If you’re following the #pltlift program (link to FREE plan), or another weight lifting program, it’s important you push yourself to see progress.
This is never a case of ‘drop and give me 20’ style of training but you have to force your body to change.
For fat loss you need a calorie deficit, to grow muscle (hypertrophy) you need progressive overload. In essence, progressive overload is the process of continually challenging your muscle to force it to adapt and change/grow.
 
This means that you need to always be trying to lift heavier and/or use more reps. Not every day but weekly there should be small increases in total reps over the sets within each movement and/or weight increases (equipment allowing)
 
There are 3 key mechanisms to hypertrophy:

1. Mechanical tension. Lifting heavy enough weights through a full range of motion. A full range of motion with good control to provide sufficient time under tension.
2. Muscle damage. During weight lifting your muscles become damaged through the concentric and eccentric movements. Muscle actually becomes more damaged through the eccentric (negative rep) than the concentric but both are needed. Often we can experience DOMS (Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness) from this but Its not an essential process to grow muscle
3. Metabolic stress. Sometimes this can be ‘the burn’ or ‘the pump’ causes the increase of metabolites, lactate etc which provides an anabolic effect and don’t sling resulting in a hormonal response.

 
When you are lifting during a set the final few reps of the set provide the stimulus. So I’d say you lifted a set of 11 heavy reps. Maybe the first 7 feel ‘ok’ but then 8 onwards things are getting hard. It’s these final hard reps that are the ‘effective’ reps. The reps leading up to them are providing fatigue and are very much needed, but the final reps are where the growth is. It’s therefore important that you push yourself into these harder reps. Picking a weight that’s challenging, every time you hit the top end of your rep range it’s time to choose a heavier weight and push harder.
 
Over a 12 week program your fatigue should increase. Week by week you should feel a little more jaded and weary until the final deload week.
This is by design.
This is how you grow.
In CrossFit Its often said you have to ‘get comfortable with being uncomfortable’ and that’s a fair assessment.
Over time your strength will continue to grow and the weights you lift continue to increase.

tks
Paul

On April 22nd 2018, the very first PLT Nutrition client tracked their first day’s food.
Since then, thousands of clients have successfully achieved their goals of weight loss, weight maintenance and muscle gain; many breaking away from a lifelong cycle of yo-yo dieting.
 
So how did we arrive at today?
How did I become a nutrition coach?
 
I always had a sports background, I was always into weightlifting, but through my 30's & 40's had gotten off track and had become very overweight.
At my peak I was 226lb; at 5ft 7" I was obese with extremely high cholesterol. As a father of 2 young children I finally plumbed the depths of the 'enough is enough' and in November 2014 it was time to make a change.
 
I began by changing how I ate, then I changed how much alcohol I drank, and lastly I started to do CrossFit. By May of 2015 I had lost 57lb in 20 weeks without a coach, without any diet plan and without any idea!
 
Although I had achieved a significant weight loss, I didn't know what I was doing; I white knuckled the weight loss but it worked! I continued to eat better, increased my CrossFit to 6x a week and maintained my weight through 2015 to the middle of 2016. It was then I became frustrated, frustrated that I worked out a LOT but didn't look like I worked out - sound familiar? I had come across someone in a Facebook group who was a nutrition coach and after a few messages decided to sign-up with the then small company. The first 12 weeks went well and excitedly I extended and purchased a 2nd, 12 week plan. The 2nd plan wasn't as successful and towards the end I started to realize this wasn't the approach I needed. I left at the beginning of January 2017 and joined another coaching company; this was a very large company and they took a different approach to coaching. I only stayed for 1 round but I found some great experiences with them and it really stoked my passion for nutrition and helping people.
 
I began to read nutrition papers and books, listen to podcasts from industry leaders, constantly expanding my knowledge and after a few months started to offer advice to people online; 'friends' on Facebook would message me and ask for advice. I found helping and giving them advice was so invigorating - improving peoples lives was what I knew I wanted to do,  but I wanted to do it my way. 
 
