WE’RE NOT A VACUUM

While I don’t know much about vacuums, I do know one thing, the suction is going in one direction. It’s consistently pulling things up out of carpet and almost like magic, it goes over an area and it comes out clean on the other side. It would be nice if our bodies worked this way; we could alway rely on the same thing happening all the time.

Two areas that I want to break this analogy down more is in regards to training and nutrition. When it comes to training, there are constant variables that impact how a training session can go. Some examples include: not fully recovered, missed nutrition, a rushed or missing warm up, inadequate sleep. poor technique, and improper intensity to name a few.

Each of these factors will impact a training session positively and negatively. If you don’t sleep at all through the night, even if you hit seven out of nine factors, it’s going to affect your training. In other words, your training effectiveness doesn’t occur in a vacuum.

The same applies to nutrition. Even if you hit the perfect pre/intra/post training combination for your nutrition, if the 48 (or more) hours prior to training was horrible quality, it’s going to impact your training. The same applies to body composition, muscle growth, recovery and strength gains. Again, your nutrition doesn’t occur in a vacuum.

Striving for excellence and maximizing consistency is key. While we shouldn’t get discouraged if we don’t hit 100% all the time, we also shouldn’t expect optimum results if we don’t look at the big picture. The bottom line is everything that happens impacts us in one way or another. Let’s stack the cards in our favor and keep things headed in the right direction.