Sick of Not Getting The Results You Want from Your Workouts? Here Are 10 Ideas to Fix that problem!

By Elliot Newman

I don’t care whether you want to gain muscle, build strength, lose body-fat – or some combination of those 3 things…

…what you’re about to discover in this blog post will help you do it. And, what I’m about to say isn’t ‘mainstream’, ‘trendy’ or what you’ll read in the latest edition of Muscle and Fiction. This is the real stuff, that really works…

#1: SHOCK HORROR: The “Best Workout Program” Doesn’t Exist

Every Tom, Dick and Nobody on the Internet today wants to debate what ‘the best’ workout program is.

I’m here to tell you that no matter what your goal, there is no ‘best’ workout program.

If you took the top athletes in ANY sport – be it Bodybuilding or Powerlifting, Weightlifting or Crossfit, or even Tennis or Golf – you’d find differences in the way these athletes trained… proving that the idea that there’s a single ‘best way’ to train, is nonsense.

Here’s what really important…

BELIEF in your training program! 

If you really believe in your program, and it excites you, that’ll motivate you to train HARD. And one thing is for sure… you must train HARD if you want results!

Over the years I’ve trained with people with amazing physiques, and others who were incredibly strong, who never really had a program! They just went to gym, trained ‘instinctively’ and made HUGE gains.

In contrast, I’ve seen other people make little, or no gains, even though, on paper, their workout program looked very well thought through.

My preference is, of course, for you to have an extremely good program, that excites YOU. That way you stand the best chance possible of making gains… be it muscle, strength or fat loss.

You must BELIEVE in what you’re doing when it comes to the gym/working out.

#2: If In Doubt, Stick to Sets of 5

If in doubt, you cannot go wrong with sets of 5 – if MUSCLE and STRENGTH GAINS are the goal.

Take everyone’s favorite lift – The Bench Press – as an example…

Let’s say today, you could do 5 sets of 5 reps on the Bench Press, with 135lbs (60kg). If you spent the next year building that up to 5 sets of 5 reps with 225lbs (100kg), do you think you’d be BIGGER and STRONGER?

Well, you’re obviously stronger, because the weights are significantly heavier!

And, provided you ate enough, you’d also be more MUSCULAR. Likely significantly more muscular.

The same cannot be said if you went from doing 4 sets of 12 reps with 90lbs, to 4 sets of 12 reps with 50% more weight. Those kinds of rep schemes don’t build the same dense, long lasting muscle, and they certainly don’t build the same kind of strength.

#3: If You Want to Get Strong, You Have to Man Up and Lift Heavy

If you really want to build STRENGTH as effectively as possible – singles, doubles and triples are where you need to be.

Some ‘tried and tested’ rep schemes include:

• Working up to a 1 Rep Max (taking 8-12 sets to do it, adding weight each set, until you hit a new personal best)
• Working up to a new 2 rep max
• Working up to a new 3 rep max
• 5 sets of 2 reps (above 80% of your 1RM)
• 3 sets of 3 reps (above 85% of your 1RM)
• 10 singles (at 90% + of your 1RM)

These kinds of set/rep protocols, applied to big compound movements like squatting, pressing (eg Bench Press) and pulling exercises (eg the Deadlift), build strength FASTER than anything else.

You can also ‘go heavy’ on Loaded Carries, like this one – Zercher Walks using the Yoke Bar. Absolutely brutal on the mid-section:

#4: If You Progressively Get Stronger AND Eat Enough, You WILL Build Muscle

I touched on this earlier, but it bears repeating…

There’s no ‘Magic’ to adding muscle. Really it just comes down to this:

• Progressively getting stronger
• Progressively eating more quality food (I say quality food, because you want to MAXIMIZE muscle gain and MINIMIZE fat gain)

I’d love to tell you it was ‘1 secret exercise’ or ‘1 weird food’ that’ll give you a physique like Arnie back-in-the-day, with the strength to match. But…

I’d be lying.

Get STRONGER.

Eat a bit more than you burn off (calorie wise) each day. That’s it – that’s the big secret – to building muscle, in a nutshell.

#5: To Lose Body-Fat, Diet is King, Exercise is Queen

Every month you’ll see the same tired shit on the front of the Major Men’s Fitness Magazines. The same headlines, rotated on and off the front cover throughout the year:

“6 Exercises for Ripped 6 Pack Abs”

“Hollywood Actor [INSERT MOVIE STAR NAME] reveals his Secret Moves for Abs worthy of an Action Hero”

“7 Weird Movements You Can Do at Home, that’ll Burn Body-Fat while You Sleep”

I could write that crap with my eyes closed. But, that’s what it is…

CRAP.

To lose body-fat, DIET is KING!

There’s no escaping that fact. You just can’t out-train a crappy diet.

Of course, this isn’t what sells magazines – because most people would rather believe they could train hard for a few minutes, a few times a week, and still ‘eat all their favorite foods’, to lose body-fat.

Doesn’t work! Not in the long-run anyway.

Reason is…

If you absolutely BUST-YOUR-ASS in the gym, you might – and I really do mean might – burn 500 calories. Maybe 600 at a push.

However, if you go to your favorite fast food restaurant afterwards, and smash down a burger, chips and shake – you’ll eat TWICE that. Maybe more.

