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Hello and welcome to another episode of the Leo Alves podcast.
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We are closing in on 300 episodes, which is wild to me because I remember starting this podcast back in I remember exactly where I was.
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Introduction: How Long Should You Stick to a Workout Plan
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And I was in um it was when I was living in Japan.
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It was December 2020.
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And uh I was specifically at a hostel in Asaka
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And I had been staying at this hostel for quite a while.
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Like a no, I think it was actually November twenty twenty.
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It it was towards the end of twenty twenty.
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And um
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And I had made that hostel like basically my home because um typically I'm not a f the biggest fan of hostels in Japan.
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They are definitely better than a lot of what I've experienced in the USA or traveling around Europe.
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Um
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But that was when Japan had its travel ban as well.
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And like I was like maybe one of only two guests in the entire hostel.
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And they were like doing it at cut prices because again there was no tourism.
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So they were
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you know like trying to maybe at least like get locals to come in and obviously locals are going to be likely to pay less um
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So they had their prices low.
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Like it was pretty good time to be a tourist in Japan if you were lucky enough to get in just before the country closed.
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I was on like a working holiday visa, so
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Yeah, that was brilliant.
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But anyway, today's podcast episode isn't about Japan.
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That was just basically me talking about when I started this podcast.
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Never did I think, um to be honest, when I started it, I didn't have a clue as to what I was going to do with it, where I was going to go.
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Um a part of me, to be honest, still feels like that a bit.
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It's more just like I just want to show up every week.
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And then anything that happens is just like
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a buy a byproduct, it's a bonus.
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Um I'm still doing this without really any expectations.
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Uh I I just enjoy it.
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And you know, I don't want to at like throughout those whole six
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W it's what?
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It's May twenty twenty six now.
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I started let's say in November twenty twenty.
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Maybe about been doing this for about five and a half years.
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I definitely haven't been
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Um I'm not even at episode 300 yet and I'm talking like I am, but I don't know.
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I'm on a bit of a tangent before I start today's podcast episode.
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Um I haven't been consistent the whole time
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Like there's definitely been phases where I haven't released an episode for quite a few months.
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And then there were other phases where I was releasing an episode like twice a week.
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I eventually realized that I think that was um too consistent that I felt like the quality of the episode was starting to decline for me proper proper um
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Probably.
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Maybe not.
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And you know, I could be wrong.
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Maybe I was just being a harsh critic and like the quality was still there.
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And to be fair, this was during a time where
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I ha was still early in my podcasting journey, so a lot still hadn't been said on the podcast.
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But I felt like as time went on, I felt like one episode a week was um a nice
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place for me to be and that's not to say that I'll never go back to twice a week again.
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To be fair I am considering increasing the frequency but I also want to do something that I can 100% be consistent with
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Uh and and you know, okay, but I will miss the uh one or two the the odd week here and there in the year.
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Um so I shouldn't probably say a hundred percent.
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Uh and and that's going to happen, but um
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I want to do something that I can realistically be consistent with for a long time and uh and and obviously I'm going to be able to be much more consistent with once a week
than twice.
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Um and that's just a fact, right?
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But anyway, yeah, I've been enjoying this podcast episode.
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Thanks for coming along on the journey with me.
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If you have um been finding these podcast episodes useful, then remember please leave me a a review on
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whichever podcast platform you listen to me on and otherwise that is it for today's podcast episode.
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I hope you're not joking.
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Let's get stuck into um
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Basically, the the topic of today's podcast episode is why you keep changing workout plans.
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I'm going to discuss everything around it, you know, why do simple plans often work best, what actually matters most in a program
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How do you know a plan is working, etc.
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, etc.
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?
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Because I feel like there's a lot to say regarding the subject.
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I feel like um you know sometimes you get people who think, oh yeah, workout planning, there can't be that much to it.
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I'm just going to go to the gym and
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And do some bicep kills.
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And then you get other people who I feel like think they know a lot.
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And to be fair, you don't have to know a ton to make progress.
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I do want to make that clear.
