There's a 500 lb Gorilla in the room.....

Below is an email I received. It is brilliant. One of the most thought out emails I have had in a long time. Read the email and look for my thoughts below it.....

The Email:

Into our second week of strength training, I am beginning to feel and appreciate the affects of this ladder/rung training approach, and do have a sense of satisfaction that I am pressing a 5 with hopes of reaching the 5x5 level with both arms in the weeks to come. However, I am a little concerned that my limited time for working out, which up until now had been three (sometimes four) days a week at class, is too focused.

Before strength training started, I always got the feeling my whole body was being fired and my ass was kicked hard at least once a week at classes (usually more than once a week!) Since I just don't have a lot of time beyond class for additional training, this scheme was perfect for me, and think I have been feeling and showing the results.

My concern is that if my only training is focused on strength training through presses for two months, I am not getting the full body work that I would like and missing the natural benefit of working with kettle bells, in that it works so much of your body. And right! I know that I shouldn't be concerned with being 'entertained' either, but only looking forward to presses for the next 6 weeks is a little uninspiring.

Maybe I'm the only one who feels this way - if so, I am happy to shut up and go with it. I do respect your approach, and have really enjoyed the variety and effectiveness of your classes. I don't pretend to know more than you about training to be sure. Wouldn't it be beneficial though to break up the regimen at least once a week, or every other week with a 'change up' to fire parts that may be dormant during strength training? At least giving us people with limited time and struggling to make ground in strength training a reprieve?

At this point in the email it ended with the usual "Mike your so cool...I wish I could be just like you....Could I wash your car this summer..." endings that everyone puts on their emails to me. :)

NOW...tap into this. According to Issurin and Lustig (2004) Motor Ability; Residual Duration (measured in 'days') This is how long you can STOP training with NO EFFECT ON PERFORMANCE. Yes...this means you can walk away and not train.

Aerobic Endurance 30 +/- 5 days
Maximum strength 30 +/- 5 days
Anaerobic Glycolytic Endurance 18 +/- 4 days
Strength Endurance 15 +/- 5 days
Maximun Speed 5 +/- 3 days

There's the numbers. This study assumes you stopped training. Stop. Nothing. Zero training. Your body will keep it's capacity for that length of time before it starts adapting to your new lifestyle. Pretty impressive stuff. Your body will keep it's form even though the function has stopped. HIGH-FIVE !!!! That rocks ! I don't feel guilty anymore. I am going to train smarter, not harder. That's the baseline.

Let's talk about the email...

Training serves many purposes. A good personal trainer will make you set goals. Something attainable. Measurable. These mile markers serve a dual purpose. The client will see value in the training due to the results AND the client will see value in the trainer due to the same results. Everybody wins. The problem is...some of the goals are so lame. Lose 10 pounds before my wedding. Really? Lose 10 pounds? Weak. Sew their mouth shut and have them suck their food thru a straw for 2 weeks. Done. Next? It's not hard. You only have to 'stop' something. Stopping a behavior is not hard. Let's see....I am going to change my diet not to include fast food. OMG !!! How will you do that? Your so strong willed. Can you say 'your my hero'? Lame, lame,....el Lamo'. McDonalds doesn't deliver. Stop going to Mickey 'D's and you got it covered. Just...don't ...go. How tough was that? STRENGTH TRAINING IS DIFFERENT.

