[youtube width="640" height="380"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orQm6wyXK8E[/youtube]
Interesting thoughts from my homeboy, Mark "Smelly" Bell.
What are your thoughts on over training?
Drop a comment and let us know.
Live The Code
--Z--
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17 Responses
Stealing his motto!! “The road to nowhere is paved with excuses!”
@Pete: true!!! less excuses and more gettin after it!
Love his message— Train hard and quit making excuses. But the language and idea that you can ignore proven science is unnecessary and short sighted. He thinks he is cutting edge or hard core but just comes off as rude to me. Come on Zach is this what you want young athlete’s to be inspired by?
@Mike: I hear ya, brutha, I don’t get worries about the language, it’s the message to focus on…. When I get talkin’ about something I have passion for I start cursing without realizing….
The cursing doesn’t bother me, and, I know Smelly personally, the guy has the heart of a Teddy Bear and he is committed to helping people get strong… he flew across the country to hold a seminar here and didn’t care if 1 person or 100 showed up, his mission was to help others
I bet he gets a million question re: over-training and there is NOTHING wrong with settin’ peeps straight and telling them to stop whining.
Let’s focus on the good, not the cursing…. the cursing doesn’t make him a lesser person in any way.
Kids SHOULD watch the video, they SHOULD take the lesson to heart and start taking action and eliminating excuses.
It is their choice if they want to curse or not, not our responsibility.
Hey Zach what do you think about his steroid use.
I do think that overtraining is bullshit
Here’s some info. from Louie Simmons about this subject
http://journal.crossfit.com/2010/02/training-at-90-percent.tpl
Yah, I agree with him. Cavemen didn’t think “oh, damn… I’ve already outrun two sabre-tooth tigers today, I guess I’ll hole up in the ol’ cave and skip hunting for food, cuz wow, I’m beat”…
IF you’re going to go, GO HARD. Anything else is just ‘going through the motions’ for not much progress (if any).
great vid. thanks Zach.
J
Jackie makes a good point lol you can’t get tired if that’s all you know. I’ve seen a 90 year old Greek man push a 3500lb car uphill into tye garage. Why? Because it didnt run. Over training Is a poor excuse for not wanting to lift in my book
When I was 14 and running track and cross country, I decided to train hard for all of my events. When I finished my workout, I’d pick up another. I was also long jumping. As the track season went on, I got worse and worse. I went from being the #1 long jumper to a non-competitor. But for pride, I was nearly beaten by the worst runner on our team. I wasn’t tired, but just couldn’t kick it into gear. Finally, the season ended.
Three weeks later our coach asked me to pace our #1 runner in the mile. After 3/4 I felt great, but was holding back to keep #1 into it. Finally, it was just f*ck this and I took off. I smoked him and finished only seconds off the school record. When I asked the coach why I had been so bad during the season and so strong post-season, he just said “You were probably overtrained.” In later years I learned that I performed well and progressed with limited training and poorly with increased training.
For further insight, look up Tommy Kono and get his view on training and performance. Keep in mind that he beat competitors in weight classes above his when the team needed it. As well, he did this while lifting in world and Olympic competitions, establishing multiple world records on the way. He also won the Mr. World and Mr. Universe physique competitions multiple times.
That said, you’ve got to have a strong attitude. And look up Dave Tate if you want to know where that attitude might steer you wrong and into rehab.
I have a question for you. All of a sudden this week when I benched if I had a grip any wider than pointer finger on smooth part of bar, I would hear my shoulder pop.What can I do to fix this problem? Thanks
That needed to be put out there so bad.
I never understood over training. You hear it/read about it, but if you look at people with physical jobs you don’t see it. They may have physical issues, but it is not due to over working, but not taking care of their body when they are done working.
I never heard a farmer say, “I need to take the day off because I am over training.” No they grab another 100# bail and get to work.
