feeling mentally drained or physically bored and disappointed with a lack of results, it can be tempting to quit. Here’s the catch; quitting is the only way to ensure you will never reach your goals. 

The #1 thing you need to do when you hit a fitness plateau is keep showing up. It’s not easy. But if you can show up on the bad days, you become unstoppable. If you think working with a coach is what you need to break your fitness plateau, fill out my inquiry form to connect with me one-on-one. After applying on my website, you’ll receive an email from me so we can find a time to hop on the phone and decide if my program is right for you.