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But then you also realize like, oh, there's a bit of um
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the Dunning Kruger going on.
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And uh I f I so what I will say, I think it was like just I've done it before, but I wanted to go all in have a podcast episode where I just go all in on the topic again
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Um so I'm going to cover 10 questions today on just basically workout programming and and yeah just things surrounding it.
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So
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I hope you do enjoy it.
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How Long Should You Stick to a Workout Program?
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Otherwise, question number one, how long should you stick to a workout plan?
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And um to be fun to be honest, I don't think there's like a should here.
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Like there's not one straight answer.
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Like I can't just be like 10 weeks.
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That's it.
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Next.
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Uh it's going to vary in quite a few factors.
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I would say like the Goldilocks zone for a lot of people is typically going to be about eight weeks, maybe ten.
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Um
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Ultimately, it's going to depend on a few factors.
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Like, are you bored of it?
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Are you still making great progress?
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Like if you're like on week 10, but you're still not bored of it, you're still making tremendous progress, like you're managing to
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Progressively overload like there's no tomorrow on the workout plan.
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Like why change?
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Do you know what I mean?
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Like you don't need to change.
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You can still keep going with it.
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I've run workout programs for like I think
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I think the longest I've done was four months.
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One plan.
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Um But you know, you could be on week six or week seven and you're like, you know what, I think it's time for something new because I'm just really not feeling this right
now.
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Um or it doesn't feel my best.
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Sometimes it's not even a case of changing an entire workout program.
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Sometimes it might just be a case of you know changing one, two or three exercises at some point within the plan
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just because those specific exercises don't agree with you as much or they don't feel good.
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Um so how long should you stick to a workout program?
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You know, there's not one straight answer.
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I would say a Goldilocks stone for many people is probably about eight, nine, ten weeks.
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That could be quite a good sweet s a sweet spot if you want to do yeah, seven, that's fine too
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Um I I think it's just a a question of like, you know, are you progressing?
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Are you bored?
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Do you feel like you're still being consistent with it?
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Are you still going?
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I think sometimes people um also are guilty of
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Just switching programs too fast.
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Like they'll do a program for like I've met people who do different things every single week.
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You're not gonna make progress like that.
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Like I'm gonna make that clear right now.
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Like
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Because we have to think about how are we going to make progress when it comes to being in the gym?
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Progress is going to come on the back of progressive overload.
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How can you progressively overload an exercise if you're doing a different exercise every single week?
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You cannot
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Like you at least need to do an exercise consistently for at least a while so you can progressively overload that exercise over time.
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If you're doing something different every single time
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you're you can't implement progressive overload.
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So therefore you're by you know definition you're going to struggle to make progress.
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Again, you also don't want to do it for too long as well.
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Like I've met people who just run full body workouts like for forever
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And I don't want to say that it's terrible, like if you're making progress then great.
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But for example, with that type of progress, um that type of person, if you've been doing f just full-body workouts for like six years
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You would probably make tremendous progress from just like running an upper lower split or a push-pull leg split because it's something new.
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Like there comes a point where
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A new stimulus is really good for the body as well in regards to muscle building.
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Um question number two, why do people program hop?
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Why Program Hopping Kills Progress
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I think a lot of people program hop and what basically what program hopping basically is, and I've met a lot of people like this in my life as well.
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um it's like they'll do a a workout program for like two weeks and then they see a new one and then they start that new one and they do it for like three weeks and then they go
back to another one and they're like, oh, you know, that one looks great, let me do it and then they do it for two weeks and then they change it.
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It's like
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It's like that shiny object syndrome, I think it's called.
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And they don't realize it's like, hey, hey, hey, like, fur you need to s chill the the hell out, like slow down, like
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You are self-sabotaging sabotaging your results right now because again, it's like I was saying earlier, how are you going to make progress when you're always just
basically doing something different nearly every single week?
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I think people program hop yeah just starts shiny object syndrome and I think a lot of them are often quite impatient with their lack of results on the current workout
program
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Um and they think they should be progressing faster because they feel like they're doing a lot of other things right, but they're not getting any results to show it.
