Reflections on Riddlestruck Open 2021

Welcome to the platform podcast where we talk to coaches, athletes, experts, and real people to learn about their approaches to training, nutrition, mindset, and much more. I'm your host, Jordan Kunde-Wright, founder and head coach of the Twin Cities Catebell Club. And I'm on a mission to help others build sustainable healthy lifestyles. Before we jump into this week's episode, I want to take a second to make an important announcement about the Twin Cities Catebell Open. The event will still be taking place in person in Little Canada, Minnesota on October 23rd. But with the Delta variant causing restrictions and travel issues for many people, we've decided to also include video submissions for participants who are unable or unwilling to make the trip in person. So now you'll be able to compete no matter where you live. You'll be able to submit your videos until midnight central time on October 22nd. And you'll be eligible for all of the same prizes as our in-person competitors. Just go to our website, Twin Cities Catebell Club dot com for details. I also want to say that I am incredibly grateful that you listened to this podcast, and the best way that you could support me is to register for the Twin Cities Catebell Open, and maybe tell a friend or two. And if you haven't already, please be sure to leave a rating and review of the platform podcast in your app of choice and support my work by supporting our sponsors whose affiliate links you'll find in the episode notes. And of course, if you want to step on the platform and competing Catebell Sport, or you need help in reaching your best with your nutrition, please reach out to me. I help athletes of all levels reach their goals without wasting time using my integrated online coaching approach. You can follow me on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube at Twin Cities Catebell Club, or email me at Twin Cities Catebell Club at gmail.com. Now without further ado, let's take some time and reflect on the 2021 Riddle Struck Open. All right, welcome into this week's episode of the platform podcast. This is a Reflections episode. I like to do these after every competition because I always find that it is important to think about how the competition went and reflect on it and take lessons from every comp. If you had a really, really good competition, you can think about what went well, what worked, why did it go well and take lessons from that and build upon that success and create a repeatable process that works for you and makes you successful. If you had a less successful competition, then you want to reflect on that and take those lessons and think about why did it not go well? What are the things that you can change? What can you do differently next time so that you are successful or more successful the next time you step on the platform? I think it's incredibly important to do that and really think about what your key takeaways are from any competition. For me, this is especially important as a coach because I need to not only think about my own performance on the platform, but the different lifters on the platform and what they did well and what lessons I can take from people's performances and are there lessons that are specific to that lifter and changes that we need to make specific to that lifter or are there lessons that can be generalizable to the whole team? So I'm going to go through some of those thoughts and I haven't written these down. This is honestly just free-flowing open reflection as I go through the process. But first, I want to start by saying a big shout out and thank you to everyone from team Ritalstruck. So Steven Rital, Amanda, Sarah, Matt, you guys put together an executed and excellent competition. I know it's incredibly challenging right now with COVID and all of the stuff going on with COVID to organize a comp and put together a comp and then pull it off and do it well virtually. As well as some in-person, I know you guys had some people that were kind of in-person, but that's just because you're all local to each other. But with it being almost entirely online, either via live zoom or via video submission, which is what I did. It went really, really smoothly. You guys actually gave me a really nice blueprint for how I can do video submissions, how I can manage video submissions for the Twin Cities kettlebell open here in eight weeks. So and if you missed that announcement from last week, we are accepting video submissions. The plan is still to have this competition in person, but I will also be accepting video submissions up until midnight on that Saturday, the day of the competition. So you will have that day up until midnight of that day to submit your videos for judging. You'll be eligible for all of the prizes that we're awarding to the lifters. And you'll be eligible for rank. So if you are somewhere where you can't travel or you live in a different country and don't plan on flying across the ocean to come compete, that is okay. You can do it via video submission and still participate and put your best out there. So I hope that that makes it more accessible for more people and that we have a large contingent of people. I know we're getting registrations in for the in-person comp and I hope that we'll get a bunch of people that can do it online as well. So thank you for Steve and the team showing a good way to execute online competition. So it was very low stress. It was well managed, well communicated, which I greatly, greatly appreciate. That makes it a lot easier for everybody to come out and show their best when there's no confusion or stress around the organization or