frustration, regression, injury, and failure. is is the lot of most typical gym
members who, in their hurry to make short-term metamorphoses, turn
short-term failure into long-term failure, and add more names to the end-
less roll of those who have trained but yet got little or nothing to show for
it.. Here is memorable advice from Peary Rader, founder of maga-
zine back in the thirties. It came during an interview late in his life, published
in , November , page . Rader was asked, “But, what do you
consider the single most important rule to remember during a workout?”
Always err on the side of conservatism. Even if you know you can do better,
drop back to the point where you are using just a bit less weight or doing one or
two reps less than you had planned to do. en, every week or two, gradually
increase your sets, reps or weight.. Later in the interview he returned to the theme of conservatism:
Yes, you have to work very hard but you do have to work within your ability and
capacity to recover before your next workout... People who promise shortcuts
in time and effort are among the worst abusers of the interest of weight train-
ing.. e fastest progress is made by having the longest possible stretch of con-
secutive full-bore workouts, greatest possible frequency of training, and
largest possible weight increments. But in practice the “fastest possible” is
usually very slow.. Full-bore workouts are no good if you are not increasing your poundages
regularly. Progressive poundages are the barometer of progress, not effort
per se. It is possible to work yourself into the ground but not train progres-
sively. It is also possible to keep poundages progressive without working
yourself into the ground every workout. Properly applied effort is what is
needed, not effort pure and simple.. e greatest number of consecutive full-bore workouts is no good if you
are not recovering fully from each of them. You need to adapt your train-
ing intensity and frequency so that you are getting stronger on a consistent
basis, albeit slowly. If you push too hard and too quickly, not only will you
not go forward, but you may regress. You need to cycle your training inten-
sity to some degree.