Breaking The Plateau: How Often You Should Change Your Workout Routine?

How Often You Should Be Changing Your Workout Routine

Breaking the plateau by changing your workout routine is no easy task. In today’s contributed post, we give you a few ideas to start that fitness journey to the next level.

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When we’ve found a workout routine that really works for us, we can feel loathe to change it at all.

You may find a specific form of ab workout that really sculpts your stomach, but for every single one of us, we can hit a plateau.

What is the solution to overcoming this, when we hit that point where we become stagnant and are not able to build additional muscle?

Changing your workout regime. But there are so many different schools of thought on changing your workout routine.

Why should you do it, and how often should you change?

The Main Reasons To Consider Changing Your Workout Routine

Apart from the difficulty of gaining extra muscle, one of the main reasons you should think about changing your workout routine is that you could change your goals.

For example, if you had a goal at the very outset to get stronger, but now it’s changed to something like losing fat or building a better set of muscles, the workout routine needs to change to reflect your new goals.

On the other hand, it could be a very simple fact that you are bored. You may have got to the point that your motivation is so low that you really can’t be bothered to hit all those muscles with the same intensity that you used to.

Or on the other hand, it could very well be schedule related, meaning that you need to alter your workout to better suit your lifestyle.

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The Solutions

The solutions are varied, but, it doesn’t always require an extreme change.

Your muscles do benefit from your workouts being constantly shaken up, but if your goals are strength related, you need to work that muscle appropriately.

Sometimes, it’s as simple as swapping from something like a squat to a lunge. The exercises are, in essence, working the same sort of muscle, but it’s making a smaller change within the workout. The structure is still the same, but the exercises are slightly different so that you notice the difference, but it’s not a seismic change.

If you are struggling because of a lack of motivation, say, if you’ve been working out at home, the mental stimulus of getting to a gym near you, where you are able to see other people working out and how much their lifting, squatting, etc, could provide you with that bit of motivation you’ve needed, in which case, you don’t actually have to change your workout routine. Instead, you can just lift heavier!

Related: 10 Best Half Marathons in the United States

Why Should You Even Bother Changing Your Workout Routine?

They say you should change your workout routine approximately every 8 weeks, but in fact, you may not need to completely get rid of your workout regime.

It depends on the reasons, but if you have no reason to make a change, then there is no need. The goal of a workout is to challenge your body.

If you are doing this, then mission accomplished! When we break it down to the biomechanical reasons we gain muscle, it’s about our body adapting to the stimulus.

So, if you are feeling challenged by the stimulus you’re putting your body under, then there is no need to do anything different.

Related: Best Half Marathon Playlist

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