Strategic Planning for Better Fitness Results: What You Should Know
Better fitness results. What most people think: work harder! What good fitness coaches know: work smarter. This is how to use strategic planning for better fitness results.
Take a moment to think about your fitness future. Where do you want to see yourself in 3 months? How about in 12 months? What about 5 years from now?
It’s impossible to predict the future. But strategic planning for both training and nutrition can be the difference maker in getting better fitness results.
Planning ahead (yes, even years ahead), allows us to stay motivated, achieve milestone goals, and measure progress over time. This is a major component of how I help my clients get fit now, and stay fit for life.
As a coach, I use strategic planning to create a roadmap for fitness results. My clients tell me where they want to end up, and help them start the engine and get there.
Read on to learn more about strategic planning for better fitness results, including how to create a roadmap for your own goals.
What is Strategic Planning for Better Fitness Results?
Strategic planning for fitness results involves setting clear, achievable goals and developing a structured approach to reach them. It includes:
Assessing your current fitness level
Identifying specific objectives such as losing weight, building muscle, improving endurance
Creating a tailored plan that details workouts, nutrition, and lifestyle changes
Measuring progress over time and adjusting strategies as needed
Learning the why behind the what to ways to improve adherence and motivation over time
In other words: it’s a deliberate, organized, data-driven way to maximize your efforts and ensure consistent, effective progress toward your fitness goals.
Why is Strategic Planning Important for Better Fitness Results?
90% are just like you and me: everyday people with busy lives trying to feel better, look better, live better and live longer. Not pro-athletes with a season to prep for. Not a physique competitor prepping to step on stage in a sparkly thong bikini.
So as everyday people, do we really need a strategic plan?
100% yes.
Strategic planning will not only help you achieve better results across the board, it’ll help you maintain those results for as long as you want to maintain them.
Strategic Planning for Better Fitness Results
Here’s what you’ll need in order to create a strategic plan for your personal fitness goals:
1. Assess Current Fitness Level
If you don’t know where you are starting from, it’s going to be difficult to plan an efficient route to where you want to go.
Here are a few ways to assess your starting point:
Biometrics at a doctors office
Body composition test/lean body mass test
Strength tests
Mile run test
Girth measurements
Progress photos
Track current sleep habits, stress levels and energy over time
Track nutrition intake over time
Log workouts over time
Work with a coach to establish a solid baseline
Want help establishing a baseline? Book a Strategy Session. Note that you are interested in a comprehensive fitness assessment and we’ll work together to gather the data you need.
2. Set Your Long-Term “Big Feels” Goal
Your plan should start with an end point in mind. Ironically, while this is the first step, it’s actually the step that it’s okay to be a bit vague about. Meaning: you don’t need to know how much you’ll weigh, how much you’ll be able to squat, how many miles you can run in how many minutes.
In fact, your long-term goal really shouldn’t have anything to do with specific numbers. Instead, it’s about how you want to feel, and live, and be in your world.
Your long-term goal is the gut feels. This is your guiding light that never runs out of fuel.
3. Create SMART Milestone Goals
Now is when you start to turn those “feels” into attainable stepping stone goals. Big Feels keep the fire burning. SMART goals keep you on track.
The SMART goals framework is a widely used strategy for this step. SMART is an acronym that stands for Specific, Measureable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-Bound.
“Click to download SMART Goals Planner”
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For example, if your goal is to be strong and fit enough to go on a 5-day hiking trip with your best friends in a few years time, you might set a series of SMART goals such as: a 15k walk without stopping by year end, complete a 2-day overnight hike next summer, or walk 2 miles a day to increase stamina and improve cardiovascular health.
4. Map Out Your Schedule
My recommendation is to do this for an entire year.
Do you have a vacation planned? Are you attending a wedding? Big birthday coming up? High stress season at work? Stretches of time with nothing planned?
After over a decade of coaching I’ve learned that there is no “perfect” time to commit to getting in shape. Life doesn’t slow down. There will always be events and time spans that pop up. There will also be stretches of time that lend themselves to buckling down and pushing hard.
Plan for both.
If you take a look at your calendar you can schedule in diet breaks around vacations. Push phases when you know you’ll have more time to devote to your workouts. Maintenance phases during the busiest work season.
Make your plan work for you, not against you.
5. Build Your Training/Nutrition Programming
This is where most people will benefit astronomically from hiring a coach/professional. Why? Because the path to fitness success is rarely (read: never) a straight shot.
Most long-term goals require periodization: some months of fat loss, some months of muscle building, some months of maintenance. Otherwise you risk burnout, metabolic adaptation, psychological roadblocks, etc.
Of course, you can absolutely piece together a year long plan that can work for your goals.
For example, if you goal is to build muscle and lose fat you might spend:
4-6 weeks focusing on improving mindset, hormones, sleep, stress
4 months in a muscle building phase to improve body composition and hormonal balance
3 months in a undulating fat loss phase to drive, well, fat loss
1-2 months in a maintenance phase to re-establish a baseline
2 months back in a fat loss phase to finish the job
Through each of these phases you’ll tailor your training, cardio sessions, energy intake and macro ratios to support the specific goal. It’s doable, but support is recommended.
6. Keep Tabs on Progress (aka KPIs)
Key progress indicators (KPIs) are data points that are used to measure progress over time. KPIs are used in business, brand building, social media marketing, etc. And they’re useful in their own right here.
For example most of my clients track the following metrics:
Strength gains in big lifts – squats, push ups, deadlifts, etc.
Weight and/or body composition if possible
Girth measurements – waist, hips, chest, etc.
Progress photos – front, side, back
Energy intake and food choices
Step count over time
We also use a variety of biofeedback markers to measure physiological responses. Stress. Sleep quality. All day energy. Motivation. Focus.
I recommend circling back to your SMART goals and identifying the most important factors that will tell you whether your plan is working, or not.
7. Become a Life Long Learner
If you don’t see the point in going for a walk every day, why would you do it? But if you understand the physical, metabolic and mental benefits of moving your body every single day you’ll make a point to do it more often.
The more you understand the “why” behind the “what”, the more likely you are to believe in the importance of sticking with it. I’ve found that enhanced learning improves motivation, self-efficacy, enjoyment, self-discipline and therefore…better fitness results.
Want to know more?
Bonus Step: Spot Check
What happens if you set up the plan, follow the plan but still don’t see results?
