Most Effective Way To Build Muscle I Most Effective Way To Build Strength
In this instructional video, Eric Roberts breaks down the concept of progressive overload—the cornerstone of effective strength training and muscle growth. He starts by defining progressive overload as simply doing more work over time, then explains the physiological stress‑recovery‑adaptation cycle that drives body changes, emphasizing that the body only adapts when the training stress exceeds its homeostatic threshold. Roberts outlines a hierarchy of overload methods: the most effective are increasing weight or reps; secondary tactics include increasing time under tension and improving range of motion or form; supplemental tactics involve adding sets, modestly reducing rest periods, and enhancing movement control. He stresses the importance of tracking workouts and having a structured program to ensure consistent overload, and points viewers to his detailed article, fitness podcast, and Clubhouse coaching community for deeper guidance. The video concludes with a call to action to like, subscribe, and engage with the provided resources.
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YouTube, what is going on? Welcome back to the channel. Welcome to this video. In this video, we're going to be talking about all things progressive overload, and it is the workout secret, the workout thing that you need if you want to see change in your body. I don't know if you have heard it before or you have not heard it before. You may have heard me speak about it— excuse me— before, and in various different videos and stuff like that, but I realized I don't have a specific video entirely for progressive overload, and so I wanted to make this video to make sure you and I are both on the same page, and so you can see the best progress and the best results and the most results and all those great things that you wanna see. Okay? So we're gonna first touch on exactly what is progressive overload. We're then gonna touch on the importance of it and why you should care, because you're probably sitting there, if you have no clue what this means, you're like, what the hell is progressive overload? Why do I care about it? What is the big deal? Like, da da da. We're going to talk about why you definitely should be caring about it, and then we're going to go into how to progressive overload, how to apply it into your workouts, how to make sure you're having it in your workouts. Because after you figure out what it is and the importance of it and why you should care about it, you're going to want to make sure you have it in your workouts and your week-to-week and month-to-month workouts. And so let's first start with very simply, what is Progressive overload. I feel like I need to get a little bit closer. Progressive overload is simply just, in the simplest form, progressive overload is just simply doing more over a period of time. And that's it. That's really the most basic thing I can tell you is it's simply you are doing more over a period of time. And again, we're going to talk on like exact ways on how to have the progressive overload, but just know like When we get into all of these ways, it's literally just you doing more than you are right now over an extended period of time. So if what you're doing right now, if you're doing the same exact thing 6 months from now, or 2 months from now, or a year from now, that's not going to be a good thing when it comes to changing your physique, changing your body, changing your strength, changing your lean muscle definition. All of those things you're probably wanting to do. If you're watching it, if you're taking the time to watch this video, you probably want to change your physique. You probably want to see some more muscles. You probably want to get stronger. You probably want to be able to do pull-ups or whatever your goal is. You probably have a goal for the reason you're working out. Progressive overload is going to make sure you get to that goal because you're going to be doing more over a period of time. So very simply put, I don't even want to go more in depth. Very simply put, that is progressive overload. You're doing more over a period of time. Now, what is the importance of it and why should you care? You should care because there is a cycle that your body goes through in order to create an adaptation, to create a change. And I know my handwriting kind of sucks, but I wrote it right here. But there is a cycle that your body goes through. Remember, the, the change is the adaptation. Adaptation is like changing your body. You adapt, right? Here's that cycle. First and foremost, you put a stress on your body, okay? Working out is a stress that you're putting on your body, but it's a good stress 'cause it's gonna allow you to change in the long term if you do it right. So you put a stress in your body and your body says, oh snap, this mofo's crazy. And remember, your body, the main goal, the only goal of your body is to keep you alive. That's it. That is the only goal of your body. That is the single function. It's what it needs to do. It's what it wants to do. And it's going to find any way to hopefully keep you alive. And so your body says, oh snap, this person's putting a stress on me that we are not able to kind of handle, or it's just, it's just a big stress. So shit, we got to make sure we, we respond to this, right? So your body realizes the stress working out. It then, if you're doing all your things correctly, sleeping, having good nutrition, doing all those kind of things, it's then going to recover from that stress. And it says, all right, cool. We've gotten that recovered from. Now, we need to adapt to that stress to make sure that we can then endure that stress. Endure, endure. I feel like I've said that a few times. To make sure we can manage that stress and be prepared for that stress the next time moving forward. And again, your body has no clue whether you're running from a tiger or lifting weights to build muscle. It has no clue. It's just no stress. So your body says, all right, we got this stress, we recovered from it, now we need to make sure we adapt, okay, to