CFJ Star Mental Dec2010, Sport, Crossfit
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THE
JOURNAL
The Value of Mental Rehearsal
in Strength Training
Bill Starr explains how you can use your mind to get the most
out of your body in the gym or in any athletic endeavor.
By Bill Starr
December 2010
“So much of a successful life is preparation.” —Nancy Pickard,
The Blue Corn Murders
Strength training is an individual activity. While an athlete might have the beneit of a coach to advise him on the
various aspects of the discipline, he is strictly on his own when doing an exercise. Or he should be. If someone, out of
good intentions, helps him move a weight thought a sticking point, which often happens on the lat bench and incline,
that person is doing the athlete a disservice.
1
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark ® of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
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Mental Rehearsal ...
(continued)
In the inal analysis, an athlete has to be his own coach
and advisor. He must learn not to depend on others in his
quest for greater strength. If he does, odds are he will never
succeed, simply because no one can understand how he
feels better than he can. He has to do whatever he can to
develop conidence in his own abilities to improve himself.
This generally comes through experience, but not always.
It’s not automatic. I’ve watched competitors at power and
Olympic meets crumble under pressure, and they all had
been participating the their chosen sports for a very long
time. Conversely, I’ve seen athletes lifting at their very irst
meets who were as poised and conident as some of the
best in the country. Building conidence is a learned skill,
and it does not happen overnight.
Building conidence is
a learned skill, and it does not
happen overnight.
Anyone just starting out on a strength program wiII make
progress if he’s consistent, learns good technique, eats
right and gets his needed rest. But once he’s been training
for some time and knocking on the door of the high-
intermediate or advanced levels, progress comes much
more slowly. This is true for the competitive weightlifter as
well as those who are strength training to become more
proicient in their respective sports. Those who continue
to break through barriers are the ones who pay close
attention to all aspects of training.
They know what exercises work best for them and what set
and rep formula brings the most results. They understand
the importance of rest and diet. They take supplements
and build their meals around protein. They keep accurate
records of all workouts and igure out their daily, weekly
and monthly workloads. Then they use these numbers
to identify weaker areas and make sure they spend time
making those weaker groups stronger. They continue to
hone their form while slowly but steadily increasing their
overall workload and top-end numbers.
And they become more self-assured. Many believe that
the quality of self-assurance is innate. You either have it or
you don’t. I don’t agree. While I do believe some people
are more self-conident by nature, I have also seen
countless young, under-conident men transform into
extremely self-assured athletes. It’s a trait that can be
improved over time. It’s very much a skill, and like any
other skill, the more it’s practiced correctly, the better you
will become at utilizing it in your daily workouts and in the
competitive arena.
Conidence is learned over time, and mental skills are often
just as important as physical skills.
2
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark
®
of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
Feedback to
Visit
Caption
Mental Rehearsal ...
(continued)
The Mind of the Individual
I began this piece pointing out that training with weights
is an individual activity, in contrast to team sports. In any
team sports, the athlete has a coach, and in some cases
several of them. One of the main jobs of coaches is to
instill more conidence in their players because they
know this attribute is critical for success. So they supply
the motivation and hand out the rewards. If the sports
team happens to win championships of some type, every
member of the team feels elated, even if he never actually
played in a game all season. If the team failed, no one in
particular was blamed, other than perhaps the head coach
of a D1 football team.
By the way, what I’m about to present on mental rehearsal
can be useful to someone participating in a team sport as
well as those in individual sports. At Johns Hopkins, all the
members of the Olympic weightlifting team played team
sports. What I taught them in terms of mental preparation,
they easily used prior to an Olympic meet and before a
game of baseball, football or lacrosse.
There’s nothing complicated about learning self-coni-
dence, but it does require a large dose of patience. It isn’t
going to happen overnight, and it has to be practiced
diligently and with a great deal of total concentration. This
is something that doesn’t come easy to everyone, so for
some, it may take a fairly long time before everything falls
nicely in place. This, too, explains why many are never able
to master the skill. Becoming proicient in a mental skill is
much more diicult than learning a physical one because
a mental exercise has to be done precisely every single
time you do it. With a physical skill such as squatting, you
might get stronger even though you use faulty form on
some occasions.
Mental rehearsal also
has beneits far beyond
the realm of sports.
It’s a valuable asset
in daily activities.
Conidence is especially important in individual sports such as
weightlifting, where you compete alone.
And it goes without saying that some athletes will learn
this skill faster than others. I’ve found that those who have
participated in an individual sport at some time in their
lives have an easier time dealing with mental preparation
than those who have not. This is due to the fact that
they had already done some type of mental rehearsal in
conjunction to their participation in strength training. And
if they had taken part in competition in an individual sport,
they understand the concept that they’re on their own.
This is not always the case with someone who has only
been a part of a team sport.
This is not the case in an individual sport or in strength
training. An individual-sport athlete—wrestling, boxing,
swimming, fencing, track and ield events, etc.—has to
rely solely on his skills in order to taste the sweet nectar
of success. And if he fails, there is no one else to share the
disappointment with. Some athletes don’t care for this at
all. However, I found it extremely desirable. The end results
were due to what I had done, not what a teammate had
done. I played and enjoyed just about every team sport
there is, but I still get more satisfaction from winning a
game of racquetball than a volleyball match.
3
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark
®
of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
Feedback to
Visit
Mental Rehearsal ...
(continued)
Mental rehearsal also has beneits far beyond the realm
of sports. It’s a valuable asset in daily activities. Currently,
I use it more for my everyday chores than for my weight
training. The day before I do my grocery shopping, I make
a list and then mentally rehearse where I should go irst,
what comes next, and so on until I have gone through the
entire supermarket and am at the check-out line. I try to
run all my errands on one day, and some days they add
up to four or ive stops. The night before, I put them all
in order, so that the next day I don’t have to think about
whether I should go to the library or the post oice irst. I
already have my route mapped out in my head. This, I fully
understand, isn’t such a big deal, but at the same time,
it makes my life slightly less complicated and leaves my
mind free to think about other things.
Which ones went easy? Time to push them harder. Should
I add another set to the seated presses or continue to
add more reps? Would today be a good day to try out a
diferent exercise for my deltoids? Stuf like that. Nothing
earth-shaking, yet I’m much better prepared for the
workout than I would be if I hadn’t taken a few moments
to think through the upcoming session. Keep in mind that
it’s usually the little things that make a diference in our
training, and in life in general.
This process goes by many names: “mental rehearsal,”
“mental preparation” and “visualization” are the most
common, but some disciplines have others. They’re
basically all the same. What you’re attempting to do is
form a mental image of something you wish to occur in
the future. While mental rehearsal most certainly can be
utilized for a wide range of activities, I will restrict this piece
to strength training and competitive lifting.
While I don’t employ mental rehearsal now as I did when
I was competing, I still use it for my upcoming sessions.
When I was driving to Baltimore while working at Hopkins,
I would use the time to mentally review what I planned to
do that day. I do the same thing now when I walk because
the walk serves as one of my warm-up activities for my
lifting. I go over what’s on my routine for the day and
then think back to my last session using those exercises.
Mind Over Matter
Even before I learned the proper method of doing mental
rehearsal, I always did a form of mental preparation before
I began competing in Olympic meets. Prior to becoming
enchanted with that sport, I boxed and wrestled, two
Some of the most impressive athletes aren’t the strongest physically but dominate the competition
with intense focus and drive.
4
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark
®
of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
Feedback to
Visit
Mental Rehearsal ...
(continued)
The pre-competition period is an important time. Use it wisely to set yourself up for success.
individual sports that require the athlete to be mentally
ready or sufer dire consequences. In the ring, a dumb
mistake can put your lights out. Before a bout or a match, I
would mentally go over all the important aspects of what
I was about to try and do. At the same time, I would give
myself a pep talk to elevate my self-conidence.
with the York Barbell Club team, it wasn’t providing what
I needed. In Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Ohio, Kentucky,
Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana, there were usually two and
sometimes three competitors in my class who could beat
me or, on a good day, I could handle them, but on the East
When I turned my full attention to Olympic lifting, I
discovered that mentally preparing for a contest was a
great deal easier than it had been for the combative sports.
Now I didn’t have to be concerned what my opponent
did, because it didn’t directly afect me, other than making
me select a diferent attempt. I would write out all my
warm-ups and my intended attempts on platform and go
over them again and again, mentally paying attention to
all the key form points.
The reason deep breathing
works so well is that the mind
can only concentrate on
one thing at a time.
Then, at the contest, I would review what I needed to do
for each of the three lifts—press, snatch, and clean and
jerk—right after weigh-in and then prior to each individual
event. Most of the other lifters used a similar method, and
I know that in my case it helped a great deal. This system
worked out well enough for me to win some regional-level
meets, but when I moved to York and began competing
Coast, I would enter meets where there were 10 or more
lifters capable of knocking me out of a medal. Usually two
or three held some national title. It was as if I had gone
from the minor league to the majors in one fell swoop, and
I wasn’t prepared.
5
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark
®
of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
Feedback to
Visit
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl lemansa.htw.pl
THE
JOURNAL
The Value of Mental Rehearsal
in Strength Training
Bill Starr explains how you can use your mind to get the most
out of your body in the gym or in any athletic endeavor.
By Bill Starr
December 2010
“So much of a successful life is preparation.” —Nancy Pickard,
The Blue Corn Murders
Strength training is an individual activity. While an athlete might have the beneit of a coach to advise him on the
various aspects of the discipline, he is strictly on his own when doing an exercise. Or he should be. If someone, out of
good intentions, helps him move a weight thought a sticking point, which often happens on the lat bench and incline,
that person is doing the athlete a disservice.
1
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark ® of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
Feedback to
Visit
Mental Rehearsal ...
(continued)
In the inal analysis, an athlete has to be his own coach
and advisor. He must learn not to depend on others in his
quest for greater strength. If he does, odds are he will never
succeed, simply because no one can understand how he
feels better than he can. He has to do whatever he can to
develop conidence in his own abilities to improve himself.
This generally comes through experience, but not always.
It’s not automatic. I’ve watched competitors at power and
Olympic meets crumble under pressure, and they all had
been participating the their chosen sports for a very long
time. Conversely, I’ve seen athletes lifting at their very irst
meets who were as poised and conident as some of the
best in the country. Building conidence is a learned skill,
and it does not happen overnight.
Building conidence is
a learned skill, and it does not
happen overnight.
Anyone just starting out on a strength program wiII make
progress if he’s consistent, learns good technique, eats
right and gets his needed rest. But once he’s been training
for some time and knocking on the door of the high-
intermediate or advanced levels, progress comes much
more slowly. This is true for the competitive weightlifter as
well as those who are strength training to become more
proicient in their respective sports. Those who continue
to break through barriers are the ones who pay close
attention to all aspects of training.
They know what exercises work best for them and what set
and rep formula brings the most results. They understand
the importance of rest and diet. They take supplements
and build their meals around protein. They keep accurate
records of all workouts and igure out their daily, weekly
and monthly workloads. Then they use these numbers
to identify weaker areas and make sure they spend time
making those weaker groups stronger. They continue to
hone their form while slowly but steadily increasing their
overall workload and top-end numbers.
And they become more self-assured. Many believe that
the quality of self-assurance is innate. You either have it or
you don’t. I don’t agree. While I do believe some people
are more self-conident by nature, I have also seen
countless young, under-conident men transform into
extremely self-assured athletes. It’s a trait that can be
improved over time. It’s very much a skill, and like any
other skill, the more it’s practiced correctly, the better you
will become at utilizing it in your daily workouts and in the
competitive arena.
Conidence is learned over time, and mental skills are often
just as important as physical skills.
2
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark
®
of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
Feedback to
Visit
Caption
Mental Rehearsal ...
(continued)
The Mind of the Individual
I began this piece pointing out that training with weights
is an individual activity, in contrast to team sports. In any
team sports, the athlete has a coach, and in some cases
several of them. One of the main jobs of coaches is to
instill more conidence in their players because they
know this attribute is critical for success. So they supply
the motivation and hand out the rewards. If the sports
team happens to win championships of some type, every
member of the team feels elated, even if he never actually
played in a game all season. If the team failed, no one in
particular was blamed, other than perhaps the head coach
of a D1 football team.
By the way, what I’m about to present on mental rehearsal
can be useful to someone participating in a team sport as
well as those in individual sports. At Johns Hopkins, all the
members of the Olympic weightlifting team played team
sports. What I taught them in terms of mental preparation,
they easily used prior to an Olympic meet and before a
game of baseball, football or lacrosse.
There’s nothing complicated about learning self-coni-
dence, but it does require a large dose of patience. It isn’t
going to happen overnight, and it has to be practiced
diligently and with a great deal of total concentration. This
is something that doesn’t come easy to everyone, so for
some, it may take a fairly long time before everything falls
nicely in place. This, too, explains why many are never able
to master the skill. Becoming proicient in a mental skill is
much more diicult than learning a physical one because
a mental exercise has to be done precisely every single
time you do it. With a physical skill such as squatting, you
might get stronger even though you use faulty form on
some occasions.
Mental rehearsal also
has beneits far beyond
the realm of sports.
It’s a valuable asset
in daily activities.
Conidence is especially important in individual sports such as
weightlifting, where you compete alone.
And it goes without saying that some athletes will learn
this skill faster than others. I’ve found that those who have
participated in an individual sport at some time in their
lives have an easier time dealing with mental preparation
than those who have not. This is due to the fact that
they had already done some type of mental rehearsal in
conjunction to their participation in strength training. And
if they had taken part in competition in an individual sport,
they understand the concept that they’re on their own.
