9 Sure-Fire Tips to Sky-Rocket Your Strength Gains (AKA: Stop Being a Puny Weakling)

Jonny Hamilton-Potter
Jan 15, 2016
7 min read

Excluding ‘beginner gains’ this article has been put together to show you 9 tips we can implement in order to gain strength and carry on getting stronger.

By reading this, you’ll also develop a good understanding of what you can do if you hit a strength plateau by learning about the likes of fatigue indicators and different training strategies which can be incorporated into your programming.

So lets get stuck into the following 9 factors (which are set in no particular order) and learn exactly what we can do to improve.

1. Progressive Overload (PO)

PO is the gradual increase of stress placed upon the body during training. Without progressive overload your body does not need to adapt or improve and therefore will not get bigger or stronger beyond a certain point.

My favorite way of specifically gaining strength though PO is simply by monitoring training volume (sets x reps x weight) and making sure that over time exercise volume, session volume and then total weekly training volume is increasing sufficiently.

During volume increases it's also very important to take into account your individual maximal recoverable volume (MRV). MRV is the amount of stress you can recover from and therefore continue to progress, this is always vastly different from person to person (I will be talking more about MRV later in this article)

2. Implement Training Strategy (Intermediate-Advanced Trainees)

Training strategy (like progressive overload) isn’t necessarily important in order to see strength and muscle growth when you first decide to take up training with weights.

Eventually momentum will stop and if you can honestly say that the halt in progress isn’t due to a particular reason (like lack of sleep or new life stressors, which we’ll cover later) you may want to consider implementing some strategies designed to overcome plateaus.

Some examples of training strategies are:

De-loads, where you reduce training volume (normally by 20-30% or so) in order to aid recovery before another training cycle
Intensification exercises (in moderation) such as drop sets, myo-reps, paused reps etc.
Focusing on and developing weak body-parts which are preventing you from progressing certain lifts
Mobilizing and stretching certain areas if said areas are preventing exercises from being performed efficiently
Executing a periodised routine which focuses on different intensities and rep ranges throughout a cycle such as block periodisation.

3. Grow Big Muscles (A Bigger Muscle is a Stronger Muscle)

Unfortunately it takes a pretty long time to build big muscles; If you read my article 'you're being a whiny bitch when it comes to your progress...(but its probably not your fault)' , you’ll understand how long it can take to gain muscle and the time it can take in order to reach your lifetime muscular potential.

That being said even if strength gains are your main goal it’s still a good idea to implement the 6-12 rep ranges (a good rep range for muscle growth) as well as hitting lower reps due to the fact that muscle size has a direct correlation with muscular strength

4. Prioritize Adequate Nutrition (Especially in Intermediate-Advanced Trainees)

Outside of new trainees who can get stronger no matter what they do; even with the best programming you won’t build substantial muscle mass and strength unless you’re in a calorie surplus (macronutrient ratios should also be prioritized during this time).

Focusing on eating in a slight surplus for a decent amount of time complemented with the right macro set up for your goals (carbs, protein, fat, fibre) will insure adequate recovery from training, muscle glycogen replenishment (energy storage) and muscle growth.

Check out my article for information on setting up your nutirion for strengh gains.

5. Master the Chosen Lifts

The more proficient you are at a lift the more benefit you’ll receive (from a strength and hypertrophy perspective). You get more comfortable and confident with adding lbs/kgs to that exercise over time and the newfound proficiency will also ensure that you’re feeling that exercise in the area that’s meant to be worked.

However, mastery of an exercise doesn’t come overnight, it takes 1000s of reps in order to subconsciously be able to go through all the cues needed to truly become an expert of that movement.

When you perform an exercise (especially as a beginner and intermediate) you should be focusing developing 2 things:

Muscular awareness - sometimes known as mind muscle connection (without sacrificing too much poundage)
Kinesthetic awareness - knowing where your body is in space

Developing your muscular and kinesthetic awareness will eventually let you know if you’re performing an exercise correctly based on if it ‘feels’ right or not and can take some time to get to the required level.

6. Decrease Lifestyle Stress

Not everyone can recover from the same amount of training volume and frequency (MRV, which is spoken about in point 2), so don’t try to pick any old routine from the muscle mags and expect amazing results.

You may be one of the smart ones and have already taken your maximal recoverable volume into account and designed a great routine, however don’t be surprised if progress grinds to a halt due to new lifestyle stressors and/or lack of sleep.

