Mobility changes, strength changes, opportunity for evaluation is constant.
Here's mine. I wrote it over the course of the day, around training and flat-out stuffing myself with food because it was a CHEAT DAY PARTY PARTY PARTY. Also, the title to this post is the title of this list.
Goals, large and small, for training improvement in 2013:
1. learn more. I've recently struggled with that sense of "the more you know, the more you realize you don't know." I am overwhelmed right now. I am formulating a plan of attack and will figure out how to start "studying" what I don't know this year.
2. Continue to tweak and perfect my diet. This involves abovementioned learning.
3. Be more proactive about prehabbing. This will include more dedication to mobility work prior to lifting sessions.
4. Investigate supplementing to a greater degree.
5. Re-evaluate macronutrient breakdown in diet to really be honest with myself about what kind of holes exist within it(and therefore changes that need to be made).
6. Stop coming down so horrendously hard on myself for, basically, everything. Generating this list is actually somewhat difficult for me because my mind is one of these lists 24/7. I cannot stop focusing on what I'm not doing, what I'm not doing right, what I'm not doing enough, and just getting down on myself for it. That's much easier to do right now with an injury, I've realized.
7. Work on my mindset in training. Continue to improve on things that will often result in my emotions getting in the way of my lifting.
8. Continue to improve how much I let what is happening around me in the gym distract me.
9. Develop strategies for improved focus in training and out of training.
10. Continue my education regarding programming, which is in its absolute infancy right now.
11. Improve my strange relationship with my own ego, which hinders me when it tells me I should be doing more weight on something and also hinders me when it fails to activate when it would it be reasonable and healthy for it to do so.
12. Take pride in lifting-based accomplishments, from small PRs to large ones. My automatic response to accomplishments tends to be one of apathy. They are never "good enough," I often think of them as steps in an unending progression of mediocrity. That's probably not good or helpful.
13. Blog more. Blog more about abovementioned accomplishments because it will benefit me to do so even if I do end up looking like a narcissistic asshole. It's my blog, I can do what I want, damnit.
14. Research more about the role of mental strategy in strength training.
15. MEDITATE. I KEEP SAYING I'M GOING TO DO THIS. GRRRR.
16. figure out a way to reach out to more lifters and continue to develop the way in which I am engaged in the community, whatever that means.
17. Encourage more women to join our powerlifting team. Use fellow team member Ashley to do so. Sorry, Ashley, you are now a pawn in my scheme.
18. Continue the process of beating down whatever voices linger in my mind that tell me my body is sub-par for whatever reason, particularly aesthetic. F*ck that, Jesus Christ.
19. Be able to cut successfully to 105 for competition. Success means that I will still be able to lift like a boss even after going through the carb/sodium/water retention depletion process.
20. Strengthen adductors.
21. Massive glute training (can be interpreted in both ways of interpreting this phrase).
22. If injury occurs again this year, which it probably will, survive better.
23. Learn how to coach others and articulate topics discussed in coaching better.
24. Strengthen/gain mass in quads.
25. Focus harder on core strength when my rib will let me again.
26. Raise GPP by being more diligent with accessory work timing in training sessions.
27. Attempt to separate when decisions I'm making in my training are being made from fear and when they are being made from reason and/or love. That's right, I said love.
28. Watch my posture during times in which I am not training.
29. Be diligent about getting 7-8 hours of sleep on the nights before I teach.
30. Complain less.
31. Congratulate more.
32. Stop being ashamed of my lifting. No one really cares in either direction about my lifting, ultimately, so being ashamed of it is kind of ridiculous.
33. Learn how to fry sweet potatoes for carb back-loading. F*ck yes. Okay, this is not probably going to develop my training. But it's a goal.
34. Start seeing a chiro semi-regularly to maintain a better idea of what's going on with my body as I ask it to do extreme things.
