Working Smarter AND Harder

“Work smarter, not harder”

You’ve heard it before, and in many cases, it’s right. There’s a lot of times that you can come to this conclusion, especially in fitness, when people are metaphorically (hopefully not physically) slamming their head against the wall, only to have their head be cut and bruised and the wall remains visually untouched. With that in mind, I think a lot of people take this too much to heart, and have frankly missed the forest for the trees. This is going to turn a lot of you off, and I’m okay with that - but, if you’re reading this, chances are, you don’t actually train hard. If this triggered some sort of negative emotion, I invite you to put that aside and read on, and maybe you’ll learn something. If you get to the end of this, and you still think I’m a jerk, fine. I can live with that.

I’ve been guilty of this hundreds of times before, from both a coaching perspective, as well as my own athletic development - getting caught up in all the nuance, and all the details. Maybe it’s about triggering the correct physiological response, or it’s about finding the right biomechanical positions. But, at the end of the day, true effort trumps all. Before I touch on my points, I want to give you a few examples that might make you start to understand what I mean here.

Let’s start off with one of the greatest bodybuilders to ever live - Ronnie Coleman. I already know what you’re thinking… “He’s a genetic freak! We can all do what he did and never look like him,” and maybe you’re right. But, that’s not really my point. Any experienced, critically thinking coach could look at the way Ronnie trained - the way he did Leg Press, or the way he did his T-Bar Rows, and KNOW in our minds that there’s a better way to perform those exercises to get more out of it, and genetic freak aside, that really didn’t matter much, if at all. Yes, he’s a genetic freak, but let me ask you this: Have you EVER seen someone in the gym that trained that hard, had that much hype for all their sets, and was just as much as a savage as he is? Probably not, and if you have, you know ONE person out of the hundreds you’ve seen at all your different gyms. There’s a reason people love watching his old training videos to get them motivated before they train - everyone wants to emulate that. 

If we turn towards powerlifting, and this may spark some controversy or conversation amongst a lot of you, and that’s okay - but, let’s take a look at Westside. They’re a very polarizing group of individuals. You either love them or you hate them, and personally, as much as I think there’s better options for (raw) lifting out there, I love Westside. The attitude that all the top dogs at that gym had in its prime was unmatched, and they absolutely dominated their side of the sport for a long, long time. Conjugate lover or not, those dudes train their absolute asses off. The people who train there often drive from different parts of the country, live in their cars or other not ideal living situations in Ohio, working hard labor jobs to help them barely get by financially, JUST so they can be part of that greater community of individuals who all will do what it means to be the best. THAT ALONE speaks volumes about the effort these guys put in. No one chooses to live in their car to half ass the one thing that has them living in their car in the first place. They’re always in the gym training together, competing against one another, and doing whatever they can to get an edge over their competition. Love it or hate it, you probably don’t train that hard regardless of how smart you think you and your programming are, and that’s why you’ll always lose to them. Again, I’m not here to say that I think Westside/Conjugate is stupid by any means, but we’ve all seen someone fly up by us while thinking “how? They train like an idiot.”

At the end of the day, effort reigns supreme. Over the years, coming up as a coach, I’ve dived into heavily nuanced topics and realms, thinking that it may be the game changer, and a lot of those topics have helped create the base of my model and how I view coaching. I think my coaching model is extremely effective for creating stronger individuals. But, creating the strongest individuals doesn’t start or end with my model. It comes from the unrelenting, unbreakable will to do the shit that isn’t fun. It comes from taking your body to places it hasn’t been, and that’s not always going to be defined by your physical readiness in my opinion (sometimes it will be, of course). This is why this type of topic is hard to write about. I can’t quantify effort based off my eyes alone. This is where things like velocity measuring devices, or some of the fancier Keiser equipment would come into play, but that’s a discussion for another time.

Let’s talk about RPE. I love RPE. I use it a lot, and pretty much 100% of the people I work with will see it in their programming assuming that they’re healthy. The best part about RPE is that it allows you to take what you have for the day and not be confined to a percentage that doesn’t take your fatigue and readiness into account. But, on the flip side, the worst part about RPE is the P. “Perceived.” That word excuses a lot of ‘check in, check out’ days in my opinion, because instead of it being about how many more reps you could’ve done, it becomes about how hard it felt. I don’t really care how hard it felt. If the bar felt a bit heavy today, or maybe you were moving a little slower than usual, but you could’ve grinded out 4 more reps, then you didn’t do your RPE 8. Simple as that. Try to create more objective lines within this subjective model, and ask “how many more could I really have done,” and not “oof, this feels tough today.” 

Assistance work is where half assery really shines. I’ve seen plenty of cases of someone doing say, a goblet squat, or some rows, and stopping ‘because it burns a lot.’ The prescription says RPE 9, but they very well could’ve done 3-4 more reps. Mission not accomplished. Without that really high effort, or coming in with a close-ish proximity to failure, you’re not demanding much out of your muscles or system to adapt to. You’re just maintaining what you already have. If that’s your goal, awesome, this article doesn’t apply anywhere near as much to you. But, I have a feeling most people reading this have a desire to get better than they are now. If you’re doing rows with the same weight you did last year, or are still doing split squats with the same 16kg kettlebell that you started your training cycle with, you’re just spinning your wheels quite honestly. A lot of powerlifters don’t find accessory work very fun, and that’s okay. We like the big 3. But, being the best powerlifter you possibly can be, and being the best powerlifter you can be while enjoying every single rep and exercise of your training are very, very different things, that in my opinion, will lead to 2 different ceilings at the end of a competitive career. This whole process is about pushing yourself to new heights, recovering, adapting, and growing. I think one of the best cases in this light is Ed Coan, as he had the same exercises in his programming across his entire career, and focused on progressive overload on ALL OF THEM. His tricep pushdowns, his close stance beltless high bar squats, etc., and to me, this is exactly why he dominated so many weight classes, and looked like an off season bodybuilder the whole time. It’s hard not to grow muscles when you’re week over week, month over month, year over year, forcing adaptation upon them. 

Just some food for thought. Hopefully, a lot of food for thought. My biggest hope is that reading this can make you intrinsically question your effort, and if you really give it your all - and if not, hopefully you’ll make some changes or re-evaluate your goals if you feel like you’ve been slacking a bit recently.

And hey - if you still think I’m a jerk, this all still probably applies to you.