As a self confessed nerd, I LOVE a good research paper.
One of the things I love about it is that it can give validation and confirmation of what we already believe to be true.
For example, knowing that stress is a significant killer of your progress.
Case in point, a 2008 paper showed that stressed out subjects had significantly lesser gains in strength in their bench press and squat compared to their more chilled out counterparts.
This may be because stress directly negatively affects the way with which we adapt to training, and this adaptation is what equals better strength, and potentially fat loss and muscle gain.
I should note that when life does get stressful, it doesn’t mean that training will yield zero results, it just means that there’s a need to back off a little to allow your body to adapt.
Remember that the recovery piece of the puzzle is just as important as the training piece!
James B
