Ok, this is just going to be kind of a few random thoughts…

I am very in tune with what goes on at our gym. We are small enough where I know everybody really well and I can literally see progress in every athlete week to week, session to session, or lack of progress.

I know who is showing up and who isn’t.

I pretty much know how every kid is doing in the sports that they play… I can typically predict performances based on their training sessions.. (of course there are always a few outliers that make me, Kevin, and Tommy scratch our heads)…

I am always looking for correlation between things…

• strength to jumping ability to speed
• relative body strength to speed and jumping
• jumping to speed
• various types of strength to performance in sport
• strength to injuries

Then the non physical things with the physical….

• consistency to strength to confidence
• responsibility to performance in gym to performance in sports
• confidence and performance

Anyway, I’ve learned that what works for one doesn’t ALWAYS work for another but typically trends are trends for a reason.

The most consistent kids typically improve the most and have the best numbers in the gym. They also typically develop confidence. They also typically see the biggest performance improvements on the field, mat, court, etc….

On the outside it may seem like the gym is the same for everybody… Everybody is just trying to get stronger, etc. to some extent this is true… however, when you look deeper we are using training as a means to build different qualities with different athletes.

For example, for young 11 year boy who has never worked out before and might a bit timid and or goofy training is:

• a way to build a foundation of physical capacity and learn the fundamentals of fitness
• developing good habits
• a way to learn commitment, consistency, and hard ASS work!
• a place to see examples of what he could accomplish of he sticks with something
• a way to build confidence
• an outlet and a place to get away from a phone, computer, tv…
• obviously a way to get an advantage in sports (prob the least important at this stage)

For a high school Junior who might be one the top kids in the state for his sport and might be getting scholarship looks training takes on a different meaning…

• he should have already built the foundation of physical capacity needed to take performance levels higher.
• numbers in the gym become more important to performance goals
• they should be seasoned on the fundamentals
• They should have already learned good habits of eating and taking care of their bodies
• they should not need to be micromanaged and spoon fed (they should be taking responsibility for their own success)
• training should be based around specific weaknesses that are only found when taking the body to its physical limits.

If you are an athlete that has aspirations of all conference or all state and playing in college and you haven’t check off the boxes above then you need to sit down and re-evaluate.

We have a young kid here that has been coming for maybe 6 months. He almost never misses and the amount of progress he’s made both physically and mentally in just 6 months is mind boggling. Myself, Coach Tom, and Coach Kev are amazed every week how much more athletic and confident he is getting. I don’t even think he’s playing any sports right now but he’s probably making more progress than any other kid around his age. I bring him up because he is in that stage of the first example above. There is no pressure. Just show up consistently and learn.

Then we have other athletes that are in 2-3x a week but they are older and polished and have built the foundation. They only need a few training sessions along with their sport. They are working toward much more specific training goals.

So its a pretty random email but just a lot of thoughts that I’ve had lately… to tie it all up why are you or your kid training? Do you have goals? Is your effort and consistency on par with your goals?