⚡️SSL #015 How to find your training “sweet spot”

Nov 13, 2022

I’ve been thinking a lot about how to best structure my athlete’s programs for peak performance.

When done correctly, becoming faster, stronger, and more aesthetic is way easier.

I’m talking about becoming one of the fastest guys are your team.

Becoming freakishly strong.

And chiseled like a greek statue.

I’m going share with you some of my thoughts including:

How To Squeeze Genetic Potential
What Is The Sweet Spot?
How To Find The Sweet Spot
A Cheat code To Find The Sweet Spot
How I Find The Sweet Spot With Clients

Let’s dive in...

#1 How To Squeeze Genetic Potential

I have a couple of athletes I work with whose personal best is in the mid to low 10s in the 100m.

The tricky part is the closer someone is to their genetic potential the harder you have to work to squeeze out more gains.

For example, let’s say you were a 100m world champion like Fred Kerley.

In that case, doing more drills isn’t going to help you win more world championship titles.

That’s not what helped Usain Bolt break all those world records.

Instead at that level, everything seems to boil down to 1 thing.

Training within your sweet spot.

#2 What Is The Sweet Spot?

The way I define the “sweet spot” is an almost magical place in your training where it’s challenging enough to produce desirable adaptations but not so challenging that you get injured.

Elite distance runners, powerlifters, and track athletes have been using this concept for years.

Researchers have even developed what they call the “stimulus fatigue recovery adaptation theory” to illustrate how athletes respond to training when they hit their sweet spot.

When it comes to programming and coaching, I’d say 80% of the job is making sure the athlete doesn’t get injured and doesn’t plateau.

If you don’t get injured + avoid plateaus for extended periods of time you will make insane progress. I'm not saying it’ll be fast, but it compounds quickly, week after week, month after month.

A great book on this subject is called The Compound Effect, highly recommend it.

#3 How To Find The Sweet Spot

Here are some questions to ask yourself to find that sweet spot:

How difficult are the strength training sessions?

Easy, medium, or hard.

How difficult are the sprint sessions and or practice?

Easy, medium, or hard.

How exhausted are you at the end of the week?

Barely, a decent amount, or a lot.

How recovered are you at the beginning of the week?

Barely, a decent amount, or completely recovered.

Answer these truthfully because this isn’t about being tough but collecting useful data.

#4 Cheat Code To Find The Sweet Spot

A cheat code is to have a CNS Tester at the beginning of the week.

What I mean by this is to have an exercise to test out where your Central Nervous System is at, in the beginning of the week.

Of my athletes is able to dunk so at the beginning of his strength training he will go do a couple of dunks to get a reading on his CNS.

Depending on this he will either go hard, go light, or somewhere in between.

Not everyone is able to dunk, yet, so alternatively you can do box jumps and see if you’re able to hit your PR or if you’re struggling to hit your regular numbers.

That would be a quick and effective way to see where you’re at.

Remember, The objective is to train at that point where it’s not so easy that you barely see results, but also not so challenging that you’re at risk for injury.

Somewhere between that 2 points is the sweet spot.

#5 How I Find The Sweet Spot With Clients

To show you how seriously I take this.

Inside the training app, I use with my athletes we even have an RPE scale where after every single session, they mark their rate of perceived exertion from 1-10.

You could do the same by keeping a log of how difficulty each training session is.

Keep this in mind:

1) It takes about 72 hours to properly recover from an intense training session.

2) Progress is cyclical, not linear so don’t expect to get faster, and stronger every single week of the year.

3) A de-load week usually leads to the greatest gains in performance the following week.

TL;DR

For a world champion, doing more drills isn’t going to help them win more world championship titles.
Instead at that level, everything seems to boil down to 1 thing. Training in your sweet spot.
Sweet Spot = If you don’t get injured + avoid plateaus for extended periods of time you will make insane progress.
Have an exercise to test out where your Central Nervous System is at, at the beginning of the week

Stay Fast,

Cesar

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