Bad days are an unavoidable part of training. You’ve been following a program consistently, your sleep is excellent, your diet is clean and you feel fitter than ever before. Then out of the blue, you walk into the gym and everything goes wrong.
Training sessions, like life, don’t always go to plan. One day, that 150lb snatch will just fly up. The next, you fail 135lb over and over until frustrated, you swear at your bar and storm out the door and go sit in the parking lot. Bad days can easily turn into bad weeks if you let yourself get hung up over a poor result. A bad session can undermine your self-confidence and make you question everything you do.
For me, being in the gym all day every day means that if I let a bad workout get to me, my life would be pretty miserable. There are some days that I never want to pick up a barbell again, and I have come to accept that it’s okay to feel like this. Learning how to deal with bad sessions is incredibly valuable, and has helped me ensure that every workout is productive, even if it’s not always fun.
Perspective is essential. For most of us, training is about the big picture, and one day isn’t going to make or break your quest for lifelong health. Stay focused on why you are training and concentrate on your goals. Mindset is everything, so rather than getting down, accept a bad day and make do.
You have a couple of choices when you encounter one of those demoralizing days. One option is to just stop. While we embrace persistence, we don’t want it to turn in to stupidity. Sometimes it is okay to walk away. If you are so focused on how much you hate everything that you forget to think about technique, stop. If something hurts in a bad way, stop. Make it an active recovery day instead and go sit on the Airdyne or foam roller. Go for a walk or do yoga. (Altered stimulus but productive.) Don’t form bad habits by grinding through with poor mechanics. (Unproductive.)
Another option is to be satisfied with just getting it done. The barrier is often mental, not physical. So long as your form is good, there is no shame in just completing a workout. It doesn’t have to be at an impressive time and you don’t have to enjoy it. Get your work done and then get out of the gym. Be happy that you did what you needed to, even if you weren’t super in to it. Use mental tricks to rationalize the workload and focus on just getting through.
The last option is to alter your training stimulus and goals to make them appropriate for your current state of mind. If snatches and handstand walks are likely to end badly, ask your coach to modify the workout to something lower skill and less intimidating. Do a simple bodyweight metcon instead. Getting a good, light workout in is better than struggling through a train-wreck, heavy one.
What separates good athletes from great athletes is the ability to keep bad training days productive. Recurrent bad days can also be an excellent opportunity to evaluate your lifestyle and program and make changes. Always feel low energy on Monday mornings? Maybe you need to prioritize sleep and cut back on the drinks on the weekend. If you feel off for a week, think back and consider whether you are eating enough of the right foods. Finally, we are all susceptible to overtraining and burnout. A succession of bad workouts tells me that I need to take a week off and focus on active recovery and addressing mobility deficits, so I can come back stronger and refreshed.
A bad day won’t set you back, but a bad attitude will. Get out of that negative, self-pitying headspace that can accompany a sub-par training session, and do something productive instead.
