|
|
By
Phil Stevens |
|
No matter what people want to
believe money will not, and cannot buy you love as in the
popular song, or progress in the gym. If it could then like
most things you purchase with money you would own it for the
life of you, or the product, and that JUST isn’t true
when it comes to accomplishments in the gym or on the platform.
|
 |
The fault I see time and time again
is that people try and believe this is true. They hit a new PR and
somehow feel they now have a right to that new load any time they
step foot in the gym. Now yes, this can be true at very early stages
in a lifters training life when linear progress still works, but
that soon will fade. Soon you will hit a spot where you cannot live
on the laurels of days past. You will hit a point where you must
earn your right to lift, not only new loads, but as well the loads
you have prior on a daily basis.
You have no iron god given right to
a load you had done prior when the moons and stars were aligned
and then sun even shined on your rear end for a moment and allowed
you to hit that new personal best. That PR was earned from long
past work and dedication with loads lower then it and so will the
next PR be.
This is where patience and discipline
come into play. Where punching
that clock on a daily basis is a must, and you have to take each
training session for what it is. Have the discipline to come in
with a plan you aim to strike at, but as well the maturity and patience
to earn that days training. A realization as well the further you
go, the stronger you get, the further and further from one another
the PR’s will become.
Eventually you will see months between
PR attempts. Months between attempts even at the same loads you
have done prior. This is where progress comes NOT from trying to
go for new loads week after week, tearing yourself down physically
and mentally only to regress. Progress comes from weeks and months
of hard disciplined back breaking work, refining ability, stacking
reps and sets of lifts you have done prior again and again. Looking
to do them with just a bit more snap, a bit more ease. One more
rep, one more set. Working through fatigue and hitting loads that
you have done prior but in a fatigued state from having hit that
same load 8 times before this attempt.
This is where you have to truly
become a student, and love the journey your on. Progress
is fun, training is FUN for everyone when its easy. Like Dave Tate
once said in a seminar I hosted. “It’s easy to go from
shit to suck, anyone can do that. It’s the going from suck
to good, and then good to great that is hard.” To open the
same seminar he had a great analogy. He held up a 5 lb plate and
asked what it meant to the audience. Most said a nickel, a 5lb plate,
change etc.. No! he was right in saying as, I paraphrase ,“This
5 lb plate can represent weeks, months, even years of hard work
as you get more advanced. Busting your ass day in, day out, at things
you’ve already done, earning your way up to add one more little
nickel to the bar”
Wake up people. You have no right
to anything when it comes to resistance training, not even the accomplishments
you have done prior. You don’t own them. You have to keep
at it HARD even to sustain the ability to do them let alone do more.
You must walk in each day with a clean slate and a rough plan. Progress
later in training is made when you go in with the mind set of putting
perfect work in with loads you have done prior.
Earn your way each and every day you
go to the gym to higher loads. If it’s there and you know it,
strike while the iron is HOT. Though it is only after you make your
current 80% ability your bitch that you have the right to even try
85% and so on, and so on. You have to gain a level of maturity and
no when to step up and take your shots, and when to back off and
take your lashings with loads you have done prior. Confident and
knowing that by putting the work in you WILL earn your way to new
heights at some point in the future.
No progress is made by you going
in and failing while trying to hit 90%, 95%, 100%, or 105% on a
day you aren’t able. You’re better off, and will make
more progress backing the hell off and taking what you have that
day getting some quality work in. Walking away proud of the fact
you gave what you had that day, and maybe even a lil bit more, but
you didn’t fail. You worked hard, you strained and succeeded.
Again early in training age its
easy. One single training session can be considered an event that
will cause a stimulus for adaptation.
The beauty as well at this stage is you heal just as fast as you
reach that stimulus. Each is short and quick. This is why most people
see love the so called newbie gains.
Just know those are short lived. The
longer you’re in it, the longer these adaptation causing events
get. It may take weeks or months of stacking consistent training
one on top of another, on top of another, with the accumulated fatigue,
load, and volume, to create a stimulus enough to warrant adaptation
in an advanced trainee. As well at this stage it’s going to
take near as long, or as long for that adaptation, evolution, and
growth in the human body to occur. Meaning the work you do today,
tomorrow, next and last when at a higher level may not show its
true teeth for weeks, or more likely, months down the road.
|
|
Again this takes
discipline, maturity, patience, and awareness of your body.
This is something you will see and find in damn near every
single person/athlete and more so coach that has made it,
or brought people from beyond mediocre to having made accomplishments
worth recognition. If you don’t have it in you then maybe
this isn’t for you. Or if you know you love training,
lifting, but cannot control your own stupidity and pig headedness
in your programming, that’s fine and very normal.
Recognize this.
Turn your head off and find yourself a qualified coach to
do the programming and thinking for you. What ver you do.
For the sake of all the gods of iron and steel stop the stupidity
and crying of lack of progress in your training and get in
there punch the clock and start using loads you can handle
and only move beyond that when you have earned the right to
ON A DAILY BASIS.
|
About The Author
|
Coach Phil Stevens is an accomplished
strength athlete with considerable experience in both powerlifting
and strongman competition. Phil is the 2007 APA World Champion
in the 242-pound class (total). He currently holds the APF
275-pound class raw National bench, squat, deadlift, and total
records. Phil’s marquis lift was his 700-pound raw deadlift,
performed on February 14, 2009 in Phoenix, Arizona.
Phil has been ranked in the
“Top 10” in the deadlift Nationally across all powerlifting
federations, and in addition to his coaching duties at Staley
Training Systems, he also serves as the Arizona State Chair
for the North American Highlander Association, as well as
the founder of Lift For Hope, an annual strength-competition
with proceeds donated to Charity (www.Lift4Hope.org).
|
|
 |
|
