Please take a minute to read this great article written by Head Coach, Jeff Edwards. It’s extremely heart felt and made a big impact on me when I read it last night. We’re lucky to have such a great coach!
“You can’t improve something if you cannot measure it. This is one of the important reasons performance based training is so effective vs other methods of exercise. Performance based training is intended to improve your ability to do something, not just provide you with what felt like a good workout. I know most people are looking to sweat, heart pounding, muscle burning, worn out from fatigue feeling, and there is certainly a place for that in any style of training. However, a good sweat does not in itself make a good workout. Life is about learning, exploring, exceeding our previous abilities, and making connections with other people. Fitness is about what you are capable of. It’s a journey of learning, exceeding your abilities, and along the way you can make some incredible connections with some incredible people. It’s simple hard work applied towards a purposeful goal. Improvement.
One of the most difficult parts of being a coach is convincing people of the need for a change in their thinking. Occasionally someone reaches out to us and says very frankly that they don’t want to do X because they don’t want Y to happen. There is a problem with this approach. It assumes what you want to do will still result in attaining your goal, and that the association between x resulting in y is even valid. Unfortunately more often than not neither is the case. If you want to be more fit, as defined by the ability to improve your performance at any task as well as improved body composition, health, and flexibility you can’t eliminate the effective means of achieving those goals. We live in a dynamic world, and need to prepare people for the demands of that world.
Not everyone is ready to change, and some people will never change. Understand that change is a choice. Many people have chosen to step up and work to make a change, and we are eager to be able to apply our knowledge and experience towards helping those people make some incredible positive changes. The greatest part of coaching are those moments you see someone grow, you see how they’ve changed. It doesn’t happen all at once, but we see it happen little by little all the time. It’s incredibly rewarding to help someone exceed their ability, improve their lives, their bodies, their confidence.
We do what we do because we are students and teachers, we teach people how to become a healthier more capable person, and we are always learning how to be better coaches and athletes ourselves. Our experience coaching athletes to Regionals for the past 5 years, competing in National Weightlifting meets, teaching better posture and flexibility, and helping people lose 20+lbs has helped us learn and improve ourselves over the past 6 years. I know I speak for all of our coaches in saying, I love this job. Be open to a new way of thinking, to new challenges and struggles, to working hard to reach your goals, and open to your potential success. You’d be amazed what you can really do with a little change.”
