The Plan, the Backup, and the Backup to the Backup
The first kettlebell sport client I ever coached is a triathlete named Sarah Fornero. I walked up to her at a gym in Chicago, told her she should compete in this weird sport nobody had heard of, and she said okay, let's go. That was a long time ago now. She has since hit Master of Sport numbers, momentarily held a world record for jerks, and built a triathlon game (jerk, snatch, long cycle, all in one sitting) that would crush most lifters who try it.
But the thing I took from talking with her on the 100th episode of the podcast is not a number. It's the way she thinks on the platform. And it's the single most useful thing I can hand you if you compete, or if you do anything hard under a clock.
Here it is: have a plan, have a backup plan, and have a backup to the backup plan.
Why one plan is not enough
Most lifters walk onto the platform with a single number in their head. "I'm going to hit 14 reps per minute." Great. That works right up until it doesn't. The bell feels heavier than it did in the gym. The adrenaline spikes your heart rate before you even pick it up. Your grip starts barking at minute four. And now your one plan is dead, and you've got six minutes left and nowhere to go.
That's where people fall apart. Not because they're weak. Because they ran out of road.
Sarah doesn't run out of road. She picks her paces ahead of time and tries to follow them as metronomically (her word, and I'll allow it) as possible. But the genius is what's underneath that. No matter what she feels like, she has a plan for the set, and she already knows what she'll do on the next set if this one goes sideways. And if she misses ALL of those, the next set is a fresh start and she goes again. There's always a next move.
Her line stuck with me: she's always adjusting so that it's never wrong. It's just right for what she needed that day.
Sit with that. The goal isn't to execute one perfect plan. The goal is to never be in a position where you have no good option left.
The two dials: the clock and the breath
So how do you actually run this in real time? Sarah runs two dials, and she switches between them.
The first is the clock. She's a numbers person, counting constantly. If she wants 14 reps per minute on jerk, she knows she should be at 7 reps by the 30 second mark, around 4 by 16 seconds. She checks in at those little checkpoints all set long, not just at the top of the minute. If she's ahead of pace, she deliberately slows down (going out too hot is how you blow up). If she's behind, she switches to the second dial.
The second dial is the breath. In the rack on long cycle she knows it's a catch breath, then zero, one, or two breaths before the next rep depending on how hard she's working. On snatch with a heavy bell she has a set number of breaths to take in fixation. When the clock says she's behind, she stops chasing reps and locks onto the breaths instead, because the breaths keep the technique honest. Get the breathing right and the reps come back clean.
Clock to set pace. Breath to protect form. Toggle between them. That's a complete control system you can run inside a ten minute set, and you can build it for yourself starting at your very next training session.
What this looks like when it really goes wrong
Two stories from Sarah that show you the backup plans in action.
At a competition up in Canada I was counting a set for her and halfway through she just yelled a number at me and changed her pacing mid set. I didn't even understand at first; I thought she was telling me I'd miscounted. She wasn't. She'd run the numbers in her head, decided plan A wasn't happening, and rolled to plan B without breaking rhythm. That's the system working under fire.
The other story is bigger. She hurt her hand before a competition she'd already signed up for. Instead of scratching, she changed the entry. Swapped double bell lifts for one arm 28 kilogram long cycle and jerk and lifted with literally one arm. Why? Because she likes the lift. The injury closed one door, so she walked through a different one. Same instinct, bigger scale: never let yourself get stuck with no move.
And the floor under all of it, her rule for training, is this: live to train tomorrow. If a specific pain says stop, she stops. There's always another training set coming. (Competition is the one place she'll let an athlete push to the fringes, but that's a choice the athlete makes, not the default.)
How to steal this
You don't need to be a Master of Sport to use any of this. Build it small:
Pick your goal pace before you lift, and pick two checkpoints inside each minute to verify it. Decide right now what you'll do if you're ahead (slow down) and what you'll do if you're behind (go to your breath count, not panic). Write a plan B pace and a plan C pace before you ever pick up the bell. And give yourself permission to treat the next set as a clean slate.
Have a plan. Actually have a plan. Execute the plan. And when the plan dies, which it will, calmly walk to the next one. That's not being gifted with calm. That's being prepared, and you can prepare.
Listen to my full interview with Dr. Sarah Fornero here.
If you want help building a pacing plan you can actually trust under a clock, that's exactly the kind of thing I coach. Reach out and apply here. I've never turned anyone away over money, so don't let that be the reason you sit on the sideline.
Vokse eller dø. — Coach Jordan