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Not realizing that the reason why they're not getting any results isn't because
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um of the current workout plan they're doing, but it's because they're never just doing a workout plan for long enough.
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When Should You Actually Change Exercises?
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Question number three
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When should you actually change exercises?
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I would say to change exercises like a good time.
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Um are you bored of the exercise?
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Okay, change it up
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Are you just like not progressing on an exercise?
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Like I've run um exercises before and workout plans, me and with my one-to-one online fitness members.
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Like this is why logging workouts is important, so you can realize what I'm about to say.
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Where
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Like you will progressively overload every single exercise on the workout plan like apart from that one.
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Like for some reason that specific exercise
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You just can't seem to improve at it.
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Like the weight doesn't go up, the reps don't go up.
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If anything, it feels like it might be regressing slash like maintaining as the weeks go on.
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And eventually there just comes a time where you're like, you know what, this isn't really doing it for me.
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Let me switch it out for something similar.
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So instead of a barbell chest press, I'm going to do like
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a dump old chest press.
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So it's not like we're completely like doing something totally new.
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We're just changing it for something similar.
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And I would say
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Wow like there's hold on there's I don't know if you can hear these two train I'm like right by a train track and there's two trains passing right now and that was just like
really noisy because
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I've never had two at the same time.
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Um, sorry about that.
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Anyway, um I think yeah, it's just uh it's just like sometimes it's not even about changing the exercise completely
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Um and by that I mean like doing something completely different.
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Like you can just substitute it for something quite similar, but I think it's just like okay
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This isn't really working for me.
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I haven't really progressed at this exercise even though I've been doing it consistently for four or five weeks now.
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Like I should have progressively overloaded it somehow by
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by this point.
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Like I've been doing it for at least a month now and it's just not going anywhere.
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Some exercises just don't feel right as well.
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Like there is that point as well where you could change an exercise because of that.
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Like I remember I'll never forget I was one time I was in a gym.
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And this was the first time it really hit me.
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This was back in like 2018.
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I was doing um there was like, you know, so like dumbbell lateral raises.
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There was a machine variation of that and I sat down and I did it
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And instantly I was like, no, this machine isn't for me.
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It does not feel good on my shoulders.
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And I had it set up all correct.
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It just didn't feel good.
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And now ultimately, like that's not an unusual thing as well, because machines are made for the average person.
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And you know, more often than not
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like average person uh average person with average average limb lengths etc and you know you get people who aren't who just aren't going to fit that um I probably do fit
that description more so in regards to like
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like height, etc.
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But yeah, it just didn't feel right.
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And I was like, okay, I'm swapping that out immediately.
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Um sometimes you might get like a niggle or an injury.
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Like that could be a reason to
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uh change in exercise.
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So there's quite a few reasons as to why you might do it.
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Are You Over-Optimising Your Fitness Routine?
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Question number four, are you sabotaging progress by over-optimizing?
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Um I feel like there's so many ways I could take this down.
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Um
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Probably more of maybe like there are there's obviously going to be scenarios where no, you're not going to sabotage results by like trying to optimize everything.
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Because for some people that's that's what they need.
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Maybe some people are already doing a lot of things correctly
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And they just like need to dull in these last few factors within their daily life that's help going to you know help them make that like last five percent of progress.
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But then
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There's other people who are just like, mate, like why are you trying to opt over optimize your workout plan like when you're trying to like like you're trying to
optimize
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X, Y, and Z factor in your workout plan.
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What you're going to do specifically on week two, session two, and then on week four, session three.
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It's like
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You're not even going to the gym.
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Like you're just not even consistent at the gym.
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But you're worried about all these other things that you're trying to overoptimize.
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Like it it becomes a form of procrastination for a lot of people.
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It's like, you know what, if you would just get in the gym and follow
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something you would be making much more progress so you know it can go both ways like are you sabotaging progress by overoptimizing
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It depends on the person.
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Uh question number five, how do you know a plan is working?
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How Do You Know a Workout Plan Is Working?
