The plan

What we are doing, and why it looks the way it does.

Where this is going, and when

The whole plan from now to the end of October, with what changes at each step. Dates move if your training does, and nothing here is fixed.

Now → 25 August Phase one Getting the movements to feel automatic Your next session is Saturday 1 August, 15:30. The whole point of this stretch is that walking into the gym stops being an event.

🏋In trainingTwo sessions a week. Both open with the same two lifts, the squat to overhead press and the RDL, so the movements that matter most get repeated every week. From there your own session goes further than ours does. Weight creeps up on the lifts you already own.

🧠In your bodyCoordination and connective tissue adapt first, before muscle does. It is the least visible part of the whole plan and the part everything later is built on.

🔍What we checkHow comfortable the gym feels, out of ten. There is a slider on your progress page, move it whenever you like.

1 → 29 September Phase two Building, and the first free weights Now that the movements are known, the load gets to do the talking.

🏋In trainingMachines start becoming free weights, one at a time and never all at once. Chest press to incline dumbbell press, machine row to a supported dumbbell row.

🧠In your bodyThis is where real strength adaptation happens and the muscle itself starts doing more of the work. Free weights also ask your stabilising muscles to join in, which a machine does for you.

🔍What we checkHow your core handles load, around 1 September. Not just how it feels on the day, but how your stomach feels the day after.

1 → 27 October Phase three Real load, and the first review Pushing the weight properly on everything you own by then.

🏋In trainingLoad goes up across the board. Somewhere in here you will hit a stretch where a lift stops moving. That is a normal part of it and it is worth saying now, before it happens.

🧠In your bodyStrength keeps climbing. This is the stretch where the numbers you set in July start looking small.

🔍What we checkYour best set on all five main lifts, around 20 October. Straight off your own logged numbers, nothing estimated.

November onward The long view Where this actually goes Late October is a full review, where we re-read everything and write the next stretch properly instead of guessing at it now.

🏋In trainingWhatever the review says. By then there is nine months of your own numbers to plan from rather than assumptions.

🧠In your bodyThe thing worth watching is your strength numbers still climbing. That is the proof the plan is doing its job.

Why it is the way it is

Every choice here has a reason. These are the ones worth knowing.

🏋Why we lift, not just cardioYour body keeps the muscle and the bone it has a reason to keep. Lifting is that reason, and that is why this is not just cardio.

💨Why you breathe out on every effortHolding your breath spikes the pressure inside your stomach. Three months post-op, that is the one thing we avoid.

🧗Why your core work is standingSame muscles as a crunch, none of the pressure on your stomach.

🔄Why both sessions open the same wayThe squat to overhead press and the RDL start every session, with me and on your own. Those two are worth repeating until they are automatic, and it means you always begin on something you know.

🎯Why only two new exercises a weekEnough to stay interesting. Few enough that you never walk in unsure.

📈Why 12 reps means go heavierA rule you can use without me there. Twelve clean, add weight. Under seven, take some off.

What we are not doing

On purpose.

×Trying to be good at itThe whole job is turning up and doing something. A session where you felt clumsy and finished it counts exactly the same as one where everything flew. Being amazing at this was never the point.

×Daily weigh-ins, photos, body fat percentageYour eating is already sorted. You do not need another number to feel bad about.

×Heavy loaded core workNot until your surgical team actually says yes.

Does something on this page not work for you? Tell me what you would change, what is missing, or what you would rather have instead. This is your site and I would rather build it the way you actually use it. Tell me ›

Any of it can change.

If something hurts, feels wrong, or is just not working for you, say so and we change it. None of this is fixed.

Anna