execution of the actual event. So thank you again. So I want to give shout outs to some lifters as well from my team in particular. You know, not that I don't care about how other people did but I'm going to want to give a shout out first to my to my guy, the Tim's. The Tim's both did well. Tim Harding in his first ever competition knocked out 99 reps on long cycle with the 16s and he was so close to hitting 100 and we could I could see it on the video. It seemed like he he was disappointed to run out of time because I think he knew he needed one more rep to hit 100 and when his time was up, you could see that he just he wish he had like five more seconds to finish that one, one more rep. But it was a great, great performance from him. Awesome cardio, really, really awesome cardio. It is hard to hold 10 RPMs plus for long cycles. So to hold 10 RPMs for 10 minutes is fantastic. So he did just a great job. And I want to, you know, we debriefed a little bit and want adjustment we have to make for him is, you know, to to make sure that we're not expecting to make up too many reps going into the final minute of any set because he said that he's he's more of a long distance runner than a sprinter so he can't he can't crank out, you know, the 14 RPM 16 RPM final minute on long cycle. It's just hard for him to go that fast. So we'll make that adjustment maybe come out with just a high pace sustained over time and not try and go to 12, 13, 14 RPMs on anything. So I got your note and we will make that we'll make that adjustment. Tim Boyer, big Tim didn't compete in the riddle struck, but we're doing 10 minute test outsets for everybody on the team, whether or not they competed so that I have a baseline of fitness for everyone who is competing and for designing of the next phase, I will have I will have objective measures of their of their output so that I can build their next phase. And so Tim Boyer, big Tim completed a 10 minute set in all three lifts. So he got 77 reps on long cycle, 109 on the jerk and I want to say 137 on snatch. If I remember right, all with the 16s, he spread those out a little bit because you can take time, you know, when you're not in a competition, you can take time between the sets as much time as you want. So he did one lift per day and did really, really well for somebody who just a couple of weeks ago did not think that he could finish a 10 minute set yet alone, a 10 minute set in all three lifts. I think that is a huge accomplishment and something that he should be very proud of. I'm very proud of him. I think he's very proud of himself because that was that's fantastic work, that's a lot of work. And it's really a testament to the focus and consistency that Tim has put in. Emron Bojoila, my guy here in the Twin Cities, banged out 72 reps on long cycle and he finished the 10 minutes for the first time. He finished the full time and then took a break and then he did a jerk set wasn't able to finish the 10 minutes on the jerk set. And we've got some lessons learned and just debriefed with him today. And jerk is hard, man, it is it is a unique challenge. And even Tim kind of had the same Tim Boyer had the same the same struggles as Emron, which is if you can't find relaxation in your rack position, it is damn near impossible to hold pace. You have to be able to unload your muscles in the rack position. So you have to be able to let your chest relax, let your legs relax, let your shoulders relax. Right. And if you can't rest there, the only other place you can rest is overhead. And if you're stacked really well, you can maybe get some leg relaxation. Maybe you can get your chest to relax a little bit, but your shoulders are still stabilizing the bells, your triceps are still stabilizing the bells. Right. So you really have to work on achieving that rack position. So the lesson from that is kind of two or three fold, there's kind of two or three things there, right. First, you have to build the time under tension, just time in those positions. You have to you have to build up the capability to just be able to hold the weights. Right. That's that's just foundation strength. You've got to do that, but you also have to work on mobility a lot because as I was discussing with Emron this morning, you know, protracting your shoulders forward can and then connecting your elbows to your body and standing with straight legs while bearing load is not something we ever do in life. Right. This is a very sport specific movement. Right. It's not like squatting, which is just a fundamental human movement that babies learn to do at a very young age, right. They can squat with good form because they have the mobility in this as soon as they build the strength to be able to do it, like baby squat, ask to grass. Right. So that's just a natural movement. You don't ever see somebody just put their elbows onto their pelvis and rest them there while holding something. It's not a natural movement pattern to do. So because of that, we have to learn and program the body to be able to achieve that position. Right. So mobility work is a specially key. Right. That is that is especially key because you have to be able to achieve some type of rest position. And then the the third piece of it is the connection to the body. So those who are kind of really related, you know, one thing that Emron was struggling with up until just a like a week or two ago was he was not actually getting his elbows connected to his legs, you know, to his body to then get the drive from his legs. I mean, so he was not actually getting his elbows connected to his body, which then connects the force from your legs into your arms, right. So that was a