#114: Progressive Overload: Build Muscle & Get Toned in Midlife (Step-by-Step Guide)

If you’ve been working out with weights but feel like your arms still jiggle and you're not looking more toned, then this episode is a must-listen.

In episode #114, I'm getting back to basics and covering one of the most important principles in strength training: progressive overload. 

If you want results - like better muscle tone, more strength, and a firmer, fitter body - progressive overload is the key. 

You’ll learn:

• What progressive overload really means (no, it’s not just “lift heavy”)
• Why random workouts and group fitness classes aren't great ways to build muscle
• How to use reps, weights, and simple tracking to apply progressive overload
• What to do when progress slows down (or life gets in the way)

Whether your goal is to get stronger, feel more confident in a sleeveless top, or keep up with the grandkids - this is foundational information you need.

Hit play and learn how to train smarter - not harder.

Resources mentioned:

• Learn to Lift program >>
• Free guide: How to Start Weight Training After 40 >> 

Transcript

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#114: Progressive Overload: Build Muscle & Get Toned in Midlife (Step-by-Step Guide)


[00:00:00] Welcome to 40+ Fitness for Women. I'm Lynn Sederlöf-Airisto, your host, and I am certified Menopause Fitness coach. And today I wanted to kind of go back to basics because I think this is something that is worth reminding women of, and also for those of you who are new or even thinking about how do you get ready for summer by improving your muscle tone so that you feel more confident in your clothes.
This is one of those things that I think it's really important for you to understand, and that is progressive overload. It is key to you getting results from your programming , 
in fact, it's one of the keys. I mean, there are more than one key. Of course. There are things like, what is your programming?
What are you actually doing in the [00:01:00] weight room? How are you doing it? How are you recovering and how is your nutrition? So there are several things that you need to watch out for, but today let's talk about progressive overload. 
 Okay, so we are here with, I think, many different goals. And I think that a lot of us have several of these goals. So, but whether your goal is to get stronger because you notice those grocery bags are getting heavier, whether you notice that, you know, your body is not as firm as it used to be, your arms are kind of jiggling too much when you move or you want to build muscle tone 'cause you notice that that's really disappeared in midlife.
Well, whatever your goal is, you need to build muscle and key to building muscle is progressive overload. Now, progressive overload, all that means is that you need to [00:02:00] be challenging your body wherever it is at, at that point in time. 
So progressive overload today is going to be different weights and reps, and maybe even different exercises than what you are doing a year from now or two years from now, or five years from now in your weight training journey.
And it is about training. So exercise is one thing. That is us moving our bodies and exercise is good for us. I think that has been proven across the board. If you're someone who doesn't exercise, get up and do whatever, and that's gonna be better than nothing. But if you have a goal. If your goal is to get stronger, if your goal is to have unassisted living when you're older, if your goal is to be more toned, if your goal is to pick up those grandchildren with ease, [00:03:00] you need to train in a systematic way to achieve those goals. 
So just merely exercising is not maybe gonna do for you what you want. The same thing with if your goal is to lose weight, just kind of eating a little healthier. Is not going to get you those results the same way as if you get really systematic about what are you eating, when are you eating it, tracking what you eat, all the things, plus the things that you need to do outside of your eating, like making sure that your body hasn't stopped moving weight trainings so that you don't lose muscle.
These kinds of things. So there are systems and Processes for achieving these things when you have goals and you are going to get there much better when you follow these systems and processes. 
And I know some of you may feel like this is kind of a radical thing to say, but if you think about who are the [00:04:00] people who are working hardest on building muscle?
Well, there are those. People who do this as bodybuilders, and what are they doing? They are certainly not spending any time in group fitness classes. They are not doing circuit training. You will never see them do a burpee or jumping jacks in between sets at the gym. Okay. They're not doing it because they're serious about building muscle.
