ExRx.net

if wanting more information before shooting off at the hip is "being Oscar", then I'm guilty.

Taking a break was not the only possibe answer, but you know that already.

There is a reason why Stephen is one of only two members of this forum with a conferred title. He just knows things.

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Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.--Francis Chan

I thought it was more like when they induct you into the Country Music Hall of Fame. Your best days are past, but you did some fine work. Now go play in Branson with the other seniles. It's a sign of respect.

No?

This is why some people fluctuate volume and use deloads...

Plan to do too much, then too little, super compensate, then come back stronger, fresher. One of my pet hates though is calling a "deload" a week off, so, not exactly the same. But this is nothing new.

If I have clients going on holiday and they're worried about progress, I sometimes burn them out a little before they go. They come back and are almost always stronger, unless they've spend the whole holiday being drunk.

This is also why powerlifters and most athletes for most competitions "deload" before a competition.

I was actually speaking about training to a powerlifter last week and he mocked the deload thing. I said what do you do the week before a competition? "next to nothing", he said. And why do you do that? To "peak".

You hit your best numbers when you're at your peak. If you never back off you'll never be at your peak. Being at peak performance by nature is always a short term thing, though, hence the terminology, "peak". If you could peak all the time the mountain would be flat. There would be no peak.

I've also found if you never back off your body will force it through pain/injury or stagnation.

You can either attempt to manage your fatigue or let your fatigue manage you. Both can and do work.

KPj

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Thanks TimD

No.

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Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.--Francis Chan

Thanks for the kind words. Is Kenny Croxdale the other member? That's good - no, great - company to be in.

I really like this forum. Too bad TimD isn't around any more. It's coming up on a year since his passing. A shame.

All the best in the New Year.

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Thanks, TimD

Yeah. Sometimes I hit on stuff and think, I need to ask TimD about that . . . but I can't. I'm glad I learned as much from him as I did while I could. I wish I could still get his feedback on posts now.

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Peter V. Dell'Orto
http://strength-basics.blogspot.com

Yesterday morning I woke to a radio news story about a Stanford University study about sleep. Stanford U found that when athletes sleep 10hours the night before a big competition, athletes improve their performance. Tested were swimmers, basketball players, tennis players etc and improvements can be as much as 40%.

I just did a Google search and found this.

http://med.stanford.edu/ism/2011/july/sleep.html

It's a 2011 study, so I'm not sure why it took so long for it to be reported on the radio.

Ten hours of sleep a night is what most adults averaged before the invention of the light bulb. It's all Thomas Edison's fault!

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Thanks, TimD