As for science?! Ha! You can make anything sound good. There are thousands of people pounding red wine and chocolate because science says it is good for you. People are eating whole grain because the science tells them it is good for you. Please, science should be approached with a level of caution. Just because science has proven that over training exists, yet I can train hard six days per week without any injury and keep getting stronger I don’t believe it. Sure you could say, “Just wait it will catch up with you.” My response is, “When? I have been doing this for three years now!” And I feel better now than I did when I was affraid of overtraining.
Good stuff!
For the most part a good message (minus the language). And I am sure he is a great guy but it is really hard to over train when you are on steroids like he is.
But since you are in a sense backing what he says and I know you are clean, well then the message has a lot more meaning.
Good stuff. As I listned I was rubbing my elbow and realized I hadn’t gone heavy in years due to tendanitis or whatever excuse I was using to cover up my ego. SO I went to the gym and surprised myself with the heaviest bench day I had in years. Some pain is just in our heads. We may or may not agree with Mark but it all depends on who’s kool-aid we choose to drink. Whether he uses steroids or not isn’t the question, he works his ass off everyday . Don’t let science dictate your life, be your own human guinea pig… If it works then do it, if not then try something else..
Hey Zach, Looks like I’m almost a month late on this one, but here’ goes.
I agree whole heartedly that people make too many excuses. “I’m too old,” “I have bad knees so I can’t squat, “I don’t have time.” WTF?! People DO need to get over it and push themselves… or at least stop complaining about how they never get anywhere. Accountability.
The concept of “Over training” has been studies for decades in the scientific community. As part of that scientific community, I have both seen and studied the effects of over training personally. The fact is that it’s not simply about how much you train and how hard you train. It’s about the ratio of training to recovery. By all means, train your ass off, get strong physically and mentally. The key is to make sure that you recover properly. Yes, steroids will shorten recovery time, allowing you to train at higher intensities more frequently. For everyone else, just as much time and effort needs to be placed on recovery techniques (mobility, stretching, nutrition, SLEEP, etc.) as is placed on training.
I am noticing that I have the potential to blab about this all day, so let’s get straight to the point and hope that people can think for themselves about this and see the differences.
Scientifically studied Signs/symptoms of OVERTRAINING:
-decreased immune function (athletes will be more likely to get sick… flu, colds whatever),
-decreased performance (decreases in muscular and cardiovascular endurance
-decreases in maximal force output, overall performance decrements)
-decreases in mental performance
Signs/symptoms of being a pussy:
-“I’m too tired”
-“What, lions to run from today?!”
-“I can’t”
-(insert your favorite excuse here)
The fact of the matter is that too often overtraining is confused with being a pussy.
Train HARD. Train SMART. Train UNDERGROUND. Then RECOVER and REPEAT.
O yea, also forgot to mention…
chocolate and wine –
Both have been found to have super high levels of antioxidants wich negate free-radicals in the body. Free radicals in the simplest terms, for those who don’t know, are basically harmful bi-products of stress that slow the recovery process. While antioxidants can help negate those effects, science never said that (dark) chocolate and wine are the end-all-be-all. No, rather, mainstream media takes these studies, reads them half-assed and puts there own ignorant spins on them. While science may constantly be changing, keeping up with it can be very beneficial, but be careful of your sources. Read the studies in peer-reviewed, scientific journals… don’t let some ignorant news reporter give you their misinterpreted summary.
————-
manual labor jobs-
The thing about manual labor jobs is that while the may be difficult and tiring, they often do not push any of the body’s systems to close to maximal effort. Most often (with exceptions of course) they are low intensity, low load activities that are repeated hundreds if not thousands of times each day. Because they are less intense, they require less of what I like to call “recovery effort”– the time and dedication it takes to recover and return the next time. In many cases McDonalds and 4 hours of sleep will do just fine. For Undergrounders however, “recovery effort” should be on the same priority as their training itself.
Again…
Train HARD. Train SMART. Train UNDERGROUND. Then RECOVER and REPEAT.