When progress stalls you may start also start to experience some of the following common fatigue indicators which all point towards under-recovery such as:

Variability in heart rate
Decreased desire/want to train
Mood swings
Lowered appetite
Interrupted sleep or sleep apnea
Uncommon Illness
Regular injuries/RSI
Decreases in strength/endurance

If you notice that you have/are experiencing 1-2 (or many) of the above bullet-points you may now be wondering what to do next?.... I suggest a few things for different situations

If you were making good progress before experiencing new lifestyle stress - and now noticing drops in performance and recovery - Consider de-loading until the time of stress passes. E.g. if you know you have a 3 week deadline at work, you will be in the office very early – very late late and you also have to manage other outside factors (maybe a relationship or family), try lowering your training session volume for 3 weeks to around 70% of current weight and sets and focus on not taking sets to muscular failure. Once the 3 week period is over you can then increase training volume to what it was previously and once again monitor progression and fatigue

If you are experiencing ‘new’ and what will be unavoidable on-going lifestyle stress – You may need to find a new MRV. A simple way to do this (thanks to one of Mike Isreatel’s recent Facebook posts) is to lower your current training volume by 25% for 2 months (mainly from dropping sets or dropping certain less-important accessory exercises). If you don’t improve performance and also start to reverse some of the ‘common signs of under recovery’ then lower volume another 10% until you start to see training and recovery progress again.

If you aren’t sleeping at-least 6 hours per night - simply getting into a routine of going to bed earlier and possibly using relaxation techniques do help – Personally I like to listen to podcasts or reading fiction at night as a way to relax and unwind

If you’re always surrounded and thinking about the stressors in your life - look at partaking in leisure/low stress activates when you can – Activities such as going to restaurants with friends, visiting bars, going for a walk in the park, bowling with your family etc.. Basically anything low stress that can take your mind off what may previously be causing you issues or worries.

7. Maintain Healthy Joints

It’s pretty self-explanatory; being able to carry out exercises pain free is extremely important when trying to get stronger. If you can’t do an exercise or load-up sufficient weight due to pain then you wont be able to progressively overload and cause adaption. Some ways to help maintain healthy joints are:

Not to overdo high impact work such as plyometrics, sprinting, jogging
Mobilize/dynamic stretch your muscles (See this video courtesy of Joe DeFranco for a great agility warm up)
Increase flexibility through static stretching
Supplement with EPA/DHA (more information here)
Carry out exercises with good form (sometimes requiring you to drop your ego)
Reduce stress

8. Rest Longer Between Sets

If you don’t give your muscles sufficient time to recover between sets then you’ll find it extremely difficult to add weight or reps thus increasing session volume. It has been shown that longer rest periods don’t have negative effects on hypertrophy either so if you feel you need to take 3-5 mins (or even more) in order to rest long enough to hit a new personal record then don’t be afraid to do so

9. Train with a Strong Bastard

Need a boost?

Get a workout partner who’s strong as hell and can push you.

Now this doesn’t mean going to failure on every exercise until the veins you never knew existed are popping from your head, but training with someone who is better than you can:

Prevent you becoming lazy with exercises you possibly don’t enjoy or exercises that normally lack the required intensity
Increase motivation and aspiration
Give you confidence to know you have a spotter when you need one
Improve your focus on the task ahead
Improve training consistency and adherence

That being said when training with a stronger individual you need to take on board these facts:

How long they have been training - you won’t be as strong as them overnight
Genetics - you may never be as strong as them based such things as biomechanics, recovery and hormones
Just because their plan works for them it doesn’t mean it is optimal or even more important suited to you
Based on genetics they may actually have a pretty poor training routine and/or nutrition set up

So with the 4 bullet points in-mind make sure that everything else in this article is read through and understood with some of the points implemented into your routine in in order to make training with someone stronger than you really pay off like it should.

The Wrap Up:

There’s never an excuse for not getting stronger. Or if there is, there’s usually a simple solution.

You don’t need to drastically overhaul your entire routine, start a brand new fancy program, start training like an IFBB pro, or buy yourself a Shake Weight – you just need one of the 9 smart strategies above.

I actually thought a hell of a lot about my own training and progress while writing this, which is always cool.

As always, if I can help, send me an email or add me on Facebook and drop me a PM

Also you can’t expect to get stronger without a staple nutrition plan so If you’ve not grabbed my free e-book yet, get your copy here

Jonny

References:

http://www.strengtheory.com/complete-strength-training-guide/

http://www.strengtheory.com/poor-recovery-and-increased-muscle-breakdown-insufficient-sleep-part-2/

https://bretcontreras.com/progressive-overload/

https://bretcontreras.com/average-female-strength-gains-over-a-six-month-period/

Mike Isreateal - http://www.jtsstrength.com/articles/2015/12/27/fatigue-indicators-and-how-to-use-them/

Brad Schoenfeld - https://www.t-nation.com/training/demolish-your-genetic-limits

http://www.jtsstrength.com/articles/2014/12/09/everything-need-know-recovering/