key for him for actually being able to finish the 10 minutes on long cycle. But because he wasn't able to finish the 10 minutes on jerk, it's likely because he can't yet find relaxation in the rack position. And unlike in long cycle where you can spread out the misery a little bit with the backswing, you know, you get some relief on your grip in the backswing, you can rest in the rack position on the way up, you can rest, you can find some relaxation overhead, and then you can rest in the rack position again on the way down if you need to. Unlike that in jerk, it is all about localized suffering in your ability to actually find relaxation without being able to change positions very much. You have you have only two positions locked out overhead or in rack position. So you don't get you don't get a lot of movement diversity there. So you can't spread the misery out. So you really have to work on that connection so that you can drive the energy from the legs into the bells. And then you have to be able to connect in order to relax in the rack position. If you're not connected well, you're going to be you're going to be holding the weights up with your chest with your shoulders with your arms. Right. So if you don't get that connection, you'll never just you'll never be able to let your muscles disengage and just bear the weight of the bells on your skeleton. Right. So it's very important that you work on mobility in order to achieve that. And then and then snatch and run and run was able to complete the 10 minutes in snatch as well. So he did really well with that. So really really proud of him there doing a lot of good work. Joe 71 reps in in the long cycle. Joe Honig's my guy from Louisiana gave a Tigers 71 reps in the long cycle finished the 10 minutes. Right. Finish the 10 minutes in snatch jerk. Same thing. Struggle. Struggle bus. Right. So he was not able to finish the 10 minutes there still still relatively new to the to the lift in general. Right. So same same challenges as as Emron is having and and that Tim is having as well, just mobility in order to achieve relaxation relaxation in the jerk is is definitely is definitely something that needs to be developed and it takes time to do that. So that is a big takeaway for for me with the team is more mobility work and putting together an actual protocol that they can follow that that is specific to the sport. So I'll be be working on developing that I do have I do actually have a protocol developed I just need to film it put it on paper and and get the resources out there for for people to use. So I am going to be creating a specific protocol for for mobility for kettlebell sport. So that is that is going to be fun. Audrey 60 reps in the long cycle did the weight cut with with me and Bobby Hicks. We're going to have a special a special episode with the two of them coming on to discuss the the water cut protocol that we did for that for that competition. So Audrey Audrey got 60 reps in long cycle with double 16s just a few reps shy of her personal best and this is with only a few weeks of 16 KG work under her under her belt. So she's been working on she's been working on moving up in weight we just moved her up a little a little bit ago so I did not expect her to hit her personal personal best in the in the 16 KG long cycle but she came really close and really put up one hell of a fight it was a great great set and she finished she finished on the ground speaking gibberish but it was a great set she worked she worked really hard but after debriefing with her she she had she had the struggle of time management a little bit she she thought she had plenty of time to warm up and she needs she needs a decent amount of time to warm up she thought she had it and got started warming up but was getting her technology set up and making sure that she was ready and before she knew it it was time for her to lift and she was doing the live stream so she had a set time that she had to lift so she did not get as much of a warm up in as she wanted so another lesson from this was make sure that you allow more time than what you then what you think you need because you never want to run out of time to get warmed up not having a proper warm up will definitely hinder your performance that is unequivocal the research backs it up over and over and over again that peak performance you need a functional warm up you need to be your your systems need to be ready to go so make sure you give yourself extra time to warm up so I mean I honestly say you know get get started especially on comp day right get started 30 minutes earlier than you think you need to right just give yourself 20 a time you can always relax if you get warm and you still have time before your set right it's easier to stay warm than it is to get warm so get yourself warm get yourself loose and then if you have extra time then you just stay warm and that gives you time to to focus your mind and get your mind right before you know but make sure that you make sure that you give yourself 20 a time right and then our our buddy Bobby Hicks frequent guests of the podcast also did the water cut with me and he had a very interesting set 48 reps in the long cycle finished the 10 minutes with the 24's for the first time which was really his goal going into this he did awesome fighting and dealing with some difficult circumstances training in Florida it gets hot in humid in Florida and it was the hottest most humid day humid day he had experienced in Florida to this point when he when he did this so that makes it very very challenging especially with long cycle where you're managing two bells on every rep and if your grip starts