By Michael Krueger
Do you make things harder than they need to be? I’ve been accused of that behavior a time or two, and I wouldn’t necessarily disagree with the assessment. I try not to make other people’s lives harder, but when it comes to my own, I think that occasionally it can be a positive thing.
In fact, when it comes to physical training, making it harder is whole point. Being in a safe and controlled environment is the perfect time to make things more difficult. Struggling for that next rep while maintaining good form is tough. Pushing for an additional 30-second interval at the end of your workout is painful, to say the least.
When you push your limits while training, you toughen your body and your mind so that you can move beyond what your mind tells you can do when you really need to. This is what training is all about…
…except when it’s not.
The Problem
Progress only comes through overload. If you keep doing something you can easily do, you’re just repeating yourself. A while back, I got a new client who was unhappy with her progress. In one exercise prescribed by her previous trainer, she was doing three sets of 10 reps. I suggested that on her first set she do as many reps as she could with the weight she was using; she just went on and on. I stopped her when she hit 30 reps… then we added weight. If you don’t challenge yourself while training, you aren’t accomplishing much for the time you are investing.
This doesn’t mean that you will always do better than you did the last time out. If you are bumping up against your maximums, then progress becomes small and very slow, if it occurs at all; this just means it’s time to review where you’ve come from and figure out where you want to go. No matter what, it’s time to make a change.
There are a lot of other variables that effect how well you perform. You might be tired, ill, or injured, or maybe your nutrition isn’t what it could be. When your training is off, it’s very important to understand why. If you are tired, why is that? Were you up late watching TV, or maybe you were out with friends and didn’t get in until the wee hours of the morning? If you haven’t been eating, why? Maybe you’ve settled into a fast food, salt, or sugar snack mode, or perhaps you’ve just been lazy about preparing meals. You can’t accomplish much on a poor diet. If you’ve been ill or injured, then take a few days off to rest and recover. If that does help see a doctor.
Sometimes, when you’re training at the gym, it’s easy to forget why you’re there. I don’t mean you literally forget and just wander around (although I have seen a lot of people doing just that). Rather, I mean that you forget what your goals are and what is needed to attain them. You chat with others, short your rep count, skip a set or two, and head out after giving just a partial effort. If your head isn’t in the moment, it’s easy to just accept a subpar performance and move on.
If you normally train consistently and keep a good log, those days are easy to spot. Those incomplete workouts stare at you when you open your book. They haunt you because you know you cheated yourself. They are there forever, and you know that you wasted an opportunity to improve; it’s a day you will never get back.
I know the previous paragraph was a little dramatic. It was supposed to make you sit up and take notice, even if was just to snort out a little laugh at the absurdity of someone actually caring that much about his performance in a single workout. Well, truth be told, I do care that much… and so should you.
The Result
It’s a well-worn axiom in sports that “you play as you practice.” If you don’t train with focus, intensity, and purpose, you won’t be able to perform at the highest level when the game is on the line. When you’re playing a game, it simply means a loss, but when you are a firefighter on a call, it means a whole lot more.
If you go into the gym and simply go through the motions of working out you get a bare minimum of physical benefit. This isn’t a good outcome, but it’s something. You burned a few calories, you moved your body around, maybe stretched a bit, and then you went home. If someone asked you later how your workout was you’d probably say something like, “Good… it was good.”
After a day like this, you didn’t progress physically toward your goals, but you probably didn’t backslide much either. It takes time to physically lose what you’ve gained, and one workout isn’t going to do it. But what happened in your head is where the real damage was done, and that can linger and infect other areas of your life.
Training takes discipline. It’s hard work and sometimes the mental aspect is even harder than the physical. Getting your body to work is easy compared to motivating a tanking mind. Once you blow off a workout it’s easier to do it again next time. You won’t feel good about it, but you’ll still let it happen. Each workout then becomes a slog, and the misses add up, and eventually the dust collects on your workout log and the moss starts growing around your brain. By then, it’s showing in all aspects of your life; you can’t afford to let that happen.
Sometimes, all it takes to break the downward cycle is to plan a few days off, check your previous workouts looking for the positive as well as the negative, and building on what you find. A new program with a different focus, a new exciting goal, or perhaps a new workout partner will spark your enthusiasm.
Sometime though, it’s bigger than having simply lost focus and joy in your training—much bigger. If you pay attention, your training can act as the “cannery in the coal mine”; it can alert you early on to problems you aren’t consciously aware of. Take a good look at your life, not just your training. If you’ve always been a fit and focused person and now you spend your time sitting and staring, snapping at the people around you or becoming withdrawn, you might be dealing with depression. Firefighters often live a stressful and chaotic life. You work odd shifts, don’t get enough sleep, and often eat poorly. You see the pain and suffering of innocent people, and sometimes there just isn’t anything you can do to alleviate it. Just as a bone will give out and snap when stress on it reaches the breaking point, you too can only withstand so much and then something has to give.
The Solution
Depression can destroy your life, and it frequently kills. Firefighters are tough and often refuse to accept that this could happen to them. Rather than asking for help, they try to self-treat with drugs, alcohol, food, and even with exercise. Compulsive exercisers are trying to train their problems away; it doesn’t work any better than drugs, alcohol, or food does. Exercise can be a big help in dealing with depression, but it’s not a cure; rather, it’s a part of the treatment.
You’ll need to take action and get the assistance you need to get healthy again. Too many people (not just firefighters) believe seeking help with emotional or psychological issues is a sign of weakness or shows a lack of moral character; that is not true.
So, if you find yourself in a training malaise and you can’t chalk it up to a simple training funk, don’t ignore it and don’t hope it will just go away; because it won’t. Get evaluated, get treatment as needed so you can get back in the game…
…healthy, strong, and fit for duty.
Michael Krueger is an NSCA-certified personal trainer. He got his start in fitness training while serving in the United States Coast Guard. He works with firefighters and others in and around Madison, Wisconsin. He is available to fire departments, civic organizations, and athletic teams for training, consulting, and speaking engagements. He has published numerous articles on fitness, health, and the mind-body connection and was a featured speaker at the IAFC’s FRI 2009 Health Day in Dallas, Texas. E-mail him at MKPTLLC@gmail.
