Seasons of Change..

I'm not sure where the disconnect happened, but it seems that some of the coaches and the BHIP attendees are on different pages... perhaps completely different books now. Somehow the word "maintenance" became attached to those that have completed the original "onramp" program. Maintenance implies that all goals/advancement/progressions have been met and maxed out. Nothing can get better so we just maintain running speed. I'm not sure why this word became linked with bhip, as one of the acronyms stands for "IMPROVEMENT". How can you maintain and improve something? That can't happen. Things have to change for improvements to take place.

There was a time when you all enjoyed doing absurd amounts of work and then coming up from the mud, dusting yourselves off, and high-fiving each other. It seems like things have changed. I've seem a few indicators that people are shirking the work (not everyone, and trust me, we know) but today, we witnessed the pinnacle of this new phenomenon.

I programmed the workout for today for a reason. It is a workout you all did during the onramp. You have done it several times and I figured that everyone would get super pumped up to blow it out of the water with all of the strength and anaerobic conditioning work we've done since then. Everyone should have blown their times out of the water. Instead, what do I see??? I see people doing pushups on their knees and squats that look half-assed, and no one is hustling at all. That alone is unacceptable. To make matters worse, this was done right in plain view of the new BHIP onramp. Way to inspire them guys. Upon being called out by an instructor, complaints were issued about not being able to finish the workout if done as assigned. Yet everyone was done and gone well before class was supposed to be over.

Are we to believe that everyone is already fit enough? No one has any more room for improvement? That's absolute bullshit. We (the coaches) are still holding people accountable for improvements.. The program depends on it. Your fitness depends on it. Your reasoning for coming to class should depend on it. If you aren't getting any returns out of an investment, you would divest, if you were smart, right? Why would you keep attending a class that promises a return and then not investing yourself?? What's worse is that people then point fingers at the coaches and say that they're not being pushed enough by the coaches. What a smack to our faces. You don't want to do the work? That's fine. But make sure you point your finger in the right direction when we ask who to blame. YOU play the hand you were dealt as you want to.

So let’s get a few things straight. You are always accountable for improvement. You are TRAINING. NOT MAINTAINING. You should be striving for performance improvements whether the coaches directly demand it or not. You are still competing with yourselves and others. Life is never going to get easier unless you train HARDER. Sweat more in training: bleed less in battle. Push-ups were NEVER allowed to be performed on knees and the stop-watch has always been your enemy.

P.S. The new BHIP onramp class did the very same workout last week and not a single person even thought about doing it on their knees. It’s not even something they think about. The jokingly take pride in the fact that they aren’t allowed to modify things for ease and even joke about how they won’t let themselves do it on their own workouts. Several have even expressed how irked they get when they see others doing pushups on their knees just to make them easier.

The bottom line is that you’re selling yourself and your training short when you do that. No one benefits from that. We need to get back to that groove where everyone expected way more of themselves and we need to start taking responsibility for that. Like I said, if you don’t want to do the work, that’s fine, but admit that to yourself, in the mirror and please do not come to class as weakness and laziness and self-pity can be contagious when not properly addressed. We offer many other programs like yoga, Pilates, step, and spin where you can scale things as low as you need. But please don’t dilute something that is renowned for setting the bar high. You have worked far too hard and too long to simply regress back to the mamby pamby methods. Why would you do that? "Almost" is only good is horseshoes ans hand-grenades. Step up to it and LIVE UP TO IT! Do it! No compromise, no regrets, just hard work and sweat. You’ll be doing yourself a favor.

Here’s the workouts: They have been modified in lieu of what we saw today.

1.
- 1000 Hand-release push-ups
- 1000 Ass-to-Ankle squats

Take as much time as needed. If it takes 7 days, then so be it. Break it up. Get ‘em done. Get ‘em done well. Take pride in your work. If you’re knees touch the ground on the push, redo the rep or the whole set. If your hips are too high or you bend your back instead of actually squatting, redo them. Make ‘em count. They’re for YOU. Not me.

2. 10 Bruin-Walk Hill repeats.

Do Not do them on Friday. The onramp class will be doing them on Friday.
Use the first 2 to warm up with. Start at about 70% and by the 5th one, be going at 100%.

Bonus: If you feel that you misrepresented yourself today and want to redeem yourself to YOURSELF. Go ahead and redo the workout. Perhaps in a group with some stopwatches; bring some motivation. Make it count. Live up to your expectations of yourselves.

** If you feel that this doesn’t apply to you and you’ve always put out 100% and never shirked the work, then good for you. Do some tabatas and some death-by’s instead of the 1000s if you so choose; no sweat off my back. But make sure you’re really evaluating yourself. Being critical of yourself won’t hurt you.

http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2007/04/29/from-geek-to-freak-how-i-gained-34-lbs-of-muscle-in-4-weeks/


http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2009/01/07/the-power-of-less-leo-babauta-zen-habits/

Thoughts?