General Adaptation Syndrome and the 3 possible results from training…
Like Goldilocks and the 3 bears, only with more sexy science and far less boring plotline and character development…
Stress and the human body’s abilities and mechanisms to cope with it are amazing things. Stress is caused by anything and everything you encounter - a brutal squat session, people not indicating before they turn off, high fructose corn syrup, a spider in the bath, Alan Henry… Stress is simply your body’s way of interpreting the world around you.
Without giving you too much of a lecture, the idea that everyone interprets the world around them through stress was presented as the General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS) by Hans Selye back in the 1950’s. Entire volumes of books have been written on GAS and its implications, none of it will be covered here… For the purposes of strength and conditioning, you only need to understand its relevance to athletic performance…
We have 3 stages…
1. Alarm reaction: in layman's terms, this is pretty much the workout… The immediate training effect that leads to the degradation of muscle tissue and energy substrates. The increased demands trigger the secretion of stress hormones. This is a catabolic response.
2. Resistance: this is the recovery stage… This is when the body attempts to repair the damage from the workout through an insulin response. This is an anabolic stage… Stress hormone levels will return to normal but only if given enough time to do so. If another stressor returns before the body has completely recovered, the athlete will experience another alarm reaction, pushing him or her deeper into a catabolic state.
3. Exhaustion: this is overtraining… Too much stress will result in “burnout”, “overload”, “adrenal fatigue”, etc… In this state the athlete’s endocrine system begins to shut down, as it can no longer keep pace with the high stress loads placed upon it. [As a side note, an athlete in this state will typically have a deficient thyroid, severely impaired immune system, elevated cortisol levels, terrible sleep patterns, inhibited insulin response, etc… They are basically a bag of s*** at this point...]
Based on this, and coupled with a basic understanding of physiology, we find that are only 3 possible results from training…
1. The porridge is too cold [nothing really happens]… A low grade stress will produce a mild alarm response, and a mild alarm response will produce minimal positive adaptation because the training stimulus wasn’t stressful enough. Simply put, if the athlete doesn’t try very hard, they won’t get very good…
2. The porridge is too hot [athlete gets worse]… Long bouts of stress are applied, but before the body can begin to build itself up again, more stress is applied, pushing the athlete deeper into that catabolic state… This continues for months or even years until eventually the athlete either gives up or breaks down... Simply put, if the athlete does too much, they won’t recover, grow and progress.
3. The porridge is juuuuust right [athlete improves]… This is the desired response. Short bouts of stress are applied over a period of weeks or months, producing an alarm response, signalling a massive catabolic hormone release, forcing the body into a resistance stage where it begins to rebuild the damaged tissue and refill the metabolic stores. The result is supercompensation by the athlete’s body, improving subsequent performance. Simply put, training and recovery are spot on, so the athlete improves.
How do we keep the porridge just right?
At our end, we utilize a periodization [programming] method that allows for the application of high levels of stress within a framework that allows optimal recovery time between workouts to ensure proper, continuous adaptation to stress…
At your end, you need to realize that more training doesn’t always equal more results. Stress is caused by anything and everything you encounter - the drive to work, the foods you eat, the emails you receive, training, your relationships, extra training - and it does take its toll, and you do need to recover from it. Less is not more, less is less, but a lot of the time less is exactly what you need in order to improve.
To be crystal clear: a training session is only productive if you can recover from it and improve… Adding another training session on top of it before you have recovered will send you backwards.
As a Blackbrook member, all you have to do is consistently show up, do what is written for you, try hard, then go home and relax without doing a tonne of other crap that can hinder recovery and growth. The more experienced members will need more recovery time. A stronger, larger muscle requires more recovery time than a smaller one, but that's a conversation I'm not willing to have again...
“Sit the f*** down and have a beer”
~ Coach Collins
Copyright 2017
Like Goldilocks and the 3 bears, only with more sexy science and far less boring plotline and character development…
Stress and the human body’s abilities and mechanisms to cope with it are amazing things. Stress is caused by anything and everything you encounter - a brutal squat session, people not indicating before they turn off, high fructose corn syrup, a spider in the bath, Alan Henry… Stress is simply your body’s way of interpreting the world around you.
Without giving you too much of a lecture, the idea that everyone interprets the world around them through stress was presented as the General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS) by Hans Selye back in the 1950’s. Entire volumes of books have been written on GAS and its implications, none of it will be covered here… For the purposes of strength and conditioning, you only need to understand its relevance to athletic performance…
We have 3 stages…
1. Alarm reaction: in layman's terms, this is pretty much the workout… The immediate training effect that leads to the degradation of muscle tissue and energy substrates. The increased demands trigger the secretion of stress hormones. This is a catabolic response.
2. Resistance: this is the recovery stage… This is when the body attempts to repair the damage from the workout through an insulin response. This is an anabolic stage… Stress hormone levels will return to normal but only if given enough time to do so. If another stressor returns before the body has completely recovered, the athlete will experience another alarm reaction, pushing him or her deeper into a catabolic state.
3. Exhaustion: this is overtraining… Too much stress will result in “burnout”, “overload”, “adrenal fatigue”, etc… In this state the athlete’s endocrine system begins to shut down, as it can no longer keep pace with the high stress loads placed upon it. [As a side note, an athlete in this state will typically have a deficient thyroid, severely impaired immune system, elevated cortisol levels, terrible sleep patterns, inhibited insulin response, etc… They are basically a bag of s*** at this point...]
Based on this, and coupled with a basic understanding of physiology, we find that are only 3 possible results from training…
1. The porridge is too cold [nothing really happens]… A low grade stress will produce a mild alarm response, and a mild alarm response will produce minimal positive adaptation because the training stimulus wasn’t stressful enough. Simply put, if the athlete doesn’t try very hard, they won’t get very good…
2. The porridge is too hot [athlete gets worse]… Long bouts of stress are applied, but before the body can begin to build itself up again, more stress is applied, pushing the athlete deeper into that catabolic state… This continues for months or even years until eventually the athlete either gives up or breaks down... Simply put, if the athlete does too much, they won’t recover, grow and progress.
3. The porridge is juuuuust right [athlete improves]… This is the desired response. Short bouts of stress are applied over a period of weeks or months, producing an alarm response, signalling a massive catabolic hormone release, forcing the body into a resistance stage where it begins to rebuild the damaged tissue and refill the metabolic stores. The result is supercompensation by the athlete’s body, improving subsequent performance. Simply put, training and recovery are spot on, so the athlete improves.
How do we keep the porridge just right?
At our end, we utilize a periodization [programming] method that allows for the application of high levels of stress within a framework that allows optimal recovery time between workouts to ensure proper, continuous adaptation to stress…
At your end, you need to realize that more training doesn’t always equal more results. Stress is caused by anything and everything you encounter - the drive to work, the foods you eat, the emails you receive, training, your relationships, extra training - and it does take its toll, and you do need to recover from it. Less is not more, less is less, but a lot of the time less is exactly what you need in order to improve.
To be crystal clear: a training session is only productive if you can recover from it and improve… Adding another training session on top of it before you have recovered will send you backwards.
As a Blackbrook member, all you have to do is consistently show up, do what is written for you, try hard, then go home and relax without doing a tonne of other crap that can hinder recovery and growth. The more experienced members will need more recovery time. A stronger, larger muscle requires more recovery time than a smaller one, but that's a conversation I'm not willing to have again...
“Sit the f*** down and have a beer”
~ Coach Collins
Copyright 2017
