What makes a training session “good”?

If there is one discussion that sport coaches, strength coaches, sport scientists, athletes, and fitness hobbyists could all have together, it’s the question of “what makes a workout good?”.

The problem is this: we would likely all disagree!

Especially in the amateur-to-professional sport funnel, I have witnessed athletes with high aspirations relentlessly bash themselves with nonsensical workouts “because [insert famous athlete here] does this!” or “because my CrossFit Coach prescribed it and…!” or “because I saw a documentary about the Navy Seals doing this and they’re hard AF!”.

True enough. But, just because that workout is good for (or acceptable to) someone else with an entirely different set of skills, performance goals, and schedules does not mean it is good for you specifically.

START HERE.

Sport scientists spend their lives thinking about, designing, and managing training sessions and competitive schedules - that was a primary piece of our education and remains a staple of our job.

Meaning… it’s not always as easy as it looks to someone who sees us put it up on the board or write it into the Excel sheet. There should always be a justification for why and how a workout is planned - and it should have a lot to do with the individual or group in front of us and their goals!

Let’s start with the M.E.D Principle.

The Minimal Effective Dose (M.E.D.) Rule tells us that optimal training provides a stimulus (the training) with just enough load and volume to induce an adaption (bigger muscles, faster sprint, weight loss, better performance) - and that more is not better.

tl;dr: less is literally more.

Therefore, it is impossible to judge whether your training is effective (M.E.D) without:
↪️ Knowing where you started
↪️ Having a goal
↪️ Planning steps to get there

The training session itself is the third bullet point, the taking of the steps to get there.

That is why coaches and sport scientists plan training sessions in advance and with purpose against the larger context of the season (competition, travel schedules, equipment availability, load management, etc.!) - always with your current baseline and your goals in mind in order to determine M.E.D.

You know what DOESN’T have your goals in mind?

Sweat and pain. Puking and crying. Extreme exhaustion. Burpees.

Those things may sometimes (hopefully not often) result from an intense training session, but they certainly do not define whether the session was successful, productive.

In fact, it tells you that you’ve overdone it more than anything.

In order to ensure your workouts are productive in the long term, always double check that you are training what you think you are training and that you have a goal in mind, toward which you can take measurable steps with each session.

PAIN VS. PROGRESS

Some ways to determine whether your training session was effective:

• Ask yourself “how did this move me forward?” How did you move the needle on your progress? How did you raise the threshold of your fitness capacity, acquire a relevant skill for your performance goal?

• Your wellness markers (see our recommendations about using Wellness Questionnaires here!) remain steady or with only minor fluctuations. Your mood, fatigue, and motivation should not absolutely tank from one day to the rest, nor should your pain rankings skyrocket overnight. Consistent, quality, progressively-overloaded training is not intensely disruptive.

• You learned something. Training is never just purely physical. Sometimes there is little bodily exhaustion, and yet skills, techniques, and knowledge acquired. That’s never a waste of time!

Some factors that do not determine a good, productive training day:

• You puked

• You are sore as hell after or the next day

• You are so at-limit that you are in physical or mental pain

• You sweated excessively and can wring out your shirt (impressive, but not a quality assessment!)

• You are extremely fatigued after for hours or days.

Ultimately, those factors not only suggest that your training session was too much, but they also disrupt the positive adaptions to training and your performance the rest of the week (or longer!).

Suffering in one session for the sake of a cool workout, “trying something new” for variety, or for your own ego is a poor use of time, energy, motivation, and capacity. Please do not waste these valuable (and limited) resources on a “mental toughness exercise” that is ultimately more dangerous than it is helpful.

If your coach puts you in extreme pain or fatigue scenarios often, it’s time to have a serious conversation.

Progress doesn’t happen in pain.
Progress occurs by moving the needle forward gradually, with as minimal excessive damage as possible.

(Yes, even the Navy Seals, Special Operations Teams, and professional MMA fighters operate under the M.E.D. Rule… their performance demands just often happen to require more pain and extreme inclements than, say, playing a 90’ match does!)

Remember, more is not better.
Better is better.

(Read more about that here!)

Whatever your session looks like, give it 100% and it will absolutely be more productive for your long-term goals than your every-now-and-then extreme workouts that leave you with bragging rights but close to death.

Keep a long-game mindset when planning sessions, balance volume and load appropriately, and always give as little as possible the best you can.

Puke quantity won’t get you anywhere but the bathroom. :-)