When you start up your training after some time off – either a few years, or just the start of another season – you train more, and you get faster, stronger & fitter.

So training makes you a better athlete, right?

Well, yes and no. It’s not the training that makes you a better athlete, but the recovery and adaptation that occurs after your training session that makes you a better athlete. While the training is important (without it there wouldn’t be any recovery), it is the time after training which is most important. This means that in order to fulfil your potential you must have adequate recovery time, which in turn limits your possible training time.

The aim is to do as little training as possible to get the required results. Why is this? It is because training is a stress to your body, it tires you out both physically and mentally, and can cause illness and injury. We need this stress, it’s how it’s meant to be – because it is this stress which causes the body to adapt and improve itself. But, like any stress, too much is bad, and the goal is to find a balance between doing enough to invoke the required training adaptations, without doing too much so that the rest and recovery times are not adversely affected.

This is one more reason why it’s important to avoid any ‘junk training’, as junk training leads to junk recovery, and extra hours of wasted time.

How do you avoid junk training?

Simple.

You need a carefully planned training plan, implementing strength, conditioning and flexibility in unison – which is based on your personal abilities, strengths and weaknesses – so that not only your training is working the best for you, but also the important recovery and adaptation periods as well.