CHANGE IS THE POINT

27-21-15-12-9: Thrusters@50kg and Toes To Bar. 

The whiteboard read as such. My brain, jacked on the three shots of coffee I had downed prior attempts to calculate the total amount of volume. It arrived at “a lot”.

Wanting to create an impression amongst the newly acquainted community, I had quickly ramped up my training intensity again after being cooped up in a camper van for the previous two months. I had a complex imbedded within my psyche that to be an effective coach, I needed to demonstrate a degree of superiority over my athletes. 

I warmed up, extensively, for two and a half minutes, with a couple of reps on any empty barbell before I slapped the yellow 15kg bumper plates on either end of the steel. I didn’t have time for a proper warm-up, although more so than this, I simply couldn’t be bothered – a warm up didn’t deliver that same hit of dopamine that the intensity does. The countdown for the workout begins and the clock beeps for the final 3-2-1 as I raise the bar overhead for my first set of thrusters.

Grinding through my first round, I stumble back to the barbell; my body beginning to indicate the first signs of breakdown. It’s that point in a workout where the reps begin to get sloppy, and the commutes to the chalk bucket become lengthier and lengthier. The clock is yet to hit five minutes.

Moments into the second round and a sharp pop in my shoulder blade forces me to drop the bar and retreat, as I clutch at the site of discomfort. Concern lingers and enters into the internal conversation and a question rises to the forefront: “Have I done something really bad here?”.

These thoughts spiral, but after some seconds, my pride takes over and the pain begins to subside – a dull ache now as I stand and attempt to get some movement back through the joint. I look back up at the clock for the umpteenth time of the workout. “There is still time” I thought… Stopped over with my hands on my knees, profusely sweating and shaking, I made a decision I would soon regret and I stepped towards the bar, continuing my set of 21’s.

A matter of minutes later, I lie prostrate in a puddle of my own sweat. As the adrenaline begins to drain, the pain in my shoulder begins to intensify. It feels now as if it has been injected with lead; a heavy throbbing, making it difficult to breath or lift. 

It took the better part of 12 months to rehab that shoulder and occasionally it still clicks, although the clicking serves as a valuable reminder. While physically, I became somewhat limited with regards to my training, it was psychologically, that I experienced the greatest adjustment. Unable to now perform workouts I had once been able too, my identity begun to fracture.

While this period of my life can be categorised in terms of frustration, de-motivation, angst and defeat, I recognise now that these were symptomatic of my attachment to an arbitrary standard. 

Prideful and ignorant, I needed something to latch on too – the RX on the whiteboard becoming my daemon. Once I found consistency in my training this standard morphed from something far greater than a randomised metric a couple of bored athletes out of a barn in Cookeville had created. It represented a sense of self; or more specifically self-worth and in chasing this, I lost touch with what a physical practice is; an undulating and dynamic negotiation of one’s capacity to tolerate stress, psychological preparedness, and an objective assessment of where intention needs to be directed on a given day.

Some days the point of this practice is to make intentional compromises in the spirit of competition or exploration, however, most days this is not the case. 84 thrusters and toes to bar on a day where I was likely under recovered and had not re-established a baseline of fitness was a bad idea. I missed the point and in doing so, I got burned.

Maybe though, just maybe… This was the point all along. Perhaps I needed that injury as much as I needed that RX. After all, being broken proved a pivotal opportunity to build anew.