Skip to main content

Overtraining Doesn't Exist

Over at the "Iron Samurai" (see my "links" section), Nick Horton has a post that I wish I would have written myself.  It's entitled "Overtraining Doesn't Exist."

 I imagine the title alone would enflame many of your H.I.T. pundits or others who may think that Mike Mentzer was actually on to something.

 Here's a portion of the article:



I’m going to say something many people in the fitness industry will get pissed at me for. But I believe it to be true (within reason).
OVERTRAINING DOESN’T EXIST
That’s bullshit, of course. Overtraining is a medical syndrome that some people do get themselves into. But… it is EXTREMELY rare, and YOU have never had it.
I want you to avoid ANY thought of overtraining. In all of the years I have been coaching, I have not EVER overtrained a single athlete. Ever.
  • CNS fatigue is not overtraining.
  • Feeling tired is not overtraining.
  • A loss of appetite is not overtraining.
  • Being massively sore is not overtraining.
  • Watching your numbers and performance fall is not overtraining.
All of that is part of the adaptation process. You are SUPPOSED to feel like you are getting your ass kicked during a loading phase. If you didn’t, you weren’t loading hard enough.
Lifters always come up to me saying that they have been feeling tired and sluggish, and they wonder if it is time for a deload/taper. My answer is nearly always NO.
Why? Because feeling like shit is part of the point.
You don’t get stronger by only doing light weights that feel easy, do you? Of course not. You force your body to deal with weight that is actually TOO heavy to do comfortably to FORCE the issue. That’s what progressive resistance is all about.
Loading and deloading are simply applying those progressive resistance principles on a grander scale. A well-designed loading phase FORCES your body to adapt to a stressful situation. Without a massive amount of stress you don’t get to have massive gains. Sorry, that is just reality.
Slow gains are very common in the gym in large part because people don’t do enough work. My programs produce infamously fast gains because I make people do more. It’s not magic, it’s nothing special, it is just focusing in on the ultra basics in a big way.
Do work, son.
And here's a link to the full article:
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Feel free to leave us some feedback on the article or any topics you would like us to cover in the future! Much Appreciated!

Popular posts from this blog

Layoffs

Some Thoughts and Ideas on Layoffs (Hint: It’s More Than Just Taking it Easy)      We all need layoffs from time to time.  They allow us to rejuvenate, recover, and “refill” our energy reserves.  Our muscles need them in order to recover sufficiently after many weeks of hard training.  Our nervous systems need them.  It is, in fact, often our nervous systems that require them the most.  But layoffs are good for more than just the body.  Our minds need them just as much as our bodies.  A mental break from training, and even thinking about training, helps us to return to the gym “fired up” for another few weeks or months of hard and heavy barbell sessions.      You may wonder why I’m writing an essay on layoffs.  Isn’t it just about lying around and taking it easy?  Well, sometimes that’s the case.  There are decidedly times, depending on what “intensity” of lifting you’ve been training wi...
Post a Comment
Read more

Easy Strength Meets Easy Muscle

A Hybrid High-Frequency Training Program for a Combination of Size and Strength      For more than 20 years, I have preached the benefits of high-frequency training (HFT) programs.  First in the pages of some of the major bodybuilding magazines, such as IronMan magazine and Planet Muscle , and then on the blog when I started it in 2009.  For the most part, the training I recommended was for strength first, with size, if it occurred, as more of a side-effect of the strength and power training.  And for more than a decade, one of my favorite ways to use HFT is through so-called easy strength methods.  However, I have in the last couple years proposed the theory of using an “easy muscle” approach, where you largely keep the “tenets” of easy strength but do it for higher repetitions, with the sole goal of hypertrophy.      I’m not alone in thinking that this might be a good method for many seeking gains in muscle mass....
Post a Comment
Read more

Marvin Eder’s Mass-Building Methods

  The Many and Varied Mass-Building Methods of Power Bodybuilding’s G.O.A.T. Eder as he appeared in my article "Full Body Workouts" for IronMan  magazine.      In many ways, the essay you are now reading is the one that has had the “longest time coming.”  I have no clue why it has taken me this long to write an article specifically on Marvin Eder, especially considering the fact that I have long considered him the greatest bodybuilder cum strength athlete of all friggin’ time .  In fact, over 20 years ago, I wrote this in the pages of IronMan magazine: In my opinion, the greatest all-around bodybuilder, powerlifter and strength athlete ever to walk the planet, Eder had 19-inch arms at a bodyweight of 198. He could bench 510, squat 550 for 10 reps and do a barbell press with 365. He was reported to have achieved the amazing feat of cranking out 1,000 dips in only 17 minutes. Imagine doing a dip a second for 17 minutes. As Gene Mozee once put ...
Post a Comment
Read more