In this article we are going to talk about how implement progressive overload to your strength training routine. When you are strength training you must abide by the law of progressive overload. Progressive overload is a strategic and continuous increase in demand on the musculoskeletal system. Ignoring this law leads to monotonous workouts that lead you to the same place you were yesterday.

              “If it doesn’t challenge you, it doesn’t change you”

– Fred Devito

Here’s an example, let us use the bench press to observe this phenomenon. Today you bench 195 for 5×5, it was difficult, but you did it. If you were to continue to bench 195 for 5×5 week after week it would feel easier potentially, but you would not continue to get stronger after a week or two. You’ll never bench 315 benching 195 every week, it is just not going to happen

This is where progression comes into play. You need to make this harder over time to see any gains in strength or size. This is accomplished with many strategies which we will jump into each one individually next.

Increase weight

This is what most people think of when they think of progression especially for strength. Most people start out adding 5-10lb to their lifts each week thereby increasing the intensity. This is popular for a reason; it is easy to track and leads to big strength gains. This doesn’t work forever though, at some point you can’t add weight each week and you will need to add a different technique to trick your body continuing to adapt.

Increase reps or sets

Another popular method. This is great for bodybuilding/hypertrophy work. This is because your gains in muscle mostly come from increasing volume, not necessarily just increasing weight. Using our bench press example from earlier you have many options here are two.

1. Increase 1 rep a week until you hit a desired number. Let us say 5×10 is the goal, then once you get reach this goal increase the weight and restart the cycle.
2. Increasing the sets each week until you hit a desired goal. Let us say 10×5 this time. You get the point.

The former is best for hypertrophy and the latter is best for strength.

Increase time under tension

This is like increasing reps but leaves more freedom and creativity. This is at its core just an increase in the time the muscles are under load. This can be accomplished by increasing reps, slowing each individual rep down, adding pauses during the reps for 1-5s, 1.5 reps the list goes on. This can be modified to favor different adaptations.

Here are some time under tension techniques for various goals.

Strength/power

• isometric pauses– pausing at some point in the motion for a given time.
• box squats– squatting to a box then exploding off.
• heavy eccentrics– lowering a supramaximal load for a given time.
• continuous sets– not breaking the rep at the top or bottom leaving th muscles under constant tension.

Hypertrophy/tendon healing

• slow eccentrics– slowly lowering and or raising the weight with a given time period.
• 1.5 reps– completing half of the range of motion of a lift twice. For example dropping to the bottom of a squat coming up half way, descending back to the bottom, then coming back to standing.
• Isometric pauses– same as previous just more of them or more a longer time.

Improve technique

Improving technique is the difference between being an average lifter and an elite lifter. Poor technique leads to many negative consequences such as strength leaks and overuse injuries. For our purposes to day we are going to stress the strength leaks. During complex lifts like the Olympic lifts it is especially apparent. Being off a degree or two at various points of the lift make the difference between a new PR and a failed attempt. The power lifts such as the squat, bench and deadlift good and bad technique is brought to the forefront as the weight gets heavier. This leads to shorting your potential or at worst developing an injury.

Focusing on progressing technique is something to consider at the beginning of trying a new exercise for a couple weeks. It is also worth considering during a plateau.

Increase range of motion

It is as simple as it sounds. Maybe you are learning to squat and you can only go ¼ of the way down. It would be wise to progress achieving a better depth before increasing anything else.

On the other hand progressing some exercises such as lunges is a good way to increase difficulty without increasing weight or reps. Here is a lunge progression where you can keep the same weight, but increase difficulty solely with ROM.

Split squat > front foot elevated split squat > rear foot elevated split squat > both feet elevated split squat

Increase speed

Great for power development, this is a progression technique useful for increasing muscle recruitment abilities. I talk about this in my article The Best Rep Schemes for Strength Training as a good way to progress with a goal of being more powerful. Increasing the speed of a lift is a good way to recruit fast twitch muscle fibers without the need of heavy weights. This allows you to increase the volume of lifts without running the risk of over training

The only downside to this is it is extremely hard to quantify. You can purchase devices such as the beast which I use from time to time. But if you are not willing to shell out a couple hundred bucks you are left guessing whether you are in fact going faster or not.

Increase density         

This is a great technique for conditioning, time efficiency and weight loss. It increases the amount or work done in a given time making workouts fast and predictable. There are several ways to accomplish this.

1. Keep the work the same but decrease the time

This is accomplished by shortening rest intervals or having a circuit set up where-in the time allotted decreases week to week.

Example:  5 exercises 10 reps each for a 15 min AMRAP. Decrease to 12 min one week then 10 min the next trying to get the same amount of sets in as when you did 15 min.

2. Increase the work and keep the time the same

This is accomplished by increasing the reps or exercises completed in a given time period.

Example: 5 exercises 10 reps each for a 15 min amrap. Every week add one rep to each exercise.

Increase frequency

To participate in this form of progression you will increase the number of times per week you perform a particular exercise. This increases the weekly volume of an exercise and believe me those pounds add up. This increase of volume also equates to more “practice”. The concept of practicing strength was popularized by the well know Russian kettlebell guru Pavel Tsatsouline. The concept basically states that the more exposure you get to a given movement the better you will get. So increasing the times per week you train an exercise will lead to greater strength gains.

When applying this concept, it is important you take into consideration total volume. You would not go from squatting 5×5 2x a week to 5x per week. That is an astronomical increase in volume. To have more success you might go from 5×5 2x per week to 2×5 4x per week. This doubles your practice and keeps total volume relatively the same assuming you adjust the weight accordingly.