Session Intent: What are we trying to improve here?

When I sit down to program for a client, I often find myself taking a pause when building metcons or intervals to ask myself: what are we trying to improve here? That question is the driver behind intentional training.

There is this prevailing sentiment in the fitness racing space that "just training hard" is a solution to every problem. However, that idea is only a small part of the truth. Hard work is necessary but not sufficient to achieve any goal, but intentional work is what drives the greatest long-term improvements.

What I mean by intentional work is this: when you're building a metcon or conditioning session for a client, you need to have a reason for building it besides filling the training time they have available. Training needs to carry a purpose connected to their goals, and if pressed, you should be able to justify each element in the workout with a clear pathway to that athlete's goals. This connection between a movement, intensity prescription, or time domain, and the goal is what defines performance coaching from GPP.

I'm not saying that GPP is bad, it's just that when a client has hired you to help them achieve a specific goal, your job is to guide them through intentional training toward that goal.

A good example is deciding where to put the Echo bike in an interval session.

4 sets; rest 4min between sets
4min AMRAP:
30 calories Echo
30 bar-facing burpees
Max TTB in the remaining time

4 sets; rest 4min between sets
4min AMRAP:
30 bar-facing burpees
30 TTB
Max calories Echo in the remaining time

Anyone who's done workouts like these knows they feel very different. The movements are the same, but by changing their order and which movement has a fixed amount of work versus an open-ended target, you've dramatically altered the stimulus.

In the first version, the bike and burpees build fatigue before the athlete gets to the TTB. We're asking them to accumulate reps with heart rate near max and compounding fatigue. If we instruct the athlete to record their splits we can also look at their cycle speed, set sizes, and rest between sets to see how they handle it.

In the second version, the burpees and TTB become the pre-fatigue work before the Echo. This version really comes down to what kind of power output this athlete can produce under accumulated fatigue. We can also get splits on the buy-in, allowing us to look at deterioration in burpee pace or TTB sets across the four rounds.

Adding a pacing prescription makes the intention even clearer. "Hit the same calories in rounds 1 through 3, then drop the hammer in round 4" asks the athlete to approach the session differently than "get as many calories as possible in every round."

The point is that movement order, volume, rest, and pacing all change what we're asking the athlete to do, and what we learn from the training session. Those choices should come from what we're trying to improve.

Pull up a metcon you've programmed for this week and ask yourself: what am I trying to improve for this athlete?

Then look at the movement order, the rep counts, the rest periods, and the pacing instructions. Can you explain how those choices support the intention? Does the athlete know how you want them to execute it?

If the answer isn't clear, that's your starting point. Sometimes the adjustment is changing the workout. Sometimes it's keeping the workout exactly as written and giving the athlete a better explanation of what you want them to get out of it.

- Kyle