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A plan you're going to know a plan is working.
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Um
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Because you're just getting strong as fuck as time goes on, to put it bluntly, you know, you're you're you're doing more reps, you're doing more weight.
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The exercises are like flying in regard to progression.
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Um
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This is why it's important to log progress as well, because you can actually like see in front of you firsthand, like the exercise is improving over time
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Last week I did 20k um I mean last month I did 20 kg dumbbells.
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This month I'm doing 26 kg dumbbells.
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That there is an obvious sign of progress.
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So you can know
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The plan is likely working there.
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Like now, is you are you seeing like similar progress across the board?
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If so, yeah.
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Like and sometimes you might not progress that quickly.
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Like sometimes it could just be like oh
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Rep I'm I'm getting more reps.
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Even then, if you're doing way more reps than you did last month for the same amount of weight, like um especially if you've been already going to the gym for a while
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Like that's going to be progress as well.
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So you're going to know a plan is progressing just because you're getting strong as fuck, mate.
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And uh and that's just and and you know that's relative as well.
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Like
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Yeah some one person getting strong as hell is going to be look different to another one who someone else who's maybe in their earlier days of working out.
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Is Boredom a Valid Reason to Change Programs?
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Um
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Question number six, is boredom a valid reason to switch?
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Yeah, I did mention that earlier.
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Um, so I'll say it again, I won't take too much time on this question because again I covered it earlier, but boredom is absolutely a reason to switch
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As long as that doesn't mean you're switching like every two or three weeks, because then, you know, I wouldn't say like, okay, I maybe you're bored of it, but then
there's also a a time where you've just got to do it.
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Like, but you're not gett like two to three weeks, as I said, it's not long enough to progress at something.
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But then if you've been doing it for like six, seven, eight, nine, ten six, seven if you've been doing it for six, seven, eight, nine, ten weeks, um
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I don't know why I said that by the way, like I've got uh I've got a f a 15-year-old brother and a 17-year-old cousin and they've just been they've drilled that into my head.
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I don't know where that's come from
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from.
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But um yeah, like it is.
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Like um if you've been running a workout plan for like seven, eight, nine, ten weeks and you know you're starting to get bored, yes, a very valid reason to switch because
at the end of the day
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If you're getting bored of your workouts, then that's obviously going to work against you eventually.
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And that progress is going to start to slow down.
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You're going to want to start to be maybe a little bit less consistent because you're bored of it.
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So
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Yeah, it's absolutely a reason to be able to change things up.
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What Should You Actually Track in the Gym?
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Um question number seven, what should you track?
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I would say when it comes to your workouts, do you want to log?
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Um so the way I do it
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I will have my session at the top, like the session name, like full body A or upper B or I don't know, just like or push.
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And then I'll have the five exercises underneath it.
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And then alongside each exercise, I'll just basically have
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The weight I lifted X the amount of reps I did.
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And then whether and then I'll have that twice if I did two sets, or I'll have that three times if I did three, or four times if I did four, and so on.
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And that's basically how I log all my workouts.
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So if I did again, I'm throwing random numbers out there.
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20 KG um or let's say
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Nah, you know what, this is me, less let's say 30 kg.
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Um to be honest, I've been nursing a tennis my tennis elbow right now, which is actually improv it's improved a ton and I think I'm I'm close to 100% as long as I don't do
anything reckless anytime soon, so
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I've actually been benching much lighter than usual just to be sensible with it.
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But yeah, let's say I'm gonna throw random numbers out.
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chest pressing 26 kg dumbbells.
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Um and I did eight reps.
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I would basically lock that down by I would write 26x
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eight and that's how I lock it down for the first set and then maybe if I did seven reps for the second set then after on the on the maybe like next to it I'd have twenty six X
seven.
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And that's just basically how I you know like log my progress over time.
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Um question number eight.
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What Matters Most in the Gym?
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What actually matters most in the program?
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I would say you know what?
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The thing is, it's this it the funny part is it's not actually something you would even have on paper
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It's the intensity of your workouts.
