A few days ago, I was reading something where a trainer was talking about how training should be approached a little like a job.
He wasn’t saying that you need to train eight hours per day or anything of the sort. Instead, he was trying to say that sometimes, you just have to do the training, even if it’s not particularly fun.
Of course, this hit me like a ton of bricks considering what I’d written last week and what I was then spending my weekend trying to do. After all, I wasn’t having fun. Was I wrong?
Then I did some thinking and remembered one very important thing. I remembered that if you hate your job, you find a new one, and that’s all I did.
After only one day of training with this new system, I have to say that so far, so good.
Now, it’s too early to truly assess anything as far as effectiveness. I may have just spent an hour or so outside basically wasting my time, but I don’t think so.
I started with some moderately heavy (for me) deadlifts at 225 lbs. I did five sets of three reps and they were pretty taxing.
Next, I decided to do something other than normal squats because, well, they get kind of boring. I threw my barbell into the landmine, slapped a 25 lbs plate on it, and did landmine front squats. It wasn’t a lot of weight, but it was a completely new movement, so I did three sets of eight there and, well, they were pretty taxing. I suspect the weight will go up quickly on this, though.
Then I started doing sled drags with 70 lbs (45 lbs plate and 25 lbs plate) on it. I dragged it 20 yards, then turned around and dragged it back 20 yards for 40 yards total. I did that five times with minimal rest.
Some rest was especially minimal as I tried to race the rain to start up for the second round of pours.
The thing is, I feel freaking amazing. I actually feel like I accomplished something in training today, and that’s always a good thing.
Realistically, I understand that I can’t train heavy indefinitely. At some point, you’re just going to stall out a bit. You can’t keep increasing the weight indefinitely.
And, honestly, that’s OK. It has to be OK. It’s a fact of life, so if it sucks, you’re slap out of luck anyway.
But the thing is, you have to be able to look at the training and feel like you’re getting something out of it. You have to at least recognize that you’re getting actual value for your effort.
Today, I got that.
I lifted fairly heavy. I lifted for volume. I did some conditioning work. I did a little bit of everything I wanted to do.
Then I get to turn around and do it all again on Wednesday, and I’m kind of pumped about that, even if I may have to figure out how to train around a hurricane bearing down on us.
I’ll deal with that another time.
For now, I’m stoked about training, at least for today. If this continues, I’ll be good to go.
The thing that is going to be important for me to remember is to get in sufficient volume. Can’t do but two reps? OK, do more sets. The key is apparently to do between 15-30 reps total, and that’s my minimum. So long as I hit that, I’ve done what I need to do.
I think what I’ve started to figure out is that you’re not doing yourself any favors by complicating programs unnecessarily, but also figure out how to be flexible enough to get good training even if you’re having a bad day. Plan to do five reps for three sets and only lifted it three times? Take a break and lift it three more times, and again, and again. Keep doing it until you get the reps you need.
At the end of the day, you’ll end up feeling better about your training.
At least, that’s what I’m doing going forward.