I was continually astounded over the different styles and approaches to weight loss; what surprised me most was the actual encouraging of unhealthy/obsessive behaviors around tracking, counting calories, weighing and measuring. Sadly this still is very prevalent in the industry.
 
With a desire to see something change, I made the decision to start something new, in an attempt to break the mold of what was happening in the industry around me.  With the knowledge of having gone through the process with several other nutrition companies, I felt I was in a great position to take on board what was good and what worked, and I had an even better grasp of what wasn’t good and what I felt was an unhealthy approach to nutrition coaching. So I obtained a formal nutritional qualification and I created PLT using ‘all the best bits’ and ensuring my company left behind ’the bad’ and sadly, there was plenty of bad. I wanted PLT to be different, not like all the others, something fresh and new. I wanted clients to lose weight in a healthy, balanced way that was a lifestyle change for life and not a fad leading to, or continuing a cycle of yo-yo dieting.  I wanted to educate my clients, give them the skills to go it alone and maintain a healthy life with the tools they had learnt from PLT coaching. I wanted to stop this obsessive behavior around tracking food, rigid macro counting, and the worst experience of all, over-dieting clients. It was time to do things ‘The PLT Way’. 
 
Early 2018 I began talking to someone online who wanted help to lose weight and they signed for 6 months, woah, my first official client and they signed for 6 months!
Their first day tracking was April 22nd and my very first check-in was completed on April 29th!

Soon more and more clients signed, and by August 2018, PLT Nutrition had 100 clients! My gorgeous daughter made this cake for me to congratulate my hard work, and I began to realize this approach was what people truly needed. I started to talk to another coach I knew very well, and who shared my vision and approach, about coming onboard and Patti Lawson started to coach for PLT Nutrition. Initially this was a part-time basis but by November Patti was working full-time for PLT Nutrition.
 
Since then, PLT Nutrition has grown to have thousands of clients and a team of coaches that comprises Registered Dietitians, Nutritionists & Holistic Practitioners, all coaching clients 'The PLT Way'.
An approach to coaching that's unique, an approach that avoids the numbers obsessed approach of others. At PLT Nutrition we work an approach that's designed to avoid the obsessive tracking, we keep things loose and fluid.
At PLT Nutrition we don't work with fixed macros but with ranges that allow true flexibility and allows the client to be more intuitive about eating.
Our approach appeals to people that want to lose weight healthily and enjoy life, its for people that want to still eat the foods they love and enjoy with their families.
 
We are all the sum of our experiences and my experiences from being coached in 2016 & 2017 taught me the good, and the bad, and the ugly and showed me the vision of nutrition I wanted.

However, PLT still continues to evolve.
At PLT Nutrition we never settle, we never stand still, we are always moving forward trying to become ever more flexible but still achieve results.
We are far from perfect, our approach can be too relaxed for some people, but our approach is something the whole company and staff believe in, it's not 'for the ‘Gram' its not 'just for results' its for health, for vitality and for sustainability, and has proven successful for thousands of happy clients.

As PLT Nutrition heads into its 5th year, I am ever thankful for this opportunity to help people.
I would like to take this moment to thank all the staff at PLT Nutrition, they say it takes a village and it really does...
To the Leadership team; thank you for the work you do to better our coaches, to better the experience of our clients and for your ongoing support of my vision
To the coaching team; thank you for the hours you spend working with clients on their help and also, thank you for sharing and delivering my vision for nutrition.
To the PLT Nutrition Community; thank you for building the most inclusive, diverse and happy community on Facebook! Yes that's a BIG statement but we receive SO MANY comments daily about how people love and feel comfort in the community. Whether a client or not, there's SO MUCH FREE STUFF given away, not just awesome advice, but documents and training plans!

Thank you for everything
Paul X