35. Eat salmon more often.
36. Give more to others in training sessions. Get out of my own head in order to do so.
37. Improve scapulae retraction inequality.
38. Learn how to overhead press. I'm terrible at engaging my lats/lifting my chest into this.
39. IMPROVE MY CRAPPY BOX SQUAT oh my lord is it embarrassingly bad.
40. Focus on glute activation to develop speed.
41. Find other strategies to develop overall lifting speed.
42. Purchase minibands so I don't have to keep asking Kyle to use his.
43. Purchase chalk because Kyle beat me to it on this round.
44. Attempt to maintain a more neutral spine during certain lifts--my head has a way of snapping back during pulling and heavy rowing that's probably not fantastic for my neck.
45. Do VW's more diligently.
46. Walk to the gym more in the winter even if it's cold. I don't really do any cardio, so this is pretty much my only option for it these days and I should probably really try to do it more often.
47. Work on embracing adversity in training more. If I'm sick, train harder. Learn from the process.
48. Auto-regulate honestly. Especially if I'm teetering on the edge of an injury/think I might be causing one. I admit that this should have been more involved in how I approached my rib, and I failed at it badly.
49. Watch how I phrase things. There's no need for me to verbally brutalize myself through the description of my acts and/or psyche if it's unwarranted.
50. Watch more Youtube--and by that, I mean "smart" Youtube a la Mark Bell, Dave Tate, etc.
__________________
Training log: http://www.sherdog.net/forums/f49/broken-rattles-tiny-bones-babyeaters-log-2050815/
My wordpress blog: http://babyeaterlifts.wordpress.com
51. Continue to keep my mouth shut and take Kyle's advice in training. Continue to be aware how my actions and mental state might have an effect on him as he works with me.
52. Be more diligent about logging. EVEN if I'm injured, which I have a hard time doing.
53. Clarify where my motivations come from in relation to my training goals. What drives me, how can I focus on it and purify it?
54. Expand my collection of workout garb. It's frivolous and superficial but it makes me happy and probably in some small way helps me self-identify as a lifter. I mean, damnit, my glutes sure don't.
55. Purchase and read at least one strength-training related book. I basically no longer read these days, so this is actually more of a feat for me than it sounds. Ugh, I used to love reading, what happened?
56. Comment more on both Youtube lifting videos and training logs.
57. Network more within the lifting blogging community.
58. Determine whether or not I want to start squat work with knee wraps. Decisions, decisions.
59. Improve wide-grip press and work towards using it in competition.
60. Better myself as secretary of our powerlifting team. Pretend I'm freaking Joan from Mad Men (sans glute development) if that's what it takes to do so. The better I am about efficiency and contributing to the team, the more prepared I am to take on a helpful role in the lifting community at a later point in my career.
61. Work on my tolerance of brospeak/people speaking about my lifting as bodybuilding when I'm discussing it with non-lifters.
62. Work on my tolerance of Crossfit. It's here to stay, it's going to become more and more prevalent as more and more powerlifters embrace it/incorporate it into their gyms.
63. Be a better ambassador for powerlifting. This includes fully embracing my status as a lightweight lifter. It also includes not being allowed to call myself a "novelty," even in a facetious manner. I'm no one's novelty act.
64. Go to a meet outside of Iowa. This might be more like in the next two years, but I REALLY want to compete in a different setting with different people around me. It would be a good challenge and I'd only get to meet more powerlifters that way.
65. Work to generate more visibility for our team within the city in which it is located. Athletically, we have some really talented team members and our club is probably one of the more accomplished athletic clubs at the University of Iowa.
66. Figure out more ways to keep my hips from doing wonky things during a pull--both breaking off the floor and at lockout.
67. Make sure I replace my mouth guard a few times per year. I'm sure that thing is going to get nasty eventually.
68. Be more diligent about SMR work, particularly through the quads, glutes, and hamstrings. Possibly calves if I want to torture myself.
69. Learn to spot better. Particularly at squat. I am pretty inexperienced there.
70. Continue to think about lifting and lifters less and less in terms of gender. I wish everyone would adopt this one.
71. Do more submaximal bench work and check my pride when I do. Submaximal is about firming up motor patterns and technique.
