In my latest free report I talk about 5 training mistakes that most athletes make.

Along with poor planning, lack of effective recovery methods and misguided diet information one of the biggest mistakes is training too long in a single workout.

Many times I go to a team or High School training facility and finish my entire workout before others even finish their first exercise of the day. When new athletes come to train with me for the first time, they are absolutely shocked at how short their workouts are and by the fact that they are getting significantly better results in half the time. This is also true for the fitness enthusiasts I train also.

Spending too much time in the gym is another thing that leads to over training. When you first start your workout and first hard set your body begins to increase its release of testosterone to aid in the muscle building process. This peaks at 27 minutes.

At the 45 minute mark your testosterone levels return to baseline. If you train longer than that your testosterone levels will slowly start to drop below baseline and your cortisol (the stress hormone that eats muscle and increases body-fat storage) levels will slowly creep up.

Cortisol increases due to the fact that the intense training is taxing the muscles and is used to help deal with the internal inflammation in the body. This is similar to a doctor administering a cortisol shot for an acute sports injury.

By the one hour mark your cortisol levels will be higher than your testosterone levels. Obviously this is the worst possible scenario. In the old Soviet Union sports doctors would monitor athlete’s blood periodically during workouts to determine when this was happening. Once it did they would know when to shut the workout down.

That is why I rarely allow my clients to train for longer than 45 minutes after their initial high intensity set in the weight room and would strongly suggest that you don’t either. You will be shocked at how much faster you will grow.

Of course during some sports fitness games and competition preparation workouts may exceed this time limit but the more you can manage it the better your weight training will progress.