to go where the bells get slick it gets very very challenging very quickly so really really good job by him fighting through I know you know the fort he didn't get he didn't get all 48 of the reps to count because he had he had some issues when when he was lost when he had lost his grip with he had to shoulder rack some of them to get them to keep them from going all over the place and I think he got stopped by his judge on the official count but he finished the 10 minutes on his video you know and I was there counting reps for him and that was his goal and he slowed pace way down he actually changed his technique like I was talking about on long cycle where you can spread out the misery he was he was intentionally slowing his technique down to make sure he finished the time so he was taking a rest in the rack position on the way up he would jerk the bells take a breath there and then bring the bells back down and rather than going immediately into his next cycle of cleans he racked and would take a couple of breaths and then drop into his next cycle of cleans so he was intentionally slowing his pace and taking more rest to really to really make sure that he had the best opportunity to keep his heart rate down and to make sure that he could finish the time now he's also realized that he has some he has some technique changes he needs to make on his on his cleans for a long cycle which what she's working on but it was a great set great set by him really good fight thanks for tuning into this episode of the platform podcast we interrupt this interview to share some exciting updates about the twin cities kettlebell open happening October 23rd here at the athlete lab in little canada missota in the heart of the twin cities and now also available to compete in online by a video submission 27 degrees apparel has finished designing our event t-shirts and has given us a discount code tckb10 for 10% off all of his apparel and those shirts will be customizable by pre-order up until a couple of weeks before the competition so you can check out the website for details on that we also have two belts from denis the sillyiv at bellevator as well as six pairs of ursa's barefoot athletic training shoes which are my personal favorite for snatch as well as deadlift and gpp and our friend Nikolai pushlove from the Seattle kettlebell club is providing his new maiden the USA pro kettlebells for competitors to try out and use on the platform if they choose as well as support from expiring nutrition and others and if you have any other ideas or connections to interested sponsors please reach out to me and don't forget to register for the event on our website twinsys kettlebell club.com now let's get back to the interview i will say from debriefing with him another another lesson learned don't make changes the day of competition don't make changes on the day of competition he changed the chalk that he was using the brand of chalk that he was using per a recommendation from another lifter that there was a better you know better brand of chalk for him to use than what he was currently using i'll leave the the brand names out of it because it's a relevant if you're used to working with one certain type of chalk and it's what you normally get don't then change it the day of a competition right it's just not a good idea to make changes right because you you don't you're introducing a new variable on the day when it matters the most to be as consistent as possible with your training um you know with mirroring what you've done in training right so don't change your don't change your warm up routine um significantly right other than giving you know giving yourself more time but don't change what you actually do don't change don't try a new food on the day of competition don't try a new supplement um like really try and stick with your routine right don't change don't change your equipment if you have any control over that right and when you're competing in your own environment you have control over that right so don't make changes by choice right don't don't choose to change your brand of chalk the day of competition because what what he found was the brand of chalk that he was previously using lasted longer for him and it adhered to his bells better it adhered to his hands better the new brand of chalk did not is here as well so by minute six ninety percent of the chalk was gone by minute seven all of the chalk was gone so and then the last three minutes he was just fighting he was just fighting through it right he he had a he had a challenging time and which was part of the reason for the shoulder racking of the bells you know so don't make changes the day of competition you want to try making a change try it in practice you know a couple of days before try you know and do it more than once right give it more than one shot but don't make changes the day of competition that i think that is a very important lesson that is definitely something i would very strongly advise for everybody try and keep your routine as consistent as possible right don't make any significant changes the day of competition so those are the highlights and call outs from from others on the team and from their sets their test outs and from my own personal performance i was not happy i made it to seven and a half minutes into the long cycle before i set the bells down i got 47 reps officially set the bells down picked them back up about i took about 40 seconds of rest picked them back up and banged out another like 16 reps or so which i'm trying to decide whether or not that means that i physically quit or mentally quit because i will say like the data does back up