Retain, Don't Detrain

Whether you are a business owner, a parent, or just have a lot on right now, responsibilities and opportunities mean life can get busy, and sometimes training might have to take a backseat.

But here’s the TRUTH: you don’t have to hit the gym for hours on end to keep your hard-earned results. Once you've built a solid foundation, you can maintain your strength and fitness with far less volume than what’s required for yielding these adaptations in the first place. This means that even during those hectic weeks or challenging times, you can still keep up your training with just a small amount of effort & time when smart decisions are made around how to do it.

Retain, don’t detrain - Stopping Completely is a recipe for a longer road back to where you were. Instead, embrace those busy times by incorporating focused sessions to retain instead of going backwards. Your body will thank you and you will get back on track quicker when time allows again.

A fascinating study by Bickel et al. (2011) examined the minimal training volume needed to uphold strength and hypertrophy adaptations.

 Participants engaged in a 16-week quad training program, completing a total of 27 sets per week.

Following this training phase, subjects were divided into three groups for an additional 32 weeks, each experiencing varying training volumes.

One group ceased training entirely (detraining), the second group maintained only 1/3 of the initial volume, while the final group sustained just 1/9 of the original load—The results highlighted that even a minimal training volume of 1/9 of previous volume can effectively preserve strength and muscle gains achieved during the initial training period over even an extended period of time.

Don’t be all or nothing!

Be strategic and Do what you can

 

Bickel CS, Cross JM, Bamman MM. Exercise dosing to retain resistance training adaptations in young and older adults. Med Sci Sports Exerc. 2011 Jul;43(7):1177-87. doi: 10.1249/MSS.0b013e318207c15d. PMID: 21131862.