Today’s blog topic: Arousal Management. *cough cough* And now that I have your attention... I also have all “those” innuendos out of the way so we’ll be mature from here on out.
Before we go any further in to this, I want to say that this isn’t cut and dry and there’s a lot more too it than I can fit in a blog post. So before you go setting out for a huge new clean PR while amidst a adrenaline-filled moment of rage and end us blowing out your back, there still needs to be control and thankfully we have amazing coaches “standing guard” to keep your best interest, and safety, at heart.
We have all heard a coach or training partner yell something in the moment to try and get us fired up. “Get mad at the bar!”. That kind of thing. They’re trying to increase of level of arousal; trying to get the adrenaline pumping. There are a lot of freak stories out there about feats performed by someone with a crazy adrenaline rush. Lifting a car to free someone trapped underneath for example. Those people are performing at peak arousal. If in that moment with adrenaline rushing through their circulatory system we asked them to assemble some IKEA furniture or sew a blanket, things probably wouldn’t go so well.
The bottom of the red represents “Technicality”; methodical, purposeful, high quality, uncompromising movement patterns. The very other side, the bottom of the green, represent “Aggression” (or arousal); we rely on adrenaline to give us the extra push to increase on the base formed while progressing the needle along the gauge.
We need to think of arousal management as a continuum or a speedometer even. On the red side, at the bottom we have “technicality”. Way over at the end of the green, we find “aggression”. Fine, precise motor skills need to be performed while the needle is pointing towards technicality. When it’s time to lift a car, we need to shift the needle over to aggression. We can apply this continuum to our training in the gym as well. Over the past six weeks we have been working our squat cleans. We have done decreasing rep - increasing load intervals. One of the goals with this type of structure is to move the needle along that continuum. We start with lighter loads so we can drill consistent high quality, proper movement patterns. These need to become second nature. Repetition makes that happen. Then, the next step as we increased the weight a little, is to move that needle up a notch towards aggression. We are still focusing on technicality but we add in some intensity. So on and so forth until this week; moving the needle up a notch each week. Now relying on the base of work that we have drilled over the past six weeks, we get aggressive. That technical base allows to increase arousal and chuck some weight!
What brings that arousal is going to differ from person to person. Some people like the “anger” and that works for them. I had the conversation with an exceptionally smiley and happy person at 6AM this morning, that she should use “excitement instead of anger. I like this idea. Either way, that needle has moved up to the arousal side of the curve. We want to get the adrenaline going. We want wake up that central nervous system and be firing with our sympathetic nervous system. The sympathetic nervous system is responsible for our “fight or flight” response. When you see MMA fighters getting smacked on their shoulders or ears half ripped off before stepping into the ring or a strongman sniffing ammonia before a lift, that’s why. The body doesn’t like those things. The body reacts to those things. The sympathetic nervous system fires and we get our adrenaline rush.
As I said at the very beginning, it is not healthy to throw all caution to the wind and just rip it. We need to lay the base of technicality first. Once we have that solid foundation, its time to start moving the needle. Repeat this cycle and you have yourself a real recipe for success and continued progression.
The next time you “test” something, whether it be today on the squat clean or not, trust and rely on the foundation of technicality and turn that needle up to aggression a little bit!
“Yell SEITSI and send it.” - Coach TJ