that i was i was redlined and not just for a little while i was redlined for almost the entire set um i started i started the set basically in zone two um and then quickly went to zone three and then zone four is on five and once you're in zone four and zone five um your anaerobic and that means that you're producing lactate and your heart rate is obviously very high your over threshold your over lactate threshold your over anaerobic threshold um there's only so long you can stay there um before you throw up or pass out or both um and i can say that i was i was over what my max heart rate you know in quotes is supposed to be within three minutes um which is not good um that is trying to hold pace trying trying to just stay moving at that intensity for more than you know seven minutes is not something most people can do not something most athletes can do and i am not an exceptional athlete in that regard um so um i i felt like my heart was going to beat through my chest um i was you know my respiration rate was super high my heart rate was super high uh really just was struggling to to and i couldn't get my heart right down i couldn't i couldn't get it down i couldn't keep it down um so um i i struggled struggled through it um put the bells down picked them back up and finished um because i wasn't i wasn't i wasn't uh in person i wasn't going to i wasn't going to disturb another lifter by picking picking the bells back up and finishing my time um i just i wanted to get more at this at that point once i once i didn't finish the ten minutes a long cycle this this went from being a competition um that i was going to try and perform my best into being a competition that had become uh another training session which is honestly what my mindset should have been going into it um which i'll dig into in just a little bit but um i came in i came in wanting to do i registered for a 10-minute triathlon with the 20s but due to some issues in training and and just life my training calendar my training consistency wasn't wasn't where i needed it to be but i was also dealing with i dealt with a forearm injury um you know muscle strain in my forearm which knocked me out of training um for you know 10 days or so uh you know so i didn't have the training base really to to support um the level of output that i was trying to that i was trying to achieve and i think intuitively that i knew that i actually articulated it to the group of people that was watching on my zoom while i lifted um which that might not have been the best thing to do because once i the thought was in my head but once i externalized it uh it kind of validated it so i think a lesson for me is to not is to not externalize uh negative self-talk don't externalize those those things because then they become real and they become um you know you could keep it internal and tell yourself no that's not true but i think i knew it was true um which is why i externalized it so i'm still not quite certain um not quite certain what why i put the bellstone i'm not sure if it was physical limitation or if it was mental limitation i'm still trying to i'm still vacillating on that i'm still trying to dissect that i don't know and maybe i'll never know um in the moment it very much felt like physical limitation that i just couldn't keep going or my heart was going to explore probably wouldn't have happened um but you know i might have passed out um which is dangerous in its own right when you're in your garage by yourself um so but i've never pushed myself to the point of passing out um so and maybe that's not advisable um but so there's part of me that feels like i i i didn't push to my limit but you know the data would say that i did push to my limit i pushed to max heart rate and i stayed there uh for a long time um so i'm not sure um so then from that point um i did a i decided it was going to be a training session and not a competition um so and after having put the bells down but then finished the long cycle set um i took i took some time took a took a few hours off um to to refocus and recharge but when i when i went to to do jerk i was still sore in in several areas that are necessary for jerk lats and triceps and legs my quads in particular um so i i knew that a 10-minute set um would not that it wasn't in the cards but it to push to a 10-minute set would would put me at a pretty significant risk of injury based on uh particularly how my pecs were feeling um that i would i would have been likely to to strain a peck or uh strain a calf um strain a quad there's there's a few things that were pretty tight so i just i made the decision since i had already failed on my long cycle set to be smart and live to live to train another day because the you know uh the twinsidys kettlebell open is eight weeks away um you know at that point it was ten weeks away um so i i i didn't uh i did not want to risk a significant injury by pushing um when i didn't feel that i that i had it in my capability to to push without a significant risk of injury so i i i i stepped it back um to a five-minute jerk set and just turned it into a workout basically where for five minutes i mean uh ten rpm pace i just metronomed it and ten rpm is not um super fast for me on jerk that's a solid pace but it's not it's not anything crazy um that honestly would have been my target pace for a 10-minute set would have been um ten to 12 rpm so um so i uh yeah i just i let it uh i let it just be a workout and went nice and steady um and then took like 15 minutes and banged out and banged out a snatch set uh five-minute snatch set as well so um ended up basically doing a five-minute triathlon with a little extra time on