Imagine, in preparation to compete in a half-marathon, performing all of your training on a treadmill in an air-conditioned room with the temperature set at a comfortable 70 degrees. Now imagine that race day comes and you find yourself running on a trail filled with rocky terrain, small streams, and soft sand, and with temperatures in the high 90s with high humidity. I don’t care how good you got at running on a treadmill, you will be unprepared for this race.

CrossFit founder, Greg Glassman, is quoted as saying “we fail at the margins of our experience.” And we absolutely do. This applies to more than just the weather when we train, and to more than just fitness, too. Training conditions are as much an element of training as the exercises performed or the reps and sets. If we are preparing to perform in a specific sport, our training experience should touch on and, as much as possible/reasonable, match the potential conditions of performance day. If we are training for life in general, then our diversity of potential experiences and demands can benefit from an infinite variety of exposures. Take this a step further, and you can apply the same principle in order to better prepare yourself for everything from boardroom presentations to taking the Bar exam to a theater performance. Of course, some of these outside-of-margin failures will inevitably happen. We must encounter these margins of experience at some point, and often it is unpredictable. But when we shape our training exclusively around ideal conditions, we are intentionally keeping the margins of our experience small, and therefore drawing unnecessary boundaries around our performance.

What does this all mean for you? Some days it’s going to be hot, and some days it’s going to be cold, and some days you’re going to be tired or sore or upset or just not feeling it, and these are all opportunities to expand the boundaries of your experience. Your goal in training isn’t to set the ideal conditions for getting the best performance number on that day, it’s to train for optimal performance on any given day, regardless of the condition.

Training is available, rain or shine.

- PS

7/24/17

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  Deadlift - 5rm

  
  

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  14 min EMOM:

  
  




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  Even: 6 KB goblet squats (AHAP)

  
  


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  Odd: 6 KB swings (AHAP)