72. Reconcile the seeming discrepancy between my sense of pride/foolhardiness when lifting and my self-loathing. It's a weird combination of character traits to have in relation to training, and one that is one of my greatest weaknesses.
73. Improve wrist mobility, because there are some issues there right now. Particularly with the right one, which might be a scapula rotation issue, see #37. Dangit.
74. Possibly run a trial with following the carb backloading diet more correctly.
75. Help out new lifters in their first meet in April. I've watched a few people on our team improve quickly, and it has been exciting. I want to see their efforts pay off in a good first meet in the spring.
76. Do more prehab and hypertrophy work outside of regular training hours. I'm horribly lazy outside of the gym (I save all effort and energy for teaching and being in the gym) so this one will be a challenge for me. Small changes will get me there.
77. Drink more water.
78. Drink more green tea, something I've been better about lately, actually.
79. Fix the issue I've been having with my hips doing something wonky when I squat sometimes. The wonkiness is apparently most easily seen from the back, so I'll have to film myself from behind while squatting and you know that's going to be attractive.
80. No more disparaging remarks regarding my posterior plane(s). I'm sort of kidding, sort of not on this one. It is in keeping with prior items on this list, i.e. disparaging remarks towards myself just aren't that helpful in relation to self-confidence-building. Also, honestly, my glutes are not that bad. They're just not.
81. Laugh more around training sessions (probably not during). This seems to help my psyche.
82. Stop being as automatically belligerent when someone at the gym gets in my space.
83. (Be able to) help someone with their programming--and have enough knowledge to do so--if my help is requested.
84. Find more lyric-less music for lifting that I really like. I don't really listen to music during many work sets right now, but enjoy it a lot when doing accessory work. I think it helps with motivation and probably has aided in pushing out a few extra reps here and there.
85. Start taping more of my bench sessions. My bench sucks, therefore I conclude that no one is going to want to watch my bench work, therefore I don't film it and/or don't make videos of it. This is erroneous logic if I follow the logic of #32 (premise: no one actually cares that much about what I'm lifting) and making video would only help me in being able to spot errors in form, improvement (or lackthereof) in speed, and/or make fun of crap people are doing in the gym around me as I work.
86. I'm so close to being done with this list, awesome. I bet you haven't read this far in it. Oh, you have? Okay, number eighty-six: maintain calluses so I don't tear one off during the course of 2013. I believe this is possible.
87. Force myself to do this "bat-hang" Donnie Thompson mobility move Kyle had me do once. It was awesome, but I'm still kind of afraid of it.
88. Remain mostly mute in response to the misplaced enthusiasm of students/acquaintances who, upon finding out I lift, launch into a detailed description of how good they are at leg press, the pec deck, or similar. I'm actually serious about this one. Telling someone why the leg press isn't a test of their maximal strength levels is just not productive use of my time.
89. Spend less internet time doing frivolous crap and more of it researching lifting. I'm ashamed that I need to even write this one up, but I know it would help my lifting if I made a concerted effort to do so. Better yet, as referenced in #55, pick up one of my hypothetical strength training books that I WILL read this year and spend time with that instead of reddit/pinterest/pajiba.
90. Rebuild my pull-up and chin-up numbers. Improve on them.
91. Do more flat press work; I'm terrible at it and a lot of my mobility inequalities come out when I do it.
92. Max test floor press because I THINK I can probably do 135 sometime this year and that would be pretty cool. Hell, if I did 120 x 3, I should be able to do 135, or I'm close to it.
93. Use a lacrosse ball for SMR on my traps/upper back because I know the area tends to get extremely tight.
94. Try some epsom salt baths for recovery.
95. Learn more about how maximal strength training carries over into training for specific sports--and I mean literally on a physiological level how the carryover works.
96. Continue to re-evaluate aspects of my squat: grip width on the bar, stance, hip use throughout the year. Mobility changes, strength changes, opportunity for evaluation is constant. Hmm, I like that, I'm going to use that. It's going to be the TITLE of this hulking tome!
