🥇 The Athlete Development Journal

Developing speed, strength, power, health, and character, so athletes get the most out of their athletic career.

Listen to this episode in the car with your athlete. ⬇️

You can also listen on ​Spotify​ or ​Apple Podcasts​.

Mind. The busy problem

I think busyness is inappropriately demonized by many people today.

Yes, excessive busyness can be pathological. And no, I don’t think being busy for the sake of being busy is a worthy use of anyone’s time.

But, if you are busy because you’re filling your days with productive, meaningful work, then you’re building a valuable skillset: your work capacity.

Let’s imagine you’re a waitress in a small-town restaurant. Day-in and day-out, you have your regular customer flow. Sometimes you’re handling 1 or 2 tables and sometimes you’re handling 5 or 6 of them.

Then, one day, your co-worker calls off during the Saturday evening dinner rush. All of a sudden, you’re handling 12 tables at once!

You’re panicked. Your mind is moving a million miles an hour. You’re confusing drink orders. You’re late getting the check to everyone. This is way more than you can handle.

Now, let’s run that back, but this time you’re a waitress in a busy NYC restaurant. Day-in and day-out, you have your regular customer flow. Sometimes you’re handling 7 or 8 tables and sometimes you’re handling 13 or 14 of them.

Now, a day when you have 12 tables at once doesn’t feel so bad. You’re used to this. You know how to organize your time to make sure everyone gets what they need when they need it. You have an organization structure to keep all the orders straight. You’ve built up the capacity to handle that work.

I see the same thing happen with kids when they go off to college.

The high school overachievers who stretched themselves thin with 2 or 3 varsity sports, 3 clubs, student council, all AP classes, plus year-round GT training typically go off to college and thrive. They tell me that they’re shocked how much free time they have and how much easier school is than they thought it would be.

The high school kids who go ghost at GT during their season, who cannot fathom coming to a 6am or 7am session, and take all blow-off classes their senior year? Well… they struggle.

All adaptation requires a stressor that pushes your boundary. If you want to get stronger, you have to lift more weight for more reps. If you want better conditioning, you have to run faster and further. Your work capacity is no different.

Your season of busyness isn’t a problem that needs to be fixed, it’s a training ground for your future.

Body. 2 steps forward, 1 step back

Season after season, year after year, I see the same trend: those who train during the season have progress that compounds exponentially compared to those who don’t.

The athletes who train through the season stay healthier, perform better during the important times of the season, and see better long-term progress.

Let’s dive a little further into each of those.

1) Stay healthier

Training is the best anti-injury medicine that we’ve got at our disposal. It’s not 100% perfect, but it’s by far the best tool that we have available.

Continuing to train during the season allows you to continue to carry your shield and fortify yourself to the best of your ability.

Additionally, appropriately dosed training gives a big recovery boost and allows you to feel much better. We all know if you feel good, you play good.

2) Perform better during the important times of the season

You didn’t train all off-season just so you can show off during the first 2 weeks of pre-season, before games even start.

You want to win, and you want to win a lot.

This means the most important time of the season comes at the very end: playoffs.

If you stop training once the season starts most of the speed, strength, agility, and power gains that you made will have significantly diminished by the time that you need them the most.

If you don’t believe me, take the word of some guys who know a thing or two about winning:

“We paid a serious price to get to this point. We put in a lot of work. We’re practicing in pads on Super Bowl week. We’re squatting 80% of our maxes on Super Bowl week. I mean, we worked for this. Our bodies were ready. Our minds were ready.” -Matthew Slater (Patriots Wide Receiver 2017– Super Bowl Champion)

3) See better long-term progress

Too often we lose sight of the forest for the trees. We focus on what’s happening right now and can’t see the long-term plan.

Another big reason to keep training through this season is to make sure you’re maximizing your potential next season.

Stopping training once the season starts is like taking 2 steps forward and 1 step back. Continuing to train during the season is like taking 3 steps forward.

All of a sudden you’re 2 steps ahead of where you would otherwise be (along with being 3 steps ahead of your competition). Repeat this process season after season and year after year and you’ll learn the value of compound interest.

How we make it happen…

I feel so strongly about this concept that I’ve built my entire business model to make in-season training as accessible and easy as possible, despite it being less profitable for the business.

With our current waitlist, it would make more financial sense for me to clear up space on our client roster and bring new athletes on.

But, that’s not what I’m interested in.

I want to see our tight community of athletes have the highest possible chance at success. That means it’s my job to make in-season training as efficient and effective as possible. Here are some ways we do that:

• Our individualized training model allows for each athlete to be doing a program built specifically for their circumstances, which means we can push hard when it makes sense and pull back when it makes sense.
• I’ve developed tiered packaging that allows our athletes to continue training 1 or 2 days per week through the season, depending on what is appropriate for them.
• Our online scheduling system allows our athletes to shift their training sessions around their busy schedule.
• I always make sure to offer sessions in the early morning, afternoon, and at night throughout the week, so our athletes can schedule around their games and practices.
• I stay in communication with our athletes about what practice has been like as well as their soreness, sleep, energy, etc. through our Daily Readiness Assessments, so I can add or subtract things to their program as appropriate.

It’s always cool to watch our super committed athletes continue to find ways to get work done in-season.

Soul. The solution doesn’t exist

If you’re struggling with trying to fit an infinite amount of work/events/schedules into a finite amount of time, let me offer you this quote from economist Thomas Sowell:

“There are no solutions, only trade-offs.”

This aphorism bounces around in my skull on repeat.

It’s short, sweet, and kind-of-obvious… but incredibly powerful if you can internalize it.

There are going to be pros and cons about every decision you make. You’re not going to find that perfect solution that allows you to chase excellence at its highest level, while simultaneously always feeling well rested and relaxed.

You do some soul-searching and figure out what trade-offs you can live with and what trade-offs you can’t.

When I was in high school and college, I was driven by the thought of avoiding the “what-ifs” in the future. I was extraordinarily annoyed by all of the old heads I met that would tell me, “I would have gone D1, but….”

I was so repulsed at the thought of becoming one of them, that anytime I thought of skipping a training session or not giving everything I had on a rep, I thought of myself becoming a “woulda, coulda, shoulda” guy and flipped the switch to put the work in. I was willing to take the trade-off of being absolutely exhausted to avoid the pain of looking back with “what-if” glasses in the future.

Now, though, I’m at a season in my life where I’m willing to leave work on the table. I have two young girls and the trade-off of being exhausted and not spending enough time with them is not something I’m willing to risk.

Yes, I expose myself to the possibility of wearing “what-if” glasses in the future when thinking about how much more successful our business could have been.

That’s the whole point, though. There isn’t a perfect solution; each choice has trade-offs.

Only you can decide what trade-offs you’re willing to make.

Let’s wrap it up with a couple important things…

1. This newsletter and podcast is completely free. I spend many hours each week researching, writing, illustrating, recording, editing, and uploading. The best way you can support it and allow it to continue is to share it with people you know. You can just send them to ​gtperformance.co/newsletter​ and they can subscribe there!
2. Everything in these newsletters, podcasts, social media, and on our website is for educational purposes only and should not be taken as medical advice for you or your athlete. Consult directly with a healthcare professional.

Thanks so much for your help in spreading the word about athlete development!

Be >,

Zach

Dr. Zach Guiser, PT, DPT, CSCS