make sure we can endure that stress later on. And the way it adapts is, for the sake of this argument, you build stronger, more defined muscles. That is the adaptation, right? Then that's what you're going for. That's the— that's your goal. You want to look more defined, or you want to get stronger, you want to be able to do push-ups or pull-ups or whatever the case may be. That is the adaptation you are chasing, right? And this is literally how progressive overload works, is for you to be able to change your body. The really key ticker here is this, where progressive overload comes into play. The stress that you put on your body has to be great enough. It has to be high enough of a stimulus, a high enough threshold for your body to say, oh, like it basically ticks it off, like tick. Oh shit. This person hit that threshold. They are doing more than what we are capable of handling right now. We got to make sure— that's a signal, hey body, recover and then adapt. But you have to hit that threshold up there to be able to make sure you tell your body you got to change. Because what did I say earlier? Your body's main goal is to keep you alive. That's it. It doesn't want to build muscle. It doesn't wanna lose fat, it doesn't wanna get stronger, it wants to maintain homeostasis, which is just staying the exact same. 'Cause think about it, that's the easiest. It's easiest to stay the exact same, keep everything the same, and just survive. That is the easiest thing, and that's what your body wants to do. It wants to take the easiest route 'cause it just wants to keep you alive. So what you are going to have to do is you are going to have to put a stress great enough Almost absolutely knock this thing down. You're going to have to put a stress great enough on your body in order to see that adaptation that you're looking for, because otherwise your body's going to say— let's just take for the example you're lifting 10 pounds for 10 reps, right? Let's say you're doing 10-pound bicep curls for 10 reps, right? And at first that was a stress that was great enough for your body to say, oh snap, we need to make sure we respond to this. Okay. Okay? So that was great at first, but then it adapts to it. So then it says, oh wait, wait a minute. This person, it's a stress for sure, 'cause you're still doing the workout, but we've already adapted to this stress. So why would we adapt to it again? We have to make sure your digestive system's functioning. We have to make sure your reproductive system is functioning. We have to make sure your hormonal system is functioning. We have to make sure your brain is functioning. Building muscle is at the very— or building muscle strength is at the very, very, very, very, very end of the totem pole. Doesn't— your body doesn't care about doing that. The only way it has to is if you put a stress great enough. So you, you know, you continue to lift these 10 pounds for 10 reps, but over time your body's gonna say, all right, well, we're not gonna keep adapting because we've already recovered. It's like you've already tapped out, you've already recovered from that. So there's no reason your body's gonna continue to change 'cause you're not giving it a reason for your body to change. And that's why, you know, if you're kind of stuck in the same rut with like not seeing your physique change or not getting stronger or doing whatever the case may be, you are not having this proper progressive overload. You're not putting a stress that is great enough on your body to then say, all right, shit, we gotta recover from this stress. And so that is why progressive overload is so important. That's why you should care about it, because if you don't have this right here, without the stress, without hitting that threshold, without hitting that stimulus and kind of like ticking your body to say, oh shit, all right, we gotta go, we gotta do this. without hitting that threshold, your body's not gonna change. 'Cause it doesn't want to. It wants to stay the same. And even if you keep doing the same thing, I think somebody smart once said this, I think it was like Albert Einstein, he's a pretty smart guy. I think it was him at least. He said, keep doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is legit insanity. That's what you're kinda doing. If you just keep lifting your 10-pound dumbbells for 10 reps and like, just doing all that stuff, your body's not going to continue to change. That is why it's so important and that's why you need to have it in your workouts. Now, it comes in different forms and fashions, so let's cover some of the ways you can have progressive overload in your workouts. Now, I'm gonna break the ways up into a few different things. Think of this as like a good, better, best scenario, right? None of these things are bad because, like, if you're getting better, that's always a good thing. So none of these things or any of these things are gonna be inherently bad. Just think of it more on like a good, better, best continuum when it comes to specifically changing the way your body looks. And so the best is going to be in purple here, and that's going to be doing more reps or lifting more weight. When it comes to seeing change in your physique, the best is going to be doing more weight or doing more reps. But we're going to talk about that here a bit later down here, so please stick with me. This is not like if you don't do this, you're a failure and you won't see your body change. That's not what this is like, so you got to stick with me. But, you know, all things equal, all things considered, the best is going to be doing more weight or lifting more reps. And if you are like, okay, how do I do that? I wrote an entire article on my website exactly laying out how to lift more weight, how to make sure you progress your weights, how to make sure you progress your reps, when to increase weight, all of that stuff. So I'll link that article here in the description of this show— of this show. I was thinking about my podcast, which, if you don't listen to the podcast, Eric Roberts Fitness Podcast, um, I will link that. I actually have to record a podcast after this, that's why. But