What are you training for?

I get asked this question all the time, and when meeting new clients’, it is also a question I am sure to ask.

'So, what are you training for?'

The majority of the time, people are training to change their body composition. Whether this is to lose fat or build muscle. This is a perfectly acceptable reason to train, but it is also where motivation can be hard to find. It can be very demoralising if you feel like you aren’t changing the way you look. You haven’t lost any fat, or haven’t built any muscle, or so you perceive. This can result in a person giving up and never finding fulfilment and reason for their training.

When you see yourself in the mirror every-single-day, it is very difficult to notice change. Using the scales as well can cause problems. If you haven’t lost any weight, then you haven’t lost any fat? Wrong. There are many, many reasons why you may weigh a certain weight. Muscle glycogen stores, not going to the toilet, having drunk a litre of water prior to weighing yourself are all examples. Did you know that a gram and millilitre are the same measurement? So, drinking a litre of water before weighing yourself will result in an extra kilogram on the scales.

To combat this, weigh yourself at the same time of day. Just after waking up usually works best. The scale can be a useful tool, use it as such, and understand that it is not everything!

But, if the above is your goal; body composition, what is the best tool. Well, body fat measurements can be useful, but expensive and daunting to get done. Body measurements potentially but do you really have time for this?

I would recommend pictures. Compare pictures month to month. More frequently than this can result in not as much or as obvious differences being seen, and therefore can be demotivating.

But what if you don’t see change in a month? Then this is positive. Why!? Because something needs to change. If your goal is fat loss you might need to drop your calories. Or, if your goal is muscle gain, you may need to up your calories or increase the intensity of your training (progressive overload). Do not let a lack of progress be your reason to stop. It should be your reason to continue, to try a bit harder, to achieve your goal.

My advice is to use multiple tools to judge how you are getting on. Pictures, yes. Scales, yes but be careful. But what about how your clothes fit or if you are receiving any compliments? What about if you are stronger in the gym or can walk upstairs without getting out of breath, or you have smashed your 5km personal best?

What about how you feel?

This one is the key. If you feel better in yourself then listen to that! Keep going and keep pushing forward. If you feel good then you are doing good! Isn’t that the reason that you started in the first place?

Be smart,

Joe