Thursday, August 07, 2008

Kick It Up A Notch



For those of you who watch the Food Network, you're familiar with Emril's phrase, 'Kick it up a notch!' It's a good phrase, and although I'm not applying it to food today, it works for a variety of other things as well, most specifically training.

We've all it that plateau in training at some point or another. In fact, if you're like me I'm sure you've tried to avoid it, but regardless it still happens. I've had four seperate and entirely unrelated conversations in the past week about plateaus, sticking points, and simply just wanting to take it to the next level. I hear you! So let's do it.

Strength comes in numbers and switching it up with a little extra guidance or support might be what we all need. Even if it's something as small as taking one food item out of your diet, adding one extra workout a week, or even switching the days of your workouts. The worst thing any athlete/fitness guru wants to have happen is a stalemate in training. We get comfortable in our daily patterns, we allow our bodies to accomodate to whatever training stimulus previously worked for us. Constantly review your nutrition and training programs, see if there is a flaw somewhere, and look at the entire picture.

Feel free to share some ideas, or ask questions. Those four conversations I had this past week, share some thoughts here and use each other for motivation. It never hurts to have a lending hand.

5 comments:

Gregory K said...

Dan John recently wrote an article for t-nation on training intensity.

http://www.t-nation.com/article/sports_body_training_performance_bodybuilding/i_hate_medium

BAM!

fawn said...

Pamela,
It was so nice to meet you in person this weekend! Too bad I hardly had a chance to talk to you... I had to rush the Reifkinds off to the airport.

I look at your blog regularly, Rif and I spent a good amount of time talking about plateaus this weekend actually. Frustrating as hell when you are experiencing one...

Pamela MacElree said...

Thanks Greg, I'll have to check it out.

Fawn, nice to meet you as well. Perhaps the next time I'm in MN we'll have more time to speak in person, until then it's all here! Hope the plateau breaks soon, I know it's a pain!

jensinkler said...

I have a hunch ours was one of the conversations you're referring to in this post (which, btw, I meant to comment on ages ago ... I am a delinquent commenter, I'm sorry).

Just an update -- once I stopped buying cheese and chocolately trail mix, it became a lot easier not to eat it at nearly every meal. What am I, an idiot?!

Anyway, I feel like my plateau is breaking, and I wanted to say thanks again for your help!

Pamela MacElree said...

That's great Jens, glad to hear it! I should remind my self of the same thing every so often.