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By
Phil Stevens |
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The straight out fact is, no
matter how much we think we can or want to be, we have to
get it through our heads, WE CANT BE ON TOP ALL YEAR LONG!
Plain and simple, I don’t
care what the fitness rags and the popular media portrays.
It is all lies. If your training hard and trying to get to
the extremes in your chosen sport or profession you cannot
be at the top, in peaking all year long. The majority of your
time is spent on one or the other side of the mountain, ramping
up, or down to just have brief moments at the top. You have
to learn to enjoy the process the ride.
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You have to take an athletic mindset
to your passions, your work, and realize it has to be a labor of
love. Look forward to training, to the next challenge. Take on each
step knowing that the way to the top is usually not a straight line.
That once you reach that next step inevitably there is going to
be a plateau, or a few needed steps backward to heal, to recover,
from bringing your mind, your body, to the limits, to the point
of breaking. Prior to once again making the trek to the peak.
This can be seen in any athletic
endeavor.
Athletes train months on end peak
for a single day or single event. Slowly ramping things up, slowly
taking themselves higher and faster. Consistently adding steps,
further and further stress for their bodies to adapt to in order
to take a swing at the fences on one day, or one season, prior to
once again resting.
The same goes for a nutrition protocol
that has you reaching for extremes. The body can only take so much
before it has to begin to break. You can only sport that ripped
veiny six pack so long before you MUST, take a break. The body will
limit you. You will start to lose things. Muscle mass will go, general
health, cognitive function, state of well being. Just like being
Obese, obscenely over fat.
Exteme leanness IS NOT a state of
fitness or a state or marker of health. Your body does not want
and cant sustain naturally and in health for extended periods of
time at ultra low body fat. Again I don’t care what the media
shows or some supplement companied and fitness rags portray. The
most health and the most progress is done on one or another side
of the slope away from that peak point that is short lived.
At times, you're going to have hurdles,
have injuries and obstacles in your way. we all have them. They
are something we have to accept, and use not as a point of stress,
as something to fret an cry over, or force us to quit, but use as
fire. That by over coming this next step, or going a few steps down
on a rocky road to make our way around an obstacle we are on our
way back to the many peaks along our path.
While in our mind there may be but
one ultimate pinnacle, in reality the road up to that and after
that is paved with many small hills and valleys each having there
own peak.
We have to learn
to take pride in those peaks, and then learn and move on keep going
to new ones.
Even after sticking it out and making
it to what we thought of as our ultimate goal, it not over. Our
climbs, our rises, and our falls have just begun. You are done if
you try to live life on the memory of one crest, one trip to the
top. Or you simply try to maintain a certain level and slowly make
progress on two roads at once. (getting huge, strong, and extremely
lean) it’s a continuing journey. We must press on to new goals.
Having the ability to accept that
your trek now leads down in into discomfort in order to once again
rise up through hard work to a new higher and or different top.
Accepting a fall to reach that next top is what separates those
who will succeed from those who will continue to widdle away in
mediocrity in an attempt to be on top none stop. All that leads
to Is crashing, burning, or at the least plateauing, and staying
the SAME for years. Never really reaching what you are capable,
due to never taking a rest from pressing the limits in order to
then break new ground.
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There
is a time for pushing the limits HARD, and a time to stop,
step back, reload, and then reach for new heights.
Its those who realize
this. That accept this. That educate and learn how they react.
That take the months and years to travel those peaks and valleys
enjoying the ride. Learning their personal mental and physical
limits, and that healing, resting, and having fun will lead
to great things that will last long and end up burning hotter
and rising higher then their counter parts that burnt HOT
and burnt out fast.
You have to have
an off season if you push life, work, training and diet or
diet to reach extremes. You have two choices Live hard, live
heavy, make a mark, and then rest and recover for the next
run. Or simply relegate yourself to being average, mediocre,
and likely unhappy and unhealthy. It’s your choice.
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About The Author
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Coach Phil Stevens is an accomplished
strength athlete with considerable experience in both powerlifting
and strongman competition. Phil is the 2007 APA World Champion
in the 242-pound class (total). He currently holds the APF
275-pound class raw National bench, squat, deadlift, and total
records. Phil’s marquis lift was his 700-pound raw deadlift,
performed on February 14, 2009 in Phoenix, Arizona.
Phil has been ranked in the “Top 10” in the deadlift Nationally across all powerlifting federations, also serves as the Arizona State Chair for the North American Highlander Association, as well as the founder of Lift For Hope, an annual strength-competition
with proceeds donated to Charity (www.Lift4Hope.org).
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