the long cycle um and it was fine um and i still you know had an output of over over 13 000 kilos on the day so um it was a good training session um but you know i think the for me the there was two two major lessons um the first was that you have to be consistent in your training to expect to be able to have a solid output on the platform your your result on the platform are just a revelation of what your training has looked like right it's it's math it's mathematically predictable based on your training output what your what your output is going to be on the platform so i think that's i think that's why i was so nervous as i knew i knew i didn't have the the base of training to justify what i was trying to do and that got into my head so i didn't feel confident that i was going to be successful um i got which made me more nervous which then hindered performance etc right so um lesson number one for me is you have to be consistent in training and if you're not consistent in your training you need to modify your expectations i should not have gone into this thinking oh this is going to be a competition where i'm going to try and give my best output i should have looked at my training volume and looked at my training consistency and just treated this like a uh another training session and and and said because i was signed up i'd paid my money i was registered i wasn't going to not do it um but i should have gone into it with the expectation of i'm just going to i'm just going to test my capabilities and i'm going to push myself to you know uh do five minutes and all three lifts that that i had the training base for i could have done a five minute triathlon and i did do five minute triathlon but i could have pushed i could have pushed harder in the first five minutes of all three lifts i could have done a much more intense uh focus and pace for five minutes rather than trying to manage my pace to finish ten minutes um i could have pushed i could have pushed harder and had i gone in with the five minute triathlon mindset um i would have i would have pushed harder in those first five minutes but so i i think that's the that's the primary lesson is is consistency in training is what earns you the right to expect results on the platform you're not going to be able to show up on the competition and just will yourself throw it to a good performance um it just kettlebell sport doesn't work like that just doesn't i've never seen anybody be able to will themselves to a great performance um just it's it's it's purely based on capability in what you've earned in your in your training so um that's lesson number one i think uh lesson number two for me and it's correlated to lesson number one is i need to focus more on addressing my weaknesses i think my strengths have gotten me as far as they're going to get me um and my technique is pretty good in all three lifts at this point it can always be better but i generally consider myself to be a technician and not a great athlete in this sport um i have worked really really hard on my technique and i'm very uh i'm very anal about analyzing technique breaking down technique um i think i understand all of the fundamentals of all three lifts and i think i'm actually pretty skilled at all three lifts um in a from a technical standpoint um it doesn't mean my output is the best um because there are many many many more talented lifters than me um both men and women and people who have better output than me because they're better conditioned athletes who also have excellent technique um you know better athletes for this type of sport this is not my optimal sport um i'm an Olympic lifter and a power lifter by nature that's what my output um that's what my muscle fibers are really programmed for but with that said um if i spent more time focusing on my cardiovascular conditioning um and and working on developing that capacity and that capability i could be a better lifter i i can be better at this sport by changing my approach and focusing more on addressing my weakness so to that end um i am working on my cardio um and i actually um swallowed my pride and and reached out to steven riddle um who also i should shout out um had a just ridiculous performance on long cycle with the 20s i think you hit a hundred and a hundred and thirteen reps or something on the long cycle with the 20s um in ten minutes and then did a five minutes set with the 24s as well and and hit i think 40 um with the 24s so his cardio is phenomenal his technique is also excellent and he's a great lifter um so uh seeing his performance and feeling how much my cardio limited me particularly in long cycle um i reached out to steven and asked him to help me with my cardio um not that i don't know enough to program my own cardio i do i know plenty i know how to program cardio i know how to program strengthening conditioning um i know how to do conditioning protocols um but i wasn't doing it and i wasn't actually following through on doing my protocols you know or or anything i wasn't even designing cardio protocols for myself i was literally just doing my three days a week of of kettlebell sport training and i didn't even get three days a week in consistently as i mentioned before so for my previous lesson so um i need to spend more time working on my weaknesses i need to address my cardio the cardio has been my biggest limiting factor um my entire lifting career for kettlebell sport it's not that i'm not strong i am strong but i do not have great cardio cardio is my biggest limit so i need to i need to work on that and so i'm outsourcing that to somebody who knows as much or more than me um about cardio training and strengthening