Training Tactics to Fuel Your Journey

The purpose of this guide is to make your fitness journey as efficient as possible. We’re not here to provide a made-to-measure plan for your body, but what we can do is tell you everything you need to know about training the right way.

We’re going to ease you in to proceedings and start with some basic tactics. In truth, these tactics could have spun a whole dissertation – but they are more general suggestions that will help you along your way.

In terms of the more detailed, drilled-down advice, this will occur in subsequent chapters where we look at individual components of a workout.

Bearing this in mind, before you even pick up a dumbbell, make sure you keep the following suggestions firmly in the back of your mind.

The 90% form rule

For a beginner, we would argue that this is one of the most important suggestions to take on board. Far too many people who are just starting with their fitness journey will put strength over finesse – even though the latter is paramount to success.

When we talk about the 90% rule we don’t mean anything overly complex. The basis is that if you can’t perform a set of reps that are at least 90% correct, the weight is too high. Or, you might just be exhausted, and your rest period needs to be longer as a result.

One of the reasons gyms have so many mirrors arranged around the room is because of form. While some people might turn to them for vanity reasons, on the most part they are used to assist during a workout.

Don’t be afraid to peer into the mirror, and find out if you really are performing that exercise correctly. If you’re not, take action. Otherwise, you won’t just increase your chances of incurring injury, but you will most probably be working the wrong areas of your body and not giving yourself any benefits whatsoever.

Don’t be afraid to turn to the professionals

The previous point lends itself perfectly onto the next one; the use of professionals.

Some people might give personal trainers a bad name, and in some cases it’s rightly so. Some will rip you off, some don’t really know what they are talking about and won’t help you along your journey in the slightest.

There are some which are completely worth the money though, and will fine-tune your progress every step of the way. We’ve just spoken about form, and the very best trainers will ensure that this is the first thing that you think about when you take to an exercise.

If you’ve never worked out before, a personal trainer is completely advisable. It’s someone who can introduce you to countless exercises, and also allow you to use the machinery correctly.

Of course, if you are training with someone who knows what they are doing or if you are confident in YouTube videos you needn’t worry, but a good personal trainer can accelerate your progress substantially.

A general rule of thumb is to find the busiest one in the gym. Those that don’t have clients tend not to for a reason.

Understand your limits

We’ve just spoken about a professional helping you along your way and in relation to this next suggestion, this can be a huge advantage.

When we breach the topic about knowing your limits, most people immediately assume we are talking about not pushing themselves too far. In actual fact, we’re talking about both types of limits – the type where you are not pushing yourself enough, and the type where you are going too much.

If you fall into the group of the former, your progress is likely to stall. Put simply, if you’re not pushing your body, you’re not pushing it to develop.

This applies to both cardio and weight training. In relation to pushing yourself too much, it goes without saying that you are more likely to incur injuries and your body will quickly tell you that you are doing too much.

Unfortunately, identifying these limits is extremely difficult indeed. A trial-and-error approach is the best thing we can recommend. In relation to weight training, simply experimenting with different weights is the only thing you can do.

As we’ve already said, professionals can make the job easier, mainly because they have a firm idea of your capabilities due to their work with so many other different bodies through their career.

…But make sure you push them

We could have shoehorned this next suggestion into the previous one, but it’s probably worthy of its own section.

As we’ve already said, if you don’t push your body hard enough, it’s not going to develop in the way that you want.

This development of your body isn’t just about bulging muscles though. It also relates to your metabolic rate.

The harder you work out, the faster your metabolism will come. This is absolutely crucial through the course of the day, as it means that you will continue burning fat long after your workout has been completed.

Don’t even try to spot check

Something that a lot of beginners spend time focusing on is spot checking. For those unaware, this refers to the process where you can actually decide where on your body fat is going to be lost. In other words, you can say “I want to focus on the fat dropping away from my waist”.

Unfortunately, this is a complete and utter misconception. Any advice that you find which suggests the above is fabricated – there’s no other story. Your body will lose fat in a way that it desires, you can’t program it to work any other way.

Of course, it’s a completely different story when it comes to muscles, as you can train different areas of your body accordingly. Never attempt to prove this with fat though; regardless of what you eat or how you act, it will just increase or decrease at its own will.