The Personal Record

The Personal Record (PR) is one of the most powerful tools we have for self coaching.  Let's face it, truly high intensity exercise takes some guts and determination to accomplish on one's own.  Having a coach or teammates nearby generally makes it much more likely that you will put out a maximum effort.  But when you are by yourself in your home gym it is so easy to put in a sub-par performance.

I find that in order to really tap into my full high-intensity potential when training on my own, I need to use a system of PRs to push myself.  So on each high intensity day, I seek to surpass my preceding performance in one or more parameters.  As I work my way through a cycle, these summits become harder and harder to achieve and the required effort to reach my PR goal becomes more demanding.

Currently, my high intensity training days are broken into two different components.  In the first section I am working with CST's FlowFit 2.  With this I am increasing the number of rounds each micro-cycle.  I am performing each round on the minute - thus work and rest are both contained in a 1 minute round.  So here I am essentially working purely with volume (adding a round every four days).  The second section is comprised of a Six Degrees of Sandbag routine that I put together for myself (I'll be filming and posting it eventually).  I am doing rounds of 3 repetitions through the circuit.  I do 4 rounds and I am gradually reducing the rest between rounds each micro-cycle.  So here I am working with density.  Doing the same amount of work in progressively less time.

Every four days, I know that I have to push myself beyond my previous performance into a new PR in a given parameter of each component.  This keeps me honest about how hard I can actually work and stops me from slacking.  Of course, this can't go on forever.  Eventually you will start running into plateaus.  This is why we switch our training up regularly so that we can continue to adapt and progress up the spiraling path to higher levels of performance.  Try using PRs in your training.  Get yourself a whiteboard or a training journal and watch your numbers, and your performance, soar.