getting back to it, I will link that article in the description of this video here below. So please, please, please feel free to check that out. But again, essentially doing more weight or doing more reps. So again, let's say for example you are doing a dumbbell shoulder press and your workout program calls for 3 sets of 8 to 10 reps, right? There's 2 main ways you can kinda go about doing this. You can either increase the weight or increase the reps. So let's say you're gonna increase the reps, right? You have an 8 to 10 rep range, okay? What you can do is say, all right, I'm gonna lift 3 sets of 8 reps for 20 pounds. That's week 1. Week 2, I'm gonna lift 3 sets of 9 reps for 20 pounds. Week 2. Week 3, I'm gonna lift 3 sets of 10 reps with 20 pounds. That's week 3. You've now gotten to the top end of that rep range, right? Because you've been increasing reps. So once you get to the top end of the rep range, what you can then do is say, all right, I'm going to then drop the reps back down and increase the weight. So now I'm going to do 3 sets of 8 with 22.5 pounds and then 3 sets of 9 with 22.5 pounds and so on and so forth, right? That's your first option. That's my preferred option. That's the option I would probably push you to go towards and I like doing. Though, if you are doing more of like a compound, say you're doing a barbell back squat, for example, you're doing 3 sets of 5 reps. Could literally look like, you know, week 1, 3 sets of 5 at 100 pounds. Week 2, 3 sets of 5 at 105 pounds. Week 3, 3 sets of 5 at 110 pounds. And it's like slowly increasing over time. Of course, at some point that's gonna tap out. Like, you can't just keep adding 5 pounds every single week. If you could, we would all just be like lifting cars and houses, which would be sweet. Sweet, but unfortunately that's not how your body works. And so, you know, eventually it's going to tap out, so you will probably have to go back to more of the, um, the rep scheme. But again, if you want more in-depth on that, check out that article. I go super, super, super in-depth on that article. So if you're interested in that, don't, you know, don't shortchange yourself. Check the article out. All right, but the reason these 2 things are the best, quote unquote, so to speak, is like you are signaling your body to make a change from a muscular Adaptation. You're basically saying, hey muscles, we need to work harder, we need to do more things, we need to lift more weight. You're putting that stress on your muscle, right? Going back to stress, you're putting that stress on your muscle, which is going to then lead to the adaptation of, you know, having stronger, more defined muscles. Now remember, like I said, none of these are going to be bad. So like, don't think if you don't do those 2 things right there, like, you're, you're not going to see your physique change or whatever. There will come a time where you do have to do those 2 things to see your physique change. So don't get that twisted either. But there's other ways to have progressive overload as well. So number 1, more TUT, more time under tension. So let's say, for example, you are doing a bicep curl, right? Let's say you do a bicep curl and your bicep curl looks like this, okay? There's like basically no time under tension, right? Time under tension just means like how much time are your muscles under tension, right? How much time are you controlling the weight, contracting your muscles having tension inside of your muscles. So this right here compared to this right here, think about how much more time under tension you are having for your muscles. And this is where honestly I see people, they go from not really working out the best, doing like, you know, just like swinging the weight around or like lifting their arms like this, to like actually controlling the weight, squeezing their muscle, making sure they use the right muscle. They actually drop down in weight, but they see a better result because they're using more time under tension and they're using less momentum, less inertia, and actually using their muscles. And so again, this is where, like, you know, it can kind of be dependent. It always depends. If you ever learn anything from me, it depends. It always depends. But like, more time under tension is a great way to actually tax the muscle more, which is going to allow your muscle to change more. But once you get that good time under tension, for example, you then want to combine that with doing more weight or more reps. But that could be a way where if you're somebody who's kind of just like slinging the weights around right now, if you have more time under tension, that is a form of getting better over time. And then once you kind of get that down, you can then add reps and add, you know, add the weight, that kind of stuff. So that's number 1. And kind of piggybacking on top of that, number 2, more range of motion/better form. So This could— I can think of a few things. If you're somebody who, for example, let's say you're doing a Bulgarian split squat or a regular squat, and let's say right now you can't get all the way to the ground, right? Or you can't get a full range of motion. You stop early, you stop short. If you're doing a squat, excuse me, maybe you come down halfway. Or if you're doing a Bulgarian split squat, you can't really get your back knee close to the ground. Let's say over a month, 2 months, 3 months, 4 months, you're now getting deeper into your squat and you're getting parallel, you know, You're getting the proper range of motion. Let's say you're doing a Bulgarian split squat and over 2 months your knee is basically touching the ground now. That is a form of progressive overload and your body will change from that because you are now, instead of doing a half rep, you're doing a full rep. And so you're having this more range of motion, which then puts your muscles under more time under tension, which puts your muscles under more stress, which means there's more stress in your body. So over time, Guess what? You're doing more, you're adding more stress, and that is going to be a way to see your physique change. And so I have a lot