The title of this piece is a reference to a slogan in use with many special units within armed forces and police units. This is mainly with describing or instructing Close Quarters Battle training and operations. The meaning is that it is better to move slow, smooth and decisive. Rather than too fast with the risk of getting outflanked, isolated or confronted with all sorts of sudden surprises. 
You might wonder why and how this should refer to training and exercising. Well… in you progress in fitness and overall health, it is much better to have a slow and smooth progression. Going too fast in certain aspects will likely get you of balance and it will therefor hamper your overall progress.
We all heard the stories of people dropping an amazing amount of body weight, which most of the time just comes back on (or at least partially). Or it induces all kinds of health issues. It is way better to have a slow and steady progression in your weight loss, strength gain or gain of muscle mass. That way it is sustainable and you keep your body more in balance.
Nowadays there is a large number of people that expects ‘instant gratification’ with everything they do and encounter. Since everything is readily available on the internet within a blink of an eye, why not everything else? Start a new training programme; there should be some results after one or two weeks. You ate healthy today? Why is the scale not indicating the results the next morning? It just does not work like that.
Especially if your goal is fat loss or weight loss, it is good to realize that results will not come overnight and you have to put in your effort over time and consitstency is key for this.
If for instance you gradually gained weight in the past 5 years, it is a bit unrealistic to expect the weight to go in 5 weeks or even 5 months time. The sustainable way to cope with this, is a change of lifestyle and these results will take time. You should not be put off by the time it takes, because this is the best way to ensure it is a lasting change and it makes sure there are no side effects.
The same is applicable to any form of training. When you set goals to increase your lifts for instance and you tend to go to your limits each and every time you train. This is a certain way for you to reach a state of overtraining sooner rather than later. And recovery of a state of overtraining takes long and it surely will affect your daily life as well; due to the high impact it has on your body. For your overall progress it is more beneficial to work in fases of building up, followed by recovery and maintenance.
What to Do Now
So do not worry or feel disappointed when progress is slow or even very slow. Keep in mind that there is progress and slowly going in the right direction, is still moving in the right direction! If you want to know what Continuous Improvement Fitness could do for you, get in touch through the contact page.
Slow is smooth, smooth is fast.
Start now, not tomorrow.
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