And even if you don't wanna get to their result, and believe me, they are also using substances and doing crazy things in addition to the training, but you can learn something from them and start to do things to actually put muscle on your body. Because it is not easy, especially in midlife. It's not like you are gonna wake up one day and pong, you know, you have these huge muscles.[00:05:00] 
So we need to do something to make that happen, and progressive overload is key for that. 
Now all it means is that we are going to be increasing the amount of stimulus, the amount of challenge we're giving our body over time. And the easiest way to do this is to think about rep ranges and the weights that you're lifting.
And by the way. Progressive overload is really gonna work best when you have a set program of exercises that you do and you repeat those same exercises week after week after week. In fact, most of us who are doing this longer term. We're not swapping out a whole ton of exercises over time. I know that in programs that you can buy, they do swap out exercises more often, but that's [00:06:00] because the general public, they want entertainment, so so they want more swapping out.
And I'm not saying that swapping out is a bad thing. There are definitely advantages to it that there's only a limited number of exercises you can put into any training session and they're gonna work your muscles in a little bit different ways. So it is good over time to have some sort of variation in what you're doing, but this kind of doing something different every time, trying to confuse your muscles. All that. It's, yeah, not the way to go. 
. So when we're talking about progressive overload, we want to talk about rep ranges and we wanna talk about the amount of weight that you're using and that really works best in this kind of set program. So when you start weight training, you're gonna figure out what is your weight that you're using for a particular exercise.
And I know I use bicep curls a lot, but it's an easy one. [00:07:00] So if, figure out what is your starting weight on bicep curls? Your coach has given you a rep range to work in. Generally, if you're new to lifting, something like eight to 12 reps is a good place to start. It's a long enough, uh, um, number of reps that you are not lifting suit.
The first you're not struggling in the first reps that you do. But it's not so long that you're exhausted by, by the time you get to number 12. So eight to 12 is good. And the way you should use the rep ranges, and I think this is something that you know, you see on social media all the time that people are like, do this for eight to 12.
It's not that you should like always pick up the same weight and just do eight to 12 of that particular exercise. You can work in the eight to 12 rep range, but how much weight you pick up is [00:08:00] going to change over time. 
So in an ideal world, the first time you go in to do bicep curls, you are going to find a weight that feels challenging for you when you get to your eighth bicep curl.
Now, what does challenging mean? It means that you know, you are having to put in some effort to do that last curl. You'll notice the effort by things like involuntary, slow down. I. So that rep will be slower than the first one. So if you video yourself and then you clip the video, so you just see your first rep and your last rep, you'll notice that your last rep is happening at a slower pace, not because you've decided to make it go slower, but because you just can't keep it going at the same pace because your muscle fibers are starting to tire out.
[00:09:00] Okay. And when you get more experienced, you'll start to be able to notice in the feeling of how you're lifting that, Hey, I'm getting to the point or close to the point where I won't be able to do another one. Okay? So you wanna be able to challenge yourself enough that you're getting close to as many as you can do that's called working to failure. 
So, but in the beginning when you're just starting out, you don't know really what going to failure feels like, and you don't necessarily wanna be working to failure on all exercises, because some of the exercises when you go to failure, you are risking things like you're back and this kind of thing.
So the rep ranges work pretty nicely that you choose a weight. You get to the eight reps, if that's the bottom of your rep range, and then great. That's a good wait for you to start with. The next time you do the same [00:10:00] exercises, so you do that same bicep curl, you pick up that same weight that you were able to do eight reps with last time, and this time you aim to do nine reps okay? 
And if you can do the nine reps, fabulous. Then the next time you come in, you aim to do. 10 reps and so on and so forth, until you're at a point where you can do 12 reps. With the weight that you started with. Let's say that was five pounds, so you can do 12 reps with the five pounds. That feels good.
Your form's good. You can be struggling on the last rep, that's fine. You should be struggling on the last rep. It feels good. The form's good, and then you switch up to a higher weight. Now, generally, you don't need to increase the weight a huge amount, but when we're talking about a muscle like a bicep, and [00:11:00] you are dealing with dumbbells, which only come in certain sizes, right?
