One of the most frustrating things a bodybuilder can encounter is hitting the wall at a plateau. A plateau refers to a point where you seem to stop growing, and your strength seems to stop increasing. It seems that you can train as hard as you like and your body doesn't seem to react like it used to, your muscles aren't breaking down after workout and you are recovering before your even hurt. Here we will explore this mysterious 'plateau' and look at some ways to overcome the inevitable condition.



A plateau is usually caused by the body becoming too accustomed to the kind of work it is being asked to do. As you should know, the reason muscles grow and expand is because they are forced to perform tasks that are outside their capability and so a message is sent that they need to be larger and stronger to cope with being asked to perform such workloads.

You will usually find a plateau to occur when:

1. Your training program has remained the same for too long. This includes the same exercises, the same number of sets and reps, and the same rest periods. The body becomes accustomed to being challenged in exactly the same way and despite your efforts, requires no extra growth to handle that challenge.

2. Your eating has remained the same. Just like your training, you will notice you can reach a point in your diet where your body becomes accustomed to taking in a larger amount of food. Even though you still eat alot, you won't continue to grow unless you are challenging your body by taking in more and raising the bar again.

So how can you beat the notorious plateau? Let's take a look.

The obvious answer is that beating plateaus comes down to changing things up. Changing the way you eat and changing the way you train. Here are some ideas:

Do your whole workout backwards.

Whatever you normally do at the gym do it in reverse. If you used to train back and biceps together starting with back first, hit your bi's first and see how different it is. If you used to train concentration curls then preacher curls, reverse the order. Change the number of reps, throw on an extra two or decrease by two and go for full power. Anything to shock your muscles into growing again.

Eat EVERYTHING

Depending on what your goals are alter your diet to shock your digestive system too. Maybe try to take in the same amount of calories from different foods or just go for a super overhaul and add an extra few thousand calories per day. There is no doubt your body will respond.

Supplements

There are certain supplement, mainly very new in nature that can actually assist an athlete to break physical barriers in the last few reps of your workouts, taking the body to places it has never been and in the process smashing through plateus very effectively. An example of one such supplement is the new Gakic, which works to remove fatigue toxins from the bloodstream during high intensity exercise and allows the trainer to push past the point of usual failure.

Whichever method you use, remember the idea is to instigate CHANGE. The moment you notice your growth stop, change things up. It's one of the big secrets to supercharged and continual growth.