Exercise Advice - Achieving Your Goals / Making Gains
The key to achieving your fitness and exercise goals or making gains in speed/time/muscle is to stop listening to your body and find some other finish cue. The reason the Couch 2 5K (C25K) program is so successful is that you have a virtual coach in your ear telling you when to run and when to walk. Over the course of 9 weeks you learn to stop listening to your legs screaming "please stop" and you start listening for Constance to tell you to walk. Over 9 weeks she tells you to walk less and less. Your legs get used to running and after 9 weeks you can run a 5k without crying like a baby.
The key to its success and all success in the gym, on the track/treadmill, whatever your fitness goals are is to stop listening to your body and to do that one more rep. It is about hitting 10 and not quitting after 6 when your arms tell you its time to stop. Your head will give out long before your muscles will.
Find some other queue. I ran an 8:30 mile (in my last 5k I averaged just over a 10:00 mile) this morning. As far as I know it is my fastest mile ever, probably even when I was a kid. I did it my sprinting and slowing down to a run, then sprinting again at 2:00 intervals. My legs were telling me to stop but I focused on the clock and ignored my legs. That is when I had the idea for this posting and gained the knowledge of success in the gym. This is one of the rare occasions I will tell you to not listen to your body (here and in the kitchen).
Give it a try next time you do a sprint or an interval. If you are used to doing 30 seconds, add another 30 seconds but when you do watch the clock and do not slow down or lower the incline until you reach the full 30 seconds. I think you will be surprised how easy it is.
