Hopped back on the track today for some sprints. It would be an understatement to say I had some rust to bust off. Regardless, the session went well and by the end I was starting to feel sort of like a sprinter again. If you have a new goal but don't want to lose other qualities you have developed, drop in those other elements of training from time to time and you'll be surprised at how well you can maintain certain skills. Technique has the shortest drop off period of any quality, so more than anything you'll notice a loss of specific skill. Fortunately, you can gain it back fairly quickly through the appropriate dose of of whatever specific stimuli you want to utilize. For me, I want to continue to build strength and size while not completely losing my ability to sprint. For this, a sprint session every 7-10 days will allow for skill maintenance, with minimal negative impact on my strength development work. Keep some variety in your life, and you probably won't get bored with it. 🤙🏽 http://ift.tt/2tEjqhK

Nearly got a new deadlift PR today, pulled it up but just missed lock out. 495lb without a belt or straps at 184lb bodyweight. I am certain that my next attempt will be a success. Had a rough day with some interpersonal stuff, but I did my best to channel it into some positive energy. What better way to expend some energy than deadlifts! The next time life gets you down, fire right back and do something constructive that makes you feel good about yourself. We cannot always control the things that happen to us, but we can definitely control our outlook and perspective on such matters. Keep your head up, never give up, and remember that every day we get is a gift we will never get back. Thanks to @jaccob_20, @petra.huebner and the rest of the crew for motivation! http://ift.tt/2uM7RZD

If you are struggling with stagnant weight training results, it may be time to look at a few key areas. 1. Are you pushing yourself hard enough? Thanks to the influx of minimum effective dose talk in the coaching world, the pendulum has swung from chronic over-reaching in training to chronic under training (aka pussification). The fact of the matter is that if you want to get big and strong, you need to constantly be working toward doing more work over time - both in terms of volume and intensity. 2. Are you recovering enough? Not everyone can train the same muscle groups or do the same types of workouts every 24-48hr. Since hard work is what we want, it is imperative that you are recovered enough to attack the next session. If you aren't sleeping MORE than 8hr per night, chances are you could benefit from finding ways to sleep more. 3. If size is your goal, are you eating enough? Most skinny twigs I've talked to always say "yeah man I eat a lot, I don't know why I don't grow." Sorry to break it to you, but generally people who say this simply don't know what it feels like to actually eat a lot. I guarantee if you're an adult male who is 5'10" and 140lb, you are not eating a lot. 4. Are you too mentally wrapped up in training and methodology to even put out quality work? I see a lot of people getting super analytical about their training, but then when it's time to move weight, it's way too controlled and they're more worried about gear and grip instead of trying to kill the barbell. Who gives a hoot about your back arch if you can't bench 1.5x your body weight. Sometimes the best solutions are the simplest ones - do more work, recover more, eat big, quit overthinking and attack the bar. http://ift.tt/2sxFeyp

After a little 2.2km run around the block, I hit the gym for an upper body push workout. I experimented with something new, going for a bunch of relatively heavy singles on bench, then following that up with high volume, low weight accessory work. Give it a shot, you should be in and out in 45min and get a major pump! 1. Bench - singles up to 295lb, finishing off with some faster reps at 225lb. 2. Bar only military press - 2x30 (mixing in front and behind head) 3. Cable Fly's - 4x10-12 4. Lateral DB Raises - 5x12-15 http://ift.tt/2s0i6J4

Finding my place of zen - one sprint at a time. Most people sprint because they want to be fast - or rather fastER. Where they're at now isn't good enough, but if only they could do one more sprint, or try 1% harder, or squat 10lb more, or fit in one more session before their race - then they could run a time to be satisfied with. Unfortunately, this approach is operating from the ego, and the ego can never be satisfied. All of these mentalities are common, and they all revolve around not being satisfied with the current moment/ability/place/concept of one's "goodness"/etc. It is only when we break away from these mentalities that we are actually free to enjoy what we do with the moments we have, to be free to improve the qualities we want to improve, and to be satisfied with wherever we stand when we finally throw in the towel. As I've said before, being emotionally attached to outcomes is a one-way ticket to dissatisfaction. Athletes create preconceived notions of what they can or cannot accomplish, often with an undercurrent of overcompensation for the deep down truth that they don't actually believe in themselves. None of this would be a problem if at the end of the day you didn't really care about the outcome! Things are only important when you convince yourself they're important. Reality check - the universe and its inhabitants don't care about your time - so why do you? Once you realize that you can be free of all this BS, you can go out and have fun for the sake of having fun. You can want to improve, you can try to improve, and you can spend hours doing the right things to improve - but the ONLY way you'll ever be satisfied with any of it is if you let go of your attachment to the outcome itself. http://ift.tt/2paVQe0

