Moving to Three Month Workout Cycles

After a good run in July and August, September and October have been unfocused.   In early September, I was able to put up some decent numbers.  I did a back squat for 315x3, and a bench of 200x1.   Then I got sick for a week or so,and that derailed my progress.   That's OK though, because I’ve achieved my goal of “getting back into lifting”.

One of the difficult things about lifting long-term is having a steady supply of goals to achieve.   When starting out or re-starting, it is easy to see good progress in the first 3-6 months, but after that gains come more slowly.   In my last workouts, I've begun to approach the zone where I am lifting heavy all the time, and without proper goals, I don't believe there is a way to sustain this.  

So I've been thinking that 3 months / 12 weeks is a good time-frame to set workout goals, try new methods, supplements, etc.
- It gives you enough time to properly evaluate the effects of the program
- It keeps things fresh & helps with motivation
- It prevents overtraining
 
This is how it works

Week 1-2 - Plan new workouts, set goals, try new techniques

Weeks 2-14 - Workout using the plan, monitoring goals on a weekly basis

Week 15 - Off weeks - rest & evaluate plan

This basic system gives you about 3 months on a plan, and 1 month off / preparing for the next plan, so you get three major "cycles" a year.  

So what of the goals for each cycle?  The following are possibilities:

- Increase strength - Increase bench to 250, squat to 400, etc.  
- Lose Body fat - Drop from 215 to 190, etc.
- Increase endurance - 100 pushups in a minute, run 5 miles in 45 min
- Increase muscle definition / appearance - hard to measure, but this is basically what bodybuilding amounts to
- Prepare for a particular sport / event - prepare to run a marathon, hike up a mountain, etc.
- Maintain current levels - I suppose this is a possibility, but it's not very motivating.   I would make sense if you saw the next months as being impossible.  You could simply say you will do 1-2 workout per week, and try to eat sensibly.  

The best part of this type of planning is that you can set very big long-term goals without getting discouraged.   Dropping 100lbs of body fat is hard.   Benching 315lbs is hard.   You won't get there in 3 months, or even a year.   But with the right goals/ focus, dropping 10lbs is not hard, and neither is adding 20lbs to your bench.   The same could be said for virtually anything else in life...