Get your nutrition right, and you can torch body-fat quite easily, with minimal exercise!

For instance:

A perfect diet, and 10 sets of 10 kettlebell swings 3 times a week (that’s like 10 minutes of work 3 times a week), could give you a great physique.

Yet, to achieve a great physique, ‘diet wise’, you need to be ‘on it’ 90% of the time (at least in the long run).

You make your choices.

#6: Being a Pussy Doesn’t Work – and Nor Does Annihilating Yourself in The Gym

I often hear people complaining that they aren’t ‘making gains’ in the gym.

The same people are usually training with the kind of intensity and commitment that’s PATHETIC. You know the kind of person – reading the newspaper while riding the bike at the gym… or, spending more time texting than training.

If you want RESULTS – it’ll cost you. In ‘blood, sweat and tears’.

On the contrary, some people FAIL to get the results they want because they insist on annihilating themselves every time they set foot in the gym.

CrossShit. Sorry, I mean ‘CrossFit’ is a great example of this. Sure, they get great results, for a while. Then the injury rate just becomes INSANE.

You have to train hard, in a way that’s sustainable.

CrossFit isn’t that (at least not how most people do it).

Going to an old-school boxing gym where they make you do 20 Push Ups every time you do something ‘wrong’ – isn’t that. It’s moronic.

Training for 3 hours a day, every day, isn’t that. Unless you’re a professional athlete.

The great Lee Haney – one of the best Bodybuilders that ever lived – summed it up nicely when he said:

“Stimulate don’t Annihilate”

It’s great advice when it comes to working out…

HARD enough to produce RESULTS. But not so hard it causes overtraining, injury and so on.

Another way to look at it is this:

To get RESULTS, you should aim to train OPTIMALLY. And, ‘optimally’ doesn’t mean trying to kill yourself every time you set foot in the gym.

#7: Recovery Needs Careful Thought and Implementation

This point follows on nicely from the previous point…

I don’t care what your goal is – muscle, strength, fat loss, or some combination of 2 or 3 of those things…

You should only train in a way you can recover from.

Do too much, and overtraining, aches, pains and injury awaits.

My best recommendations for recovery are:

• Pre, During and Post Workout Nutrition. I like HIIT Fuel before and during. And, some combination of Protein, Carbs, Salt and Quality Herbs for Post.
• Contrast Showers (1 minute hot, 30 seconds cold. Repeat for 4-6 rounds)
• Swim Recovery (walking a length of the pool, then swimming a length slowly. For 15-20 minutes)
• Hydration (Minimum 2 litres of fluids a day)
• A clean Diet made up of Natural, Unprocessed, Organic Foods
• 8 Hours of Uninterrupted Sleep each Night (this is essential! It can make all the difference between making strength, muscle and fat loss gains… OR feeling like crap and going nowhere fast)
• Minimal Stress (meditate, take leisurely walks to lower your stress levels)

The more of this ‘recovery stuff’ you do, the more you’ll be able to train, and the faster the results you’ll be able to get.

#8: Good Training Partners Are Worth Their Weight in Gold

I recently joined a gym owned by former Leeds Rhino Rugby Player Ian Kirke. He and I trained Squats and Deadlifts together the other day. It was BRUTAL.

Afterwards we both remarked how it would be almost impossible to push ourselves the way we did, training on our own.

Point being, if you can find a great training partner, you can both spur each other on to make faster gains than you ever could training solo.

Things to look for in a great training partner:

• Consistency. They gotta be willing to show up on time, and do the work
• Willingness to train in a similar way to you (or vice versa)
• Good at coaching you (and vice versa)
• Good at knowing what to say to encourage you (and vice versa). You can both get better at this, the longer you train together, because you start to figure out each other’s communication strategies, motivation strategies and so on

#9: Consistency is Underrated

A lot of guys read the popular Men’s Magazines, and just choose a different workout each week, or each month.

The trouble is…

There’s no consistency.

If you want to make faster muscle, strength and/or fat loss gains, you’d be much better off finding a SYSTEM of training that appeals to you, and then immersing yourself in it for at least 6 months.

Only then will you have a really decent grasp of the system, and how it works for you. Plus, if you stick to a system for 6 months, and train 3-4 times a week, I’m willing to bet you’ll make pretty decent gains, provided you train HARD enough, and don’t kill yourself outside of the gym.

#10: Have a ‘Plan B’ for When You Can’t Get to The Gym

Some days shit happens and you cannot get to the gym. Christmas, New Year’s Day, a crisis at work that has to be dealt with. You get the idea.

On these days it’s wise to have ‘Plan B’ – so you can still get some training in, as opposed to missing training sessions altogether.

Here are a few ideas:

• Crawling variations. Can be done at home, in the park, or even in your office.
• Pushing/Pulling a Weighted Wheelbarrow. This is a phenomenal exercise and works your body hard from head-to-toe, with particular emphasis on your grip and forearms

• Walking Forwards or Backwards with a Sled… an easy way to build your legs and gluts, with little to no pressure on the spine
• Pushing a Prowler. Very hard. Depending on how you load it, it can be murder on the legs (if you go heavy) or murder on the legs and the lungs! (if you go lighter and go for more time)

Got Questions?
Leave them below and I’ll get back to you ASAP…