It's not like you have a 5.2 pound dumbbell out there. The next one is gonna be a six pound dumbbell, or maybe it's even a seven and a half pound dumbbell, which is a huge leap. So you pick up that next size that you've got, and then you do your reps with that.
In an ideal world, you're back down to the bottom of your rep range, so then you're able to do eight reps, but.
Sometimes, let's say you only have that seven and a half pound dumbbell, then it may be that you're only able to do four reps, so. Anyway. In an ideal world, you would pick up a little bit heavier weight, which would allow you to get the eight reps, be kind of struggling on that eighth rep again, and then you would go again, progressively overloading in that the next time you try to get.
The nine reps. And when you've gotten the [00:12:00] nine reps, you go to 10 reps. When you've gotten the 10 reps, you go to the 11 reps. 11 reps. You go to the 12 reps. Okay? So if you understand like this basic idea of how you're working within the rep ranges and then increasing weights once you get to the top of your rep range.
So once you're able to do 12 reps with good form with a particular weight, then you switch up to the next weight up. 
Okay, so that was kind of the meat and bones of it that you're working in rep ranges, you are, starting at the bottom of your rep range with a particular weight. You're gonna continue working with that weight as you increase the number of reps you do. Over time, sometimes you're able to progress pretty quickly.
Sometimes that may take months, you know, to get to the top of your rep range. So it just depends on where you are in your [00:13:00] journey, what muscles we're talking about and all these things. Now let's add in a little bit of nuance around this. So generally you're not just doing one set of each exercise. So I was talking about this as if you were just doing one set.
Generally you are doing three sets, two or three sets, but I think three is fairly typical.
So what about with what are you doing in each one of the sets?
Let's say at the point where I am now, for example, um, I am at a point where I'm, I'm not progressing very quickly in my weights because I've been doing this already for three years, and I'm reaching the point where progress is slow.
And if you're at that point, then this may help you out. So let's say with the bicep curls, for example. So I'm doing, with the weights that I've been working for this [00:14:00] whole year, no, I have not increased my weights, but when I first, so I, I had been doing 10 kilo weights, and then the next up is 12 and a half kilos, which is a humongous leap.
That is a huge leap. It's like 25% more weight. And generally, if you look at what. The certificate certifying bodies recommend they say something like 3% increase in weight. So 25% is a lot more than that, but there are no other dumbbells. So I had to do that anyway. So when I went from the 12 kilo weight, I mean the 10 kilo weights jumped up to the 12.
I could do, I think it was like three reps. Okay. And. I could do the, maybe I could do three reps on the first set, three reps on the second set, two reps on the third set. Okay, so next time I came in, my aim was to get three reps on all three [00:15:00] sets.
So that's what I aimed for. When I was able to get three reps on all three sets, then I started aiming at, okay, in one of these sets, I wanna get four reps.
It didn't actually matter which one of the sets. I wasn't like being strict like that because sometimes the first set, when when you're doing it, I notice I'm still a little bit warming up. So maybe the second set that I'm able to actually perform better in. But anyway, so it's like this very slow progression.
And then there are weeks where. Maybe I've been sick, maybe I didn't sleep so well the night before. Maybe I didn't take as many recovery days or I've been out partying with my friends, so, so I wasn't even able to hit the reps that I was able to do before I. That is life, you know? But I kept challenging myself till I'm close to failure and trying to [00:16:00] progress over time.
But you can see how this requires, you know, you writing it down and being kind of systematic. And the reason also why writing it down is so important is that. You set an expectation for yourself mentally, because you can see that last time I was able to do the 12 and a half kilos, I was able to do it three times per set.
So I know, like I'm, I'm telling myself in my brain, I know I can do that. So then this time I can try to do more than that. Because, you know, to some degree this is really a mental game. I don't know if you've ever had a training session, and this happens to me all the time where there might be some people around me and somehow that just gives me the energy.
