How to Break Through Your Fitness Plateau

Don't you just hate it when you stop seeing results for all of your hard work? Everyone reaches a fitness plateau at some point in their journey. You stop losing weight or putting on muscle, and you just stay exactly the same. It's discouraging, and it's a waste of time.

So how can you break through your fitness plateau?

General Tips to Getting Off that Plateau

1. Take a Break

Your body may be too tired and run down to keep building muscle or losing weight, and you need to give it time to rest and recover. Take a few days off from your workout, or do very light exercise.

2. Keep Increasing

Run a bit longer, push a bit heavier. It's often a psychological thing holding you back.

3. Rest Less

If you're resting too much between sets or letting your heart rate dip too low, you're not going to be making the progress you think you should.

4. Switch it Up

Not seeing good muscle mass gains? Do a few weeks of endurance training. When you get back to heavy lifting, you'll make progress more quickly.

Overcoming Weight Loss Plateaus

Weight loss plateaus can be the hardest to break through. You've already shed good weight, but now you're trying to get rid of those last few--to no avail.

So how can you get over those plateaus in your weight loss? Here are a couple of tips specific to fat burning/weight loss:

1. Remember that Real Fat Takes Time

If you lost 10 to 20 pounds already, you've eliminated the easy stuff. Now you're going to burn the real fat, the stuff deep inside your cells. That's going to take more time and will go much more slowly.

2. Eat More

This may sound silly, but your body will treat a lack of calories as a starvation period, and will slow down the metabolism. If you want to speed things up, make sure your caloric intake isn't too low.

Overcoming Muscle Building Plateaus

Tired of lifting weights without seeing those muscles get big in a hurry? No matter how many protein shakes you chug or how many hours you spend at the gym, there's nothing that guarantees good growth except doing the workouts properly.

Here are some tips to help you get those muscles building at a steady rate once more:

1. Use Dumbbells

Just changing up the angle of the exercise recruits new muscles, and those new muscles will grow fairly quickly.

2. Go High Intensity

Instead of lifting slow and steady, go fast and hard. The added intensity will help to build muscle, and will burn off excess fat as well.

3. Change Your Routine

Have you been going heavy recently? Why not try endurance training with light weights? Instead of doing all free weights, use machines and cables. Changing it up can help to increase your results.

4. Take the Days Off

If you're supposed to give your muscles a day or two to rest, do it! Your muscles need rest in order to grow, so your lack of rest could be the reason why you're not seeing any muscle growth.

Getting off that fitness plateau can be hard, but it's possible if you tackle it the smart way. The tips above will help you mix things up so that you can keep making progress.

3 Things You Should Never Do at the Gym

Some people get lucky and are born with fit, toned bodies. Andy Peloquin is not one of those people... Fitness has come hard for him, and he's had to work for it. His trials have led him to becoming a martial artist, an NFPT-certified fitness trainer, and a man passionate about exercise, diet and healthy living. He loves to exercise--he does so six days a week--and loves to share his passion for fitness and health with others.

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