ON COACHING

 

Consider this the sequel to “how much ya bench?”, because the inevitable response whenever someone is asked this question and they’re too ashamed to answer it is “some of the best coaches didn’t lift much/can’t currently lift much”.  So let’s talk about coaching, specifically because, once again, peoples’ credentials are called into play whenever they start offering advice on the subject of training and bringing up coaches like this is, quite honestly, very stupid.  I thought about titling this post “you’re still a Halfling even when you ride on an ogre” to continue my DnD thing, but felt it would get people focusing on the wrong part of the story.  Anyway, let’s cut to the chase on this one: being a coach is NOT about having an encyclopedic knowledge of training, to include having read a million different studies (what, I mean abstracts….wait, I REALLY mean “watching youtube videos of dudes who read abstracts explain the abstract”...if even that), and if I have to explain that to you, it means you’ve never actually been a coached athlete before…which means you should honestly shut up about coaches.

 

Man, I’m getting heated about this.  It honestly does upset me when people bring up coaches to defend their own ineptitude, and maybe it’s because I owe so much to the coaches I had in my life that to see them employed as a means to excuse their weakness hits me on a personal level.  So for those of you that have never actually been coached before, here’s what a coach does: it produces the best results in an ATHLETE and/or a TEAM.  They don’t just produce a spreadsheet with numbers and throw it at an athlete and say “Here: I calculated all of this based off the latest and greatest studies on exercise science, combined with 30 years of formal education and produced the most optimum and perfect program for you”.   If you were an athlete and a coach did that, you’d assume that coach hated you.  A coach WORKS with the athlete, because the relationship between the coach and athlete is a HUMAN relationship, that depends heavily on the understanding of the psychology between the two individuals and, if in team sport, how that builds into an effective team.

 

A coach isn’t simply an information ATM: a coach is a teacher and mentor that helps guide an athlete to reaching their potential.  Part of that is a coach has an eye FOR said potential, and the knowledge on how to unlock it.  And this requires an ability to understand the athlete as an individual, which flies completely in the face of those dudes that want to read a million studies and then think they found the universal answer to all training problems.  That’s the easy way out, which, in turn, means it’s the less effective way out.  And speaking of less effective, that’s another funny thing about coaches: sometimes they employ SUB-OPTIMAL (GASP!) methods with athletes because they understand that said particular athlete is simply going to respond better to that method compared to the optimal method…which means producing SUPERIOR results with inferior methods.  Madness?!  No: reality.  Because humans are flawed, and, in turn, perfection is not only impossible but often the pursuit of it results in unrealized potential compared to a more realistic approach.

How do you like them apples?

 

If you’re a coach and you have an athlete that is just 100% Viking berserker heritage, you’ll understand that telling them to keep 3 reps in the tank and a program that’s all percentages and math just plain isn’t going to work with them.  They’re not wired for that.  So you figure out a way to harness that energy and spirit into something productive without burning them out.  You give them prowler conditioning sessions where they can blow their lungs out, understanding that the concentric only nature of the movement will make it so that they don’t tap too far into their recovery while still allowing them to feel like they went “all out”, or you employ the max effort method with regular movement rotation to allow them maximal strain without frying their body.  Meanwhile, if you have that shy, reserved introverted genius kid, you’re not going to scream at them in the middle of a set and call them names to get them amped up: you’re gonna give them some quiet cues to focus on and make sure they’re drilling speed and technique with every rep.  A good coach knows ATHLETES and humans: they know how to produce results in these athletes.

 

And, in turn, sometimes awesome coaches DON’T know the latest and greatest in exercise science, medicine, nutrition, etc etc.  Why?  Because, to quote Kroc: they “don’t have to”.  Do you really think Cus D’Amato knew about the prepilin chart, or the impact of simple carbs on glycogen stores?  No: but he sure knew how to produce heavyweight champions.  “Psh, that’s boxing!”  Ok, first of all, dude coached Mike Tyson, who was jacked, strong, and absolutely terrifying, but ok then, Derek Poundstone is coaching Rob Kearny, who set the American log press record of 475lbs.  What’s Derek’s profession again?  Police Officer.  He hasn’t been in the lab getting his PhD, running tests and experiments: he has the bonafides of competition experience AND hands on experience working with athletes and has learned what works and what doesn’t from that, and ALSO understands how to bring out the potential of athletes under his wing.  Derek describes his training as “pain tolerance training”, and much of what he prescribes is about just doing things “because they suck”: SUPER unscientific, and SUPER effective for producing champion strongman athletes.  Because Derek understands that these are valuable attributes for a strongman competitor…primarily because he COMPETED at the top of the sport.  Hey look: “how much ya bench?” shows up once again.

Yeah: dude might know how to press a log

 

I’m going to just spell this out at this point, because I want to put this to bed and it’d be great to just have a “so there” paragraph for those kids that want to invoke coaches when their credentials are called into play.  Having read a bunch of studies does NOT make you qualified to offer advice on the subject of getting bigger and stronger.  You are negatively impacting the signal to noise ratio of whatever space you are in when you “contribute”.  Big and strong guys DO have right of way.  Why?  Because they’ve demonstrated that they can at least make ONE person big and strong.  Guys that have coached athletes have right of way: they have demonstrated they can make SEVERAL people big and strong.  People who read a lot of studies have done neither.  There is nothing special about reading a lot: they give high school diplomas to those people.  In higher education, you have to actually DO something with that knowledge before they give you a degree.  It’s cool you’re excited and passionate about your hobby: continue to make it better by NOT giving advice to new people and, instead, making room for people that actually have something worthwhile to say.  Wouldn’t you rather get advice from someone worth listening to?  Do unto others.

 

 

***SECRET BONUS TIP***

 

Hey kids, if you DO want to give advice, try this sometimes: just say what YOU would do in the situation, vs what the other person should do.  You still aren’t helping signal to noise much there, but at least the person on the other side can make the evaluation of “well…do I really want this guy’s advice?”