drtbear1967
Musclechemistry Board Certified Member
There's this old saying: "The bee is praised, but the mosquito is swatted." The gist is, they're both very busy, but the bee is making honey while the mosquito is just flying around being a dick. Or something like that. It's about productivity. Being busy isn't necessarily being productive, and that goes double when you're in the gym.
.
The Time Cap Experiment – Try this: Figure out how long a typical lifting workout lasts. Take that number in minutes and subtract 20 percent. The next time you do that workout, try to finish in the slightly shorter timeframe. Here's what that would look like: A 120-minute workout would get 24 minutes subtracted from it. New time cap: 96 minutes. A 60-minute workout would lose 12 minutes. New time cap: 48 minutes. A 30-minute workout gets dropped by 6 minutes. New time cap: 24 minutes.
.
Why Do It?
• Because you don't want to be a gym mosquito: appearing to be busy but not really getting much accomplished. Maybe you're too chatty, or maybe you get lost in Magical Phone Land without realizing it. Maybe you're reading The Secret on the bench press and someone should kick you in the balls for occupying the bench too long and also for reading The Secret. • Because you're a little chubby and out of shape right now... and taking 12 minutes between sets of curls isn't helping to keep your conditioning up.
• Because your work capacity sucks. And being able to do more work in the same amount of time – or an equal amount of quality work in the same time – is a measurement of progress. And progress is good.
.
You'll probably notice that you had a great workout. The new time cap didn't affect the number of exercises, sets, or reps you had planned to do. You simply trimmed the fat from your session. Your focus will be sharpened too. Just knowing the countdown timer on your phone is ticking away will cause you to concentrate, focus, and not get distracted. If a time cap DOES affect your workout, it's probably a sign that your conditioning has slipped. Keep the deadline, try harder, and that will fix itself.
.
The Time Cap Experiment – Try this: Figure out how long a typical lifting workout lasts. Take that number in minutes and subtract 20 percent. The next time you do that workout, try to finish in the slightly shorter timeframe. Here's what that would look like: A 120-minute workout would get 24 minutes subtracted from it. New time cap: 96 minutes. A 60-minute workout would lose 12 minutes. New time cap: 48 minutes. A 30-minute workout gets dropped by 6 minutes. New time cap: 24 minutes.
.
Why Do It?
• Because you don't want to be a gym mosquito: appearing to be busy but not really getting much accomplished. Maybe you're too chatty, or maybe you get lost in Magical Phone Land without realizing it. Maybe you're reading The Secret on the bench press and someone should kick you in the balls for occupying the bench too long and also for reading The Secret. • Because you're a little chubby and out of shape right now... and taking 12 minutes between sets of curls isn't helping to keep your conditioning up.
• Because your work capacity sucks. And being able to do more work in the same amount of time – or an equal amount of quality work in the same time – is a measurement of progress. And progress is good.
.
You'll probably notice that you had a great workout. The new time cap didn't affect the number of exercises, sets, or reps you had planned to do. You simply trimmed the fat from your session. Your focus will be sharpened too. Just knowing the countdown timer on your phone is ticking away will cause you to concentrate, focus, and not get distracted. If a time cap DOES affect your workout, it's probably a sign that your conditioning has slipped. Keep the deadline, try harder, and that will fix itself.
