Training Intensity and the Results that Have Emerged

Training Intensity and the Results that Have Emerged

It may sound cliché, but as the year 2018 wrapped up, I’ve been reflecting on what made it a life changing year for me.  2018 was so pivotal for me in so many ways but there’s one particular aspect I’d like to focus on for this entry.  That is how my training sessions went from good to incredible.  The key to this successful transition was intensity.

In September of 2018, a new chapter in my life started.  I had just recently graduated from St Michael’s College school, an institution that which I am a proud alumnus of and which taught me so much.  I was starting my first semester of university at Ryerson in the Sport Media program.  Little did I know, I was going to discover a new sport which would change my life.  This sport was weightlifting.  Up until then, I was dedicated to baseball and rugby, sports that I was serious about, but eventually realized my window of going pro was closing.  I had some prior knowledge of weightlifting, having used it as training for other sports, so I joined the barbel team at Ryerson and gave it a shot.  Ryerson Barbel welcomed me with open arms and did what they could to start me off.  I was searching for a coach and team outside of school to compete with, and after being referred to Laylor Performance Systems from a friend at St Mike’s, I called Level 5 Master Strength Coach Clance Laylor.  This phone call changed my life, and for the better.  

Coach Clance told me to come into the gym so I could get assessed and get started.  Let me bring you through my first day at Laylor Performance Systems (LPS) and what I saw.  After being assessed I got changed and took to the weightlifting platform next to Maya Laylor.  As I approached the lifting area I could sense her intensity right away.  The music was blaring and Maya was giving it her all on a max out Friday.  This intensity and energy was contagious in the gym.  I quickly noticed that there was not a single athlete in that gym giving anything less than their 100%.  It was chaos, but that kind of productive chaos which I thrive in.  At that moment, I knew that I wanted to be apart of this gym and culture of hard work and success.  And that’s exactly what this whole entry is about.  Intensity!

Let me bring you through why I’ve been so successful on the weightlifting platform these last four to five months.  I train six days a week, while being a full-time university student.  That doesn’t mean I only train six times a week either!  There are days I train twice a day, while being able to thrive academically with a solid GPA.  Sometimes I train as much as 10-12 times a week.  When we talk intensity, I’m not simply referring to how many times a week I train.  Coach Clance has developed this culture of intensity that has encouraged me to give it my all on the platform each and every time I walk into the gym.  We train to maximum weight almost every day, and when we don’t hit a personal record, we revert to volume.  I am only an athlete and not a certified coach but what I can tell you is that maxing out often makes me incredibly confident with heavy weight and encourages me to be that much more intense in my training sessions.  This training style and coaching has had me breaking personal records every week, sometimes twice a week.  Every time someone sees one of our athletes at LPS at a competition, they are shocked at how much they have improved over a period of time.  At first, I could not believe how much my weightlifting numbers were increasing with this type of intensity, but now that novelty has worn off and I’m always hungry to set a new personal record and surpass another athlete.  This system I’ve worked with at LPS has truly produced steroid-like effects for me.

Every week, I pick a time before class or training and I research results of past weightlifting competitions and I pick an athlete who I want to surpass and I try to knock them off one by one.  This is the type of intensity I’m talking about.  I’m not saying it has to apply solely to olympic weightlifting.  It can be in the classroom or just in the gym when you’re trying to get into shape.  I like to pick other athletes in my range who I want to surpass, but you can just compete with yourself and records you’ve previously set.

This kind of intensity is tough to develop but once you do, you will notice yourself progressing ahead of other athletes.  I believe the main reason for this is because this level of intensity is hard work that most people cannot subject themselves to.  Based on my experiences as a weightlifter at Laylor Performance Systems, there are no shortcuts to true success in the gym.  The fastest and most productive way is through hard work and intensity.

Since joining Coach Clance at LPS, my clean and jerk has improved by over 30 Kg’s and my snatch has improved by 40 Kg’s.  Thats a total of 70 Kg (154lbs) improvement in a relatively short period of time.  In my case, the results speak for themselves.  I cannot stress enough that without intensity, none of this could have happened.

As a weightlifting athlete, I am looking forward to my competition on February 9th where I plan to set the bar high for myself.  My goal in the next few years is to be able to compete with the best weightlifters Ontario has to offer and I’ve learned that there is no easy way to get there.  The only way is through hard work.  This is true in all aspects of life as both a student and an athlete.

I’d like to wrap up with a quote from a pro football player in the CFL who plays for the BC Lions and trains with us at LPS.  His name is Wayne Moore.  In one of my early sessions, Coach Clance pointed at the board where this quote was written and repeated: “Everybody wants to be a real monsta until they see what real monsta’s do!”  At that moment, my inner drive to be the best weightlifter was unlocked.

This is what intensity and hard work means for me.  What does it mean to you?