Building on the Foundation
If you've made it this far, you're already far ahead of most people and if you've done it right, you should have started to notice some progress! Now, this phase is going to be even more impactful because we will build on the foundation of Step 1 with more advanced training and lifestyle concepts.
Goals of Step 2:
Maintain your commitment to fitness
Learn more advanced variations of movement patterns
Understand 'Intent' in your training
Start implementing 2 of the nutrition pillars
Maintain Your Commitment
You're doing great so far! Now, you have to maintain that commitment and consistency.
Have you been tracking your attendance in a calendar or app? If not, now is the time to start. Not only will it hold you accountable, but you can continue to set weekly or monthly goals for attendance at the gym and plan out how you're going to make it happen!
Progress Your Training Program
Step 1 was all about learning the fundamentals. You should have a good handle on the hinge, squat, lunge, push and pull movements and it was probably with basic variations involving kettlebells or dumbbells. That's an awesome start!
Now that you're progressing, we want to start to increase the difficulty of your training so you continue to adapt and improve going forward. Learning more advanced movement variations like barbell squatting, pressing or deadlifting as well as introducing exercises that involve deeper ranges of motion give you more potential for adding resistance where needed and may help you to see more progress!
Understand Intent
This is one of the most important topics in fitness and can have a profound impact on the results you see in the gym. In your first few months in the gym a lot of things are new and as a result you start to see progress pretty fast. Similarly, you probably experienced a little extra soreness from doing movements you've sparingly or even never done before with weights in your hands.
Now that you're past that phase and more confident in the movements, the single most important thing you can learn is the idea of INTENT.
Intent is based around the idea that it's not just about 'what' you do with regards to strength training, it's about 'how' you do it. In order to truly progress and make changes in your strength and your body you must be challenging yourself to increase the load you're using to match the demand of a particular set x rep scheme.
After each set you perform you should have a quick reflection... Ask yourself, "how many more reps could I have done?"
If the answer is around 1-3, awesome! If it was 4 or more, you need to increase the load!
Intent is matching the demand of the number of reps or sets prescribed by choosing a load that is sufficiently challenging so that you finish the sets knowing you only had a couple reps left 'in the tank'.
You'll notice that the number of reps we program for given exercises changes from month to month and even between exercises. Some months you see 10 or 12, and in some months you will see sets of 5 or as low as 3 for exercises!
If you don't begin to push yourself to match your intent and loading with the prescribed reps then you will struggle to gain the benefits of the the training program, strength improvements, and body composition changes.
Start Applying 2 out of the 5 Nutrition Pillars
In Step 1 we discussed the 5 Nutrition Pillars, which includes the foundational concepts we think everyone needs to know and master to be successful. Here's 2 we recommend to start with:
Why Nutrition Matters
Tracking Your Food
Just like with your fitness journey, the foundational concepts lay the groundwork for long term sustainability, but they're not always specific to you and your goals. If you really want to take your nutrition and body transformation to the next level it's important to have an approach that dives deeper into the details that might impact your specific situation and struggles with making progress.
How To Progress to Step 3
In order to move on to Phase 3 and be as successful as possible in your fitness journey you should have:
Maintained a commitment to fitness for 6 months
Mastered the basic movement patterns and learned new exercises
An understanding of intent and how to apply it to your training
Adopted more advanced nutrition concepts specific to your goals