Good Words From a Good Friend

Just recently, a good friend of mine – Tommy Board – posted this “note” on his Facebook page. It really was flattering, and I thought I'd share it.

As some background – Tommy is a professional BMX racer in the NBL Vet Pro class. Tommy and I hooked up some time back, and it wasn't long before I was helping him completely re-design his workouts.

Due to location (we live in totally different parts of the country), we weren't able to train together in person, but Tommy is a hard worker, dedicated to his sport, and knows that you've got to put in the time if you want to succeed. So, truth be told, helping him out wasn't that tough – it was more of just giving old “Tommy 2x4” (his nickname) a the proverbial shove in the right direction...

Tommy came to me really in pretty darn good shape already. He's a fairly short guy like myself at only aroung 5'5”-5'6” or so (I might be an inch or two off on that measurement....)

*waits for fans of “The Office” to say “THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID!”*

Tommy is also fairly light – only 155 lbs or so. But he was still one strong dude. Tommy could crank out squats with 315 lbs. for 8+ reps, and bodyweight exercises like chins and dips were nothing for Tommy.

After going back and forth about how his races went physically, I determined that strength wasn't what he needed, and he also really didn't need any sort of long-term endurance (musclar, strength, or cardiovascular). What Tommy needed was to convert that strength to power, increase his maximum muscular-endurance output at any one time (i.e. - specifically the ability to pedal at a faster rate for the entire duration of the race...roughly 40-45 seconds), and to increase his overall work capacity so that he wasn't getting tired after a day of races.

So, I set Tommy up on a program that would address all these issues. He was doing high pulls, cleans, jumps, swings, bodyweight calisthenics circuits, etc. As Tommy was the pro BMX racer, I let him design the racing-specific part of his overall program – I just was sure to find out specifically what he was doing and when, so we could design the rest of his S&C work around it.

Tommy was coming back to me after just the first workout saying how much different he felt at the end of it, and he couldn't wait to see how it affected his racing.

It didn't take long.

After just a few weeks, Tommy was commenting on how much faster he felt at the track, how much more power he had in his start out of the gate, that he could come back time after time around the track, and wasn't tired out by the end of a weekend full of racing – something he'd never felt before.

He was placing better, and was starting to get some great comments from others about how much faster he seemed at the track.

It should also be noted that though Tommy is a professional BMX racer, that unlike many other sports, there is little money if professional racing unless you're one of a select few. Tommy does all this in, more or less, his spare time, while working, going to school, and having awife and kids. In other words, the dude is pressed for time, but still figured out a way to get the job done!

(I still wonder how he convinced his wife to go racing on Valentine's Day!)

Unfortunately, Tommy has recently suffered a broken hand in training, and is going to be out for a couple months. However, when he comes back, we're going to have him getting more powerful, getting faster, and doing better than ever!

Here is Tommy's note:

late december, i hooked up with a personal trainer name Matt Wiggins. he's a mma trainer out of north carolina and he took time out of his schedule to dial me in for the winter months and guided me to stepping my game up to the next level.

i attended some elite open races with success! i won the elite open at the indianapolis regional and had it not been for a crash into turn one, i would have been in the main at the columbus national. i continued Wiggy's program throughout spring and was preparing for the big elite series races for south park and nashville. i went to the warsaw indiana elite open race and made day 1's main.

for 3 months people had been commenting that i looked even faster this year than last. i attribute Matt's knowledge and ability to dial in workouts to meet the need of the client. if you are looking for help in your workout, get intouch with Matt at

http://www.workingclassfitness.com/

just wanted to say thank you to Matt and i will be back in 8 weeks!!!

Train Hard, Rest Hard, Play Hard-
Matt "Wiggy" Wiggins
http://www.workingclassfitness.com