The slacking comes to an end
No Sugar Challenge Day 4: Still going strong!
It has been an interesting week. I have one cat with some disease that causes her body to eat away at her teeth. I have another cat with a failing kidney. And I hyper-extended my wrist. We will all three be fine, I am sure. But it made me think a lot about what happens to your goals when you allow yourself to get distracted mentally. My workouts have been sloppy and it has caused a bit of a backslide. Three months ago at a tactical strength challenge I did 136 kettle bell snatches at 35 pounds in 5 minutes. Last night I put the bell down after 10 reps. My muscles are fatiguing faster. My brain wants to stop sooner. A little pain in my hand and I am ready to quit. I haven’t put in the extra effort lately and it shows. Unacceptable. You can’t expect the same performance without putting in the same amount of effort.
Time for that to end. This weekend I am going to a training camp at Front Range CrossFit where they are going to beat us up for four days. Long overdue. I am going to suffer for my slacking. I had my hand x-rayed and it is just a little bruised bone or a tiny strained muscle. It is what it is and it is up to me to make the best of it whether it hurts or not. So I guess my main goal for the weekend is to put everything I have into it and come out of it ready to work. I have already recaptured that passion I had in the Fall and now I just need to back it up with hard work. That said, I’m going for a run…
Amy Said,
January 6, 2011 @ 10:39 am
Don’t be too hard on yourself. You don’t need to call it slacking, it can just be a normal period of reduced intensity. You trained so intensely for such a long time, it’s not surprising that your brain and your body would make you back off for a while. No one can maintain high intensity all the time. (I know I’ve tried to do that and failed!)
I’m sure you’ll have a great time at training camp, but maybe think of that rest you’ve had as something that will help you to push hard, not something that you have to make up for. In the world of CrossFit, it’s so easy to get into that “dig down, be tougher” mentality, and I get it, I’ve done that so many times! But it failed me. You have to be kind to yourself, the body and mind can only handle so much. Don’t beat yourself up or hold yourself to impossible standards, you train harder and have more discipline than any athlete I’ve met!