In Thoughts on Training #2 I wrote about your performance limiters – those weaknesses that are diminishing your race performance. Now I want to write briefly about the biggest limiter of all for most athletes.
Limiters Are Not Always Physical
But, first, understand that limiters are not always about your physiology. There are many other limiters that may be holding you back that are not physical. Some of the more common ones are wavering motivation to train; too many “demands” in your life that get in the way of workouts as a result of saying “yes” too often; inadequate sleep that leaves you too tired to exercise on some days; a very stressful life due to career or other daily obstacles; weather, terrain, or other uncontrollable constraints that make training difficult; and many others too numerous to list here.
The Biggest Limiter: Consistency
We could dig into all of these, but I want to take a step back to address the common denominator from this list: inconsistent training. This is probably the single most common reason athletes perform poorly.
There is nothing in high-performance training more important than consistency. You are better off doing workouts that are poorly designed but done consistently than to do perfect workouts inconsistently. All your body knows is what you’ve been doing the most of for the past few weeks. If that’s been working out day after day with few missed sessions, then it will respond well when you toe a start line – regardless of how flawed the sessions may have been. But if you’ve frequently missed workouts, your body isn’t prepared for the effort it’s about to experience, no matter how smart your workouts were intended to be.
Always look for a way to fit a workout, no matter how short, into your overly busy day. Do some single-leg squats, go for a run around the block, get in 20 minutes on your treadmill or trainer. Do something. Just don’t shortchange your family, career, or sleep to do it.
Of course, everyone will miss a workout from time to time. That’s a given, even for pros. If you miss a workout in a week several times in the season it’s not a real big deal. Miss two most weeks and you’re flirting with poor performance. Three workouts skipped nearly every week means you are in big trouble and need to rethink your lifestyle, your goal, or even your dedication to sport. But if you miss three weekly workouts a couple of times each year, don’t sweat it.
What if you miss a bunch of days due to illness, business travel, or other reasons that may be out of your control? This happens to everyone from time to time. Here’s an article I wrote on this some time back.
Consistency and Goals
The key to how consistently you train often comes down to how appealing and realistic your goal is. And, consequently, how dedicated you are to achieving it.
If you’re missing workouts too often, ask yourself: Have I bitten off more than I can chew? Is that race out of my reach this season? Is a podium credible knowing my commitments to family and career? Should I be focused on only one A-priority race this year instead of three?
Be truthful with yourself. Taking on too much, which is common among athletes, usually leads to inconsistent training and poor performance. But if it’s a lifestyle matter, give considerable thought to why you do this sport and how dedicated you are to the goal. It may be time to cut back on training volume, on racing, on your goal, or on whatever is getting in the way. It’s much better to have low goals that truly excite you than high goals that you seriously doubt you have a chance of achieving but are impressive to your training buddies.
Next, I’ll be sharing my thoughts on persistence, patience, and time.
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