97. Firm up my pausing work on bench. I currently pause my reps, but sometimes I juke them. Not okay.
98. Develop more meet-specific mental strategy. This means more visualization work in the week before the meet along with meet-day visualization.
99. Work on anxiety issues in the week leading up to a meet.
100. As the next few months (now through April) set in, keep a balanced mindset regarding training and the demands that will be placed on me by the end of my academic career. Turn to others for support during this time (I'm getting better at this). Train hard, do well, learn lots even when things feel overwhelming.
__________________
Training log: http://www.sherdog.net/forums/f49/broken-rattles-tiny-bones-babyeaters-log-2050815/
My wordpress blog: http://babyeaterlifts.wordpress.com
Almost shut down s-dog by trying to post all of that in one post. Sorry, everyone. Man, that was long.
__________________
Training log: http://www.sherdog.net/forums/f49/broken-rattles-tiny-bones-babyeaters-log-2050815/
My wordpress blog: http://babyeaterlifts.wordpress.com
Almost shut down s-dog by trying to post all of that in one post. Sorry, everyone. Man, that was long.
No need to apologize. If you someone doesn't want to read it, they can simply not read it.
I'm curious as to what this Donnie Thompson bat hang thing is. I can't help but picture the rhinoceros that is Donnie Thompson hanging upside side from a (probably bent to shit) bar.
No need to apologize. If you someone doesn't want to read it, they can simply not read it.
I'm curious as to what this Donnie Thompson bat hang thing is. I can't help but picture the rhinoceros that is Donnie Thompson hanging upside side from a (probably bent to shit) bar.
Subscribe to his channel. He has plenty of good information on there.
And yes, you can do this without a monolift.
__________________
http://www.sherdog.net/forums/f49/keosawas-powerlifting-log-1980931/ - One of sherdog's pound-for-pound strongest powerlifters.
I'm normally pretty good about this, but I know I can do better. And in 2013, I will do better. I have to, because it's getting harder to ignore the fact that a small crowd gathers around me when I train.
Are they interrupting with your training? If no I wouldn't bother. I have a hard time staying focuced when I train. I just believe it is better to spend your energy doing your work instead of arguing with everyone near you.
OK, I'm a newbie so I guess I'll do some.
1)stop hurting my lower back
2)Get my bench up to my bodyweight
3)get my bodyweight up to 185 (10 pounds)
4)Stop getting sick so much
6)Go up a few more pants sizes (already up 2, bought new jeans, dat ass)
7)Start running
8)stop my left arm from drifting up and flaring out when I bench
9)remember to drink water when I work out so I'm not dehydrated the next day (actually did this once)
10)More pullups
11)Start doing grip work
12)Farmers walks
13)Learn how to convince people to let me work in when they're doing weird stuff in the power rack or move to Legio's gym
14)Do some form check videos
15)learn how to clean
16)Deadlift without hurting my back
17)Get my squat weight back up without hurting my back
18)Gain more flexibility for the squat so I can go down further
19)Increase my work capacity for squats so I'm not sore for 2 days after a workout
20)Don't let my friends pressure me into doing stuff I don't want to do in the gym
21)Use better posture throughout the day
22)don't ever lean backwards on overhead press
23)Stop popping my knuckles/wrists/elbows/ankles
24)Appreciate it when people tell me I'm looking bigger/more "buff"
25)Keep lifting weights and don't get discouraged.
I think ill make some goals for myself. Dont think I can get to 100 training goals, but maybe 50, and then 50 "personal" goals, such as stop procrastinating, lol
Mine is pretty short right now because I'm still such a noob and the things I need to work on are really basic:
1. Clean up my goddamn diet. Create a healthy meal plan and stick to it.
2. Work on my shoulder and hip mobility and keeping upright in the bottom of the squat so I can OH squat and eventually learn to snatch.
3. Keep progressing in 5/3/1 for powerlifting plus cleans.
4. Keep doing at least one 30 min+ LISS/cardio session per week on top of my BJJ and lifting. I've been better about this lately. Really should do 2-3 but one is a good place to start.