I'm just like, yes, I'm gonna like be really strong today and I get in more reps and if I'm, if nobody's around me. Then it [00:17:00] might be harder for, for me to push myself as hard. I guess I'm a little bit competitive. Um, and, um, yeah, and, and if I were to think, if I think to myself, oh, I'm really tired today. I don't know what I can do, you know, my, my training session might be worse.
Versus, Hey, I'm gonna crush it today, in fact. You, you've probably heard that if you're going into a job interview or something like that, that you should do the Superman or the Wonder Woman pose, I guess is what it is, where your hands are on your hips. Another one is that you were like, have, have your arms towards the sky and you open up your chest towards the sky.
Well, that may be, you don't wanna do in the middle of the weight room. The Wonder Woman pose, you can absolutely do between sets, and that's something that I guess triggers something in your mind that, hey, I can do it. And, uh, it could help you try it out, see how it goes.
But as I was saying, they can see that this kind of very systematic writing things down is really the way that you're [00:18:00] going to be applying the progressive overload.
And for that reason, it becomes much harder to build muscle when you go into a group fitness class because you might be able to remember, oh yeah, I did five. You know, I used the five pound weight or the two pound weight, or whatever it was that you used last time. But are you counting your reps? No. 'cause the choreography is different than last time, maybe even the, the exercises that you're doing.
'cause in the group fitness classes, it's entertainment, right? It's exercise, entertainment, it's to get people to exercise. It's not training towards a goal. I mean, your cardiovascular fitness will improve for sure as you do more of 'em, but it is more just general exercise. So. If you go to Body Pump for example, and even though they do a lot of very, very similar things, you do not see people's weights going up in body Pump.
Well, first of all, [00:19:00] it's not really, uh, strength and power training. It's muscular endurance training. But even if you were trying to do it as a strength and power training. You really are not gonna see people increasing their weights there. There's nobody in a body pump class that lifts the same kind of weights as if they had been doing, if they had done those same exact exercises, like these same exact ones that you're doing in Body pump.
So a back squat. Um, a row, you know, leaning forward, row, bicep curls, tricep extensions, dips, all those things. If you were to write those things down that you do in a body pump class and start tracking, you know, and just do those at home or at the weight room, you would get to much higher weights doing this kind of progressive overload than you ever will get to doing it in the body pump class.
'cause they're just two different ways of using those exercises.
All [00:20:00] right, so my point is progressive overload is the way that we are going to build muscle tone because we are being systematic about challenging our bodies a little bit more and a little bit more, and a little bit more as we get stronger.
People find this very intuitive when you think about running, but for some reason when you pick up weights, it becomes a whole different thing.
But if you think about when you go running, you start your running hobby and you, let's say you run around your block and you're doing it at a certain pace. You intuitively understand that, hey, when that becomes easy, I'm gonna run a little bit faster, or I'm gonna run a little bit farther. And you keep like pushing yourself doing a little bit more and a little bit more.
And guess what? Soon you're running like. 10 times further distances than when you, when you started and you're going at twice the pace that you started. And you kind of do that [00:21:00] naturally. And especially if you're like a lot of people that you'd like to track, how far did I run today? How fast did I run today?
And, and you just kind of, um, start to put yourself, challenge yourself a little bit more that. Is the same exact principle that we're talking about with the weight training, except you won't do it naturally the same way that you do with the running. And if you're in a group fitness class, it won't happen.
They don't do it for you. So the way that you get that same effect that you get stronger over time, you build your muscles over time, is you start tracking and you apply progressive overload.   
All right, so I hope that helped to explain progressive overload and why it is important and why it doesn't happen. . When you're in a group fitness class, why that kind of training really [00:22:00] needs to happen outside of the group fitness format when you're training either at home or at the gym on your own, that you track and you consistently and purposefully make your body or ask more of your body as you get stronger, and that's how you build muscle to get toned, lean, strong, and more functional over time. And with that, I leave you and wish you all happy training.