Training program

Strength training promotes muscle function and also ensures we build further lean muscle whilst boosting our metabolism. The more lean muscle we have, the more calories we burn at rest and our bodies will function more efficiently. Also as we get older, our bones decrease in density and it helps to have more muscle to support them. Other benefits of strength training include increasing balance, stability and posture as well as heart health and sleep quality.

Throughout our strength training program we will start with progressively overloading the muscles in the body. This means starting to work with a particular weight on a certain exercise and gradually increasing the weight used. We need to keep track of our weights every session, so we know exactly when and how to progress through the program. As we go through the program, gradually the weights will get heavier, but the numbers of repetitions we perform will decrease so the exercise is still manageable and we are still making progress. When performance plateaus or slows down, I will change your program. Depending on your level of ability we can then venture into other phases of training such are strength or endurance.

I will usually start to include cardio a week or two into your training. This is because I like my clients to take their time finding their feet with their new routine, and I also want to ensure adherence is as high as possible. During cardio we burn calories during the exercise but little to no calories are burned at rest. This is why strength training will usually take focus during my programs and cardio will be secondary. 

Full body (training all parts of the body in one session) will be the first phase of your training program. This is to promote conditioning of the body and to ease you into muscular endurance. This means higher reps and lower weights, which is also good for you to learn or rediscover exercises and to get the body used to moving again. 

The following two phases will be dedicated to hypertrophy (building muscle) where the reps will be in a moderate range and the weights will increase relatively quickly, we will then be working in a body part split, where we can give each muscle group a little more attention and time to build. The last phase will still be a body part split but we will be working on increasing strength.