Must Have's for Performance

April 6, 2016

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Nathan Waters

There are thousands of things you can do to increase your performance in life or in the sporting arena. The problem is many of us get confused on what to do or choose an advanced method before we even have the basics dialled in. Here are some things I think you need to have to reach world class performance:

• You have to constantly and consistently work towards progress. It doesn’t matter if it is in the gym or at work, you have to try and be better than you were the day before. This could mean increasing the weight on the bar, doing an extra rep or an extra set, or increasing the amount of work you do in a given time frame. It sounds simple but this is what it is all about. Too often you see people lift the same weight, for the same amount of reps, day in and day out. They are just spinning their wheels. Don’t just go through the motions.
• Get your nutrition in check. If you eat crappy foods you will not perform optimally. If you have brain fog at work and can’t think properly you won’t be able to be at your best and won’t reach your potential. In the end this could cost you a promotion or you may miss opportunities to make good money. If your goal is putting on muscle mass then you have to eat like it is a training session. You can’t grow by dreaming about it, you have to actual do something. Don’t complain if you aren’t growing and you are only eating 2 meals a day.
• When things get tough you have to be able, and willing to push through uncomfortable situations. To increase performance in any field you have to be mentally strong. Anyone who is the best in the world in their field has this quality. Nothing stops them from achieving their goal. They train around injuries and they are willing to do what others won’t do, they push themselves past the point of comfortable.
• You have to be passionate about what you do. Reaching the top requires hard work for years. Without passion it is unlikely you will stick in there long enough to see the ultimate result of your efforts.
• You can’t have any excuses. If you want something bad enough you will find a way. Your job getting in the way, lack of money, or poor genetics for example are no reason why you can’t succeed. If you truly want something you’ll find a way to get it done. If not, did you really want it or was it just a nice thought?

Tags:

Attitude

desire

motivation

Junior Development Update - Nutrition Results

November 25, 2017

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Nathan Waters - Total Health Performance

Tristyn and Mani have been training with me for about 2 months now and have been making some good progress. For 13 year old kids their commitment has been really good. In the gym their technique is getting a lot better and they have gained plenty of strength. It is exciting to see. Being so young they could reach very high levels as long as they stay focused and keep working hard.

They have been following their nutrition pretty well. I have to give a special mention to Mani here because he is very into and told me this morning that he likes to eat healthy because it is making him feel so much better. Not just at training but throughout the day. Like myself and many of our clients Mani is experiencing much better energy levels and can focus for longer periods. This is very pleasing for me to hear. Creating good habits at such a young age will really set him up for a healthy life for years to come. I am jealous that I didn't start eating and training correctly at these boys age.

Mani's progress:

Body weight - 63kg now 56kg

Lean body mass - 48.1kg now 47.8kg

Body fat - 23.6% now 14.6%

Mani has lost 7kg of body weight on the scale but the important thing is that he has only lost 300g of lean body mass. Dropping 9% body fat and maintaining lean mass has been the goal. His scale weight will shoot back up over coming weeks. I am happy he has stuck to the plan and not freaked out when he saw the scale weight dropping. Many young athletes get really worried about this and would start to pig out on junk. 

Tristyn's progress:

Body weight - 80.6kg now 80kg

Lean body mass - 64.4kg now 67kg

Body fat - 20.2% now 16.2%

With Tristyn you see that body weight has remained relatively stable whilst the lean mass has increased 2.6kg and body fat has decreased 4%. This is a good result especially when you consider compliance to the plan has not been 100%. Just making some small changes can go a long way. As Trist improves more and more habits the results will continue.

The important part for these boys is to keep enjoying their training and sticking to their nutrition. We can still improve in so many areas but we will do this gradually over time. I find many trainers get carried away with results and try to push kids too hard too early. We aren't doing anything crazy. We are aiming for long term progress. They understand it is a process of many years of consistent hard work to achieve the goals they are after.

Tags:

TeamTHP

Rugby league

Nutrition

overtraining

Strength training

strength coach

exercise physiologist

body fat

Lean Mass

body composition

progress

junior development

Junior reps

Western Suburbs Magpies

Trist

Mani