12/05/2019
There’s an episode of Seinfeld where an old man named Izzy Mandelbaum is trying to prove his physical dominance of Jerry. At the end of the episode, Jerry finds himself with a harness around his waist tied to the back of a car for “training.”
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Though this is obviously for comedic effect, there is a powerful lesson in this scene concerning conditioning in sports.
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Often, athletes approach conditioning as if all they need to do is survive that training session and they will be better conditioned, failing to realize the very point of conditioning in the first place.
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We don’t only condition with the intent of survival. We condition with the intent of pushing and maintaining a pace that our opponents cannot handle. To force them to survive. To drag them out into deep waters that they cannot handle.
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Now go back to the example from Seinfeld. Do you condition with the intent of being Jerry or do you condition with the intent of being the car?
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If the car is going 5mph, Jerry can easily keep up, fading after a long period of time.
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10mph, Jerry is going to have a much more difficult go at it.
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20 mph and now Jerry is being dragged behind the car.
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Condition with the intent to drag your opponents. Overwhelm them with a relentless pace and they will be crushed under the pressure. Conditioning is not about surviving, it’s about pushing harder, faster, and more powerfully for an extended time. Hit the gas pedal and drag your opponents.
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Credit to the following guys for the inspiration for this post:
