Are you
a turtle or a hare?
By: Eric Stone
Powerlifters do well when they
heed the old saying, "Those who fail to plan, plan to fail." The question is, what exactly is the
best planning strategy? Some lifters may train off the seat of their pants
while others set their training for meets months in advance. Either way,
lifters usually have a goal for their meet. If lifters expect to meet
their goal, however, they must have a way to reach it. The question is
whether lifters should just go as high as they can dream or should simply plan
for a small increase in each of their lifts. Conventional wisdom would be
to set goals as high as possible. As another saying goes, "Reach for
the sky, even if you miss, you'll land among the stars." The saying is
cute, but could not be further from a powerlifter's ideal goal-setting
strategy.
Many lifters go into a peaking
cycle, hoping for the highest possible gains. They push harder and harder
every week, hoping for a huge, unknown gain come meet time. Other lifters
simply set their goals extremely high, expecting a 50-pound gain on their lift
in only a few months. Some lifting programs even claim to be able to add
50 pounds to your lift in a mere two months or less. Similarly, many training
programs use percentages in telling how much weight is to be used in the cycle
and what percentage increase should be achieved on each lift as a result of the
program. Most of these programs are only two to three months long (8-12
weeks) but still expect a 5 percent increase on all lifts.
What would happen, however, if the
programs actually worked, and added 50 lbs to each lift, or added 5 percent to
each lift, in on a few months? Take a program that aims to add 50 pounds
onto your squat in two months, or 8 weeks. A lifter with a 300-pound
squat on January 1 uses the program in the 8 weeks leading up to the March 1
meet, and, at the meet, squats 350 pounds. Now, obviously the
lifter, after competing will not start the cycle up right away, so we will say
the lifter takes two months for some lighter, maintaining lifting. So, on
May 1, the lifter starts the program again, and at a July 1 meet, squats
400. The lifter takes another two months off, starts another cycle on
September 1, and adds 50 pounds again, squatting 450 on November 1. After
such a successful year of squatting, having added 150 pounds to the squat, the
lifter decides to do it all over again the next year. If the program
follows suit, his squat increases to 600. In only two years, the lifter
has doubled his squat. But, the lifter is not done, he continues to train
for another two years, squatting 900 pounds! The lifter becomes a
900-pound squatter after only four years of training. Quite impressive,
right? Seem a bit lofty? Perhaps adding 50 pounds in eight weeks is
just as lofty.
Now consider the program that aims
to add 5 percent to your lift in 8 weeks. The problem with percentages is
that it makes the poundage increase in each cycle more as the weight goes
up. For example, a 5 percent increase on a 300-pound squat would be 15
pounds, up to a 315-pound squat. A 5 percent increase on a 600-pound
squat would be 30 pounds, up to a 630-pound squat. A 5 percent increase
on a 1000-pound squat would be 50 pounds, up to a 1050-pound squat. If the
formula held true every time, Brent Mikesell would have increased his squat to
1125 pounds already, and Ryan Kennelly would have increased his bench to
840„all in 8 weeks no less! Percentages make the gains higher and higher
as your weight is higher and higher. Common sense and experience from
high poundage lifters says the gains become less and less as the weight goes
higher.
Goals do have to be set, but they
must be set reasonably, and with a long-term, not short-term plan in mind. The
above demonstrates that setting these high short-term goals are simply
unreasonable in the long term. Sure, adding 50 pounds to your squat in an
8-week cycle sounds good, maybe even reasonable, but does adding 600 pounds in
4 years sound reasonable? A 5 percent increase on your 300-pound squat is
only 15 pounds, probably reasonable, but what about adding 50 pounds onto your
1075 pound squat? Therefore, short-term goals must reflect a reasonable
long-term goal. A plan must be set with the distance future, not just the
immediate future in mind.
As the experience of the older
powerlifters dictate, the gains will be harder to come by as the weight goes up
and the years go by. In economics, the "law of diminishing
returns" is used to describe how a product's worth to a consumer becomes
less as the consumer buys more. While the first two Big Macs may taste
pretty good, the third one is not quite as good, the fourth one is not nearly
as good, and fifth one is worth almost nothing to the consumer because he
simply cannot eat any more! The same law of diminishing returns can by
applied to powerlifting, to a degree. A beginning powerlifter can usually
expect large gains because he or she simply has never lifted before.
After the beginning "boom" is over, the gains become harder to come
by. When the lifter really gets into the high weights, gains are very
difficult to come by, the lifter may even lose some. While a 20-pound
increase is somewhat minimal to a beginning 100-pound bencher, the same
increase to a 780-pound bencher would be huge!
Many lifters see their lifts shoot
through the roof in the beginning, and expect the lifts to just keep on moving
up, up, up. The law of diminishing
returns tells us those beginning gains will give way to moderate gains and,
later, minimal gains. The problems that arise as a result of, or that run
concurrently with the law of diminishing returns are a loss of motivation, and
injury. Everyone likes to be successful. Training is much more fun
if the weight keeps going up. The beginning lifter has the large "boom"
gains, thus motivating them to train even harder to get even higher
gains. While this line of thinking may work initially for a beginner,
they will eventually fall victim to the "law." The young lifter
becomes upset that the gains are less, and becomes discouraged about his
lifting. He loses his motivation to train, and the gains are even less,
starting a vicious cycle of disappointment and discouragement.
The other possibility is that the
beginning lifter continues to expect, and even plan for larger and larger
gains. After pushing themselves and pushing themselves, they overtrain
and get injured. That is not to say that pushing yourself is wrong,
simply that expecting to keep putting on more and more weight when your body cannot
handle it is asking for an injury. Planning goals too high can lead to
disappointment and injury. Now, motivation can be maintained even after
fewer gains, and injuries can be avoided. But should we just go along,
letting the "law" determine our lifting? The answer is
no. Proper long-term planning could beat the system and make the gains
steady.
Can you beat the system without
this crazy long-term thinking? You can, but the higher gains would have
to come from either better gear (i.e. tighter, better material, more layers),
from gaining body weight. Even so, the "law" will eventually
catch up to you with better gear and gaining weight. Gear can only get so
tight, and only so much gear can be added before you are at the limit of what
it can add to your lifts. The same goes for body weight. You can
only gain so much body weight before it stops adding to your lifts.
Remember the story of the turtle and the
hare? The story goes that the hare, being much faster than the turtle, runs
way ahead, but takes a nap, and ends up losing to the slow but steady
turtle. A "turtle" plans for small gains on every training
cycle, planning for a long-term goal of a much higher weight. The "hare"
runs headfirst into training, looking for the highest gain possible. The
problem is that while the hare may appear to be a more dedicated, hard-working
lifter in the short term. In the long term, however, the hare may lose
his motivation, get hurt, or simply fall victim to the law of diminishing
returns. The turtle, on the other hand, plugs along, on his way to
continual improvement and success in powerlifting.
So
are you a turtle or hare? Do you plan for the short term, or plan for the
long term? I will be honest. I was a hare. As a beginning
powerlifter, I saw success. I was naturally strong and saw my lifts shoot
up when I first started competing. I was training for the 2000 WPC Worlds
in Las Vegas, pushing myself harder than ever. I was hoping for a 550+
pound squat to break a WPC record for my age and weight at the time. I
was overtraining so badly that I tried to pull up a deadlift one morning, and
injured my lower back so seriously that I could not attend the WPC Worlds, or
even lift for more than a year. I ran, like the hare, full speed ahead
into something I was simply not prepared for, and set my sight too high, too
fast. I was not thinking about my squat in 3 or 4 years, I was just
thinking about it in 3 or 4 months. I did not think long term at
all. Alas, I have slowed down a bit, taking more the trail of the turtle,
trying to make slow and steady gains. Most powerlifters peak in their 30s
or 40s, depending on when they started lifting. Some lifters continue to
improve into the 50s and 60s. Many of us have many possible years of
lifting ahead of us. If we take the way of the turtle, we won't have to
reach for the stars, we'll "crawl" right up to them.
A big thanks goes to Rickey Dale Crain whose ideas and expertise inspired this article.
Eric Stone, thestone@chicagopowerlifting.com