of people who, like, for example, maybe they start off, you know, maybe they're 50, 60, 70, 80 pounds overweight and they can't get their back leg down in a Bulgarian split squat, right? But over time as they get stronger and lose weight, you know, they're getting down lower and they see their physique change and so on and so forth. That is a great way to have progressive overload. So just know, more time under tension, or better form/more range of motion. Again, this could be for a chest press, for example. Let's say you're doing a chest press with your elbows out super wide, or let's say you're doing a shoulder press. Let's say you're doing a shoulder press with your elbows super out wide and you bring your elbows in, you have better form, that's going to put more tension on the right muscles. And so simply executing the movement better can be progressive overload. Having better form and having better technique That will put more stress on your muscles. You're doing more. You're doing something that is more. So that is a great way to have progressive overload. So again, many ways here to have progressive overload. But again, once you, for example, once you have the proper range of motion, once you have the proper form, once you have the proper time under tension, then yes, trying to do more weight and trying to do more reps. Once those things are kind of equal, kind of like what I said, you can funnel that back up to the more weight and the more reps. More reps. So our last little tier here of— tier here— our last little tier here of ways to have progressive overload. Number 1 is going to be adding more sets. And there is nothing wrong with adding more sets because you are doing more work over a period of time. My only drawback to this is you can only do that but for— like, we're gonna do— like, okay, we start with 3 sets and then you're gonna go to 4 sets and then 5 sets and then 6 sets. And then 10 sets. And before you know it, your workouts are going to take 6 hours because you're doing a million sets. And so this is where, yes, you can do this, but really, honestly, only to a degree because you would just spend your entire day in the gym. And if that's your sole way of having progressive overload, yeah, it's just— your potential is just going to cap out. And I sometimes see this where people are like, oh, well, I don't have heavier weights, so can I just do more sets? Yeah. I mean, yeah, but the answer is eventually, like, what are you gonna do? Just like 10 sets of everything? Your workouts are literally gonna take 5 hours. And so that's where it's like, just get heavier weights. Go to a gym, invest in heavier weights, find a way to make it happen. So that's what I'd say for more sets. Again, less rest, yes, again, to a degree, because if you are decreasing your rest times, again, this is normally a way where people try to do this if they don't have heavier weights. You can only decrease your rest so much to a degree until it becomes more like you're just doing cardio at that point, as opposed to doing more of like a strength training muscle building program. Like if you're going down to like 30-second rest in between your sets, like at that point you're just doing cardio. So it's not really gonna lead to the adaptation that you're looking for, which is the change and the more muscle definition and getting stronger and doing those kind of things. So less rest, yes, but only really to a degree because you're gonna get to a point where you're not gonna end up seeing your desired outcome. And again, if you're somebody who does not have heavier weights, I would really try to find a way to invest in heavier weights. And if not, totally fine, just have proper expectations on what you're kinda managing there. So that's number 2. And number 3 I wrote down here, probably can't read it 'cause my handwriting sucks, but better control/it's easier. So let's say, for example, Again, you're doing 3 sets of 10 reps with 20 pounds. And like the first week you're like, you know, that 8th, 9th, and 10th rep you were like, and like, you know, you're really struggling those last couple reps. But let's say by week 4, you know, your first rep looks like this and your last rep looks like this. Even though it was the same weight, you had better form, better control, it was easier, you obviously clearly got stronger because If the last few reps were like this right here, and then like they go to this right here, clearly you've had to have some sort of adaptation in there and you've gotten better because you wouldn't have been able to get those last reps easier unless you got stronger, built more muscle, whatever the case may be, right? So that is a way as well where you can have some sort of progressive overload in your workout routines. Now again, that is progressive overload 101. That's all the basics you need to know about progressive overload. It is Very important. You should be having it in your workouts. This is also why you should be tracking your workouts. If you don't track your workouts, please start tracking your workouts. Very, very, very important to do that. I have all the clubhouse members. I have everybody who's inside the clubhouse, which is just like my my group coaching program where I have all my training programs, all that kind of stuff. I'll link that here below in the description as well. But everybody inside the clubhouse tracks their workouts. They see you know because let's say on week one again, you know. All right, cool. I did three sets of eight reps. Reps for 20 pounds. Week 2, what are you going to do? Go in and try to do more than what you did last week. Automatically you're having progressive overload from that point right there. So make sure you're tracking your workouts. Make sure you have a proper workout program, a proper workout routine. I have some videos here on YouTube in terms of how to make a workout program. But yeah, that's what I'd say. So I hope you enjoyed the video. If you did, please feel free to give it a thumbs up and let me know below in the comments. If you have not already, subscribe to the channel. And yeah, thank you so much and we'll chat soon. Bye.
