What should a good training plan do?

Hm so where to start? Let’s start with some basics that any training plan should do for you regardless what your goals are and what level you are at. 

A training plan should be realistic and achievable: 

Very generic and probably something you’ve heard many times before but it’s true. Regardless if you are injured and don’t have much experience with exercise or an athlete. If it’s not realistic and achievable at best your effort of keeping up will fizzle out and the worst is to get an injury on the back end of putting all that effort in. 

They should be specific: 

So again what this is will depend on who the training plan is for. If you are a keen tennis player with a few niggles the program will look different to someone who is looking to build a foundation from scratch. Plus a training plan doesn’t always have to only consist of typical Strength work and or cardio. For some it will be focused on strength and for some it will be some strength and getting more walks in during the week. 

A training plan should have a long term focus.

I have spoken about this before but I’ll repeat myself because I don’t think it can be stressed enough. This is for us normal people that are not professional athletes. If you can see yourself do a program for a year then that is about right. I tend to discourage quick fixes like 3 months plans, transformation plans etc. Within that year most likely you will change things up as you progress but it should be an overall manageable amount on a weekly basis. If you are a serious hobby athlete then you might have harder periods planned in over the year with lighter to allow recovery but again as a whole, it’s planned to be manageable. 

How I do training plans:

I mostly work with clients that want to improve their overall health but have injuries that we need to manage the symptoms of at the same time. They have most likely seen a physio and we know what the diagnosis is. The umbrella of the three things above, realistic/achievable, specific, longterm encompases allot. I really try to take into consideration what element I can bring in, to make it fun and exciting for my clients. Not just in our session but outside our session. Working on and managing injuries can be hard, static and tedious work. That’s why I find it’s really important to find ways where the injury is not in focus as much and restricting my clients ability to do some form of physical activity. 

I want my clients to feel that they are getting stronger bodies without causing other additional niggles. I put a lot of thought into how to challenge them but without causing any additional niggles. Also, I don’t want them to feel guilty if they find something hard to do or if they cant do it for whatever reason. 

What I have explained here is quite generic but I think these elements are extremely important in a training plan.