You gotta dial in. Plain and simple. You have to wrestle with the inner demons. Those dragons will tell you things. Make you promises. Give you praises and then place doubts in where you least expect it. Ultimately they only fuel the doubts. Dragons suck. They suck straight across the board. They suck your mind. They suck your energy. They suck your will. MOST importantly...they suck your confidence. There lies the trappings of 'the work-out.' I like to refer to a 'work-out' as a length of time devoted to challenging my mind or body. How I attain that....I don't care. Bell's, biking, bowling, blading or things that don't start with B. It doesn't matter. It can be mental. Sometimes just being (oops,...another B) with someone is a work out. You walk away feeling good. Why? Because it got rid of stress. Stress is a huge dragon. Get that bad boy back in the cage for a day and you will live forever !! Well, not really but you may kick the dog less. Bottom line is you got rid of stress during your work out. Strength training is the opposite. Wait...let's revisit that...STRENGTH TRAINING IS THE OPPOSITE !! There...better. It is stressful. You get very few pats on the back along the way...IF ANY. I am watching. I am watching. I know who is going to really struggle in the next 2 weeks. It's easy to see. They are still working with bells sizes that are within reach. They are moving right along (dug-a-dumm, dug-a-dumm) foot loose and fancy free. When they hit the next bell it will all fall apart. They will look at everything in the environment as the excuse why things are not improving. The next bell is too heavy...they can't do it. RIGHT ! You have to earn it ! No more rewards for just showing up and sucking your neighbors air. You have to work...and work HARD. Many, many days of not getting it will finally be rewarded when you do get it AND THEN nobody will care. Well that's not true. I will care because I love you :) For the most part it's true...nobody will care. When I gained 'X' pounds on a lift...nobody cared. I had to enjoy it myself...and you will, too. You will have a great feeling and walk a little taller. Then you will grab the next size bell and be crushed. So goes the nature of strength training. The email CLEARLY points to a desire to have a satisfying and rewarding day in the studio. Even though the writer states that they feel good about the training and the goals...they wonder about other things. THAT'S THE DAMN DRAGON TALKING !! Beat that beast down. That beast wants you to stray from your path and is putting all kinds of unfounded doubts into for head. First, You are still training your entire body. Cleans, presses, swings, snatches...all prime the pump. The focus has shifted to strength. Do you have it? Can you condition something you don't have? Deconditioned muscles and joints is the runner's pitfall without the strength portion to their training. THE CHRONIC RUNNER IS GOING FOR THE 'RUNNERS HIGH.' THEY ARE ADDICTED TO A 'HIGH.' The other component to this equation is a little word with a big finger pointed straight at you. 'Optimization.' Are you optimized? In other words...are you at your end game? Are you at the peak of your performance grid? Will dialing back and focusing on your strength training get you the silver instead of the gold? Nope. Nobody in my class fits this description. Factually , everyone can focus on strength and IT WILL IMPROVE THE OTHER AREAS BECAUSE THEIR PERFORMANCE IN THE OTHER AREAS IS BEING HELD BACK DUE, IN PART, TO GLOBAL WEAKNESS (and our overall mobility sucks but that is a separate rant). EXAMPLE: I repeated the last week, this week. My left wasn't onboard. I spooked myself into poor performance. I was afraid to clean the bell properly because I didn't think I could get it out of the hole and fire it up. So every press was out of my groove. Not this week. I have nailed it (I know...you don't care...I KNOW). If...WHEN..I nail it tomorrow I will gladly move up a rung and be crushed for the next 3-4 weeks. I hope to get all rungs thru 5 x 5 within the next month with my current bell. I have a bell that is challenging to me. Gotta dial in.
The short answer to the email is...stick with the program. Trust me. Have some faith. Don't get distracted by shiny things. We are still doing a full body work-out...your not going to lose anything. We are optimizing. Keep your dragon on a leash.

See you tomorrow.

(BTW~The guy in the picture above...doesn't eat meat. Just leaves and branches)

There is ALWAYS somebody bigger than you....

....either physically or in the weight they are using. Physically we can't help or change much. But we can change the weight. Last night people started to scramble. Some of the ladders were off so we got that squared away. Some of the weights were off, so we tweaked the weight. Some of the weights were golden !! Perfect for the day and the rungs. Here's the trouble. Last Friday you got your 5/5 and went up a bell size for this week. You went up a bell size but came down one rung across the board. So, yesterday was your 5/2 (ladder/rung) day with the new bell. You didn't get them. One side was shot...both sides didn't go...whatever. Either way you were not feeling the love. You need to go down a bell, right? Get your groove back and then try again? NO ! WRONG ! The warm fuzzies are history. You graduated. You got your 5/5 last Friday. Kiss it good-bye and move up a bell. Now...I know we all want to be reassured but fractional weights are not the answer. You don't need a " .5 " increase. You need to work a lot harder. That is the name of the game. Squeeze out an extra rep once a week and be happy with that performance. Eventually it will link up and movement starts heading north. Remember, strength training is not rewarding day to day like 'working out.' It's measurable. It's performance driven. If you don't see progress.....it's all you.

So...What happened ?