conditioning and obviously steven actually does his cardio because you can't maintain that type of pace with that high of weight without having some really fucking serious cardio um so i reached out to steven and he's uh and he's doing my he's doing my cardio programming for me and holding me accountable to do it which i still need to do today i need to actually go do my protocol uh that he that he put together for me so i think that's my other my other big lesson is um you have to sometimes especially early on um focusing on your strengths and developing your strengths and developing your technique is every bit if not more important than addressing your weaknesses right but at a certain point you have got when you have gotten the most out of your current athletic capability you need to assess what your strengths and weaknesses are and address your weaknesses you need to you need to figure out what your limit your limiting factors are to your performance and start doing focused effort on those areas right and unfortunately um for most of us if you're like me you avoid working on those areas because they're your weaknesses and because they're your weaknesses they suck to work on right so maybe it's a chicken or the egg thing maybe it's circular i don't know like i don't work on my cardio because i hate cardio and i hate cardio because i suck at cardio right well you suck at cardio because you don't do it right so if you do it you get better at it if you don't it stays the same so i need to suck it up and focus on working on my cardio so that's going to be a big focus um for me for um for quite a while probably um because i've got a long ways to go so i'm going to be working on my cardio um and the other thing and i'm you know i mentioned it before is uh that i'm going to be putting a protocol together is the mobility like my i've made a lot of progress in my mobility my mobility has gotten a lot better um but i still have limitations i have a right elbow that that doesn't fully lock um because i you know had several football injuries but i know i can improve that and i don't know that it's permanent i just know that it's hard for me to to lock my elbow right now but i i haven't had anybody tell me that that there's any like structural limitations that prevent me from being able to lock my elbow and i know that if i work on the soft tissue around my elbow that i can probably at the very least improve my elbow extension right so and that will be a huge help in overhead position in long cycle snatch well in any overhead position being able to lock my elbow will be hugely helpful i still need to work on hip mobility i need to work on my hamstring flexibility right um several areas so i'm going to get to work on addressing my weaknesses um and at some point i might actually you know when i get to an offseason phase um i might actually need to switch the focus um where instead of working on my cardio and flexibility on my off days from kettlebell and doing three days a week of kettlebell and in two days a week of conditioning slash mobility work um i might actually need to flip that and focus fully on cardio conditioning and mobility work as my primary and whatever i can get in for kettlebell sport is it might be secondary to that because um there's only so many hours a week i can dedicate to training and still you know do my job take care of my kids um be a husband to my wife and also be a coach to my athletes so i might need to just reprioritize to focus on my addressing my weaknesses so those are kind of my all of my major takeaways um from this i would go deeper into the water cut but because i recorded an episode with uh with bobby and with bobby and Audrey about the water cut protocol and some of the lessons from that um and that what that protocol is and that experience i'm gonna leave that for that episode so little teaser there for you um but that episode will be coming out next week um with with Audrey and bobby and we'll dive into the water cut because there are definitely some lessons from that as well um that can be taken and applied elsewhere in nutrition and things but um you know the the the biggest the biggest takeaway is that your results on the platform are are just a revelation of the dedication you put in in training the consistency you put in in training um and uh that was my biggest lesson and i and i really need to address i really need to address that and i need to focus on my weaknesses um i'm at the point now i've progressed i've progressed myself enough as a lifter that i can say that my i need i'm not gonna get much better until i focus on my on my weaknesses so thank you for listening um i hope this was useful for you um if not it was cathartic for me and it was good for me to process so um even if it wasn't useful for you it was for me so um yeah thank you very much for listening and i hope you guys have a great training cycle leading up to your next competition i hope that next competition is eight weeks from now at the twin cities kettlebell open here in little canada minnesota and online five video submission until next time we'll see you thanks for listening to this episode of the platform podcast i'm jordan kane right we'll be back with a new episode for you next week please don't forget to register for the twin cities kettlebell open on our website twin cities kettlebell club dot com and if you have a question or suggestion please email me at twin cities kettlebell club at gmail dot com and don't forget to follow us on social media at twin cities kettlebell club and if you want to step under the platform and competing kettlebell sport please reach out to me until next time