Progress is a slow moving train. And because of that, it can be incredibly frustrating to put in your absolute best and not see the results you want, or worse still, see no results at all. There may be a perfectly reasonable explanation for why; you may have simply not trained enough, or placed unrealistic expectations upon yourself. But in any case, here are a few reasons why you may not be seeing changes just yet.
1 – Your workout is not intense enough. A silly and obvious point, but if you have a lot of excess weight to lose, you need to do somewhat of a harder workout to shift it than someone who simply wants to lose a couple of pounds. This is not to say that you need to go absolutely hell for leather and go over and above your abilities, simply that you may not be getting enough work in to shift that excess off as quickly as you want.
2 – You’re not exercising correctly. This one comes up often with people who, with the above in mind, do indeed get out there and spend a lot of time and intensity trying to work off their excess, or are trying to bulk up. We’ve all made rookie errors like pushing from the wrong area during sit ups or push ups, but over time, this essentially means you are not working the areas of the body that the very exercise was intended for. You also heighten the risk of causing yourself an injury.
3 – You’re leaving too long between sessions. Unless you’re doing something like HIIT where your body continues to burn calories way after you’ve finished, you need to be keeping your system on its toes with regular, dedicated and intense exercise so that it becomes accustomed to hard work. Then you gradually move up to a more intense workout; if you’re leaving too much time in between, your system is going to be constantly backsliding and you’ll just plateau…which leads to the next point. Even if you are going to the gym five times a week, solidly, you need to be looking at stepping it up over time to avoid the plateau kicking in. This is where you exercise with no real results. Aim for better with every workout. Conversely, if you’re trying to bulk up, it may be that you’re not consuming enough calories. People who are going for a dirty bulk are pretty much exempt for this as they’re cramming in as much as they want. But a clean bulker is playing the long game, and its easy to get stuck in a rut of not gradually increasing calories. Then, of course, you just keep burning them off. Also, in the worst way possible, it may be that your diet is just too healthy! Aim to get fats and carbs in if you want to bulk, otherwise you’re going to remain slim and light.
4 – You’re exercising the wrong muscles. This is another common mistake. When we talk about ‘fast twitch’ and ‘slow twitch’ muscle fibres, they may sound silly. But different muscles in your body do different things. You may be working out, rowing and engaging in long distance running, but these are slow twitch exercises aimed at sustained exercise for long periods of time. Therefore, you’re not going to see the same bulking up of muscle mass as if you were hitting the fast twitch muscle fibres. Here, you’re getting the arms, abs and legs all trained up for short, sharp bursts of pulling or pushing weight, and that is where you’re going to look ripped…not through long distance endurance sport training, which is all well and good, but veers off in a different direction. Look at what you’re trying to achieve and what the exercises you’re engaged in typically bring in results.
Of course, there may be medical reasons why your body is not changing; these are normally hormonal or dietary in nature, but this can’t be helped. If your internal workings are all fine, you can bet the farm that it’s going to be tied in with one of the above.