At some point between rep 15 and rep 20, someone switched my legs out with wooden stumps. Stumps that clomped loudly on the rubber floor, refusing to bend where my knees had once been. But I was less concerned about them than the fire raging in my lungs, a fire that refused to die down no matter how hard I gulped down air in raggedy gasps. And I was only halfway done with my workout.
I had already done two sets of box jumps (regular, lateral, and depth) and 5 minutes of jumping rope as a warmup. Now my legs were starting to fail pretty hard on this circuit of plyometric dumbbell exercises (imagine a classic cheerleader or Mary Katherine Gallagher "Superstar!" pose ) and my form was breaking down. At this point, you usually have 3 choices: you can pound out each rep as quickly as you can and torpedo form; you can nut up, go zen and focus on making each rep as perfect as possible, forgetting about the number of reps you still have to do and the burn in your quads and the fire in your lungs; or you can just give up.
I chose to nut up. Some days I don't, depending on the exercise or what else is going on. But that day, I slowed down and concentrated on making my footfalls less leaden. I tried to forget about everything else I had already done and whatever else we might do, and I focused on what I was doing. I may have snuck in a small break between exercises and maybe even between the occasional rep, but I kept going.
And that's Max Power. It's not breaking your personal record day in and day out. It's not squatting or benching 300lbs. It's about choosing to nut up and dig down deep and believing that you can. That all you have to worry about is what you're doing right now, and whether you're making it count.
Visit www.maxpowernow.com to learn more or call Mike at 717 581 8188 to schedule your own training session.