The first way is jumping into a routine that is too demanding too quickly. We set high goals, have high motivation, and are truly committed to hitting the gym to get back in shape. While this is all great, we typically don’t program the appropriate progressions needed to give our bodies enough time to recover and adapt in the early stages. This can easily lead to tweaks and injuries after a few weeks. Oftentimes, these injuries sneak up on us. Whether slowly progressing over time, or a sudden unexpected tweak out of nowhere. Here is the reason why. We tend to judge our readiness for the next workout based on how our muscles feel and how sore they are, which seems to make sense since the muscles are what we are typically focused on training. The catch is, muscles recover faster than other tissues and systems of the body. Ligaments, tendons, connective tissue, the nervous system, and the endocrine system (hormones) all take longer to fully recover after exercise. So while our muscles may not be sore anymore, there are still other systems not fully recovered. If we continue down this path, there becomes a backlog of recovery in other systems/tissues which eventually becomes too much to handle and tweaks, strains, and injuries start to appear as the body struggles to keep up with all this new demand. To account for this, make the first 2-3 weeks of your new routine less intensive. Don’t train any exercises to failure, and stop a few reps short of what you feel you have left in the tank. Exercise to where you feel like you’ve accomplished something, but you still have some energy left in reserve. This may feel frustrating to stop a bit short, but it will pay off in the long run. Give your body and tissues ample time to acclimate to these new demands, and then make steady and incremental progressions. If you want the best long term outcomes with strength training and physical fitness while also avoiding injury, you need to play the long game – slow, steady, and consistent.