Supercompensation is the main goal of almost any gym trip. This is the period of time during which the athlete's muscles not only recover after training, but become stronger, more enduring, and more voluminous than they were before.
Supercompensation: what is it?
After the end of sports training, tired muscles gradually begin to recover. This lengthy process can be divided into several stages. During the first stage, the muscles return to the pre-workout level. At the next stage, muscle growth occurs, their performance increases. The period during which the muscles not only rested after training, but also became stronger - and there is supercompensation. After reaching their peak, athletic performance begins to decline and gradually return to pre-training levels.
The peak of supercompensation is the perfect moment for your next gym. If you give a load to the muscles that have not had time to recover as much as possible, the effect of training will be insignificant, if not completely negative: tired muscles are threatened with overtraining. The effectiveness of the training will also decrease if the right moment is missed: at the peak of supercompensation, muscle performance can increase by 10-20%, which allows the athlete to increase the load.
This is an important point, since only a constant increase in the load can provide a stable growth in sports performance. Without increasing the load, the athlete can only maintain the level already reached.
How do you determine the ideal time to train?
Unfortunately, it is impossible to accurately determine the period of supercompensation. This process takes place individually and depends on many factors: the athlete's metabolism, the initial level of fitness, the intensity of the load, nutrition, and the general state of the body. In addition, different functions and muscle groups are restored in different ways and the period of supercompensation is different for them.
It is also necessary to take into account the following nuance: if the training was not intense and the muscles did not receive sufficient load, there will be no supercompensation, the efficiency will not increase. In the case of excessive load, overtraining occurs, and, as a result, a stop in the development of sports indicators, or even regression.
Cyclic training - solving the problem of supercompensation
The solution to the problem of supercompensation is a competent training program, drawn up taking into account the individual characteristics of an athlete. One of the most important principles of such a program is the cyclic alternation of the intensity of the load that various muscle groups receive.
The essence of cycling in training is to divide the sports program into separate periods, which are repeated with varying degrees of intensity: easy, medium, high. The ideal option is training in split, when the program is divided into several training days, during which the athlete works out a separate muscle group.
It is also worth considering that for different parameters (such as strength, endurance, muscle volume, etc.), the period of supercompensation is different and requires loads of different intensity. Therefore, it is the split-training with cyclic change in the load that ensures the uniform development of all the trained parameters.