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I would say the intensity of your workouts matter a ton because you can have a great program, but if your intensity isn't there
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And you're not really progressively overloading over time, your form isn't very good, and you're not taking your sets close to failure.
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Like they're not hard sets
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You it doesn't matter like about how good your workout plan is because the execution isn't really there.
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So I would say like that's one of the things that matter most in a program.
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The intensity of your workouts, like that's so important.
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And
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I think I said this in the last episode, like a lot of people don't have their intensity.
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And like don't get me wrong, some people are starting out, so they can't know what like pushing yourself genuinely feels like when you've just started, like you're
still getting the hang of everything
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But I've I have seen and met a lot of people who have worked out for years by this point and there's still like there's still a lack of intensity
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They're still lifting weight that just genuinely isn't actually them pushing themselves.
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They're not taking sets of failures.
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I would just say intensity
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Um question number nine, why do simple plans often work best?
18:25
Why Simple Workout Plans Often Work Best
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Um it might be like more of a there's a correlation correlation thing, but it's not necessarily a causation because I would say maybe it's the type of person
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who just gets their shit done.
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It's like I don't need the most complicated plan in the world.
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I just want it, you know, I'm just gonna get it done
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And that type of person is often going to be like, I don't need something complicated.
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Just give me something simple.
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I'm going to bench press for three sets and then I'm going to do squats for three, uh, for three sets, and then after that, I'm going to do
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um I don't know dumbbell uh uh barbell rows for another three sets like they're not overthinking it they just go in and like obviously they're still like progressively
overloading intensity is there but
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And those factors are there, but they're also not overthinking it where they're thinking like about every m minor detail.
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It's like it's just so give them something simple and they're gonna go out and execute it because ultimately at the end of the day
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The most important thing is actually you getting it done and you being consistent, right?
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So I I would say that's probably the reason why simple plans often work best because
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It's just like you're not overthinking it, you're just doing it, which is ultimately what's most important.
19:35
Why Most People Quit Before Progress Compounds
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Now final question number 10.
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Why do people quit before compounding happens?
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I think I kind of mentioned this earlier, but I think it's people just get impatient
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Especially nowadays because we live in a world that's often full of instant gratification.
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You can get like instant dopamine hits on your phone by scrolling TikTok, scrolling Instagram, YouTube Shorts
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If you want really good food, you can order that on your phone and it will be at your door in like 15 minutes.
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Like we live in a world of just massive instant gratification that I think some people, even though they're aware of that, they still struggle with the fact that
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Oh shit, I actually have to do this for a while to see results and by a while I don't mean one or two weeks.
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Like like you know you can still see small wins in that time, but like
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Like something like big like it's going to take a while.
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It's going to take quite a few months of consistency depending on your starting point of course but
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I would say that's probably one of the biggest reasons why people quit before compounding happens is just because they don't really give themselves the chance to get
there because again um
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I think it's just a lot of people have issue with uh are just so used to you know uh instant gratification now because that's the world we live in.
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Um
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And I think we're all guilty of that to an extent, myself included.
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I don't want to sound like I'm, you know, I'm not part of that.
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Of course, there's a level of me that that is as well.
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Like I expect my food if I'm ordering it online to be here
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You know, uh well, I could say pretty quickly depending on how far the the the location is.
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Um but otherwise
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Episode Conclusion: Why Most People Never Stick to a Workout Program
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That's pretty much it from me today.
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Again, I mentioned I did mention my one-to-one online fitness members earlier.
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If you're interested in becoming a one-to-one online fitness members
21:26
And seeing fantastic results like them, if I do say so myself.
21:30
I you know, I've got social proof my on my Instagram if you want to go and check out their results.
21:35
Um
21:36
Then just click the show notes in the the link in the show notes of this podcast episode because the link to sign up and become a one-to-one online fitness member
21:43
is there.
21:45
And again, make sure you leave a review on this uh on whichever platform you listen to this on as well.
21:50
Otherwise take care.
21:51
Have an amazing day and I'll see you in the next episode
