The Great Plateau!

It seems no matter how much we exercise, how meticulous we are with our food intake, we will all at some point hit a dreaded plateau! You know the plateau where you get on the scale and the damn thing won't budge, for days, weeks, months!

Our bodies have developed over thousands of years to become very efficient.  It doesn't want to burn calories, it wants to store them. Your muscles adapt to strength training quickly and must be challenged with heavier weights. You need to mix it up!

Here are a few tips to the reduce the occurrences of plateaus:
1. Switch your workout up every 6 - 8 weeks
2. Do a variety of exercises, ie run one day, weight train another, play squash the next.
3. Provide your body with adequate rest for muscle repair
4. Stay hydrated, with water!
5. Be honest about the calories you eat and the amount of exercise you are doing. On average we underestimate our caloric intake by 20% and overestimate the calories burned through exercise creating a perfect storm for a plateau.
6. Increase the intensity of your weight training sessions, train to muscle failure!

Tips to break a plateau:
1. Recalculate your daily caloric intake. (Refer to the post called "How many calories do you need?" http://theworkoutshop.blogspot.com/2010/10/so-how-many-calories-do-you-need.html
2. Track your calories and journal them, weigh your food, measure your servings to make sure your calories are accurate, readjust as needed.
3. Increase the intensity of your cardio workouts, add intervals to blast a large volume of calories quickly
4. Add weight training, muscle burns more calories throughout the day
5. Try a new activity, keep your body guessing as to what is next.  If your activity or choice is running, try a spinning class etc.
6. Be patient, it will pass.  If you get frustrated and fall off the wagon you will find yourself having gained a few pounds..that is not how you want to break your plateau!

Guess where plateaus don't exist? Indoor rock climbing, give it a try!