Ditch your attachments to the outcomes of your actions - this is the path to inner peace. Perspective is arguably the most important thing we all need to constantly keep in check. Whether it's the session you had or the time you ran, many factors go into the ultimate performance outcome you attain. Getting emotionally attached to this outcome is an extremely common problem that holds people back in a most unnecessary fashion. Whether you have internal turmoil about how good you want to be vs how good you think you are, or you are just never satisfied by any performance outcome, you're missing one thing - a healthy perspective. At the end of the day, your time, jump distance, etc. doesn't really matter. Sorry to break it to you, but nobody really cares! And you shouldn't either. The secret to success (from a psychological standpoint) only comes when you can simultaneously care deeply about training and working intelligently, but not be emotionally attached to your performance outcomes. Emotional attachments are, for many of us, the enemy of achievement. We tell ourselves we have to do some thing, put pressure on ourselves, and then choke under this self imposed pressure. Over time a cycle presents itself which is composed of high expectations paired with self doubt, leading to underperforming due to putting too much pressure on yourself, which then reinforces self doubt, finally being overcompensated by more unrealistic expectations. Sheesh! Fortunately, you don't have to go through any of this. I am a walking example of someone who put so much pressure on themselves, only to find out that that shit doesn't work. Any burden - mental, emotional, or physical - will slow you down. Take off the emotional-attachment weight vest that we have all donned at some point, and you will find that doing what you do is more fun and more fulfilling than it was before. Beyond that, when you let go of the fear which is intertwined with this emotional attachment, you will be much more likely to perform at your best. http://ift.tt/2pDlnsT

Do you see those habits and thought patterns which inhibit your motivation and ability to take action toward your goals? That's your comfort zone. It's time to leap out of there like a frog 🐸 catching a bug 🐜. For me, motivation is derived from action. Most people see it as the other way around - he's motivated, so he takes action. I don't find that to ring true in reality. By taking action, I am then motivated to take other actions toward the same or other goals. If I instead sit there and think about all the things I want to do, but I don't do them, I end up doing just that - nothing. Ditch the excuses, stop telling yourself that something is too hard, and go do it! The only way to get to step 10 is by taking steps 1 & 2. They aren't taken tomorrow, as tomorrow is just a mental construct of time which doesn't actually exist. All that does exist is this current moment. Comment below if you took action today - it can be a physical task, mental task, or anything. Whatever it was, I want to hear about it! http://ift.tt/2ogRspl

If there's anything we can say from a reductionist perspective that is true of acceleration, it is the importance of the hamstring group as well as horizontal force production. Now, before you just load up the hip thrusts and hamstring curls, lets consider the stress that the hamstrings must endure. First, as the knee drive reaches its end point, the foot's forward motion must stop. An abrupt eccentric to isometric action happens in a flexed hip position, which is then shifted concentrically by the entire hamstring group as the leg reverses and goes to strike the ground. Training for this stage requires you to flex the hip and knee, and use a band or cable to apply force perpendicular to the shin. Start with slow eccentrics and ISO holds, moving to moderate eccentrics with an abrupt isometric at different points in the knee joint ROM. As the posture and center of mass rise through acceleration, the same ideas apply, the posture and positions must change to match the demands of more upright sprinting. As such, mid to late accel hamstring strength work should be done in a more upright position, with less focus on knee flexion and more focus on loading the hamstrings with an obtuse knee angle. Loading for this should have a vertical and horizontal component to it, such as pulling the leg to the ground from a knee up position, with a band resisting at 25-45 degrees relative to the shin angle at ground contact. Once you start to think about the athlete as a system of joint interactions, you can see how something like pelvic tilt and foot placement can make or break whether or not you perform well or get injured. Don't just look at the body, but try to see with X-Ray vision to look at interactions between joints and the musculotendinous units which connect them. Try to develop the ability to see movement of joints and their relationship with other joints, and you'll be able to create new exercises that are extremely specific to the needs of a given athlete. http://ift.tt/2n0raWZ