Free workout programs, healthy recipes, cooking lessons, nutrition tips, and fitness videos

Chicago Health Coach Mike Ockrim is a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialst (CSCS) with the National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA) and a Certified Personal Trainer with the American Council on Exercise (ACE) that will engage you in functional movement training programs, nutrition and cooking education, and sleep improvement plans to live a healthy and active lifestyle.

Get Moving - Training Periodization

Our personal training participants progress through a training approach known as periodization. This method changes the workouts regularly to keep our bodies surprised and avoid the dreaded fitness plateaus. Fitness plateaus occur when our bodies adapt to the athletic routines we participate in over-and-over again. This is known as athletic adaptation.

There are numerous ways to regularly change a training program that will not only add variety to keep things interesting, but will serve to "shock" the body with a new approach. For example:

1. Light weight (or bodyweight) and a high number of reps (12-20)

2. Heavy weight (kettlebells or sandbags) and a low number of reps (4-8)

3. Increasing or decreasing the speed for completing a rep

4. Changing the order for exercises, warm ups, or cool down

5. Increasing or decreasing the rest between sets, movements, or training sessions

A study published in the journal Medicine & Science in Sports by the Human Performance Laboratory at Ball State University shows that a periodized strength-training program can produce better results than a non-periodized program. Without boring you with the details, here is the conclusion drawn by the study results for the 34 women that participated...

The women participating in the periodization program gained more lean muscle, lost more fat, and increased their strength compared to the non-periodized group after 12 weeks.

Michael Ockrim is committed to helping participants achieve incremental progress. Periodization training is one of the tools used to enable program participants to make that incremental progress. Interested in experiencing periodization training? Connect with us and discuss your needs on a Health Plan!