The funny thing about knowing something is that it’s hard to imagine someone else not knowing it.
Like I am certain that Beethoven just figured everyone understood musical harmony.
Or your cousin, the mouthy engineer, can’t fathom that you don’t understand how a suspension bridge doesn’t just plummet into the sea below it.
Personally, I have no idea how a plane that weighs several tons achieves lift and remains in flight even though my second grade science teacher, Mr. Kaufmann, definitely tried to explain it via some mysterious thing called Bernoulli’s Principle.
In fact, I think if I was sent back in time with my current knowledge of light bulbs and iPhones and blockchain and combustion engines, the fine folks of the Wild West or wherever I landed would say, “Ok, pardner, if you’re so smart, show us how those work!” and I’d just shrug and slowly back out of the saloon before I got shot for being an idiot.
Now if there is one thing I vaguely (and I’d underline vaguely if I knew how my keyboard worked) understand is how your body reacts to training. And while this seems simple and intuitive to me, maybe it’s completely foreign to you. So allow me to use my remaining 792 words here to fill you in on what I’ve coined the “Two-Headed Monster Of Training Adaptation” (copyright pending).
To yield any results from training you need to tap into two systems. If you do not prioritize both systems you will see suboptimal results at best and no results at worst.
The first is stimulus.
Stimulus is what most people think of when they think of training. It’s the lifting of weights. The accumulation of running miles. It’s holding positions for a duration in yoga or pilates class. Essentially, it’s any external demand that you put on your body.
Stimulus must satisfy two components for it to be effective.
The first is that it must follow the SAID principle (take that Bernoulli, we’ve got our own principle!). SAID stands for Specific Adaptation to Imposed Demand. In simple terms, the stimulus must reliably deliver the outcome for which it is being used. If it does, you will adapt in kind.
Want to squat heavier? Then you need to squat with heavier weights. Want to run faster? You are going to need to run with increasingly faster paces.
Your body will adapt to the specific demands put on it. If the goal was “stronger legs” well, then there are many ways to get to that outcome even without squatting (Bulgarian split squats, leg press, leg extension, hamstring curls to name a few). But if you want to “squat heavier” then you would be well served by squatting heavier.
The second component is progressive overload. This just means things need to get harder over time. You can increase the challenge with more weight, more miles, faster paces, shorter rest times, increased range of motion or about a dozen other things that can make the stimulus more challenging.
But more challenging it must become to continue to be effective. (I feel like that should be said in Yoda’s voice)
This will not necessarily be linear (although it can be for a decently long period of time, particularly when you are new) but over your training career things must continue to progress.
OK, the TL;DR on stimulus: it needs to be specific and it needs to get harder over time.
System number two is what I refer to as chemistry.
Chemistry is the chemical interactions that happen within your body based on both internal and external factors.
One of those external factors is the aforementioned stimulus. You put a stimulus on your body and your muscles react by becoming bigger or more resilient and your nervous system responds by improving its signaling to your muscles.
Nutrition falls squarely under chemistry. The number of calories you eat and the amount of those calories that are constructed of protein, carbohydrates and fats will influence both your muscle and fat cells and directly contribute to visual body composition and performance changes.
Supplements are a subcategory of nutrition. Things like Omega 3s, Magnesium and other micronutrients play an important role in cellular function and finding the proper balance will, again, influence health, body composition and performance.
Things such as sleep, stress, mindfulness and relationships - while not being ingestible like nutrition and supplements - still deeply impact your chemistry and internal environment. Hell, a good hug and eye contact changes the chemistry in both your brain and your body.
Finally, exogenous hormones and peptides also (and often very powerfully) change your body’s chemistry. Things such as GLP-1 or testosterone or anabolic steroids will cause cellular reactions that can lead to hunger suppression, muscle growth, increased red blood cell count, fatty liver disease and high blood pressure (listen, there are no biological free rides and many of these compounds have both positive and negative effects).
Now, the magic here is to control both of these systems. Because when you master the stimulus and the chemistry you are in the driver’s seat to your fitness destiny. (I feel like that should be said in George McFly’s voice)
Most people will gravitate towards one or the other. They’ll absolutely fall in love with making sure their training is sound, their log book is up to date and they are managing volume and intensity.
Others will calibrate their food scale weekly, shop only at Whole Foods and chew each bite of their food exactly 16.8 times.
While others will research every peptide, send samples of their supplements out for independent testing and set up iPhone alerts when it’s time for their next protein shake.
But it is the person who controls both sides - the stimulus and the chemistry - that wins the game.
There are definitely people who will advocate for one or the other. They’ll cite this one very flawed study that showed that you don’t even need to lift weights to gain muscle if you take steroids. Or they’ll claim that, since they run 30 miles per week, calories don’t matter.
Those people are, how do I say this delicately, wrong.
Because while genetics are the one thing you cannot control, the stimulus and the chemistry are in your hands. And focusing on them both simultaneously and synergistically is what will lead to optimal results.
And isn’t that what you are really after.