5 Signs You Need to Change Your Exercise Routine
Have you been doing the same exercise routine for months and no longer feel like your current workout serves you or gives you the results you’re looking for? If that’s the case, it might be time to make a few changes to your workout or give it a total reboot. Change can help you better reach your objectives and stay motivated too.
1. You No Longer Feel the Challenge
Exercise shouldn’t feel too easy unless you’re doing it to relax. If you’re trying to get results, you need some challenge. When you start working out, your body isn’t accustomed to the movements you’re doing. The exercises feel like a challenge and this forces your muscles to adapt and become stronger. But if you keep doing the same movements in the same way, the movements begin to feel easier. That’s because you’ve become stronger or developed greater endurance. At that point, you need to work your muscles a little harder to continue to make gains. That’s why using progressive overload (adding more weight, volume, or using more advanced techniques) is so important. It gives your muscles a new stimulus and challenge that causes them to further adapt. Even if you use progressive overload, there may come a point where you need to add different exercises or revamp your workout to make it challenging again.
2. Your Heart Rate Isn’t Rising Enough
When you first launch into an aerobic training program, you might notice that your heart rate climbs quickly to the point where you get cardiovascular benefits. But if you keep doing the same routine at the same intensity, your heart rate doesn’t rise as much during a workout. That’s because your heart has become a more efficient pump and your cardiovascular fitness has improved. On the downside, unless you add more intensity, it will be hard to make further gains in aerobic fitness. Therefore, you must up the intensity of your training sessions. If you run or cycle, pick up the pace and add some hills, but be sure to track your heart rate to see how your cardiovascular system responds to these changes.
3. You’re No Longer Getting Results
It’s not uncommon for people to lift weights for a while and see changes in the beginning. In response to training, they become stronger and their muscles increase in size. But sometimes those changes come to a dead halt after a few months. You’re frustrated to find that you’re no longer experiencing gains in strength or changes in body composition. If that’s the case, it’s time to make your routine more challenging by lifting heavier weights, by increasing the number of repetitions, or by adding more sets. You can also introduce more advanced training techniques like supersets to challenge your muscles in a different way.
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