This is not always the case with someone who has only
been a part of a team sport.
This is not the case in an individual sport or in strength
training. An individual-sport athlete—wrestling, boxing,
swimming, fencing, track and ield events, etc.—has to
rely solely on his skills in order to taste the sweet nectar
of success. And if he fails, there is no one else to share the
disappointment with. Some athletes don’t care for this at
all. However, I found it extremely desirable. The end results
were due to what I had done, not what a teammate had
done. I played and enjoyed just about every team sport
there is, but I still get more satisfaction from winning a
game of racquetball than a volleyball match.
3
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark
®
of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
Feedback to
Visit
Mental Rehearsal ...
(continued)
Mental rehearsal also has beneits far beyond the realm
of sports. It’s a valuable asset in daily activities. Currently,
I use it more for my everyday chores than for my weight
training. The day before I do my grocery shopping, I make
a list and then mentally rehearse where I should go irst,
what comes next, and so on until I have gone through the
entire supermarket and am at the check-out line. I try to
run all my errands on one day, and some days they add
up to four or ive stops. The night before, I put them all
in order, so that the next day I don’t have to think about
whether I should go to the library or the post oice irst. I
already have my route mapped out in my head. This, I fully
understand, isn’t such a big deal, but at the same time,
it makes my life slightly less complicated and leaves my
mind free to think about other things.
Which ones went easy? Time to push them harder. Should
I add another set to the seated presses or continue to
add more reps? Would today be a good day to try out a
diferent exercise for my deltoids? Stuf like that. Nothing
earth-shaking, yet I’m much better prepared for the
workout than I would be if I hadn’t taken a few moments
to think through the upcoming session. Keep in mind that
it’s usually the little things that make a diference in our
training, and in life in general.
This process goes by many names: “mental rehearsal,”
“mental preparation” and “visualization” are the most
common, but some disciplines have others. They’re
basically all the same. What you’re attempting to do is
form a mental image of something you wish to occur in
the future. While mental rehearsal most certainly can be
utilized for a wide range of activities, I will restrict this piece
to strength training and competitive lifting.
While I don’t employ mental rehearsal now as I did when
I was competing, I still use it for my upcoming sessions.
When I was driving to Baltimore while working at Hopkins,
I would use the time to mentally review what I planned to
do that day. I do the same thing now when I walk because
the walk serves as one of my warm-up activities for my
lifting. I go over what’s on my routine for the day and
then think back to my last session using those exercises.
Mind Over Matter
Even before I learned the proper method of doing mental
rehearsal, I always did a form of mental preparation before
I began competing in Olympic meets. Prior to becoming
enchanted with that sport, I boxed and wrestled, two
Some of the most impressive athletes aren’t the strongest physically but dominate the competition
with intense focus and drive.
4
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark
®
of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
Feedback to
Visit
Mental Rehearsal ...
(continued)
The pre-competition period is an important time. Use it wisely to set yourself up for success.
individual sports that require the athlete to be mentally
ready or sufer dire consequences. In the ring, a dumb
mistake can put your lights out. Before a bout or a match, I
would mentally go over all the important aspects of what
I was about to try and do. At the same time, I would give
myself a pep talk to elevate my self-conidence.
with the York Barbell Club team, it wasn’t providing what
I needed. In Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Ohio, Kentucky,
Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana, there were usually two and
sometimes three competitors in my class who could beat
me or, on a good day, I could handle them, but on the East
When I turned my full attention to Olympic lifting, I
discovered that mentally preparing for a contest was a
great deal easier than it had been for the combative sports.
Now I didn’t have to be concerned what my opponent
did, because it didn’t directly afect me, other than making
me select a diferent attempt. I would write out all my
warm-ups and my intended attempts on platform and go
over them again and again, mentally paying attention to
all the key form points.
The reason deep breathing
works so well is that the mind
can only concentrate on
one thing at a time.
Then, at the contest, I would review what I needed to do
for each of the three lifts—press, snatch, and clean and
jerk—right after weigh-in and then prior to each individual
event. Most of the other lifters used a similar method, and
I know that in my case it helped a great deal. This system
worked out well enough for me to win some regional-level
meets, but when I moved to York and began competing
Coast, I would enter meets where there were 10 or more
lifters capable of knocking me out of a medal. Usually two
or three held some national title. It was as if I had gone
from the minor league to the majors in one fell swoop, and
I wasn’t prepared.
5
of
9
Copyright © 2010 CrossFit, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
CrossFit is a registered trademark
®
of CrossFit, Inc.
Subscription info at
Feedback to
Visit
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]