The bulk of us are at the 5 ladder and 4 rungs for the heavy day...which was today and for the rest of us...tomorrow. Today I got all the rungs with the 7.5 (36kg) bell. Now, I had gone thru this in my head a number of times and I didn't finish the rungs...in my head. My head is pretty reliable. I think going into today I spooked myself on the left. It wasn't happening. I never found my groove on the left. I moved from the bell. I just wasn't getting it. Having said that...I got it. My choices now are should I repeat the week knowing that my performance on the left wasn't the best and work on a stronger showing or do I dial in and step up a rung next week. I don't know. I am going to think about it over the weekend. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I have been biking to work over the past week/end. Nothing fantastic. An easy 5.5 miles each way. I have baggage (boy, do I have baggage) that accounts for maybe 15 extra pounds hung on the bike. Mostly my clothes for work. I didn't change a thing with my eating habits. As a matter of fact, my eating has been sucky during my work cycle with the exception of some natural peanut butter and Flackers (thanks Sarah). Everyone at work enjoyed the 2 hour "pick the flax seed from your teeth" party after eating them. I stopped drinking beer, again. Not that I drank that much of it. It wasn't a tough thing for me to stop. I did start drinking a wine blend called 'Menage a Trois'...something about the label caught my eye. Not sure what....either way, it's good. MY POINT! I am now sitting at a body weight of 180.5 lbs and I still hit my numbers.Keep in mind, last year at this time I was trying to keep under 200lbs so I had a 3 lb buffer for the RKC II weight in. My weight is significant to me at this point. Small food changes and a small boost in activity over the course of a week dropped me over 3 lbs.I got on the web sites...I tried to figure it out. I burn maybe 300-400 calories biking. Not a lot. Then again...does it need to be? It's cumulative . Right? It goes on that way...and it comes off that way. What's your plan? Do you have one? Happy with your status quo...or are you done pretending?

Keepin' it Real......

Strength training is hard on a number of levels. For the "Type A's" they need to learn to settle their ass down and dial in to the fact that less IS more. Learn to walk away. Train smarter, not harder. For the "B's" thru "Z's" they need to learn to push themselves if they have never pushed before. Again, dancing up a sweat with or without weights isn't strength training. "But Mike, I felt stronger !" Really? Awesome ! I'm glad you reached a good feeling for yourself. Did you also reach for heavier weights? I don't mean your first 3-4 weeks of your gym membership. I'm talking' after 3-4 years of training at the same weight on your belly and on the bench. Did your weight/strength improve? "Well Mike, that wasn't really my goal." Well, mission accomplished. Rite of Passage takes all the guess work out of your training. It's a program. Settle down and dial in. Monday and Wednesday are just 'pre work' for the hell that will be called Friday/Saturday.
Let's talk about today...
Medium or Moderate day...I got my numbers (5x3 rungs). I was surprised. I ran on 3 hours of sleep Sunday and 2 hours on Monday. I thought I would be weak and lethargic. Thankfully I only felt that way at work. I'm using/rep'ing a bell that is 10 lbs less that 50% body weight. I am in a good zone right now. The one extra rung added 100% more work/volume. If you got the Cl&Pr's today...Awesome! That doesn't mean you go up a bell size. Adding ONE RUNG to the ladder on Friday/Saturday is going to add 40 presses (20 per arm). Add 40 presses. Add 40 presses. Add 40 presses. Are you with me? Add 40 presses. Stocks are going up and fast. Adding one more rung...a fifth rung...adds 50 more presses. So sit back and enjoy your stable training. Survive this week and everything goes up one rung. That means the only difference between this week and next will be a total press load requirement of 190 presses this week -vs- 310 presses next week. That is the reward for hitting your numbers....lucky you !!! Shine on......

Rite of Passage !!! (so far....)

Here's the recap...First we found out the five ladders with five rungs (5x5) weight. Then we went up one bell and dropped one rung across all ladders. We are still doing five ladders total. So,...for the sake of discussion...let's talk about me. I completed 5x5 with the #7 (32kg). The standard applied. No leg assist. Heels on the ground. Knees locked. Full press to the lockout over head. Re-cleaned before each press. Monday I went up a bell size to the 7.5 (36kg). Monday is a light day so the ladder is 5 with 2 rungs (2 rungs less that the heavy day which will have 4 rungs). I got the 5x2. It was hard but it is suppose to be hard. That's the point. Today I will do 5x3 with the same weight. Let's say I can't get all the rungs. Let's say on the forth ladder I can only get 2 presses...well then I have some choices. Keep it to 2 reps or drop the clean before each press. This is why you may want to keep a log book. The best lifters keep a log book and follow how their body responded to their training. This is pretty simple so far but if your into the 5th or 6th week and things aren't moving...you need to go back and figure out the "why" in the equation. IF I decide to keep it to two presses it will look like this on the 4th ladder 1 + 2 + 2. The 5th ladder will look the same. So what happens on Friday? I couldn't get all the rungs on Wednesday so what's the point of adding rungs up to 4 on the first ladders ? Because you may be able to get the first couple ladders and the the 3rd ladder is where things drop off. This is where the training comes in....not the work-out. Anyone can sweat. Sweating is not the sign of a good or productive work out. It's just sweat. Sweat is easy. Plenty misshapen bodies sweat. Improve your ladder presses. Now your doing something. I barely sweated from fall thru spring when I was strength training.....weights always improved. It's not about the sweat.....not anymore. Time to get your press on !