THE MENTAL SIDE OF TRAINING (PART 1)
The above was a quote that Ed Coan said to me on a Sunday morning in Chicago as we were about to start the Q&A part of a seminar we were involved in.
The previous night a crew of us had trained at the famous Quad’s gym. Pete Rubish and I had done some overhead work but Pete, being the great dead lifter that he is, wanted to do some dead-lifts. I agreed and we decided on 4” deficit pulls, once the other guys we were with were done pulling.
We warmed up, as usual, 135, 22, 5 315, 405. Then got into the heavier stuff. 500 flew up, 550, 585, and 635.
Pete wanted to go to 660 in the final set. I had pulled 655 a few weeks before at the USPF Nationals on a torn groin, but pulling 660 from a deficit like that is significantly harder than from the floor. Brandon Lilly assured me that “635 was fast, Paul. I’m not saying it was a speed set, but it was damn easy looking.” And he was right. It was. I ripped 635 like it was nothing.
Pete got on the platform after hitting some nose torque (ammonia) and pulled the 660 for a grinder. He was then goaded by our crew to pull another with it. He did and it was impressive because Pete’s first rep looked like a max. Pete is famous for grinding out another rep when it looks like he will not get another.
I prepared myself to pull the 660. I paced about like a wild animal, shuffling my feet back and forth, and grunting very slightly under my breath. After a few minutes of this, I hit the small platform, reached down and pulled the slack out of the bar, then dropped my hips and went. It shot off the floor like it was out of a cannon. And then right at my knees, it died. I mean just died.
Ernie Lilliebridge Sr., a man, and a lifter I respect in all ways that you can respect someone told me “you were behind the bar the whole time. It should have gone.” Brandon thought the bar was just slightly in front of me. I personally didn’t know why it died after coming off the floor easily. But Ed did. He told me the next morning after I was whining about missing that lift when I wanted it badly. “You know why you missed it, Paul?” He said to me. “You missed it because you approached it like it was heavy. It was. Every pull before that, you walked up to the bar with confidence and ripped it off the floor. When you got to that last one, you took way too long, and you psyched yourself out of the lift.” I stood there speechless for a bit.
He was right. It had nothing to do with strength. The 660 shot off the floor because the strength was there. You see, I’m weakest off the floor. It should have gone. In the back of my mind, I had convinced myself that the 660 would be hard to get. It was a weight I was not confident in moving and I didn’t. I saw this same thing transpire a few months later at a UPA meet. The lifter walked up to his opening deadlift, set up, and ripped it off the floor. He repeated this action on his second attempt as well. He walked up to it, got set up, and ripped it off the floor.
On his third attempt, he paced back and forth in the exact manner I did at Quads that day. He banged his fist into his head, let out a yell, and approached the bar.
I leaned over to the person sitting next to me and said, “He’ll miss this one.” Sure enough, he did. In fact, he missed it at the same spot I missed my pull at Quads. After the meet, I went up and talked to him and relayed my story at Quads, and he smiled at me and acknowledged that he did indeed “talk himself out” of making that pull. That he wasn’t confident when he walked up to that bar. There’s the keyword, is not it?
Confidence. Confidence is what helps us elevate our game, our mental approach, our outlook on everything we do.
MANUFACTURING CONFIDENCE
The reason that a lot of people need to take that time to “psyche up” before an attempt they are not confident in, is because they are trying to manufacture confidence. They are trying to draw up something from within them to overcome the obstacle in front of them. It is fake confidence, it doesn’t happen because genuine confidence manifests itself naturally.
YOU overcome the obstacle and YOU have no worries about it.
There is no “psyching up” to “try”. You simply understand this is something you can do, prepare yourself, and accomplish it. People that spend time psyching up are generally trying to manufacture confidence. What they really end up doing most of the time is listening to the demons inside that talk them out of lifts. The ones that speak from down low and whisper over and over again…..”You’re not ready for this.” It will be heavy. You are not meant for this.
You do your best to fight them off, they are all that you can think about when you walk up to the bar. They are all you can think about when you un-rack it, and it feels just as heavy on your shoulders as you imagined. When you hold it in your hands, and your arms quiver and shake under the tremendous weight, and the whispers get louder. You aren’t concentrating on staying tight, driving with your legs, and pressing with all of the strength your body can muster. You’re really succumbing to the demons of doubt. “It is not there.” You’ve already whispered that to yourself in unison with them. The battle is lost.
There are no magical rituals you can conjure up during these times. Nor should there be.
What should have given you that genuine confidence to make that attempt or lift, is that your training gave you constant feedback and reinforcement, that you were good for it? In other words, your training built your body and your mind. Every time you walk up to the bar, it should be with the same attitude. It doesn’t matter if it is a warm-up or a max attempt. Part of “training” is also training the mental approach that you take with you to the bar. This also goes for taking a lift for granted. I’ve seen plenty of guys struggle or even miss weights they considered “not worthy” because they did not respect it.
Your physical approach and mental approach to your work sets, gym sets, meet attempts, all should all mirror each other. I understand that lying down under an empty bar probably will not require you to get AS focused as you need to be on a maximal attempt. You should still be setting up the same way physically. Lots of guys and gals coast through their warm-ups, then change their technique and approach to the bar altogether once the bar is loaded.
Make your heat ups count each in terms of active technique, in terms of mental approach, and mental cues. People forget that the whole point of training, is essential PRACTICE for competition.
If you don’t follow such as you vie, then why does one expect success come back competition time?
If your coaching builds confidence week when week, and you’ve been active absolutely, then once it's competition time, you’ll feel ready.
You will not second guess yourself, and you may not got to manufacture confidence so as to fight down the demons of doubt.
You will crush them underneath your feet on your thanks to the platform, wherever you may then conquer, sort of a king United Nations agency is aware of no defeat.
This is why missing attempts in training is such a detriment to successful training cycles.
I harp on this all the time, however the blokes within the “old days” may arrange out long coaching cycles, ne'ermiss a raise, then go into the competition and crush them all day.
I see guys all the time currently perpetually making an attempt to hit a one rep maxes within the athletic facility, typically missing, and curious why they bomb or fail on their thirds at meets.
Training ought to be building confidence the complete time and reinforce the notion that you simply will crush no matter is place before of you.
The mental game in training has been just as important as the physical undertaking of getting stronger.
Settle on a mental approach that works for you on the same basis.
One that you simply will draw upon that has repetition related to triumph, not failure, not one that is different for “X” attempts than you used for “Y” attempts.
Honing your mental approach to the bar may be a huge a part of turning into well rounded, and for setting the stage for success.
Approaching the bar with the arrogance of a champion, is that the place you would like to systematically end up.
This is why it is important that you NOT downplay your accomplishments, or what you are capable of, because YOUR lifting exists in a vacuum. There is not a single other person that picks up the barbell in that world, except you. Treat YOUR WORLD as if you are the strongest mother fucker in it, because you are.
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