Just then he stopped me and said something I’ll never forget: “That’s exactly your problem.”
As we turned onto the Interstate, I sat there thinking that Louie was out of his mind. How could being strong in the gym be a bad thing?
How can being strong as hell in the gym be a bad thing?
“You know what you need, Dave?” Louie continued. “You need to do those things you suck at. You’re at a point where your weaknesses are killing you, and you’re doing nothing to address them. Your legs and upper back can easily squat a grand, but your abs and lower back can’t squat 860 pounds. Which do you think you’ll squat, 1000 or 860?
http://articles.elitefts.com/articles/training-articles/the-vault-do-the-stuff-you-suck-at/
This is one of the most complex and simple subjects in life, not to mention fitness. If you are a detail guy, you won't be successful working on inspiration and charm - but you better be doing something to round these skills out. If you are at your best in a dynamic event where you get to keep a bunch of balls in play but don't have to worry for days on end about details, awesome, but you better have some activity in your life that allows you to, demands that you, work on the details. I've seen this play out a number of times - the best on the planet routinely fail when they ride their competence into an arena in which their competence is no longer enough to meet all the demands they face. Presidents, football coaches, naval officers, fitness professionals, you see them all finding out what Napoleon found out at Waterloo.
As for the powerlifter's tale above - he says he needs to work on the thing he sucks at, but I'll bet he did not actually do that. He sucks at anything with a duration greater than about 10 seconds. What he worked on was making his torso strength better in the less than 10s arena that powerlifters specialize in. IOW, he working on an attribute that was weak relative to some aspect of his competence, but he stayed within his area of competence - developing incredible amounts of force for a very short time. Should he have been on a bike or rower instead, seeking to enhance his ability to generate very little force for a very long amount of time? Nope, not to be a champion powerlifter - but yes, to be a healthier and more functional human being.
CrossFit advocates working on weaknesses in a different perspective, but I even have trouble with that. For example, if I can run now as fast as I could when just about all I did was run, but I don't run much, I see little virtue in spending more time running. The real challenge becomes in how to assess your weakness - which is really, relative weakness. I know there are many athletes that are better than I in every arena, so I could be considered weak in all aspects. What I need to know is - in which arena is my relative ability the least? For a CrossFit athlete, accurate assessment of weakness is critical information which, if addressed effectively, will provide the best return on training time.
For most non-competitive and non-CrossFitters, the best advice is "just do something". Any training you will do is good. If you are looking for training considerations, I would recommend to anyone that learning how to squat properly is fundamental to a good life, and keeping oneself out of a nursing home. In other words, if you did ten squats to your best depth (at least parallel) every day, you would never have to fear being too weak or immobile to cart yourself around. The exception to that is if your mind goes, but then you won't care whether you are in a nursing home anyway.
As we turned onto the Interstate, I sat there thinking that Louie was out of his mind. How could being strong in the gym be a bad thing?
How can being strong as hell in the gym be a bad thing?
“You know what you need, Dave?” Louie continued. “You need to do those things you suck at. You’re at a point where your weaknesses are killing you, and you’re doing nothing to address them. Your legs and upper back can easily squat a grand, but your abs and lower back can’t squat 860 pounds. Which do you think you’ll squat, 1000 or 860?
http://articles.elitefts.com/articles/training-articles/the-vault-do-the-stuff-you-suck-at/
This is one of the most complex and simple subjects in life, not to mention fitness. If you are a detail guy, you won't be successful working on inspiration and charm - but you better be doing something to round these skills out. If you are at your best in a dynamic event where you get to keep a bunch of balls in play but don't have to worry for days on end about details, awesome, but you better have some activity in your life that allows you to, demands that you, work on the details. I've seen this play out a number of times - the best on the planet routinely fail when they ride their competence into an arena in which their competence is no longer enough to meet all the demands they face. Presidents, football coaches, naval officers, fitness professionals, you see them all finding out what Napoleon found out at Waterloo.
As for the powerlifter's tale above - he says he needs to work on the thing he sucks at, but I'll bet he did not actually do that. He sucks at anything with a duration greater than about 10 seconds. What he worked on was making his torso strength better in the less than 10s arena that powerlifters specialize in. IOW, he working on an attribute that was weak relative to some aspect of his competence, but he stayed within his area of competence - developing incredible amounts of force for a very short time. Should he have been on a bike or rower instead, seeking to enhance his ability to generate very little force for a very long amount of time? Nope, not to be a champion powerlifter - but yes, to be a healthier and more functional human being.
CrossFit advocates working on weaknesses in a different perspective, but I even have trouble with that. For example, if I can run now as fast as I could when just about all I did was run, but I don't run much, I see little virtue in spending more time running. The real challenge becomes in how to assess your weakness - which is really, relative weakness. I know there are many athletes that are better than I in every arena, so I could be considered weak in all aspects. What I need to know is - in which arena is my relative ability the least? For a CrossFit athlete, accurate assessment of weakness is critical information which, if addressed effectively, will provide the best return on training time.
For most non-competitive and non-CrossFitters, the best advice is "just do something". Any training you will do is good. If you are looking for training considerations, I would recommend to anyone that learning how to squat properly is fundamental to a good life, and keeping oneself out of a nursing home. In other words, if you did ten squats to your best depth (at least parallel) every day, you would never have to fear being too weak or immobile to cart yourself around. The exception to that is if your mind goes, but then you won't care whether you are in a nursing home anyway.
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