Putting in the Hours

I posted the rendition of 'Plateau' that Nirvana performed at their 'MTV Unplugged' session on my Facebook page on May 26th.

This was after I had been at the Co op for the zillionth time and not made any progress whatsoever on new problems I was working on. I had hit a plateau! I was at a standard far beyond where I was 8 months ago when I first joined the Co op... but seemed to be stuck there.

I remember listening to one of the commentators that spoke about one of the gymnastics world championships during the 1990's and they said something along the lines of... Romania and Russia always win because they train longer and harder than anyone else...

I have no competition to win, but I definitely want to get better at bouldering than I am now, or was on the May 26th.

So the very next day I started defining my training:

Warm Up:

How long does it take before I feel ready to climb my first problem?

My first 5 warm ups:

Did I get them on my first attempt?

My projects:

Did I make any progress?

Endurance work:

How many traverses can I do in a half hour?

Conditioning:

2 x 10 v sits

2 x 20 tuck ins

2 x 5 chin ups

3 x 10 second v hold on chin up bar

2 x 20 dorsal raises

2 x 20 side raises

3 x 1 min Front Support

1 min dish hold

1 min dorsal hold

6 x heel hook leg raises to chin up bar

3 x 1 min handstands

The conditioning set is always varied, I do more of one exercise than another depending on the session or I'll stick exactly to what's listed above on another night... depends on the day I've had.

In the beginning it all seemed difficult, but as soon as I started defining where I was (difficult or not) I could define what 'better' meant. I'm not sure I really knew before.

As soon as the conditioning got easier, I added ankle weights to some of the appropriate exercises and it obviously became harder again to complete each set.

As soon as I completed all 5 warm up problems on the first attempt, it soon came to a point where I felt disappointed if I did't complete them all first go (which still happens now!) and I use the success or failure of those warm ups as an indicator of what I should expect from each session at the Co op.

If I don't feel like I'm making progress on my projects I just walk away and come down the next night to try again.

They're not going anywhere soon!

I've found that by defining where my ability is at this point in time, I can now tell IF I'm making progress and HOW to get better. I can tell what I'm weak at (which is LOTS!) and what my strengths are.

Getting better at anything is simply about putting in the hours of focused and motivated work.

As the old saying goes: Nothing worth having comes easy.

Better train hard so!

Summer psyche is strong!

(I just wished the tides in Howth suited me better this week!!)