By: Derek Wellock
What’s up everyone?! I almost started my blog post with a “rant” blog about the broken higher education system and how I don’t care about how many or what kind of paper qualifications you have, but whether or not you have the ability to change, provide value and positively impact another human’s life. But I decided, to save that for another day. Haha.
Post 20 days of Welded review. I am still in the Live Hard Challange which includes the following. 75 Hard, Phase 1 Live Hard, 30-day mandatory break (where I am now) Phase 2 Live Hard and then Phase 3 Live Hard. You have a year to complete, mess up one thing and start over. We actually did a Reps of Discipline podcast on 75 Hard, you should check it out. But as you can see I enjoy a good challenge, and right now I am in my 30-day break and decided to support Joel on his 20 days of Welded. I chose to do this to force me to keep my workouts consistent but to also limit me from doing Warrior and using it as an active recovery month. Well, that didn’t’ happen, it could have but it didn’t. You know, “3. 2. 1. Go!” and shit changes. Well, for me it does, I still lack the discipline and full control over my ego to not compete.
I did the 20 days in a row with no restarts, and for where I am at in my fitness journey I kinda expected that, but this absolutely does not mean I had a light active recovery month. Actually I beat the crap out of myself physically. I pushed hard every workout, ego and winning with some friendly competition and all the coaches being on one leaderboard made it really fun every day. It wasn’t 20 days of Welded, It was more like 20 days in a row of The Open. And there were some variables that made the challenge a mental battle too.
Getting after daily workouts with my team is a place we all thrive, doing it day in and day out made it really fun, but also pushed some of us to dark places. Hitting this level of high anaerobic intensity 20 days in a row is arguably unhealthy and can really beat the body down. There are many days over the last 20 that I should not have worked out that way, and because of the challenge I did it anyway, I love the mental component of this but as far as an intentional training component, this all the time is not sustainable or even healthy. And that is why I truly love our programming at Double Edge. The diversity of Build, Welded, Warrior with load and intensity, but also having Lean workouts purposely placed on Tuesdays and Thursdays give members and coaches a broad range to be able to train our energy systems properly and with intention.
Let me break this down. The intended stimulus of the workout. This actually matters, A LOT. Days that some people commented on my score like this is crazy, like Monday when Trent and I battled on the toes to bar/squat snatch workout. That time of 4:08 I got, yeah cool, I won the day, but the reality is I missed the intended stimulus of the workout for me to have a productive training session and progress my fitness. When I got done with that workout that fast, I was a little fitter, my arms were pumped but my heart rate was not smoked but it was up. For me to get the intended stimulus that day I personally need to do a scaled Warrior with squat snatches at 155 to 275lbs and then 27 toes to bar. This would have put me in the 10 min completion time frame and would have been a more productive training session for me. This happened many times over the last 20 days. There where a couple of days my heart rate was so maxed out because the weight was lighter for me, I also missed the intended stimulus. Of course, my fitness improved, particularly my Welded Open prep anaerobic fitness, and on the fitness continuum training this system at max capacity is a must for Welded style to training to be effective, but the anaerobic system requires recovery, all your energy systems require training and recovery in order for any single energy system to work optimally, but just like some aspects of 75 Hard, maybe not all aspects of my health improved, but without a doubt my mental game made improvement, and I have come to terms with the fact I am a scaled Warrior Athlete.
The key mental improvement I made. I learned that I can push hard and get high-intensity work done when it was literally the last thing I wanted to do. I learned that I can accomplish the goal regardless of the hurdles presented. Day 17, 18, and 19 I had some childcare disruptions and with my wife having to be at her work at 6am, I had to hit the gym at 4:30am to pull off getting the workouts done on those days. Although I don’t prefer to lift heavy and with intensity at that hour of the day, I got the work done. That is another checkbox, saying that I can and have the ability to get whatever I need to do done in order to win at my goal. Before the 20 days I learned that in much higher detail in the previous 105 days of Live Hard, one mistake on 20 days you start over 20 days, one mistake on 75 Hard you start over day one. So I learned, if I needed to get something done, I would just get it done, even if that meant getting up at 3:30am to get after the day, so don’t make BS excuses and compromises on why you are the exception and why you can’t reach your goals. Set the goal, figure out the tasks required to accomplish it, then work really hard to get it done. No excuses and no compromises.
Like all the challenges I have done, upon completion I am already mentally moving onto the next thing, I am never satisfied or feel like I have actually accomplished anything at all, its an unfortunate way to live, but it is who I am, and for the first time in my life, I 100% accept it and use it to my advantage now, in a sick way I am actually very happy about this side of me because I no longer care about finding balance. I like to grind, and when I grind through one thing, I will be onto the next. My advice to you is go out and use various challenges as stepping stones, not as endpoints. So grab onto 20 Day Build, Welded, or Warrior. Monthly Reps of Discipline, the Committed Club, a dietary commitment, or anything that will help you move forward, all these can be great stepping stones on your path of living your best life possible.
And for almost everyone sticking to the same track at the gym is ideal, but when you find yourself getting workouts done faster than everyone else, or the opposite you are not finishing the workouts in the time cap, you might be missing the intended stimulus and you should have a talk with your coach about how to approach your training. Also, this matters more when you are working out consistently 3 days per week or more. Like the committed club, training 3 to 5 days per week, week after week and year after year is how you achieve and maintain a fit lifestyle. Everything comes together with consistency, commitment, and dedication all this requires discipline. Daily Reps of Discipline.
As always, feel free to reach out to me if you need help or guidance. I am one of your coaches and I am here to help.